Desktop/Laptop Software

[sad91171]

Please create a software program for those of us who use laptops, macbooks or netbooks to score games, rather than iPhones or iPads.

[FTMSupport]

If there is enough demand, we may add it in the future. As of now, the most demand still comes from the mobile community. Thank you.

[therockbaseball]

I too would like to see a laptop version that could coincide with the iphone/android system just in case I wanted to use my laptop for home games and droid for away.

[BJWanlund]

I'm right there with the other 2 folks who posted they wanted that. I would like that as well, just so I can keep score anywhere I go and I take my MacBook Pro with me, instead of just relying on my iPhone.

BJ

[HiReception]

I too would like to throw my glove in for a Windows version; I have an iPhone, but I don't have an iPad (yet), and am hesitant to purchase the iPhone version now, when the iPad version (which is most likely superior in every way) costs extra.

Being able to take my laptop, a netbook, or even a tablet, would be a huge winner for getting a Windows netbook instead of an iPad, even if it were to cost the same as the iPad version. But, hey, that's just me.

[OhioTex]

HiReception - the iphone version is a relatively cheap investment compared to an ipad or laptop, if you are interested in electronic scoring and have an iphone. I encourage you to give iscore a try, the iphone version has all the functionality of the ipad version, and it can run on the ipad if/when you go there. The iPad version with more screen space just "makes more pages visible at once" than the iphone can but the features are the same. and learning curve is transferable

[Royce in ATL]

I agree. This would be a great feature I would buy especially if it would interact with my iPad.

I would mostly like to be able to transfer files from my iPad to my Macbook, edit them and send them back.

[FTMSupport]

What would people be willing to spend on a product created for a laptop? The App Store has really messed with people's concept of the cost of software. We still occasionally get people saying $9.99 is a lot. There is an expectation of things being 99 cents because of Apple. When a product appeals to everyone in the universe, or is a game that can be written in a week or two, it may be possible to get by on charging 99 cents. But iScore is a very in depth product with many layers of functionality and years of evolving at this point. The audience is also much much smaller than an "Angry Birds" or a "Doodle Jump", yet the time spent on development is much longer than those products. People don't think back to before the App Store when Software that does anything close to what we are doing cost 10x that amount or more --- especially on a computer.

We also have to consider support costs for a platform. Already at $9.99, we only get 70% of that (Apple takes a 30% cut). So we get $7. If there is ONE support email from a customer that takes any significant amount of time at all to figure out, we have already lost money on that sale in terms of the time spent to support the customer.

The iOS universe limits the number of support issues because we know that everyone is running the same hardware. Android is a bit tougher because there are many types of Android devices. Creating software for a laptop world would in theory take much more support because there are so many variations, crashes, etc that have nothing to do with the software itself.

Just bringing this up to let people know what we have to consider when making a decision to develop for a new platform.

[danmcc]

I've followed this thread a bit to see where it would go, the question I keep asking myself is how would a desktop/laptop version be used?

Certainly a desktop is not going to be used at a game unless it was a permanent computer at a press box which I would think have limited audience. But I could see the request being made for games scored on a device then viewed or manipulated on a desktop. Again a limited audience and would that audience actually purchase 2 versions just to be able to manipulate via desktop. Additionally what functionality on a desktop would be different that using the administrative site?

Laptop, a better case could be made for marketing here as a laptop could reasonably be taken to a game, but how many really would? Laptops can be bulky and I can't imagine holding one for 2 hours for a game let alone a double header or for travel ball 4-5 games a weekend. Additionally for coaches it would not be practical to have a laptop in the dugout.

Cost of a laptop varies but $500 would seem like a good average but I am guessing. I took a quick look on Ebay and a used Itouch 3rd generation is going for about $100 bucks. Would I want to risk my laptop on a foul ball or an Itouch more easily protected and gives the user more ability to avoid foul ball contact?

Just my thoughts. I am not necessarily against the software request, I am just having a hard time getting my mind around how it would be used for a mass market.

[Jaskegreen]

Our league tried moving to a "high tech" scorekeeping software on laptops a couple of years ago. Granted it wasn't iScore, but I think the laptops had a part in the whole thing flopping. The touch devices these days are way more intuitive and generally [adult] users engage them with less fear. We are trying it again, this time with iPads and iScore. As the person heading up this endeavor, I feel we have a much better chance of success than the prior experience.

On a personal note, my laptop has way too many moving parts for me to be comfortable having it at the baseball park. The dirt alone and all the possibilities of damaging the computer are enough to throw down a Ben (noted above) for an iPod Touch. Just my $.02.

Cheers,
Jason