I posted a reply to your post about that, its a bug with an accessibility setting in iOS. Forgot to include the fix in 1.0.7, but you can resolve it for now by disabling "Button Shapes" in the iOS accessibility settings.
Hi, sorry for the late (and long) reply. You're right, $30 is definitely a lot to be asking for an app. I'll try to explain where I'm coming from, and why I've landed on this price & monetization model. If anyone have any suggestions on how I can improve things while considering my points as well I'm definitely open to discuss.
But this app is paywalling basic stuff like a comment jump button (everyone else has this for free), content filtering, video scrubbing
When I was working on this update I spent a lot of time considering which features were "essential" and which features were more convenience/nice-to-have features. Two of the bigger features I've decided should be free are multiple accounts & post creation, both of which have been paid features in other apps. I thought everyone having access to these was way more important than app themes or a smart jump button.
Everything that was free in the last version is still free, and of course there's a bunch of new non-pro stuff too. My intent with this update was not to paywall "basic" features, but to offer more hardcore users some extra niceties that in turn support development. I don't expect the majority of people to upgrade, which is totally fine. I'll still keep improving the app for everyone regardless.
make it a reasonable one time purchase for things that don’t cost you money (under $10 imo, $5 would’ve been an easy sell). If you want to justify a subscription model you are gonna need to build features that justify it
I get that the lifetime price is high, I really do. The #1 reason I'm going for this type of subscription model is that Lemmy is so small. Apps like Apollo easily had tens of thousands of users and could therefore charge way way less. For some context - if every single active Avelon user paid for a $5 upgrade, which I'm sure you'd agree is unreasonable, that'd still be barely enough to finance one month of development. That's it. I'm not saying this justifies the price, but Lemmy is still very niche, and with such a niche market the development cost will naturally be spread among much fewer users. With the slow growth of the Lemmy userbase a one-time purchase is very risky from my perspective, and I want Avelon to make sense over a long period of time. I think the devs of both sync (which is $99) and Bean (which is $50) realized this too.
I do believe Avelon can continue to play a part in lowering the barrier of entry to Lemmy and improving the platform as a whole by pushing for more high quality apps. I hope to see Lemmy continue to become the best link-aggregator platform ever, and as that happens prices will naturally decrease.
Sorry! I'm waiting for Apple to approve a fix. Their review process is a bit of a black box but it will hopefully be ready soon!
edit: fixed now!
62
The highest upvoted image reply will become the first custom app icon (no matter how bad it is)
(imgur.com)
It's about time to get some custom icons for Avelon, so I'm hosting this chill little competition to pick the very first one!
To join, simply reply to this post with your icon suggestion. The highest upvoted image by the end of this week will be added to the app as the very first community icon. Anyone can join - no need for artistic skills!
To keep the competition fair (and Apple-compliant), there's just a feeew rules:
Icon Competition Rules
- One image per comment
- If you have multiple suggestions, post each in a separate comment
- Max 3 suggestions per person
- No NSFW/questionable content
- If the icon is rejected by Apple I'll try the next most upvoted one
- Icons must be original works
- No brand lookalikes etc. as I don't wanna get in trouble. I need the rights to use it for the app!
- No comment-edits
- The images people vote on must remain the same from the time you post it
Remember that icons must be squares with no transparency or "drawn" rounded corners. I'll also need a 1024x1024 resolution version if you win!
The competition ends this Sunday (September 24th) at 21:00 UTC (5PM ET)!
Naming Competition
I recommend joining even if you're not a great artist, but if you can't draw and still wanna join there's also a naming competition.
- Reply to any icon with a name suggestion to join
- No profane/nsfw names or names longer than a few words
- The highest upvoted name suggestion for the winner will appear underneath the icon in the App!
- The creator of an icon can't also suggest a name - that'd be no fun
Looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with! Good luck!
Thank you! I've got some pretty cool nice-to-have features in the works to make Avelon do everything I miss from the Apollo days. My current plan is to release these as an optional Pro upgrade as a way to support development. All the crucial stuff will be free since I really want to see Lemmy succeed. The upgrade will be mainly for people wanting a little extra to spice up their Lemmy experience & support development
Definitely gonna add this in Avelon too.
