My ideas for changes to the way apps work.

[budweiser]

Hmmm , I don't recall this problem on the Gp2x ,


and they sold alot of them..


Like always use the forums the users will help,


my 8 yr old daughter uses the pandora just fine ..

 

[Bosbeetle]

maybe not completely related but ive also seen a lot of users that are not aware of the community codec pack... I think there should be a buildt in program like panplayer of exile that notifies users if you want to play more filetypes please download the community codec pack.


(this has come up at the audiorace topic)

 

[hakmanplayer]

Your statement is totally unfounded. Craigix or nobody ever told me that. You are the first. I worked very , very hard to get to the enjoyment level I am now with the Pandora.


That pompous reply does not surprise me. I already own a 3DS,PSP but I wanted to venture into something different ; so sue me milkdud,!!!


But that is the exact kind of response I am getting at. You milkdud, make a mountain out of a molehill and refuse to see the bottom line. This is larger in scope than you can conceive.


By the way , I was referring to YOUR ball sack if you even have one left.

who is refusing to see the bottom line? i dont think anyone in here inclding me has said that the pandora shouldnt be more user friendly, in fact we all had this idea before craig even mentioned it, we started to implament it before craig decided to talk about it.


All we are trying to say is why are we not working toether to make this better, why start from scratch when the groundwork has already been laid? craig can tell us if there anything we could do beter instead of just running off to do it himself.


teamwork = win!


the end goal is the same sell more pandoras + improve ease of use > do so by improving user expeiance.


do you now see the bottom line?

If you knew anything about business, then you would understand [for better or for worse sometimes] the bottom line is to make $$$. That is it... and this is what things apparently have come to.


Sometimes a CEO must make unpopular decisions. Things are not done to please you milkdud.


Remember that next time you develop a game for free.


Your only as good as your last case[lawyer talk] ; nobody cares about skuzz's 1000 hrs. he put into this or that when it comes to putting food on your table.


Why can't you people wipe the shit from your eyes and see this??!!! B)


Do you see any lines???


This is discussion is getting old and I feel like it's beating a dead horse.


Over and out.


HAVE FUN .

 

[hakmanplayer]

you dont want a Pandora 2 talk, but wake up, dont be such a pighead, a 500 dollar linux retrogaming device wont bring Apple mass audience. Forget millionaire profit. I totally agree with improvements, but that wont solve the BIGGEST pandora issues. RMAs are what causes debts.

But it's not just RMA's .


if you read earlier posts it's also disgruntled people with user problems. Did you not read this you thick headed wanna be forum moderator??


Even if it is more with hardware faults say....85/15....that is way too much for any business to swallow.


I will not respond anymore to you haters.


As Dave Mason wrote and sang :


we just don't see eye to eye


there is no good guy


there is no bad guy


there's only you and me [and the community] and we just disagree.


ohhhhh ohhhhhh yah yah whoaaaaaaa

 

[ZXDunny]

If you knew anything about business, then you would understand [for better or for worse sometimes] the bottom line is to make $$$. That is it... and this is what things apparently have come to.


Sometimes a CEO must make unpopular decisions. Things are not done to please you milkdud.


Remember that next time you develop a game for free.


Your only as good as your last case[lawyer talk] ; nobody cares about skuzz's 1000 hrs. he put into this or that when it comes to putting food on your table.


Why can't you people wipe the shit from your eyes and see this??!!! B)


Do you see any lines???

You don't appear to be making any sense. Can you re-iterate that last point? What must milkshake remember when he develops a game for free? Just how many games has Milkshake actually written anyway, and why should he not develop for free if that's his choice? Why should his developing for free put food on his table, and more to the point, why should it have any effect whatsoever on his ability to put food on his table? Why should Milkshake not develop his repo and his own standard? It's an open device, he can feel free to ignore what Craig is doing, just the same as Craig is ignoring what he is doing.


You don't seem to know what you're arguing about - why not try again?


And please, do try to bear in mind that some of us develop software for no charge, for free, for the enjoyment of developing. Not all of us need to charge for what we do. Why shouldn't we make our own systems, in this case? That "newbies" might not understand how they work is neither here nor there.


D.

 

[craigix]

Certain developers will never understand that this is a business, and a machine which has to please its users.


There are a number of people who will forever perceive my attempts to improve things as an attack on them. This will never change as they cannot take their developer hat off and see things from the customer point of view.


The Pandora isn't what I wanted it to be right now, and it does not function in the simple way I had hoped, and rather than improving that situation it just fragments more and more.


