Being enabled by Tarot apps!!

Callanish

I can see the attraction of being able to upload your own decks, but then you do have to own the deck in the first place. Celtictarot did point out in the original post that apps can allow you to see/use a deck that you cannot afford to own.

As I said in my other post, one of the things I love with the Fools Dog apps is that you usually get the book as well. I find it really useful to be able to dip into the book that goes with the deck when I am away from home. I may be able to scan in decks that I own, but I can't really scan in the book.

You can scan in the book. The ability to do that has been around for years.
It's called OCR (Optical character recognition) software.
Works with any scanner you plug into any computer, google search for OCR software for the computer you have.

The Tarot & Numerology App allows for including the book reference for each individual deck loaded into it.

Sorry if "silly", sounded harsh but as someone who's both a software developer AND a tarot reader I see things differently.
It's actually very easy to make 1 App in which you can buy/use many decks.
Making a new app for each deck is just clutter and it's also a marketing tool as it raises the FD brand awareness by volume & presence.
It's of no benefit to the App store or the users and if you by several Apps from them it's just burning up your memory space on your phone/tablet.
Each of those FD Apps you install will have 90% of the same code, why can it be shared in 1 App and save space?
Apple's in court right now over memory space wasting on it's devices, you may even see the likes of Apple forcing action on issues like this.

Callanish
 

avalonian

You can scan in the book. The ability to do that has been around for years.
It's called OCR (Optical character recognition) software.
Works with any scanner you plug into any computer, google search for OCR software for the computer you have.

The Tarot & Numerology App allows for including the book reference for each individual deck loaded into it.

Sorry if "silly", sounded harsh but as someone who's both a software developer AND a tarot reader I see things differently.
It's actually very easy to make 1 App in which you can buy/use many decks.
Making a new app for each deck is just clutter and it's also a marketing tool as it raises the FD 5brand awareness by volume & presence.
It's of no benefit to the App store or the users and if you by several Apps from them it's just burning up your memory space on your phone/tablet.
Each of those FD Apps you install will have 90% of the same code, why can it be shared in 1 App and save space?
Apple's in court right now over memory space wasting on it's devices, you may even see the likes of Apple forcing action on issues like this.

Callanish

I spend all day at work sitting in front of a computer. I don't want to go out and buy a scanner, then buy OCR software, then go home and scan in hundreds of pages of books and cards. With the Fools Dog apps I just download the app, and the cards and books are on my phone and tablet in seconds. Suits me just fine, thanks.

Plus, the laptop I have is Windows 8, and the likelihood of my being able to load the software onto it without lobbing the damn thing into orbit is slim to non-existent.

:)
 

EarthAngel2911

avalonian, I'm with you. I love the fact that the Fool's Dog apps come with the complete books. Plus, the digital images are a much better quality than what my own scanner can do. (I swear, I check daily to see if they've added any new decks to their offering, just waiting to hit the Buy button.) :)

As an android user, I get a little irked by developers that only cater to the Apple crowd, especially since the android share of the market keeps growing. It has certainly taught me patience, though! :-D
 

Callanish

avalonian, I'm with you. I love the fact that the Fool's Dog apps come with the complete books. Plus, the digital images are a much better quality than what my own scanner can do. (I swear, I check daily to see if they've added any new decks to their offering, just waiting to hit the Buy button.) :)

As an android user, I get a little irked by developers that only cater to the Apple crowd, especially since the android share of the market keeps growing. It has certainly taught me patience, though! :-D

I'm constantly asked to make Android versions of my Apps.
So far I've resisted for many reasons but the 2 primary reasons that developers shun Android are:

1) Android doesn't pay developers well. iOS, even though there are fewer devices out there, still makes 2-3x more than Android. Piracy is a huge problem on Android as it's an "Open system". I read last week that in China no one pays for Android Apps, piracy is at 100% of the market.

2) Android is a nightmare to develop software for. So many different version of Android running on countless phones and tablets from different vendors with different features makes it not only a nightmare to develop for but to support long term as well.

If you are a lone developer like me, you only have so much time and focus, the platform that pays you for your time is the one to go with.

I should add that some developers manage to juggle across both but that's because they've used a "cross compiler". It's a software package that does all the work for you by turning your code into an App for either Android or iOS. You can tell which Apps use these, they are really awful.
Creating quality is much more important to me.
I actually USE my own Tarot App.
I wrote it for myself primarily because I didn't like anything else out there.
Show me another developer who is a Tarot Reader too, understands Tarot and uses their Tarot App on a daily basis?

