Do not run dictionary discovery every time application starts up.

[itkach]

(Originally reported by itkach on Sep 19, 2010 at BitBucket)

When application starts it brings up it's dictionary service which runs dictionary discovery. Dictionary discovery may take a while depending on the contents of SD card and speed of device. Normally the dictionary service keeps running in the background even if user navigates away from the application, but the system may shut it down at any time if device is low on resources, so lengthy dictionary discovery potentially may run every time user starts UI.

One alternative to dictionary auto discovery would be letting users manually specify where dictionaries are similar to how it works in Aard Dictionary for desktop. However Android UI design guidelines discourage exposing low level system elements like file system to the user and Android does not provide standard widgets to do this.

Perhaps dictionary service on startup should simply try reopen the dictionaries from the last time and only run dictionary discovery automatically if no dictionaries could be found.

This was originally reported against Aard Dictionary (aarddict/desktop#9)

[itkach]

(Commented by anonymous on Sep 19, 2010 at BitBucket)

Thanks for replying!

"As an experiment can you leave just dictionary files on your SD card and see
if that speeds up discovery?"

I did put the dictionary files on sdcard root.The searching per se doesn't
bother me, I just hope it starts when necessary. Maybe it could go this way:
try reopen the dictionaries from the last time and only run dictionary
discovery automatically if no dictionaries could be found, and can be manually
started as needed, like when you put a new dictionary file into the SDcard.

"As for Google search box popping up - I haven't seen it myself and this has
not been reported so far, so I wonder if you have some non-standard settings
that may cause this behavior. What device do you have and what is the version
of Android it runs?"

Well, it does happen on my device. Either the google search box pops up or the
typing doesn't work. I have to go back to the home screen and start Aard
again. I'm using Samsung GT-I5700 firmware version,2.1-update 1
baseband:i570EZWJD3 kernel version:2.6.29,leshak@i5700-dev 7 #65 build
number:LeshaK's Kernel v.LK2.01.1

I have this issue videotaped, just don't know how to post it here.

I like this program very much, Aard is the best offline wikipedia reader I've
ever tried.It would be perfect if this issue was solved.

[itkach]

(Commented by itkach on Sep 20, 2010 at BitBucket)

"I did put the dictionary files on sdcard root". This is not about being in
root - dictionary discovery scans the whole SD card, so the more files and
directories it has the longer it takes.

Google search box popping up looks like a different issue, I opened issue #2 to track it. Video would be very helpful, you should be able to
attach the file to issue #2 (you probably need to open account at bitbucket.org and log in though).

[itkach]

(Commented by itkach on Oct 06, 2010 at BitBucket)

Revise application startup flow so that dictionary discovery is not run
automatically (see #1).

Now the application will simply open previously opened dictionaries. If none
were open user will be presented with Dictionaries activity to initiate SD
card scan to find dictionaries before proceeding to Lookup activity.

This should also fix intermittent search box breakage (see #2) which
appears to have been the result of looking for/loading dictionaries progress
dialogs popping up and stealing focus from the search box at a bad moment.

[itkach]

Resolved in 1.1