New version of Click to chat (V 2.13.1)

V 2.13.1
- Updated translation to Brazilian Portuguese locale. Many thanks to mezysinc!
- Tweaked calls addon detection

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Oops, I forgot to notify about this update.

It's just a full update of an existing translation. Also contains a simplification in how the addon is detected, because a user reported they couldn't use it with the donation version, and even though the code is exactly the same for both apps I noticed I was manually checking instead of using an existing android function. Hopefully it doesn't break for existing users (I tested and couldn't find any issues, and so far no one reported anything so I think it is ok).

New version of Url Checker (V 1.0)

V 1.0
- Custom tabs implementation. Press the left button toggle to switch between opening as custom tab or not (Android 4.4+)
- Warning on http links
- Renamed Ascii checker module to Pattern checker
- Preserve original intent (keeps extras)

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This is version 1.0, although the previous one was in stable already.

The big improvement is the support for Custom tabs, in which you can open a reduced browser version (if available) instead of the full app. Not only you can toggle it as desired, but the button will have the state of what the original app wanted (if you open a link from Discord for example the button will be enabled by default, although you can turn it off later).

This also required to implement a background empty service, so that other apps think this one can open custom tabs. Normally this allows to 'warm up' browsers, or even preload a url, so when it is loaded it takes less time. It also means that the browser will perform actions in the background without your consent, so this app also stops it. Did you know that while the Gmail app is active, the browser is always loaded in the background? You do now.

I also made it to keep the original intent, so that the extras (extra information) is preserved. Some apps use these extras to configure some properties of the landing app (for example with the custom tabs).

The other new feature is a warning on http links (to use https instead). I added it in the ascii module, because the feature is very similar: check for a specific pattern in the url and report a warning. For this reason I decided to rename the module to Pattern Checker, and probably other checks will be performed in the future.

Blog improvements

Over the past few weeks I've been improving and adding some things here in this blog. Each of them is a minor script/change, so I didn't found necessary to create a post for that, but now that the number of changes is moderate I felt like writing about them.

'Usefulness' page form

There is now a small form at the bottom of the page (left bar in desktop mode) so you can say whether you found a page useful or not, with an optional comment. It is as easy as pressing a button, and the answer is sent through google forms (google forms has a feature that allows anyone to send a response simply by visiting a page, so when you press a button that petition is performed in the background via a fetch command). It even works anywhere in the blog, even in search pages!

As of now I received 76 'yes' and 28 'no', most of them on the click to chat addon page. I may post in the future more statistics (tell me if you would like that).

Collapsible comments

This was something I personally wanted, the comment section at the bottom is as long as the amount of comments, and some pages have a loooot of them. This made very long pages and hard to scroll all the way to the bottom, and I'm sure people didn't even know there is some info there. When I added the usefulness form this was even more noticeable. So I simply made the comments element hidden, with a toggle button at the top. It is collapsed by default, press the button and the comments will be shown, press again to hide.

Filters in menu

A few years ago I had some of the important apps in the blog menu (the horizontal bar at the top with an arrow at the right, or the top bar with buttons in desktop mode) however I needed to add manually new apps there, and it was boring.

Then I found that there is a blogger widget that shows a list of all the tags in the blog, and when clicked it shows only the posts with that tag. I tag every post with the app it represents (with the exception of the blog tag, for posts like this) so this is a very useful way to display the apps I published (not all, but those I actively develop) and it's even sorted!

The issue is that this list is shown as a separate element, at the bottom (left in desktop) and I didn't like that. So I made a script that converts the automatically populated widget list to entries in the bar menu.

Now you can quickly see all posts of a specific app simply by selecting that filter from the menu, and it will be automatically updated with new apps/tags so I don't need to do anything! 

Fixed date on top of menu

Just a quick fix, but worth mentioning. In the mobile mode, when viewing a single post, the date at the top was displayed above the menu entry and it looked bad. I found the culprit css and patched it.

Pro-adblock message

This blog has a 'you should use an adblock' message at the top, which should not be visible if you use one. However, even if you do, you may have seen it in the past. The way this message works is by simply 'look' like an ad (which adblocks remove) however the list of ads they block is not static and changes over time, so I need to update it when the current method no longer works.

