Flash Alternative OR App?

[guytal]

This is not a buyer issue, it's an issue for me (seller) as I'm not able to help my customers (re-activete links etc.) when I'm in the field, which is often. I'm also not able to view reports.



That aside, the thread above states that E-Junkie has been working on an HTML interface for well over a year now. Can we please have an update on the status and when we can expect it to be available?



Thanks,

Guy

[cbjason]

The reliance on Flash and lack of a solution in over a year is an issue for both buyers and sellers...



I say monthly service fees should be waived until the issue is fixed...

[guytal]

E-junkieGuru, I'm trying not to read too much into the silence on this thread. Respectfully, I think I'm not alone in wanting an update on something that was promised well over a year ago. Is there a reason this status cannot be provided? I think we are all wondering if E-Junkie plans to make good on its promise.



Guy

[E-junkie_Guru]

E-junkie Admin has never worked on the iPhone or other devices that don't support Flash, so it's not something broken that needs to be fixed; it's entirely new functionality that needs to be built up from scratch, since nothing of the current Flash/ActionScript-based Admin can be carried over as-is to the new DHTML-based Admin. Quite a lot of the configuration logic is managed in the ActionScript layer of things, so it's been really tedious, thorny work replicating that from the ground up in an entirely different scripting language.



Development keeps their cards pretty close to the vest, so we in Support cannot report on their progress nor make any promises as to when they will be done with any given project. I can only say the new Admin being completed is definitely a matter of "when", not "if". I really wish I could say more, but I just don't have any more to say; we in Support just aren't privy to that information.

[yourhead]

It's going on 18 months since the first mention of this. Is it still actually "in the works"????

[E-junkie_Ninja]

Yes, setting up a non-flash based version of our Seller Admin is a main goal of our development group. However, this is no simple task, it requires not just re-writing our entire website, but it also requires that we re-write the back end of our system and how it works as well.

[cbjason]

I work for a software development company that supplies educational software to ove 125 K-12 schools, in 4 months we have been through 2 phases of ipad app development, and already have the app in the marketplace in iTunes. we staff 1 (yes that is ne, no typo) programmer for ipad dev work. he did it in 4 months.



I would venture to guess you have at LEAST 125 customers...



Seriously...how long does it take...?



wtf?

[E-junkie_Guru]

I understand your concern, but that's an apples to oranges comparison, or perhaps more accurately, an apples to farmers-market comparison -- it's one thing to build a stand to sell your apples, quite another to reproduce an existing farmers market from scratch using completely different construction methods and raw materials while incorporating major improvements and provisions for continued expansion.



This project has also been delayed by our Founder and Lead Developer last year having assumed stewardship of the family business which owned the company he'd founded to operate E-junkie (you may have noticed our business name changed last year from 19.5 Degrees to that of the larger family business, Sine Info Ventures Pvt. Ltd.), so Admin redevelopment was basically on hold until he got up to speed on unfamiliar aspects of that business and ensured its affairs would continue to be conducted competently before returning his fuller attention to E-junkie, as he has finally been able to do in recent months.



We are thankful to all our clientele for your patience and understanding as we work through these growing pains on our way to becoming an even better and more mature and flexible e-commerce solution.

[whispers]

Is this built with AS2 or AS3.. Im going to say AS2 since its been up for a while?

[E-junkie_Guru]

Offhand, I'm not sure; I'll have to ask Development to clarify that.

[cynthia]

Does eJunkie work properly on an Android tablet or iPad? I'm thinking about getting a Samsung tablet so I can manage customers away from the office.

[E-junkie_Guru]

Our current Admin is built in Flash, which is not supported on Apple iOS devices such as the iPad and iPhone, but it should work fine on Android devices that have the Flash plugin installed.

[cynthia]

Any update on this? I just bought the new Samsung Galaxy Note S2 phone on Jelly Bean and can't log into eJunkie. I need a way to send customers download links from my phone. Maybe you could set up an app for this function? eJunkie has been talking for years about moving to HTML5.



How do I get the Flash plugin installed on Jelly Bean? It's no longer supported in Google Play Store.

[E-junkie_Guru]

It appears Adobe has stopped supporting Flash for all Linux-based platforms including Android, so Google has dropped support for it as of Android 4.x "Jelly Bean".



However, it's still possible to manually install the last version of Flash that Adobe released for Android, along with a browser that can still support the Flash plugin (namely Firefox or Dolphin) if you don't already have one installed. I found this page that will walk you through the procedure:

http://howto.cnet.com/8301-1131039-57554629-285/install-adobe-flash-player-on-jelly-bean-devices/

[cynthia]

Have you guys at eJunkie tried to manually install Flash and were able to log into eJunkie?



Here's my experience:

I tried it today and the Flash plugin successfully installed on my Android Jelly Bean phone. It successfully brought up the eJunkie login screen, so I was hopeful but after I entered my login credentials, clicking on the "Submit" button yield no response. I tried it on both the Dolphin browser and FireFox and neither browser would allow me to Submit my login info. There was no response.

[guytal]

Perhaps a better question is whether eJunkie is still being actively developed. A non-Flash interface was requested (and promised) a very long time ago and seems to be getting no attention. In fact, I don't recall seeing any new development (features, etc.) this past year at all. Adobe made it clear that they do not plan on supporting Flash on mobile devices, which many of us are becoming increasingly more reliant on. What's the plan to keep eJunkie viable/usable going forward?

[E-junkie_Guru]

I've asked Development to look into the trouble Cynthia reported above. Though we're always making back-end improvements behind the scenes, our current, Flash-based Admin panel is the reason you haven't seen any major new front-end features lately; it's just become too complex and crufty to modify anymore without breaking it in unpredictable ways, and we're well aware that it's becoming an obsolete technology.



Most major feature/functionality improvements are "backed up behind the dam" of a new HTML-based Admin panel that we can actually modify to add new settings/controls to manage those features. We've been making steady progress on the new Admin project since last spring, after some false starts and unexpected setbacks in 2011. I've already built the HTML templates for all but a few screens myself, and we hired an experienced new Developer last year to write the scripting to make it functional with our existing back-end. I would anticipate we should have the new Admin completed sometime this year, and then once that's fully tested and live, we can finally start implementing new features again.

[guytal]

Wow, that's great to hear! Thank you.

[E-junkie_Guru]

BTW, I found another how-to article about manually installing Flash on Android devices; this one is more detailed and includes a link to install Flash on an Android 2.2, 2.3, or 3.x device, as well as a link for Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich" and 4.1 "Jelly Bean":

http://www.ccl-la.com/blog/index.php/installing-adobe-flash-player-on-android-devices/



I notice it specifically recommends the Dolphin browser, so maybe Firefox for Android doesn't properly support the Flash plugin anymore? Whichever browser you can get working with Flash, you don't have to use it for all your Web browsing, just for sites where you need to use Flash, such as e-junkie.com.

[cynthia]

I'm hoping early this year rather than later! Thanks for the update.