Some people have been asking questions regarding the phone version of Mizuu - you know, the one that was published back in August and - despite having promised otherwise - only received one small update before it mysteriously disappeared from Android Market.
There are many reason for this, but the main reason is that I knew very little about the Android platform and how to deal with phone and tablet applications. You see, the recommended way to do it is to support both platforms in a single installation file (apk). I didn’t know this at the time, so I created a new project specifically for phones.
Obviously, this meant a lot of code duplication, missing features due to API differences and more work for me as a developer. Looking back it it now, this was a stupid decision.
I promised a lot of updates for the phone version with every good intention, but at some point I realized that it was simply going to be too much work, and I in the meantime learned about the proper way to support both phones and tablets.
With Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0) around the corner, and knowing that all Android 2.3 phones would - in theory - be able to upgrade to the latest version, I felt I had to make a tough decision. Almost 80 percent of the user install base would be able to upgrade to Android 4.0, and moving to this platform would include a lot of advantages, including two very important ones:
- Users pay once, but can use it on all their devices, both phones and tablets
- All users get updates at the same time
These two advantages pretty much made up my mind. It’s easier to update the application, users will be able to use more features due to the newer APIs and they’ll be able to use it on all their devices. Therefore: I can now confirm that I will no longer be doing any work on the deprecated version of Mizuu for phones.
Open sourcing Mizuu for Phones
I still think that the deprecated version of Mizuu (Movies) has a lot of potential, and that’s why I’ve decided to open source it, and allow other developers to work on the project.
You’ll find the project on Google Code: http://code.google.com/p/mizuu-for-phones/
I truly believe this is the best thing that could happen for Mizuu and its users. Other people will be able to continue working on the project, and hopefully get some great results out of it. I know there’s already some interest in doing that, and I’ll try to keep you updated on it. Who knows - maybe some developer will think of a cool feature, that I can also integrate into the current version of Mizuu. That’s the beauty of open source software.
Final words
If you’re feeling hurt by this decision, I am truly sorry for letting you down. It was never the intention. I am more than happy to do refunds, if you’re feeling hurt about it, and if you’re one of those who’ll be able to upgrade to the Ice Cream Sandwich version, I’ll also happily refund your purchase of the phone version.
Having said that, I still feel that the phone version of Mizuu - although not having anywhere near as many features as the tablet version - was well worth its price and still does a good job of managing your movies.