Callanish
 

Celtictarot

I saw this review on the boho gothic app,
http://innerwhisperscouk.blogspot.com/

I am using this app for Owlmoon's Jan "challenge" and I am getting to know tarot a bit better with this deck. I LOVE this deck. If I had the money, I'd buy the deck and when you are unemployed you can't keep buying decks.

I have the unitarot as well!

One thing I do love with the foold dog apps, is the use of "free spreads" something that the Boho Gothic app doesn't have :( *sobs* handy for sending to clients.

Thank you Fool's Dog! I am downloading Gypsy Palace and Goddess Tarot, the latter I own as a card deck.
 

Annabelle

Thank you so much, Callanish and Wendywu, for posting about what UniTarot and Tarot & Numerology can let me do! I'm definitely going to check those out. I have an excellent scanner, and plenty of material :D.

I have a few of the Fool's Dog tarot apps and they are okay, but I agree with Callanish that it seems silly for them to make so many separate apps (one per deck), instead of one app for which folks can download multiple decks. It just seems . . . untidy.

I have the Bohemian Gothic tarot app on my Android phone and LOVE it like crazy. It's easier/more intuitive to use than the Fool's Dog apps, for me.
 

Wendywu

I don't know about Callanish's app (which sounds excellent but unavailable to me as an Android user) but you can store scanned decks on your external SD card with Unitarot - just navigate to it when you are telling the app to install the deck. Saves me a lot of space on my phone so that it doesn't matter if I use a decent resolution to scan at.

I enjoy using the apps very much! Instant tarot cards - all my favourites - all with me all the time but without weighing my shoulder-bag down! I put the Breughel in last week, and this week I will be adding the Northern Shadows. The weight factor is no small consideration for me; my mum had terrible arthritis in her neck as she got older and the specialist said that it was caused - mostly - by carrying an excessively heavy bag on the same shoulder year in, year out ....

I don't wanna go the same way, so I don't carry physical tarot decks in my bag any more, or tarot books. It's all on my phone :)
 

Celtictarot

I spend all day at work sitting in front of a computer. I don't want to go out and buy a scanner, then buy OCR software, then go home and scan in hundreds of pages of books and cards. With the Fools Dog apps I just download the app, and the cards and books are on my phone and tablet in seconds. Suits me just fine, thanks.

Plus, the laptop I have is Windows 8, and the likelihood of my being able to load the software onto it without lobbing the damn thing into orbit is slim to non-existent.

:)
Its fine if you have the physical deck to the original poster, but I am with Avalon. I'm happy with the app because I Don't yet own the physical cards and I don't have a lot of memory on my laptop either for a million and one programmes either.
 

Callanish

I don't know about Callanish's app (which sounds excellent but unavailable to me as an Android user) but you can store scanned decks on your external SD card with Unitarot - just navigate to it when you are telling the app to install the deck. Saves me a lot of space on my phone so that it doesn't matter if I use a decent resolution to scan at.

I enjoy using the apps very much! Instant tarot cards - all my favourites - all with me all the time but without weighing my shoulder-bag down! I put the Breughel in last week, and this week I will be adding the Northern Shadows. The weight factor is no small consideration for me; my mum had terrible arthritis in her neck as she got older and the specialist said that it was caused - mostly - by carrying an excessively heavy bag on the same shoulder year in, year out ....

I don't wanna go the same way, so I don't carry physical tarot decks in my bag any more, or tarot books. It's all on my phone :)

Not using Android I wasn't aware of Unitarot, (great tip off!) , it's good to see another developer heading in this direction with self loading decks.

As much as we love the wonderful variety and choice of Tarot decks the frame work in which we use them remains largely uniform.
(I suspect that's where Unitarot gets it's name from)

I'd like to see more being done with the digital framework in which we use Tarot.
There's enormous potential for contributing to Tarot's evolution in the digital age.

My critique of the majority of Apps out there is that they focus entirely on a single deck without giving any thought to how someone will use that deck on a day to day basis.

It's entirely sales focused (selling artwork for hanging on a digital wall).

Publishers are trying to sell decks, digitally, without thought to the after sales (how they will be used once purchased).
If you create a digital framework (App) which focuses on the user experience then the deck sales will take care of themselves and we'll see Tarot really coming on age in the digital realm.

I'd like to see a thread on AT (this one or a new one) where we critique what we like/don't like in the Apps we use (not the deck, the functionality/user experience/usability). What we'd like to see. Questions on what is possible in software and what isn't.
It's up to those who make the Apps to pay attention. I am. I'm ready to listen.

Callanish