Parrot Player - A langauge learning tool for iPhone

Index » Learning resources

  • 1
 
Reply #1 - 2013 February 13, 6:21 am
simple101 New member
Registered: 2012-03-04 Posts: 4

Hello

I've just released a new iPhone app on the App Store.  It is free for the first 500 downloads.

It is an audio player that allows users to create short clips of anything they might want to practice or learn from longer pieces of audio.  These clips can then be played back individually or sequentially.  There is a toggle to add a pause between clips during playback if desired.

The app is not language specific.  I'm personally using it to study Spanish and a little Chinese as the moment.

If you're interested do take a look at the screencast on my website.  There are a couple of important controls that are not immediately obvious and the screencast helps with that.

http://www.parrotplayer.com/#how-to

And of course feel free to download and use the app for yourself. 

I hope you may find it useful and would love to hear any feedback.

Thanks

Sam

Reply #2 - 2013 February 13, 7:37 am
Marumaru Banned
From: ◯ Registered: 2013-01-03 Posts: 104

It would help if you could only make the screencast a bit more slow.

Reply #3 - 2013 February 13, 8:13 am
sethg Member
From: m Registered: 2008-11-07 Posts: 505

Cool! Downloaded smile

Advertising (register and sign in to hide this)
JapanesePod101 Sponsor
 
JapanesePod101
Reply #4 - 2013 February 13, 8:36 am
simple101 New member
Registered: 2012-03-04 Posts: 4

Thanks for the advice Marumaru.  I am probably going to redo the screencast in the near future - I am a little embarrassed about the current one.

Thanks sethg.   I hope you find it useful and if you have any thoughts on it let me know.

Reply #5 - 2013 February 13, 3:18 pm
Aspiring Member
From: San Diego Registered: 2012-08-13 Posts: 307

Great app, thanks big_smile

Reply #6 - 2013 February 13, 4:10 pm
simple101 New member
Registered: 2012-03-04 Posts: 4

Thanks Aspiring!

Reply #7 - 2013 April 29, 7:21 pm
gaiaslastlaugh 代理管理者
From: Seattle Registered: 2012-05-17 Posts: 525 Website

I just downloaded this and really like it. It's a great alternative on the go to using Audacity. Would gladly pay for an RTM version.

FWIW, I'd love to see a better ability within a clip to define playlists, or at least to move certain clips (dead air, e.g.) to a "wastebasket" pile. This would make it a LOT more fruitful to practice listening comprehension with TV by allowing us to trim out all of the dead air. And yes, you can do that permanently w/ Audacity, but I'd prefer to do it as I'm practicing.

Last edited by gaiaslastlaugh (2013 April 29, 7:37 pm)

Reply #8 - 2013 April 30, 9:00 am
sherlock Member
Registered: 2013-03-29 Posts: 55 Website

Downloading now! Thanks smile
Does this have a functionality of slowing down an audio clip?

Reply #9 - 2013 May 01, 11:38 am
jmignot Member
From: France Registered: 2006-03-03 Posts: 205

Great application ! Thanks for sharing.

One more suggestion: add the possibility to associate a short text to each sound chunk and to display it while the audio is played.
It could be used in connection with, for instance, the news from NHK easy (http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/easy/). One could read the corresponding text while listening to the audio.

Reply #10 - 2013 May 01, 11:45 am
gaiaslastlaugh 代理管理者
From: Seattle Registered: 2012-05-17 Posts: 525 Website

jmignot wrote:

Great application ! Thanks for sharing.

One more suggestion: add the possibility to associate a short text to each sound chunk and to display it while the audio is played. .

I would like this too. Also, in Clip Creation mode, I would also like to see the current clip highlighted in the list of clips in the player, so that I can tell quickly which part of the sound file is currently being played. Right now I have to look at the time on the playband, and match it up with the appropriate clip interval.

Reply #11 - 2013 May 04, 9:14 am
simple101 New member
Registered: 2012-03-04 Posts: 4

Thanks for downloading the app gaiaslastlaugh, sherlock and jmignot.  I really hope you find it useful, and if you do please feel free to rate/review it on the app store smile

gaiaslastlaugh wrote:

FWIW, I'd love to see a better ability within a clip to define playlists, or at least to move certain clips (dead air, e.g.) to a "wastebasket" pile. This would make it a LOT more fruitful to practice listening comprehension with TV by allowing us to trim out all of the dead air.

If I understand you correctly, gaiaslastlaugh, I think this is kind of possible with the current release, although the process could use some refining. You can set the end time of each clip by scrubbing the wave control to the desired point then holding down the end button for a second.  However, I'm rethinking the process for a future version that will be more visual and hopefully more inline with what you would like.

sherlock wrote:

Does this have a functionality of slowing down an audio clip?

At the moment this is not possible but I've had a few people request this feature.  It's very easy to implement a rudimentary slow playback feature (similar to the apple Podcasts app 0.5x playback speed) but the results are not very good (choppy).  I am hoping I can find a better way of doing it, and am holding off adding the feature until I do.

jmignot wrote:

One more suggestion: add the possibility to associate a short text to each sound chunk and to display it while the audio is played.

I will definitely look into adding this feature.

gaiaslastlaugh wrote:

in Clip Creation mode, I would also like to see the current clip highlighted in the list of clips in the player, so that I can tell quickly which part of the sound file is currently being played.

Nice idea. I will definitely look into adding this feature too.

Thank you very much for all the feedback.  I really appreciate it smile

  • 1