[Partial]

Hi Guys,

I'm not sure if this is cool or not, but as a long time poster I'm going for it.

I recently released a free app called PaperBox. It is a basically a document scanner with some powerful features that is built on the cloud storage of Dropbox. I built this app because I didn't think the existing tools were particularly good, and made it challenging to share and keep track of documents. Basically, I wanted something to keep track of business documents - there are lots of apps out there for keeping track of receipt, but very few for keeping track of documents. The "killer app", in my opinion anyway, is the ability to take photos of a document, and have it automatically sync and be categorized & searchable on my MBP right away. I'm using something called "OCR" to read in the text of an image and store the keywords within the pdf for searching.

PaperBox stores all user data in Dropbox, so it's very secure, and it keeps track of your documents over time. It's really meant to be more of a document management system than a document scanner.

I would love it if you guys would take a look at the web app, web site and mobile app and give me some feedback. I've tried to have some people beta test it but they give me really unhelpful things like "it's great, we love everything about it", etc.

So far, adoption has been pretty slow. I have had one user register. I haven't really done any marketing as I don't really know how to do that.

The app in the app store is simply PaperBox. The web app is found at https://www.gopaperbox.com. I will gladly return the favor and provide feedback on any apps/sites/whatever for anyone else interested. I personally find it very challenging to step away from my work and tell if something makes sense and is user friendly, etc.

Thank you!

[Capella]

I will have to check this out after work. Gotta admit I'd probably mostly use it for receipts, but I enjoy monkey testing applications.

[Partial]

Originally Posted by Capella I will have to check this out after work. Gotta admit I'd probably mostly use it for receipts, but I enjoy monkey testing applications.

Thanks, I appreciate it. It can be used for receipts, too, but it doesn't have any sort of built-in reporting or anything like that.

I have considered building something like that, but one thing at a time

[Partial]

Well, I'm a little discouraged. The app has been out 4 days and there have been about 22 downloads, 3 log-ins, and 0 documents scanned

That's about 500 hours down the drain.

[turtle]

It takes time for something to pick up steam. Plus, most haven't thought about using a camera to scan in something when a flatbed scanner is what most people think about with a scanned document.

[709]

Random incoming thoughts: I know, these are strictly aesthetic things, but hey, you asked for feedback. take em or leave em.

• The color of blue picked for the icon doesn't work for me. It seems too generic. The doc box graphic is meant to convey all those cardboard things left behind, so why not a nice light brownish color to remind those of what is supposed to leave behind? Blue is just, eh. Speaking of - the lid on your box graphic is like, one pixel too tall. It looks fat and unrealistic. Shave the top off a smidge.
• Any reason why you didn't round the corners on the app icon at the top of the web page? That's the keenest way to say "app" and not web app. Maybe, if you don't want to go balls out rounded like everyone else, clip the edges at 45. Watch BSG, and you'll get it. I think it may look sexy with the stark icon you have going.
• That weird looking "padlock" thing on the webpage? Must go. I didn't know what the fuck it was supposed to be until I read the side description. It's not a bad idea, but the icon is shite. What kind of security do you have when I could bite through your padlock that's like a hair thin?
• The icon for "A Few Hours" points to 9:00. For me, that says the same thing as "This Evening". Maybe change it to 3:00? "A few" is 3, traditionally, and it would move it from "tonight" and more towards "this afternoon".

I could go on nitpicking about the icons, but overall I think you've done a great job. The website looks nice, the photos are pro, and I hope the best for you. It's a hard game to get recognized, I'm sure.

[drewprops]

Just downloaded app, wanted to dick around with a scan to try out that functionality but I have to connect my Dropbox first. I assume that's because it has to be stored somewhere right away?

[Partial]

Originally Posted by 709 Random incoming thoughts: I know, these are strictly aesthetic things, but hey, you asked for feedback. take em or leave em. The color of blue picked for the icon doesn't work for me. It seems too generic. The doc box graphic is meant to convey all those cardboard things left behind, so why not a nice light brownish color to remind those of what is supposed to leave behind? Blue is just, eh. Speaking of - the lid on your box graphic is like, one pixel too tall. It looks fat and unrealistic. Shave the top off a smidge. Any reason why you didn't round the corners on the app icon at the top of the web page? That's the keenest way to say "app" and not web app. Maybe, if you don't want to go balls out rounded like everyone else, clip the edges at 45. Watch BSG, and you'll get it. I think it may look sexy with the stark icon you have going. That weird looking "padlock" thing on the webpage? Must go. I didn't know what the fuck it was supposed to be until I read the side description. It's not a bad idea, but the icon is shite. What kind of security do you have when I could bite through your padlock that's like a hair thin? The icon for "A Few Hours" points to 9:00. For me, that says the same thing as "This Evening". Maybe change it to 3:00? "A few" is 3, traditionally, and it would move it from "tonight" and more towards "this afternoon". I could go on nitpicking about the icons, but overall I think you've done a great job. The website looks nice, the photos are pro, and I hope the best for you. It's a hard game to get recognized, I'm sure.