I'm torn on if I should spend 3 months rewriting the whole interface only for people to attack the way it works for not being 'tech' enough. To be told how it's lame because it does not use some obscure dead method of compression or database, and how they won't support it and will just fragment it again. I know that would happen no matter how perfect it was from the users point of view.


I think it comes down to the fact that there are people who hate, absolutely hate, the idea of the Pandora being as easy or easier to use than an iPhone. It is as if they wish for the situation to remain complicated and exclusive.


I doubt there is anything I can do to change that, well, not without making some people want revenge.


Niche consoles, you'd think they would be simple.

 

[hakmanplayer]

Certain developers will never understand that this is a business, and a machine which has to please its users.


There are a number of people who will forever perceive my attempts to improve things as an attack on them. This will never change as they cannot take their developer hat off and see things from the customer point of view.


The Pandora isn't what I wanted it to be right now, and it does not function in the simple way I had hoped, and rather than improving that situation it just fragments more and more.


I'm torn on if I should spend 3 months rewriting the whole interface only for people to attack the way it works for not being 'tech' enough. To be told how it's lame because it does not use some obscure dead method of compression or database, and how they won't support it and will just fragment it again. I know that would happen no matter how perfect it was from the users point of view.


I think it comes down to the fact that there are people who hate, absolutely hate, the idea of the Pandora being as easy or easier to use than an iPhone. It is as if they wish for the situation to remain complicated and exclusive.


I doubt there is anything I can do to change that, well, not without making some people want revenge.


Niche consoles, you'd think they would be simple.

That is my point exactly.


As far as I am concerned that is the last beating this dead horse needs.


Now it will get harder for you I am certain. Whatever it is worth [maybe a peso?] you have a friend in South Florida. B)


Cheers.

 

[ZXDunny]

I think it comes down to the fact that there are people who hate, absolutely hate, the idea of the Pandora being as easy or easier to use than an iPhone. It is as if they wish for the situation to remain complicated and exclusive.

So why haven't you published details of this before now? I'd love an interface that's easier than an iPhone, I really would. Minimenu is rapidly getting more and more complex (still can't figure out how to override stuff) and XFCE is... well, it's XFCE, innit?


I'm sure if you published what you want the pandora to do, how it should do it, down to the fine details then there will be people that are more than willing to either debate that spec and improve on it (I can see why you wouldn't want that - it's your system and yours alone after all), or they can start to code your dream. Why shouldn't you make use of all the goodwill being thrown about?


I personally don't think that one man can, or should do this alone. I really cannot see any good reason why you've not told everyone how you're going to achieve this.


D.

 

[EvilDragon]

Well, I make myself short.


Everyone understands why Craig wants to have it more userfriendly and everyone would be fine if he releases a nice UI that would look spot-on and be easy for everyone to use.


What the devs don't understand is the reason he wants to redo the stuff that has already been done and is working flawlessly.


That's all.


If Craig simply codes a new UI using the system we already have, it would be perfectly userfriendly and behave exactly like he imagines it should.


Redoing the base system and THEN coding the new UI to get to the exactly same results is just much work work.


That's what the devs don't understand.


And that's it. It has nothing to do with devs going against Craig or against any usable things. That has been said by all devs in this thread multiple times already.


Imagine it like this:


You have a house with a garden.


The garden has nice grass, but it is missing pretty flowers.


What would you do?


Plant pretty flowers or remove the nice grass, plant new nice grass and THEN plant the pretty flowers?


In my example, the grass is what we already have. What's missing are the pretty flowers (which is the userfriendlyness).


So all that needs to be done would be planting the pretty flowers. Everyone can do this. If Craig likes nice red flowers, he can plant them. If someone else likes yellow flowers, he can plant them.


They are all pretty, but every user can decide if he wants to look at the red or yellow flowers. The user doesn't have to take a look at the grass, he can simply enjoy the pretty flowers.


Now - why redo the nice grass if planting nice flowers would be all that's needed?

 

[EvilDragon]

One more addition:


In fact, every dev would be very happy if Craig would code a nice and userfriendly UI using the existing fully working system already.


It would mean someone more helping, as some devs are already working on that.

 

[hakmanplayer]

One more addition:


In fact, every dev would be very happy if Craig would code a nice and userfriendly UI using the existing fully working system already.


It would mean someone more helping, as some devs are already working on that.

So tip-toe through the tulips with meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee :lol:


Good old Tiny Tim

 

[hakmanplayer]

Well, I make myself short.


Everyone understands why Craig wants to have it more userfriendly and everyone would be fine if he releases a nice UI that would look spot-on and be easy for everyone to use.


