Dev update - February Mid Month

Quick Dev update on what's next...

Pushing towards Release

Right now almost our entire focus is on getting bugs squashed and pushing towards a full release this month.  We're taking feedback from the Alpha, and fixing bugs left and right as they come in.  Setting time from the config page was fixed tonight, as was the Shuffle behavior that was broken.  We have a bunch of layout fixes for Landscape vs. Portrait for the config page, and smaller tweaks as well.  We'll continue to work on it with the intent of getting things cleaned up so we can get back to a fully stable build, and get the months of goodness (overlays, wifi, offline mode, EXIF data, sorting, and Unicode support) out to all users.
What is coming soon

In parallel I'm working to restore Frame sync. I expect to have it done fairly quckly so we can have that feature back.  I'm investigating an 'autodetect' feature as well that would scan the network for other frames so that linking them for syncing is easier.

Other work is likely going to be to slow down and catch up on documentation and video tutorials.  While I have some features burning in my brain that I'd like to get to, we are hitting a critical point where we have to pause and document many of the things we've done recently, and continue to iterate on making them easier to use.

What is coming longer term

Longer term a lot of the work we have is to finish stitching things together. 

- The overlays need to have an API so that plugins can use them.  With that comes the 'movie poster' scenarios that can be quite exciting.  

- Playlist naming/saving is another feature, and we're designing out a way to 'tag' images so you can add/remove them.  

- The Automation UI is spec'd out and you'll see a prototype currently in the alpha, that should be coming online now that we understand what it will look like.  This will enable the ability to turn it off at a certain time, and on at another time.  When combined with playlist naming this will be an incredibly useful feature I expect.

- I have an investigation on my plate to see if we can find a way to use two frames off of one pi. We investigate this every few months, and take a different stab at pulling it of.  I want to keep trying because it's one of the few things I can do to fight the pi shortage for now.

- HEIC - I have another idea for this that I want to try. I know it's painful until we figure it out.

Things may feel a bit slower this month, but it's important to take time to get to a baseline and stable.  It's what will let us run again and quickly turn around the next set of big features for March and then stabilize again in April.  

That being said, let me know if you have a feature you're most looking forward to, or if there's something you need sooner than later.  We try to always add weight to any decision based on the community feedback, so please know speaking up often matters...we'll hear you and work to get what we can in.