I've been rewriting my imaging application (PQV) for the last few weeks and have pared down the features to what I think are the ones most people want to use. I'd like opinions from the Modaco users as to what features would really be useful in an image viewer. I'm not going to give it away for free, but the price will be less than all of the competing applications.

Here's my priority list for viewer features:

1) Speed and format support - able to deftly handle JPEG, GIF, BMP, TIFF and other images (including faxes)
2) Good slide show feature - nice way to show off photos on your phone or PPC
3) Simple GUI - no need to read a manual to navigate the program. All functions should be within easy reach of the root menu.
4) Works on all Windows Mobile devices - a single license (per user) can be used on any and all devices

I've rewritten the core JPEG code in ARM assembly language, so it is much faster than my competitors. There's no need to reduce the photo sizes before viewing them; even on the 200Mhz OMAP devices, large images load quickly.

Some features I've seen from competing applications are:
1) FTP upload, Flickr upload
2) Drawing tools
3) Voice notes
4) Desktop PC photo "optimizer" application

Of the above listed features, I think #4 is the most useless. Isn't it easier to just pop your memory card straight from the camera into your device and start working with your photos instead of having to "manage" them and learn another tool?

I've experimented with competitor offerings and for me, SplashPhoto was the most frustrating and useless program. It is unable browse your folders to open image files; you are forced to use the Desktop PC tool to convert/copy your photos from your PC to your phone. I think that's an unnecessary waste of time.

How many people will really want to FTP/Upload their photos from a WinCE device into a website? This isn't very difficult to implement, but seems like something 1 out of 100 people will actually use.

Please post your comments/ideas because you'll be helping to create your ideal photo viewer.

Thanks,
Larry Bank
http://bitbank.wordpress.com

Your comments on SplashPhoto ring oh so true!
A photo viewer should have a good thumbnail view, make it easy to find your pics - a search function where you can specify which directories to search possibly? then select which pics to include so you don't get all buttons and things from web pages?
Full screen and zoom features are also what I'd like to see. Other than that your 4 priorities are spot on.
I'm not sure I would use ANY additional features, I want a quick, useful photo viewer, any additional features *might* bloat the program, slow it down or make it more complicated. Provided you get the core right and any features don't affect the core prog then I have no probs with you adding what you like, just I personally cant see me using them. The FTP upload might be popular, drawing tools, maybe. One feature people like but would prob be very difficult to impliment is the warp feature on SE phones.
I'm rambling now, aren't I?

Good luck

Thanks Confucious for your comments. It's good to see that I'm not alone in my views. I always find it interesting to read reviews of products that gush about the millions of features in a program, but the truth is that most people will never use them.

L.B.

I think that often an app works fine but then someone sugests adding functionality and what starts out as a small usefull app gets bloated out of all proportion due the the programmers trying to accomodate everyone. Do you focus on the core purpose or add all functionality requested? People will always ask for more - but sometimes it's a case of Jack of all times, master of none...

I think the ability to shrink your photos to MMS size is something that would be useful as I like to take may pics on my phone usimg the largets setting that way i get much clearer pics but then I might think ...ohh I'll snap that and send it to so and so ...but I forget to switch down the setting so tht=at when I try to send it I get told the file size is too big.

this is probably the only feature I would like to see added other than the ability to rotate so thats two additions

Ok....

So when I say I don't want any other features conan puts ideas into my head. If you are going to resize, how about the ability to resize to any size with std sizes (MMS, VGA, QVGA etc) selectable for individual or all files - if you are just going to view them on the device you don't need the full size file.

Oh, and rotating goes without saying, as does every other feature that I haven't mentioned but might use. D'Oh!

resize for optimum photo contact ID....change fom colour to black and white...ability to add text to picture

any thing else

That's a good idea about resizing to standard sizes (right now I give the choice of original, 1/4, 1/16).

What is an MMS sized image?

Thanks,
L.B.

its more compression than size I think the limit is 300kb, but my MMS seting are set to Qvga which I believe is 240x320

actually looking at it I can send any size via MMS its rejected by the incoming phone when its too large for their setting so I think it would be a case of resizing to QVGA. as most of my non smartphone friends can accept them... but only some get it when i try the VGA size and non get it when I send it as 1280 x 1024 which is what i usually take my pics in.

1280 x 1024 go fine to email addresses via MMS though.

There are actually 3 MMS sizes -100/200/300k and I think different devices (or providers?) can cope with diferent sizes for sending files.

I've reg edited mine to send at 1000k but thats not the problem see my edited post above i think I have found the problem...or it may be that there limit is set to say 300k but I can not see it as i sent a 1280x1024 124k photo to my email my wifes MPX220 set at 300k limit and my daughters sony erickson....only my email reciaved the picture both the wife and my duaghter had to view via a web browser as the file was said to be too large...didn't appear too larg for the 300k limit on the MPX220 as it was only 124k file size

TIFF viewing for faxes would be great!

I'd like something that could flow the text from a fax page, in the same sort of way as Repligo does, on the fly and on the device. That might be another app altogether!

What about overlaying another image? For the Photo Dialler apps it'd be neat to be able to overlay a mobile phone, or desk phone, or envelope icon in a corner of the image. That would let you snap your photo, add an icon and stuff it into your Photo Dialler (I don't actually use Photo Diallers, and one of the reasons is that I can't be arsed to edit the images to identify what you're dialling).

There are other apps that do uploading, and drawing tools never produce a particularly nice result IME, so I wouldn't bother much with them.

I'm getting closer to a finished product and have decided to release a beta.

Please read my blog entry for details and download links:

PQV 4.0 Test Drive

I've been debating whether or not to use thumbnail caching. What this will do is speed up the display when you scroll back and forth through a large number of images (in thumbnail view). The downside is that it will eat up memory and possibly not allow you to load full sized images when you want to. I've seen this occur in the Resco viewer where it caches everything and then when I want to load an image full size it displays red text saying there isn't enough memory.

Please chime in with your opinions about caching of the thumbnail images.

L.B.

This app is excellent - very fast, and all the features that I need. Really, the thumbnails are fast on my Vox, even with 6MP images - I wouldn't bother with the caching. Keep up the good work!

I've finally cleared my plate of other projects long enough to finish PQV 4.0; Please give it a try:

www.bitbanksoftware.com