What the devs don't understand is the reason he wants to redo the stuff that has already been done and is working flawlessly.


That's all.


If Craig simply codes a new UI using the system we already have, it would be perfectly userfriendly and behave exactly like he imagines it should.


Redoing the base system and THEN coding the new UI to get to the exactly same results is just much work work.


That's what the devs don't understand.


And that's it. It has nothing to do with devs going against Craig or against any usable things. That has been said by all devs in this thread multiple times already.


Imagine it like this:


You have a house with a garden.


The garden has nice grass, but it is missing pretty flowers.


Sorry but i have to type this:


Tiny Tim Tip Toe Through The Tulips...


tiptoe through the window


by the window, that is where i'll be


come tiptoe through the tulips with me.


oh tiptoe from the garden


by the garden of the willow tree


and tiptoe through the tulips with me.


keep deep in flowers we'll stray


we'll keep the showers away


and if i miss you in the garden, in the moonlight


will you pardon me?


and tiptoe through the tulips with me.


What would you do?


Plant pretty flowers or remove the nice grass, plant new nice grass and THEN plant the pretty flowers?


In my example, the grass is what we already have. What's missing are the pretty flowers (which is the userfriendlyness).


So all that needs to be done would be planting the pretty flowers. Everyone can do this. If Craig likes nice red flowers, he can plant them. If someone else likes yellow flowers, he can plant them.


They are all pretty, but every user can decide if he wants to look at the red or yellow flowers. The user doesn't have to take a look at the grass, he can simply enjoy the pretty flowers.


Now - why redo the nice grass if planting nice flowers would be all that's needed?

 

[Scntrblob]

What bothers me more and more is that, thats how I get it, starts to call te devs dumb or something to that effect.


We have the repo spec, we have the repo, we have PNDstore(UI will certainly improve) and we have panorama which is going 0.1 in any moment(I think)(http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/59231-panorama/page__view__findpost__p__949590). Remember you named that guy somone who starts bullshit, Craig? Thats what I mean.


We have a userfriendly Pandora in a month. And it is now already more userfriendly than the WiZ, which is btw. used by my 12 year old small brother that has absolutly NO techknowledge.


Craig, yeah, reinvent your wheel and make it rounder, others already drive a ferarri while you do. Absolutly no need to argue.

 

[milkshake]

@hackmanplayer


I think your starting to see now yes? at least I hope so.


I don't know how many more times it needs saying or different analogies that need to be used.


craig wants:


user friendly (iphone like maybe? maybe better?)


(money in the bank, but this would be a direct result of the above needs)


dev-community wants:


user friendly (iphone like maybe? maybe better?)


(money in craigs bank and money in EvilDragons bank, chance of a pandora 2)


so whats the problem?:


craig wants to do it alone, he also seems to think we don't want the same thing;


@craig... WE DO!! I PROMISE YOU WITH ALL THAT I CAN!!


what we don't want:


craig spending dead time creating from scratch something that has already been started, and is proven to work exactly how he wants it to...


whats missing:


polish that is all.


@craig unless there are other things you are not telling us, all that we need to do is polish what we have.


You could make a superb front end that is so silky smooth it would embarress steve jobs no problem


we could give you feed back... you in turn could tell us whats missing so you can get more of what you want, in turn we get more of what we want.


also panorama that B-ZaR is working on is coming on extremely nicely and hes also going to make a PND management plugin for it, in my eyes panorama + PND management is very exciting and could give you all that you require for both the "average gamer" and also "power users" as this is theme-able!


above all, the end user doesn't need to ever know or see anything that happens in the background, he just enjoys the solid yet elegant fronted that we know will exist!


this is the community spirit

 

[WizardStan]

I think it comes down to the fact that there are people who hate, absolutely hate, the idea of the Pandora being as easy or easier to use than an iPhone. It is as if they wish for the situation to remain complicated and exclusive.

No one hates the idea of the Pandora being easier than the iPhone. That's the martyr stories you've invented in your head again.


What we hate is the idea of you spending 3 months developing a solution to a problem that is on the brink of being solved RIGHT NOW in a way that would be completely incompatible with what you come up with. All the underlying stuff that you say the user doesn't care about is there so the user doesn't HAVE to care about it. The devs think about how to make things work right under the hood so that the user can have both freedom and simplicity.


The average person has absolutely no idea how crude gets turned into gasoline, and yet when I pull up to the pump there are three choices because researchers spent the time to figure out what was needed and develop those solutions. If they had just thrown up their hands and said "the average person doesn't care, they just want to be able to put gas in their tank" we'd still be using leaded fuel.


