RadicalCodex 1.5 is out.
Radical Comic Designer 2.0 is almost out (should roll out later tonight or tomorrow). 2.0 is mostly focused on improving rendering quality and overall ease of use / look and feel (and making it easier to add more features for me).
Of course, I’ve got a list of features that I am working on. But what do you want to see?
Here’s what I have in mind for each of these applications. Features that I’d like to see myself in the next few releases:
RadicalCodex
- Online Comic “Store”.
- Updated look and feel for the eBook/Comic cover view.
- Syncing with more devices.
- Webcomic reading mode.
Radical Comic Designer
- Publish to Twitter.
- Publish to Facebook.
- More types of speech bubbles.
- Additional effects.
Anything I missed that you’d like to see? Any of these jump out at you as must have features?
A side note (some of you already know this): All of the updates to both applications will be free, for registered users on all platforms, for the foreseeable future. So if you’ve been on the fence about picking up a copy… it’s super easy (and affordable) from the Radical Breeze Store. :)
October 6th, 2009 - 9:26 am
I was just wondering, is it really worth your time to develop these applications? I don’t want to seem negative, but it seems unlikely that you manage to sell enough copies to match whatever you would make doing “regular” software development work – since they are such niche applications. I’m curious because this is the sort of thing I would like to be doing when I get out of university. I just don’t know if it’s economically viable.
October 6th, 2009 - 11:55 pm
It is definitely doable to make a fairly good living on your own software.
Currently? I don’t.
But in the past I have. It’s a great deal of work. But you also get a great deal of personal freedom and satisfaction.
For me, it’s totally worth my time. The applications I work on are applications that I want to have myself. And I know many other people use and enjoy them on a daily basis. Which makes it very worthwhile for me.
October 8th, 2009 - 1:03 am
I purchased radical codex yesterday.. worked fine for about 4 mins .. since then says radical codex not responding.. have uninstalled with a complete uninstaller.. reinstalled.. used bug fix programs etc… nothing works.. it simply will not import my collection.. have also installed the patch from this site.. still no good.. I am on an xp system wich is suppose to be compatible.. please help as I am seriously unhappy at this point.
October 8th, 2009 - 1:05 am
Chris:
Whoah, that’s no good! Could you provide some details as to what you did when right before it stopped working? ex: Did you import a particular comic, etc?
You might also want to try deleting your RadicalCodex directory in your roaming folder (%APPDATA%). That will get rid of your imported database and let you start completely from scratch.
October 8th, 2009 - 1:07 am
Chris:
Just out of curiosity… what is a “Bug fix program” that you used?
October 8th, 2009 - 1:28 am
Hi Bryan… complete uninstaller has a program check and fix program attached..have used it in the past if problems occured with registery keys… thats what i tried this time.. also i was importing aquaman comics when it crashed..infact i had imported 57 of 60.. now nothing will respond at all… will try deletion of directory as stated.
October 8th, 2009 - 2:13 am
Chris: Yeah, give that a try. My guess is this may be related to the bug fixed in 1.5.1… and when a comic with “odd” image files gets imported (and before the 1.5.1 fix, an error occured) it may have gotten all messed up. Let me know if that doesn’t resolve the issue for you and I’ll keep looking.
October 8th, 2009 - 10:40 am
So far its working fine thanks bryan.. only one book is causing minor issues..left that out and rest are working fine…still cataloging collection so will keep you informed… thanks for the quick response time.. excellent after sales service
cheers
chris
October 8th, 2009 - 11:44 am
Sorry Bryan spoke to soon.. spent hours cataloging adding collections etc.. worked fine till i rebooted when i returned home.. then all books section was just that, all books.. meaning all the collections i added had nothing behind them, covers etc.. only appeared under all books… this is not how i added them, I was meticulous in typing collection names and story threads, added each collection to the apprpriate area.. now all gone.. very disapointing.. i was really looking forward to this software, but so far its just cost me a lot of time and a few dollars for very little in return.. i appreciate the efforts that go in to these things i really do…but its still very frustrating when things dont seem to work. Heres hoping theres another bug fix coming soon or im out 10 bucks usd.
cheers chris
October 8th, 2009 - 5:30 pm
Chris: Sorry to hear that man! When you added books to your individual collections: Did you add them first… then drag and drop them from All Books to the collections? Or did you drag them from the file system directly to the individual collection?
(I know quite a few people are using RadicalCodex under Windows XP without trouble. So I definitely want to get to the bottom of where your problems seem to be.)
October 9th, 2009 - 12:12 am
No I added them as new collections…clicked add new collection, then added folders to that collection. As I did each new collection they stayed put.. was able to click on each collecton heading and bring up only those books.. but later when i returned home from work I needed a system reboot and whilst collection headings where still present only all books had the actual books… only blank space appeared when clicking on collection titles…like i said i really do appreciate the efforts that go into these programs, and i apologise for being a little hot headed in last post, was the frustration speaking.. there is simply nothing like your concept out there that Im aware of, I just really want it to work, the idea is brilliant. Also one book ( so far)refuses to open at all in radicalcodex yet is a cbr file that works perfectly with other readers, when i tried to put this book in it actually kept sending that book to application data.. the same file you told me to delete and start again… the whole book would go there and an error page would say file is unable to execute because its not a zip file.. words to that effect.. found it strange that out of al the books in that folder just one actually physically copied entirely and relocated copy in realcodex application data .. dont no if that helps or not?
Appreciate the time your taking to sort out these issues
cheers
chris
October 9th, 2009 - 10:20 pm
I believe I’ve tracked down what I think is the culprit of your categorizing issue. I’ll include that fix in the next update.
As for the book causing you specific troubles… it’s hard for me to diagnose those specifically without knowing which book it is. Feel free to send an email in with the book/author/etc info and I’ll see if I can figure it out.
October 10th, 2009 - 4:35 am
will send the whole book if you like.. its a comic in cbr catwoman v2 number 1… and thanks for fixing the issue.. looking forward to the update.
cheers
chris
October 10th, 2009 - 4:48 am
Chris:
Not a problem! That’s what I’m here for!
Only send me the comic if it’s public domain / creative commons / etc. (ie, you have the right to give it to others). I’m a stickler for keeping thing on the up and up.
Another thing you can do is open the cbr in an archive viewing program (7zip, winzip, winrar, etc) and take a screenshot of the file list… then email me that resulting screenshot. That may help me narrow down the culprit.
October 11th, 2009 - 7:09 am
Hey Bryan, I’m thinking that with the Ubuntu Software Centre planning to offer paid applications this could work. I would like to see this working, as a means to make software available from hobbyists to commercial vendors, free or paid.
October 11th, 2009 - 7:23 am
Zac: Agreed! I am quite excited about the Ubuntu Software Center.