As for tapping the tab bar, currently it takes you back to the previous page. Could change it to a scroll instead if people prefer that, but haven't heard this request before.
77
Avelon for Lemmy 1.0.5 is now out! Includes posting, a better GIF player in the feed, and even better performance
(i.imgur.com)
Hey guys!
Another week and another Avelon update!
The biggest feature in this version is posting (so you can finally post in this community without using the webui!) and a better native GIF player! The feed should also be even more buttery smooth (unless you doomscroll for 2 hours straight, or so I've heard).
Changelog
- Added posting! - Supports link posts, image posts and text posts - Automatic uploading of images to Imgur! - (No way to edit posts just yet)
- Much nicer GIF video player - GIFs can now be paused - GIFs show progress just like videos
- Added pull to refresh inside posts
- Videos with audio now play nicer with background music
- Improved autoplay behavior for videos and GIFs
- Inline images with a name/alias now show the name as well as the image itself
- Improved layout on small devices with large fonts
- Performance improvements (should be even smoother now!)
- Squashed some pesky bugs
If you enjoy the app, consider leaving a review on the app store as it helps out a lot! And tell all your friends plz
Hope you enjoy the update & let me know what you think!
(Posted from Avelon)
Yeah, this is exactly right. I was brainstorming names and came up with Avelon - turns out I was actually just remembering the name of the british legend just slightly wrong. Read up on it a bit more, and figured an "island" away from the big social media giants could be a nice metaphor to use in a Lemmy app name. Ended up keeping Avelon (with an E) since I thought it sounded pretty cool and was more unique.
Coming in the next version! For both communities & users
The app is written natively for iOS, so an android version is not possible unfortunately.
176
Avelon for Lemmy is now on the App Store!
(apps.apple.com)
cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/4709002
Hi everyone!
It's been quite the journey, but Avelon is finally on the App Store!
Click here to download!
The app is includes a lot of awesome features requested by the community, including:
- Sleek design that fits right in on iOS & iPadOS
- Highly customizable look & behavior
- Mark read on scroll & hide read posts
- Customizable swipe gestures
- Multiple account support
- Smart link previews in posts and comments
- Support for videos, gifs, photos & other media
- Custom font support
- Write replies with markdown highlighting
- Privacy focused - the app has no tracking of any kind
- Gallery mode + hide bars on scroll = full immersion ... and a lot more!
Screenshots
Here's some cool app store screenshots of the app:
Developing this app has been one of the best development experiences I've had, and I feel very privileged and happy to have been able to contribute to Lemmy in this way. Nothing is more motivating than seeing so many people already enjoying the app and providing suggestions and feedback.
I really hope you enjoy Avelon, and I'm looking forward to hearing more about what everyone thinks. Keep the feedback coming!
Thank you, Sigve Rokenes
34
Avelon for Lemmy is now on the App Store!
(apps.apple.com)
Hi everyone!
It's been quite the journey, but Avelon is finally on the App Store!
Click here to download!
The app is includes a lot of awesome features requested by the community, including:
- Sleek design that fits right in on iOS & iPadOS
- Highly customizable look & behavior
- Mark read on scroll & hide read posts
- Customizable swipe gestures
- Multiple account support
- Smart link previews in posts and comments
- Support for videos, gifs, photos & other media
- Custom font support
- Write replies with markdown highlighting
- Privacy focused - the app has no tracking of any kind
- Gallery mode + hide bars on scroll = full immersion ... and a lot more!
Screenshots
Here's some cool app store screenshots of the app:
Developing this app has been one of the best development experiences I've had, and I feel very privileged and happy to have been able to contribute to Lemmy in this way. Nothing is more motivating than seeing so many people already enjoying the app and providing suggestions and feedback.
I really hope you enjoy Avelon, and I'm looking forward to hearing more about what everyone thinks. Keep the feedback coming!
