Animation Source Forums

This has been suggested in the past, and though I have also thought about it, it would take some dedication in order to make an AnimationSource App. It takes a lot of knowledge of coding of any of 'C', which is - essentially - another language. You would have to get permission from steet as well, and being as he rarely replies to pms...

It would definitely be cool. Actually, I was planning on sometime learning the coding (possible C+ or whichever is easiest) because I had plans for a possible app of my own... I have all the ideas but no knowledge of the coding. If I ever become skilled enough to code on my own, perhaps an AS app would be the first step. It would certainly make life easier to have an app rather than using the internet tool and all...

I personally don't think there needs to be such app, AS just isn't worth it.

I just don't see the point of needing an app for a site like this. Plus, if it were only for certain areas of the site, that as well seems rather pointless don't you think?

And as far as I'm concerned, people can access AS without the use of an app anyway.

I'm also looking at it like this: you need a smartphone or iPod (or something similar) to use apps. I'm not quite sure that many people on Animation Source OWN those devices, and those that do probably wouldn't be willing to get one FOR AS. In addition to that, most apps (not all) require money to download them, and even if they were free, someone would have to invest a lot of time and energy not only to create the app, but maintain it. It wouldn't be fair to them to do it for free, and it wouldn't be worth it for everyone else to have to pay for such an app.

Plus, I just flat-out don't see the point to one. If people want to check up on Animation Source, most already know EXACTLY where to go to find out what they need to know.

For a site like Animation Source, its own app would be quite inappropriate considering the work that has to go into it. Steet (or someone else) would have to learn C and C++ in order to develop the apps initially. Then, he would have to buy a developer program ($99 for iOS Developer Program/$30 for Android), THEN (in order to develop an app for iOS) he would have to buy an OS X computer, as you cannot use XCode on a Windows or Linux machine. Then he'd have to actually develop both apps, maintain them, renew is license every year etc. It's not worth it.

What IS possible, however, is a mobile website. Steet wouldn't really need to learn a whole new language (I'm assuming he already knows HTML, Javascript and CSS, so HTML5 won't be that hard to learn). The mobile website would only need to be made once, and it would work on all devices (iPhones, Androids, BlackBerrys, Windows Phones, etc.), and it wouldn't cost Steet a penny. Although the portion of users with smartphones is low, it is only going to rise in the future.

The AS experience on smartphones is quite frankly horrid, it is NOT designed to be even remotely useable. I'll give you some examples below, please note that the resolution appears larger on your screen – my screen is only 3.5" large.

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As you can see from the photos above, the experience of browsing Animation Source on a mobile device is less than satisfactory. In fact, I haven't even tried to use the shoutboxes or the textedit boxes, which most likely don't work at all. So while I find that creating a mobile app would be very inappropriate, a mobile website would be ideal. Especially if it only brings in basic functions (browsing information pages, looking at artwork, reading fanfictions, etc.).

The point still stands with whoever makes it, it would be a lot easier to make a mobile web app, as opposed to multiple apps for different platforms.



Apple and Google use the same Javascript algorithms, I thought. Considering they are both WebKit browsers. If we can get it to work on iOS and Android, we'll be fine.