Wow, awesome feedback! I'll take a look at those things. I'm not exactly sure what you mean with the logo and what is BSG?

Originally Posted by drewprops Just downloaded app, wanted to dick around with a scan to try out that functionality but I have to connect my Dropbox first. I assume that's because it has to be stored somewhere right away?

That's correct. Dropbox is used for authentication AND storage. I could make it so it doesn't need to authenticate until you try to save something? Does that make it less of a barrier to entry?

[drewprops]

Originally Posted by Partial That's correct. Dropbox is used for authentication AND storage. I could make it so it doesn't need to authenticate until you try to save something? Does that make it less of a barrier to entry?

Yeah, if you could give us a minute to see exactly how well it actually delivers on the scanning end then maybe the user would say "well heck, I could see this being useful".

It feels like a big commitment to hook up services to each other, having an opportunity for a few "first dates" might be helpful.

Is this feedback helpful?


...

[Partial]

Originally Posted by drewprops Yeah, if you could give us a minute to see exactly how well it actually delivers on the scanning end then maybe the user would say "well heck, I could see this being useful". It feels like a big commitment to hook up services to each other, having an opportunity for a few "first dates" might be helpful. Is this feedback helpful? ...

It is helpful. It may be challenging, but that's the fun of it.

[Brad]

Originally Posted by Partial and what is BSG?

Kidding aside, turtle's right. Even if you've been marketing the hell out of on social networks, ads, etc., you can't expect a huge turnout in the first few days of 1.0 availability. I hope things start looking up!

[709]

Originally Posted by Partial Wow, awesome feedback! I'll take a look at those things. I'm not exactly sure what you mean with the logo and what is BSG?

Phew. I wasn't sure you'd be receptive to strictly design stuff.

I tried the 45 idea last night, and it just didn't work (BSG= Battlestar Galactica, btw - watch it now ) but I'm liking the brown. This is with the top shaved off 2 pixels as well:



Rounding the edges could be mo sexy.

[addabox]

Oh hell, I'll chime in. On the app home page, I see what's happening with the text/graphics as you scroll down-- so many pixels from each top division to the graphic, text slightly down from that-- but the one with the padlock feels off. Every other graphic is a screen shot/phone image, which gives you a tidy margin against the text level and a nice tick-tock LR rhythm. But the graphically slight loop of the lock makes that section feel unbalanced with too much white space, and interrupts the downward flow. Kind of "tick clunk tick tock tick."

Maybe you could kill two birds (ala 709's third item in the list) by beefing up the feel of the lock and putting it on a rectangular background, which I think would also help the sense of solidity that's the point of that section. You want the lock to hold the space instead of floating, and maintain the cadence.

Realize this has nothing to do with the app per se, just my two cents.

[Partial]

Really great feedback guys!

I'm not a graphic guy at all, so it is really useful to get some feedback. I made all the graphics using a combination of Pixelmator (which is really, really good) and open source icon fonts (Font Awesome, Ionicons).

I've decided to make a "Demo" mode for when you first launch the app so you can do some scanning without logging in with Dropbox. Hopefully that gets more people to play around with it.

Thank you guys so much! I really appreciate the feedback. This project has been really fun. From a technical perspective, it is a NodeJS project using MongoDb, and then I'm using AngularJS and Twitter bootstrap for the web stuff. I have really learned a ton of new technologies implementing it, so even if no one uses it, it has certainly helped me out!

I cannot say enough good things about Pixelmator. I have never used Photoshop, only Gimp and something called Seashore, so using Pixelmator was a mind blowing experience. It is one of my favorite pieces of software ever!

[Partial]

I really like the brown logo. Hmm. Now THAT is something to think about. That's a deep rabbit hole for me since I'm a total graphics n00b, but I do like how it is!

We are getting ready to do a significant update with much of the feedback found here. I'll keep you guys posted on it.

[Partial]

I have released a significant update to the app.

A) it is now a super beautiful iOS 7 experience

B) I've added a demo mode so you can play around with and try it out before entering your Dropbox information.

Please check it out guys!

www.gopaperbox.com, PaperBox!

[drewprops]

I'll update now!!