Welcome to Dear Dr. Laptynx, a new series we’re launching that answer some of the most common questions we get from TapLynx builders. You can always feel free to ask the Doctor questions by emailing feedback@taplynx.com. Please make sure to include “Dr. Laptynx” somewhere in your subject line.
Dear Dr. Laptynx-
Recently, I’ve been feeling like my app has been behaving oddly, it seems like the views are empty, but if I’m patient, I can tell they’re just taking a long time loading. What’s wrong? Can you help?
Slow in Sonoma
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Dear Slow,
Yes, of course Dr. Laptynx can help. Lie back on the couch and tell me when you first started having these feelings. Was it when you added too many feeds at once, or when you used large images? These are the two main causes of these symptoms.In both cases, the problem is generally that the poor little device is getting overwhelmed with data on the network. Trying to load from many feeds all at once, or having large images in the app can quickly use up all the available network bandwidth, and slows all loading to a crawl.
The solution is to use fewer feeds (maybe you should have two apps instead of just one?) and make sure your images are sized appropriately for mobile.What is that appropriate size? Well, even the nicest iPhone 4 screen only shows 640 x 960 pixels at one time, so remember that, and also realize that its one thing to send one 100K image over a 3G wireless network, but 10 of them suddenly approaches a megabyte and soon you’re going to be completely filling your connection.Someday, hopefully medicine will have a cure, networks and processors will be faster, and software will be improved.
Until then, take two apps and call me in the morning.
I’ll bill your insurance.
Dr. Laptynx