Here's the first beta of Pleco 3.1 for Android:
http://cdn.pleco.com/androidapps/plecodroid-140424-310b1.apk
The current minimum system requirement for this is Android 4.0; we could end up raising it to 4.1 or lowering it to 2.3, haven't completely decided about that yet. (there isn't much in here that actually requires 4.0 now, but supporting fewer Android versions will greatly simplify future development, and a major update is the best time to make a change in that area)
This will install in place of your existing copy, so make sure to back up your flashcards / user dictionaries first in case you encounter any problems.
The interface / options / etc are now quite similar to our iOS app, so the best place to look for help with using this is the iOS instruction manual at:
pleco.com/ipmanual
A couple of Android-specific points:
http://cdn.pleco.com/androidapps/plecodroid-140424-310b1.apk
The current minimum system requirement for this is Android 4.0; we could end up raising it to 4.1 or lowering it to 2.3, haven't completely decided about that yet. (there isn't much in here that actually requires 4.0 now, but supporting fewer Android versions will greatly simplify future development, and a major update is the best time to make a change in that area)
This will install in place of your existing copy, so make sure to back up your flashcards / user dictionaries first in case you encounter any problems.
The interface / options / etc are now quite similar to our iOS app, so the best place to look for help with using this is the iOS instruction manual at:
pleco.com/ipmanual
A couple of Android-specific points:
- We've now added support for the Samsung S-Pen and for Samsung Multi-Window mode. For the former, this means that you can now press the button on your pen to clear the handwriting input box, or press it again when the box is already clear to backspace, replacing the two-finger tap gesture. For the latter, not only will Pleco open in multi-window mode, but if you copy a piece of text to the clipboard in the other window while Pleco is open to its dictionary search or clipboard reader screen, it'll automatically replace the current search or clipboard reader text with whatever you copied.
- We have a new version of our handwriting recognizer ready to launch and we're trying to decide how to handle upgrades; we're definitely going to give it for free to anybody who bought a bundle or migrated a license from another platform, but we're not sure yet whether it adds enough value to justify charging people who used our free handwriting promotion to upgrade. (they'll be able to keep using the old recognizer regardless) So we'd like to get some user feedback on whether or not the accuracy improvement compared to our old recognizer is noticeable.
If you go into the Free section of the Add-ons tab you'll see a download link for the new recognizer; install it from there and you'll a list of the characters that it comes up with appear at the bottom of the handwriting box just above the ones that the old recognizer does. They're not tappable - this is just a demo - but we've tried to match them up in font / size / etc so that they're easy to compare. So please try it out and let us know whether it makes a noticeable difference in accuracy.
(it also supports twice as many characters as the old recognizer did, so it's a big upgrade for that reason alone, but we've limited it to just the set from the old one for the purposes of this accuracy test)
- By default, Pleco will now do everything in a single activity / task, mirroring our interface on iOS. If you prefer that the dictionary / flashcard / reader / OCR sections have their own separate tasks, there's an option in Settings / Miscellaneous to enable that. If you use that option, please let us know that you're using it (so that we know to keep working on it) and let us know any problems you encounter with it, especially in the areas of task switching ("sharing" files with Pleco, switching between sections through means other than the sidebar (magnifying glass button, e.g.), etc).
- We've brought over most of our iOS type design to Android, including our lovely new fonts. We've added some code that should catch most potential font-related errors and revert to the old system fonts if it encounters one, but if you experience any weird text rendering behavior or if you simply find the new fonts unreadable, please let us know (and be sure to include your device / firmware version). As before, you can install custom fonts through Settings, though this will probably cause weird display in a few areas (let us know if / where it does).
- Two minor new options not yet out on iOS that we'd love some feedback on: tone coloring of pinyin and of example sentences (enable in Settings / Colors) and search for Cantonese in Yale instead of Jyutping romanization (enable in Settings / Languages). We've also heavily retooled the character breakdown feature in CHARS since the last iOS update and would appreciate feedback on that as well.
- Lots of options removed here, and most of them probably aren't coming back. We're no longer supporting custom color schemes for anything except tone colors - to be honest, on Android they're simply too much work - and have also scaled back the customizability of other parts of the UI to some extent. If there's a particular missing option that makes Pleco totally unworkable for you, let us know and we'll hopefully be able to suggest a fix - we've managed to address nearly all of the complaints we've had so far about the similar paring-back of settings on iOS through a combination of workflow changes and new options.
- Standard Android tap-hold selection finally works (almost) everywhere.
- With the sidebar open, you'll see two icons at the top right corner of the screen - these will let you instantly toggle Night Mode and simplified/traditional without having to go into Settings.
- If you're using Android 4.4, we now put up a prompt on first run asking which SD card you'd like to install Pleco to; if you have more than one, we'd appreciate it if you'd try a delete and reinstall (rather than just an upgrade), select something other than the default card and let us know whether files install to that correctly.
- Nicer toolbar icons (most of them still aren't xxhdpi and some of them look too big relative to others)
- Better use of the ActionBar (some screens have needlessly stacked toolbars now)
- File chooser (going to replace this with a different one, we think, at least for opening files)
- Text margins (bit too narrow in several places)