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Amazon Kindle SDK Beta Applications now open

33 points by andymism 17y ago

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ericd 17y ago
Besides reading-related apps, what types of apps is the Kindle more suited to over, say the iPhone/iPad/any other smart phone? From what I've seen, the refresh rate seems to limit its usefulness, such that any non-reading centric app would be at best a poor cousin of apps on those other devices. Am I missing an elephant in the room?
- jamesbritt 17y ago
  Some of my initial excitement was dampened when I saw the specs. Not that there aren't interesting things to be done, but full-blown multimedia seems unlikely.
  - waterlesscloud 17y ago
    You could probably do a MYST-like. Beyond that, probably not a lot of multimedia.
- Tichy 17y ago
  Maybe one could create a really cool reading app.
- sliverstorm 17y ago
  An example just popped into my head- something like google maps (perhaps even google maps itself) could work extremely well (with the large screen) if you make route finding, zoom, etc, seamless enough you don't need to drag the map around. (and by seamless what I really meant was 'right on the first try')
- andymism 17y ago
  One of the things I'll be excited to see (or develop, if I'm fast enough) would be a social note taking app integrated into the reader, shared among a book club for example. There are plenty of constraints (slow screen refresh, not ideal user interaction) but who knows, some good new ideas might be born to work around them.
MikeCapone 17y ago
Got this on Chromium (Mac): "Your browser is not fully supported"
- Zev 17y ago
  Same here, with Safari 4. Looks like it worked fine after spoofing the user agent though.
davidw 17y ago
Since it's J2ME, I signed up to see if I can port Hecl to it. What with the slow screen, an interpreter won't be the limiting factor.
wheels 17y ago
Wow, three strikes on first contact. I'm becoming less and less enthused: - Your browser is not supported (Safari or Chrome) Uhm, seriously? We're still doing that? I mean, I get it for IE 6, sort of, but it's not like there was some huge complex app hiding behind there; it was a text form. - We'll get back to you Wait, wasn't that what this was? I needed to to sign up and fill out questions, just like last time, so that I could still not download anything? - Space is limited Amazon might run out of interwebs? "The interenet is not a big truck..."
- sliverstorm 17y ago
  Well, it's not like they didn't let me in (Chrome). It was just a warning. The first time was a 'please notify me when the beta is even out' dude, space is always limited in betas, and not because they don't have enough interwebs. No offense man, but it sounds like you're getting upset because it's not working flawlessly and just the way you expected right off the bat. It's an early beta from a company that hasn't (to my knowledge) ever even done a release like this before.
- andymism 17y ago
  I thought the 'browser not supported' message was odd too. I got that message while signing up using my iPhone, but it seemed to work just fine.
GavinB 17y ago
Anyone interested in doing some development work for this platform? I don't have a specific project yet but would love to make contact with some J2ME hackers. Please e-mail me: gavinobrown at gmail.
- asmithmd1 17y ago
  Here is the Javadocs for the kindle specific stuff: http://kdk-javadocs.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html http://kdk-javadocs.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html Nothing too exciting. No sound, no location.
  - GavinB 17y ago
    I didn't realize there was no sound. That's a disappointment.
  - Mark_B 17y ago
    I wonder how long the no location will last. After all, hitting Alt-1 show current location in google maps in the browser.
sliverstorm 17y ago
I'm still amazed at the stuff everyone's getting so caught up on. So what if it's not just like every other mobile computing device? Maybe it's time to think about the problem differently. There's a ton of things that can be done without a high refresh rate. Some video games, and videos, are just about the only things that require the high refresh rate, and the Kindle is NOT a game platform.
Groxx 17y ago
Still peeved that your program must "not be a generic reader". They'll swing their weight around, or they wouldn't have that language in there.

33 points by andymism 17y ago

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ericd 17y ago

Besides reading-related apps, what types of apps is the Kindle more suited to over, say the iPhone/iPad/any other smart phone? From what I've seen, the refresh rate seems to limit its usefulness, such that any non-reading centric app would be at best a poor cousin of apps on those other devices. Am I missing an elephant in the room?

jamesbritt 17y ago
Some of my initial excitement was dampened when I saw the specs. Not that there aren't interesting things to be done, but full-blown multimedia seems unlikely.
- waterlesscloud 17y ago
  You could probably do a MYST-like. Beyond that, probably not a lot of multimedia.
Tichy 17y ago
Maybe one could create a really cool reading app.
sliverstorm 17y ago
An example just popped into my head- something like google maps (perhaps even google maps itself) could work extremely well (with the large screen) if you make route finding, zoom, etc, seamless enough you don't need to drag the map around. (and by seamless what I really meant was 'right on the first try')
andymism 17y ago
One of the things I'll be excited to see (or develop, if I'm fast enough) would be a social note taking app integrated into the reader, shared among a book club for example. There are plenty of constraints (slow screen refresh, not ideal user interaction) but who knows, some good new ideas might be born to work around them.

MikeCapone 17y ago

Got this on Chromium (Mac): "Your browser is not fully supported"

Zev 17y ago
Same here, with Safari 4. Looks like it worked fine after spoofing the user agent though.

davidw 17y ago

Since it's J2ME, I signed up to see if I can port Hecl to it. What with the slow screen, an interpreter won't be the limiting factor.

wheels 17y ago

Wow, three strikes on first contact. I'm becoming less and less enthused: - Your browser is not supported (Safari or Chrome) Uhm, seriously? We're still doing that? I mean, I get it for IE 6, sort of, but it's not like there was some huge complex app hiding behind there; it was a text form. - We'll get back to you Wait, wasn't that what this was? I needed to to sign up and fill out questions, just like last time, so that I could still not download anything? - Space is limited Amazon might run out of interwebs? "The interenet is not a big truck..."

sliverstorm 17y ago
Well, it's not like they didn't let me in (Chrome). It was just a warning. The first time was a 'please notify me when the beta is even out' dude, space is always limited in betas, and not because they don't have enough interwebs. No offense man, but it sounds like you're getting upset because it's not working flawlessly and just the way you expected right off the bat. It's an early beta from a company that hasn't (to my knowledge) ever even done a release like this before.
andymism 17y ago
I thought the 'browser not supported' message was odd too. I got that message while signing up using my iPhone, but it seemed to work just fine.

GavinB 17y ago

Anyone interested in doing some development work for this platform? I don't have a specific project yet but would love to make contact with some J2ME hackers. Please e-mail me: gavinobrown at gmail.

asmithmd1 17y ago
Here is the Javadocs for the kindle specific stuff: http://kdk-javadocs.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html http://kdk-javadocs.s3.amazonaws.com/index.html Nothing too exciting. No sound, no location.
- GavinB 17y ago
  I didn't realize there was no sound. That's a disappointment.
- Mark_B 17y ago
  I wonder how long the no location will last. After all, hitting Alt-1 show current location in google maps in the browser.

sliverstorm 17y ago

I'm still amazed at the stuff everyone's getting so caught up on. So what if it's not just like every other mobile computing device? Maybe it's time to think about the problem differently. There's a ton of things that can be done without a high refresh rate. Some video games, and videos, are just about the only things that require the high refresh rate, and the Kindle is NOT a game platform.

Groxx 17y ago

Still peeved that your program must "not be a generic reader". They'll swing their weight around, or they wouldn't have that language in there.