There is only one thing I would like to change on PocketBook. Inexcusable lack of development information.
So far there are only tiny handful of third-party applications, user generated themes and other things for PocketBook. If you want to develop for PocketBook, or even to make only a small change to an already developed program (like FBReader) you have to:
- be a skilled developer in C
- know Linux
- know how to develop for Embeded Debian and cross compile the app for ARM processor.
There are only few programmers that fit the bill, but their number is
even more restricted by fact that you have to be able to read documentation in Russian and the only forum on earth where you can discuss development at the moment is Russian speaking The-Ebook.org
[WARNING - long rant ahead
]
<rant mode>
Even here on Mobileread, most of the activity goes on on German Speaking PocketBook forum and all the announcements come here - to the English speaking PocketBook forum - after a delay, when Ulli, or mtravellerh, or some other Good Samaritan takes a pity and drops us a crumb of information from time to time.
Just to give one small example: We - the non-German-speaking Mobilereaders are left in complete dark regarding the firmware update we were promised
exactly FOUR WEEKS ago
Quote:
Originally Posted by mtravellerh
... The new firmware will be available today or tomorrow, so things should be more stable from there. We apologize for the trouble you all are having.
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Even if you are not a seasoned Embeded Linux hacker and you want to make a theme you have to use automatically (translate.google.com) translated documentation. Even the original Russian documentation that comes with the Theme Builder is VERY sketchy and comes with examples that cover only parts of the functionality.
I do not get it.
THE main reason why I took interest in PocketBook devices was that I saw the crowdsourcing the PocketBook company did on The-Ebook.org forum. I saw the company implementing things the users desired the most, I saw company that closely cooperated with their intended user base. I saw the company to declare a bounty - a 100% rebate on a PocketBook reader of your choice - for the best third-party program for the device.
PocketBook company made an extremely hacker/thinkerer/geek friendly device, only to sabotage their wonderful effort by a complete lack of documentation.
Come on, PocketBook! How difficult it is to install a screen capturing program on a machine, start it and make a 30 minutes show demonstrating use of SDK in creating a simple application?
How difficult it is to show us how to modify the default theme? How to change a position of quick menu icon, how to include series name in book description in Library view?
</rant mode>