I don't understand why you are so against collaboration, but go ahead and design your own system. It will be judged and accepted or rejected entirely on its own merits, not because of some vendetta you think people have against you.

 

[hakmanplayer]

@hackmanplayer


I think your starting to see now yes? at least I hope so.


I don't know how many more times it needs saying or different analogies that need to be used.


craig wants:


user friendly (iphone like maybe? maybe better?)


(money in the bank, but this would be a direct result of the above needs)


dev-community wants:


user friendly (iphone like maybe? maybe better?)


(money in craigs bank and money in EvilDragons bank, chance of a pandora 2)


so whats the problem?:


craig wants to do it alone, he also seems to think we don't want the same thing;


@craig... WE DO!! I PROMISE YOU WITH ALL THAT I CAN!!


what we don't want:


craig spending dead time creating from scratch something that has already been started, and is proven to work exactly how he wants it to...


whats missing:


polish that is all.


@craig unless there are other things you are not telling us, all that we need to do is polish what we have.


You could make a superb front end that is so silky smooth it would embarress steve jobs no problem


we could give you feed back... you in turn could tell us whats missing so you can get more of what you want, in turn we get more of what we want.


also panorama that B-ZaR is working on is coming on extremely nicely and hes also going to make a PND management plugin for it, in my eyes panorama + PND management is very exciting and could give you all that you require for both the "average gamer" and also "power users" as this is theme-able!


above all, the end user doesn't need to ever know or see anything that happens in the background, he just enjoys the solid yet elegant fronted that we know will exist!


this is the community spirit

Milkshake yes I do.


I believe your heart is in the right place. I think your proposal is kind, just and very giving. For what it is worth, after what you just typed, I respect you now.


The only question I have is if he is going about this 'alone' as everyone says, how do you know that??


Perhaps he has partnered up with some larger developing outfit?? Maybe he has made a huge move and at this time he chooses to remain silent, for many reasons I can fathom.


If this community made the offering you have said , if it was me, I would accept. But there must be another motive other than just wanting to go at it alone..??


Just a thought not an argument.

 

[sepp256]

Craig is complaining in this thread about the frontend for accessing the repo (be it Pandora Apps or the PNDstore) and people are arguing that he could just make a better UI that utilizes the repo spec. However, in another thread he is complaining about the unfriendliness of making and editing PNDs by the end user.


All of the complaints can be addressed without Craig going off on a goose chase trying to reinvent the wheel for 6 months. However, I don't think that we will get anywhere with Craig unless all of his complaints are addressed at once. Craig, could you bring all of your complaints to one location so that they can be all solved?


From this thread, it is clear that a beautiful, user-friendly UI can be made to access the existing infrastructure built around the repo spec.


Regarding the user-friendliness of PNDs, we could make a gui application that lets you drag/drop files to build/edit a PND (so the end-user can put some custom graphics or whatever he wants in). If this PND editing application is built for Windows and also for Pandora, then users who refuse to use the cmd line could still feel like they are able to edit PNDs. (This isn't my style, but some users may want to do this so that they feel that they have some ownership in their Pandora.) Also, this seems to be what Craig wants in the other thread. It would be even better if this PND building/editing application can be installed on Windows and integrated into the shell (like Tortiose SVN for instance), but that is more work.

 

[Linopoly]

7-zip is a FOSS application that can already do all that, as well as replace WinZip and WinRAR. It's basically a must-have for Windows users. The rest of that thread also explains alternatives to modifying an existing PND, which means there's no need for anyone except Pandora developers to know how to make SquashFS images.

 

[milkshake]

Milkshake yes I do.


I believe your heart is in the right place. I think your proposal is kind, just and very giving. For what it is worth, after what you just typed, I respect you now.


The only question I have is if he is going about this 'alone' as everyone says, how do you know that??


Perhaps he has partnered up with some larger developing outfit?? Maybe he has made a huge move and at this time he chooses to remain silent, for many reasons I can fathom.


If this community made the offering you have said , if it was me, I would accept. But there must be another motive other than just wanting to go at it alone..??


Just a thought not an argument.

I have decided to write my own menu and to start from scratch with my own ideas about how this should all work.

he said so himself

 

[ZXDunny]

7-zip is a FOSS application that can already do all that, as well as replace WinZip and WinRAR. It's basically a must-have for Windows users. The rest of that thread also explains alternatives to modifying an existing PND, which means there's no need for anyone except Pandora developers to know how to make SquashFS images.

I tried that, but it wouldn't open my PND files when I double clicked them. When I did get my PND file in there, it wouldn't let me make any changes.


D.