Thank you, Sigve Rokenes
29
cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/4073656
Heyo everyone,
This update brings a few cool new features, most notably:
- Smart link previews
- Now shown in comments and posts
- Previews for communities, users and regular links
- Image carousels
- For posts with lots of images!
- iPad support
- Layout/ui tweaks
- Bug fixes and other improvements
Check out this image gallery in the latest build to see how it works:
(just scroll through it!)
I figured (like some other devs) that some iPad support is better than none. Though the layout is not built from the ground up for iPad, it now fills the whole screen and pushes in some content. This is similar to how other apps like Apollo did it, and it looks much nicer than than a scaled up phone app. I haven't had time to test this version much, so please let me know if you discover any weird stuff.
The update also introduces a custom markdown rendering system that enables me to add things like link previews and image carousels. Seems to work pretty well now, but could definitely be some bugs with it for certain posts - if you find any, let me know!
Hope you enjoy the update!
2
Avelon update (1.0.2 b24) - iPad support, image carousels, smart link previews, user links and more!
(lemm.ee)
Heyo everyone,
This update brings a few cool new features, most notably:
- Smart link previews
- Now shown in comments and posts
- Previews for communities, users and regular links
- Image carousels
- For posts with lots of images!
- iPad support
- Layout/ui tweaks
- Bug fixes and other improvements
Check out this image gallery in the latest build to see how it works:
(just scroll through it!)
I figured (like some other devs) that some iPad support is better than none. Though the layout is not built from the ground up for iPad, it now fills the whole screen and pushes in some content. This is similar to how other apps like Apollo did it, and it looks much nicer than than a scaled up phone app. I haven't had time to test this version much, so please let me know if you discover any weird stuff.
The update also introduces a custom markdown rendering system that enables me to add things like link previews and image carousels. Seems to work pretty well now, but could definitely be some bugs with it for certain posts - if you find any, let me know!
Hope you enjoy the update!
3
Hi guys! This update (version 1.0.2 build 12) brings more sweet features, including:
- Custom font support
- Text size fully customizable!
- Hide read posts
- Customizable per-feed or you can manually toggle it
- Mark posts read on scroll
- More swipe gestures:
- Collapse comment thread
- Mark post as read
- Unfinished replies are now saved as drafts
- Option to delete your embarassing comments
- Body preview for text posts
- More customization options:
- Community icons & user avatars
- Large vote buttons
- Account avatar in bottom tab
- Hide tab labels (super clean!)
- Number of lines to show for text posts
- Download/share buttons in the image viewer
- Ellipsis buttons for posts & comments
- Easily access common options
- Reworked thread rendering system
- Edited comments now has an edited icon
- Profile pages now have avatar images
- Aaaand of course a bunch of various UI improvements & bug fixes
Wanna check it out? Here's the link:
For you seasoned testers out there, I'd really like some feedback on any bugs you might find, especially for the mark-read-on-scroll and hide-read-posts feature, but of course everything else as well. Some of these systems were a bit tricky to get right, so I might have introduced a few new bugs here and there.
Hope you enjoy the update, and let me know what you think!
Good idea! I'll look at adding this as an option
Definitely, I've implemented a few swipe actions already, but they're still a bit buggy so I need to rework the gestures before it's ready to release.
Awesome, looking forward to hearing what you think!
view more: next ›
IMO the most important thing by far is making the core app experience as solid as possible. Things like post feeds, comment sections, posting, sharing, image viewers, inboxes, replying, editing, text selection, user profiles, swipe gestures, searching, font settings, sorting options, display options, hiding read posts and everything else you'd expect takes a lot of time to develop, maintain and polish. The vast majority of my development time is spent on improvements, bug fixes and new features for everyone, and I really do care a lot about creating a great experience that can help improving Lemmy overall. Offering some more niche nice-to-have features on top of that is a good way to support everything else.
I'm not going to add a higher tier - as I briefly mentioned in an earlier comment my goal is rather the opposite. If Lemmy keeps growing, Avelon Pro could at some point make sense as a $5-or-something one-time upgrade. Unfortunately that's just not the case right now.