Version 3 Upgrade FAQ

NextPage 3

Welcome to the new home base of NextPage! Many of you have been requesting more information about the upcoming release of version 3. We've listed the most common questions below.

When will NextPage 3 be available?

Thursday, May 26th, 2016

What are the new features?

There are literally dozens of new features and enhancements. Here are the highlights:

• Landscape mode - When the iPad is turned sideways, NextPage will now enlarge the music and show it one half page at a time. Scrolling is vertical instead of horizontal when in landscape, and Page Links will jump to the top or bottom half of a page per your needs.
• Zooming/Cropping - Cropping is handy way to remove unnecessary margin space around the music.
• "Just Play" mode - Just Play eliminates the need to create a set list. Just randomly play from your Song List.
• Audio Player - You can associate a song from your iTunes music library with your sheet music and then play it while you rehearse.
• Shape Tools - You can now easily draw a number of geometric and musical shapes including squares, circles, straight lines, arrows, crescendo/decrescendo, music staves, and guitar tabs.
• Set Lists can be emailed to other NextPage users.
• The same song can now be added to a set list multiple times.
• Improved metronome animations - The new animations were a result of many of hours of live use and are more useful than before.
• Set lists can be easily duplicated with a single tap.
• The upward "flick to delete" gesture from iOS has been added to "My Sets" so you quickly delete set lists.
• More symbols have been added to the symbol tool, including various notes (eights, quarters, halves, whole). Combined with the music staff shape, you can quickly mark down riffs and intros/outros.
• iPad Pro support - NextPage takes advantage of the larger screen to make interacting the the lists and menus easier. Apple Pencil support is planned for a future release.
• Performance Improvements. NextPage works better on older iPads with large PDF files.
• Support for iCloud Drive.

Will I automatically get NextPage 3 because I own NextPage 2?

NP3 will be a new app in the App Store, so you will not automatically be upgraded. When NP3 becomes available, NP2 will be removed from the store to prevent new customers from accidentally purchasing the old version.

Must I upgrade?

Even though NP2 will be removed from the store, it will continue to work on your iPad, however:

• You will receive no further updates or fixes.
• You will not be able to install NP2 on a new device unless you have backups of your iPad to iCloud or your Mac/PC.
• And Most Importantly: When Apple releases new versions of iOS, usually every Fall in the United States, NP2 may no longer function correctly.

If NextPage is your music app of choice, we strongly encourage you to upgrade to version 3.

Will NextPage 3 work OK on my existing iPad?

We've tried very hard to make NP3 perfectly usable on everything from iPad 2 to iPad Pro, so your existing iPad will work just fine. With that said, newer iPads are obviously faster and have more memory, so they will naturally provide a better experience. As you've undoubtedly noticed, Apple's new versions of iOS always seem to make older iPads feel a bit slower with every new release. This is particularly true of the now 4-year old iPad 3, which was barely capable of driving its Retina display even in 2012. In fact, the older iPad 2 actually still performs better. If you are still using an iPad 3, it may be time to consider an upgrade, regardless of whether you're running NextPage.

Will I have to reload my music and markups?

If you have a Dropbox account, you can use the backup/restore function in both NP2 and NP3 to backup everything from NP2 and then restore it into NP3. Depending on the number and size of your PDF files, and the quality of your network connectivity, it may take multiple attempts to get everything moved over. It shouldn't take you long however; one of our beta testers happily reloaded their collection of 6,200+ PDF files into NP3 in a single day!

What will it cost?

NextPage has always been a pay-for app. The price hasn't changed much since 2010, and many long-time users have enjoyed 5+ years of upgrades at no additional charge. All of the costs of keeping up with Apple's never-ending onslaught of iOS updates and devices, as well as providing new features have never been passed on to you.

NextPage 3 will not be a free upgrade for three primary reasons:

• First, as mentioned above, we have never charged for upgrades, and that practice is no longer financially sustainable.
• Second, NP3 has been a major undertaking, and the significant costs of bringing it to you must be recouped, for just as in any other profession, software developers and graphics designers must be paid.
• And third, by being a separate app, it can exist alongside NP2, so that in the rare event a terrible bug somehow slips through the testing process, the old version will be there to fall back on in an emergency.

NextPage 3 will be Free-To-Try, meaning it can be downloaded for free and used with limits. Those limits will be: up to 5 songs in the song list and 1 set list with up to 3 songs. All features except backup/restore will be unlocked and available. An in-app purchase will be required to remove the limits.

The price of the in-app purchase is being finalized now, but it will be higher than the price you paid for NextPage 2. However, there will be a substantial discount for a brief period during the launch. The reason for the initial discount period is to give our faithful, long-time customers a chance to upgrade at less than full price. If you want to make sure not to miss out on the discount, please take a moment to sign up for the mailing list. Since Apple does not share customer information with us, we have no other way of knowing how to contact you.

Why the price increase?

Our original business plan in 2010 called for charging $7-$10 dollars every year by doing new annual versions every time Apple upgraded iOS. For various reasons, plans changed and that didn't happen, but if it had, the total cost you would have paid over time would be close to $50 dollars. From this perspective, we believe NP3 will be fairly priced, especially in light of the many new features that have been added. Many other app makers (the ones that have actually stayed in business) do charge for every new version. Viewed from another perspective, NextPage is a tool, and good tools, even for musicians, always carry a cost. A happy side-effect of free-to-try may apply to those of you who are K-12 school music teachers. You can probably now run your classroom on NextPage for free.

Launch Day Notification

If you would like to be notified on the day NextPage 3 becomes available, please click this link. Again, since Apple does not share customer names, we have no other way of contacting you. We will send you the direct App Store link to NP3 to save you the time of searching through the store. This will be the best way for you not to miss out on the substantial discount during the launch period.

As always, thanks for your continued support and interest in NextPage. It continues to be our genuine pleasure to serve you!