I couldn't find an Orthodox Calendar mobile app to my liking, so decided to make one

[E nsu3]

https://imgur.com/a/9oAgPMe

I wanted to download an Orthodox calendar but couldn’t find anything with a design to my liking. Most of them look pretty old and unintuitive. My friend and I decided to implement the calendar ourselves. And as we got to a point when we can show something, we decided to share it for those who might be interested. The app is still in development and we haven’t released it yet. Hopefully the initial version is coming this month.

The calendar gives you an opportunity to see feasts, saints and fast types for every day to keep track of major events and help with fasts.

So far we've designed basic features of the app (calendar view, settings). We’ve collaborated with a designer and are working on updating the app UI (as of now it’s more of a draft version). Also, some extra features like notifications are under development. I'll add some more technical info in the comments.

If you are interested in this app, please participate in a survey here. You can leave your feedback there and submit an email for us to contact you when the app is released. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments too. Your suggestions are welcomed!


Some additional info about the app.

It’s being developed for both Android and iOS
The app supports the following languages:

• English
• Russian
• Ukrainian

Some insights and trivia:

• Only the Android version has been tested so far. iOS will be coming with future updates.
• We considered adding a Greek translation as well. It’s on hold for now because I haven’t yet found a person to help with translation (and I experienced first hand that we can’t rely on Google Translate for sure)
• We’ve created a Facebook channel for more casual audiences there
• The development has actually been going for half of a year now, most of it was preparations of different sorts. Really hope we can get it out soon and work from there.

 

[ArmyMatt]

thanks!

 

[rusmeister]

With technology being what it is, it seems like it would be a no-brainer in our time to make an app that would be personalizable to the church that you are a part of and go to, and the algorithms should be able to correctly display what the special trope Aryans and text, as well as just the regular liturgy for those who want it. No serious development has been made as far as I can see for almost 15 years.

 

[E nsu3]

With technology being what it is, it seems like it would be a no-brainer in our time to make an app that would be personalizable to the church that you are a part of and go to, and the algorithms should be able to correctly display what the special trope Aryans and text, as well as just the regular liturgy for those who want it. No serious development has been made as far as I can see for almost 15 years.

I agree. Having put some effort in researching things in Orthodox space over the years, I found some websites and apps that cover particular niches but a lot of the time they're either locked to a particular language, specific implementation, or specific local church.
I have yet to see something akin to a platform or unified ecosystem for Orthodox. There's a lot of things that would be cool to make and problems to solve.

An app like this is our first step in that regard. Sure, right now it's just a calendar and available only on mobile (not to mention still in development). But if we see that some users are interested in it after the release and we have opportunities to work with, we're more than willing to develop more things that bring value to Orthodox church.
After all, even though we have different patriarchates and local rules, a lot of things are the same and it would be very useful to put it in one place.

Sorry, I went on a pretty big rant. I do appreciate your comment though, thanks

 

[rusmeister]

I agree. Having put some effort in researching things in Orthodox space over the years, I found some websites and apps that cover particular niches but a lot of the time they're either locked to a particular language, specific implementation, or specific local church.
I have yet to see something akin to a platform or unified ecosystem for Orthodox. There's a lot of things that would be cool to make and problems to solve.

An app like this is our first step in that regard. Sure, right now it's just a calendar and available only on mobile (not to mention still in development). But if we see that some users are interested in it after the release and we have opportunities to work with, we're more than willing to develop more things that bring value to Orthodox church.
After all, even though we have different patriarchates and local rules, a lot of things are the same and it would be very useful to put it in one place.

Sorry, I went on a pretty big rant. I do appreciate your comment though, thanks

There’s a prayer app out there called “Pray Always”. It's OK for some basic prayers, but a price tag of about $270 is insane. If they offered it for $3 or $4, they could sell thousands. But I imagine they’ve only had a handful of (wealthy) buyers at that price. (Which suggests to my mind GOArch, but I don’t say that for sure. )

 

[abacabb3]

Can we have the menaion/oectechos for each day?

 

[E nsu3]

Can we have the menaion/oectechos for each day?

We'll add it to the list of requests and think about it. I can't say off the top of my head how much effort it would take.
Thanks for the suggestion

 

[E nsu3]

Can we have the menaion/oectechos for each day?

Could you please also add some additional information about your suggestion, for example, which type of people would find that feature more valuable, what value it would bring in your opinion, etc? I can only think of the church choir who'd benefit from it and even then they already have physical copies of those books.

(I'd need this info to do some more research and think how to properly integrate it into the calendar and other related questions)

 

[rusmeister]

For me, it’s all the changeable parts of the service. I have had to spend my entire life in the church dealing with hearing and learning liturgy in a foreign language. So I learned the DL of St. John Chrysostom, but when they get to the various troparions, I’m lost, if something is inserted for a special holiday, I’m lost. On the major holidays, I’m generally lost. To say nothing of the fact that I wish I could change the language or also display Serbian and Russian, not just English, Though English is what I want most of all, I want to be able to connect it to the church that I’m standing in, So that if, say, it is the church of Saint Nicholas, and it is Saint Nicholas’s feast day, then the special prayers and troparions would be displayed at the appropriate times.

I’m not assuming that you can do all that. It is simply what I wish I had, and what it seems like 1 million monkeys typing on 1 million typewriters ought to be able to have produced over the past 15 years.

And the voice dictator simply doesn’t recognize the word, troparion. It will give me throw porion, or Trump Aryan, or trope Ariana, or something stupid like that.

 

[abacabb3]

Could you please also add some additional information about your suggestion, for example, which type of people would find that feature more valuable, what value it would bring in your opinion, etc? I can only think of the church choir who'd benefit from it and even then they already have physical copies of those books.