Arc-io

Arc-io is a service that 'helps build a faster internet with fewer ads'. It acts as a distributed CDN (content delivery network) in which users visiting the page can get page elements (images, scripts, css,...) by other users, instead of all from a centralized server. And it only ads a blue circle at the bottom left, no ads, no banners, nothing else. At first I was like 'using your bandwidth to share code to other users? no way' but after some checking and investigation I found its not as bad as it looks, and 'apparently' it only works with desktop users or under wifi. In any case, if you don't like that service it is automatically removed with adblocks (that you should have) but if for some reason it is still show for you and you want to disable it you can from the 'opt-out' link after pressing the blue icon, which redirects to here.

And what do I earn? The service pays you for the traffic (because companies pays them for the faster internet). Note that it is a very low revenue, 4$/month more or less, and I keep it because of the no-ads alternative it represents.

Another interesting fact is that this service requires you to set a specific file in the root of the site. Blogger don't allow that, however I discovered that you can embed an iframe with the arc-io widget from another site, and it will work! I currently have arc-io on my personal trianguloy.github.io page, and that's why when pressing the circle it says 'github.io gets a boost' instead of 'blogspot.com gets a boost'.

New version of Click to chat (V 2.13)

V 2.13
- New configurable changelog dialog
- Show message when sharing number

[Edit: a new beta was released with the Russian translation]

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On this version a new dialog is added: a changelog window. You can open it manually by pressing the version number from the about menu (the (i) icon) but it will also be opened automatically when the app is updated. 

This can be configured, so you can disable it, or even set it to notify only on big changes (or even all minor changes). There are 4 different settings:

• Never notify: The changelog window will never appear after a new version.
  
• Notify on important features only: The changelog window will only appear after a mayor update (from 2.X to 3.X and so on). Standard features and fixes will be ignored.
  
• Notify on new features only [default]: The changelog window will appear on new version with new features (from 2.13 to 2.14 and so on). Fixes and translations will be ignored.
  
• Always notify: The changelog window will appear on every new update, including fixes and translations updates (from 2.13 to 2.13.1 and so on).

 

I also added (finally, better late than never) a warning when sharing a number, because you never should share a private number in a public place, and apparently people didn't know a few months ago.

New version of Url checker (V 0.1)

V 0.1
- Long tap 'share' button to copy url to clipboard
- Share url as text to open on the app
- Several visual improvements and fixes

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Some useful additions and visual fixes. I'll probably promote this version as stable soon.

New version of Click to chat (V 2.12) + new donation version

V 2.12
- Removed non-google donation links to comply with new guidelines, replaced with new donation version.
- Minor tweaks with app colors

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Recently the Play Store has been updated with new requirements about payments. Now you can't have a link to a non-google donation site (to be precise this requirement has always exists, but now it seems to be mandatory, instead of 'recommended'). For this reason I removed the Paypal, Patreon and Ko-fi links, which to be honest didn't were used (except Paypal, was used once). The links are still available on this blog, from the support button above (left if desktop).

I kept the buy me a coffee app, which is the only one that people have used, and still people uninstall it so soon that Play Store refunds it. If you are wondering how can I subsist by earning nothing the answer is simple: android is (currently) a free-time thing that I do because I really like it. 

I don't like ads, will never add them, and also I don't like when an app is limited and you need to pay for advanced or extended features. However, after checking other similar apps and projects, I found that a similar and good-for-me alternative is to have the same exact app but paid. This paid version is exactly the same one, except for the color, which is yellow instead of green. All the features are, and will be, on the free version. In fact the donation version has less features, because it doesn't includes the translations (only english and spanish) because they were made by users, so I don't want to use them on a paid app. But if you want to support me, now you can with a cosmetic purchase (which is common nowadays).

You can find all the exact information about the new donation version on the play store page:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.trianguloy.openInWhatsapp.donation

New app: Url checker (V 0.0)

Its new app time!

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.trianguloy.urlchecker

This is a tool that I have personally used myself over the past few months, but now it is publicly available for anyone to use! (still as a beta). As usual no ads, no extra permissions, you know how it goes.

Check the description about the exact details of the app, but a quick summary is: when you open a link (an url), instead of opening it directly in the browser you can open it on this app, which acts as a middle step to check, review, scan, edit and even share the url before really opening it. Specially useful when you need to click links on emails or external apps. The app is based on a modular setup, with different modules you can enable/disable. Currently only three modules are available, but I expect more to come. The code is also on GitHub (https://github.com/TrianguloY/UrlChecker) so others can contribute.