(I'd need this info to do some more research and think how to properly integrate it into the calendar and other related questions)

It would take a lot of effort. It's incredibly valuable because one can have daily vespers and vigil services this way. Also one can show up to Saturday or Sunday service and have the hymns. In churches where the service is in an ecclesiastical language like slavonic, having the translation automatically at your fingertips is huge.

Incorporating this would literally change the English speaking Orthodox world.

 

[ArseniusTheSilent]

This is definitely what the Digital Chant Stand brings for Greek Orthodox services.

This on the slavonic side:
ALL SAINTS EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH Liturgical Resources in Independence Ohio

You might be overestimating the need for an actual app honestly but feel free to prove me wrong.

 

[rusmeister]

This is definitely what the Digital Chant Stand brings for Greek Orthodox services.

This on the slavonic side:
ALL SAINTS EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH Liturgical Resources in Independence Ohio

You might be overestimating the need for an actual app honestly but feel free to prove me wrong.

I’d like an app. When I am at Liturgy, I don’t want to spend time searching in a general browser. On the app with a couple of quick button presses to get what I want is what I want.

 

[ArseniusTheSilent]

I totally get it. You might try loading an Orthros or Liturgy service on the Digital Chant Stand via your phone to understand how it works quite well even on a cellphone and how something on the Slavonic or Serbian side might work. It autoformats to the usable width for most things. It also the commonly used method to pull up the byzantine notation for a large percentage of the hymns, all the set ones and the apolytikia, kontakia and others.

Simply saying it HAS to be a cellphone app might be missing the end goal of something similar that allows offline browsing if you want to be in airplane mode during the service (for example).

Personally, I would LOVE to see a site similar with sites with audio samples of Slavonic, Serbian and Georgian chat hymns which isn't really available in any centralized repository.

 

[abacabb3]

This is definitely what the Digital Chant Stand brings for Greek Orthodox services.

This on the slavonic side:
ALL SAINTS EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH Liturgical Resources in Independence Ohio

You might be overestimating the need for an actual app honestly but feel free to prove me wrong.

In English


I'll check this out

 

[abacabb3]

This is definitely what the Digital Chant Stand brings for Greek Orthodox services.

This on the slavonic side:
ALL SAINTS EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH Liturgical Resources in Independence Ohio

You might be overestimating the need for an actual app honestly but feel free to prove me wrong.

Yeah, if this was in an app so we can read it automatically without scrolling between days and knowing the website, it would be much easier.

 

[E nsu3]

This is definitely what the Digital Chant Stand brings for Greek Orthodox services.

This on the slavonic side:
ALL SAINTS EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH Liturgical Resources in Independence Ohio

You might be overestimating the need for an actual app honestly but feel free to prove me wrong.

Thank you for the references, much appreciated

 

[E nsu3]

These are some solid points you brought up. It's a good food for thought and I'll definitely take a note

 

[ArseniusTheSilent]

Liturgy IO
This is the other online resource with reasonably integrated daily menaion entries in English that is very usable via a cellphone/tablet as well for reference. You might find this one useful for context also for what exists out there.

 

[The Liturgist]

For me, it’s all the changeable parts of the service. I have had to spend my entire life in the church dealing with hearing and learning liturgy in a foreign language. So I learned the DL of St. John Chrysostom, but when they get to the various troparions, I’m lost, if something is inserted for a special holiday, I’m lost. On the major holidays, I’m generally lost. To say nothing of the fact that I wish I could change the language or also display Serbian and Russian, not just English, Though English is what I want most of all, I want to be able to connect it to the church that I’m standing in, So that if, say, it is the church of Saint Nicholas, and it is Saint Nicholas’s feast day, then the special prayers and troparions would be displayed at the appropriate times.

I’m not assuming that you can do all that. It is simply what I wish I had, and what it seems like 1 million monkeys typing on 1 million typewriters ought to be able to have produced over the past 15 years.

And the voice dictator simply doesn’t recognize the word, troparion. It will give me throw porion, or Trump Aryan, or trope Ariana, or something stupid like that.

I would note that there are services done entirely in English, and I tend to view these as well as services in Church Slavonic. Also, regarding the troparion and kontakion of the day, those are easy to find. Actually, all of the propers for upcoming liturgies can be found on Fr. John Whiteford’s liturgical resource page: Orthodox Liturgical Texts and Resources

Also there are complete online versions of the Octoechos, the Pentecostarion, the Triodion and the Menaion which I can link you to. Those compiled in contemporary language by Archimandrite Ephrem, Memory eternal, are particularly good.

Also Fr. John Whiteford’s website, linked to above, has a guide to building a liturgical library which I followed; indeed I have pretty much everything he recommended except the monthly Menaion, which has an eye-watering $1200 price tag, and also the need for it is further reduced by the fact that there are freely available monthly Menaions online, as well as his own site, which make having the Monthly Menaion even less important (and the most important material is in the Festal Menaion translated by Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, memory eternal, and Mother Mary, and the Orthodox Prayer and Services anthologion compiled by Fr. Seraphim Nasser, affectionately known as “The Nasser Five Pounder.”

 

[E nsu3]

I would note that there are services done entirely in English, and I tend to view these as well as services in Church Slavonic. Also, regarding the troparion and kontakion of the day, those are easy to find. Actually, all of the propers for upcoming liturgies can be found on Fr. John Whiteford’s liturgical resource page: Orthodox Liturgical Texts and Resources

Also there are complete online versions of the Octoechos, the Pentecostarion, the Triodion and the Menaion which I can link you to. Those compiled in contemporary language by Archimandrite Ephrem, Memory eternal, are particularly good.

Also Fr. John Whiteford’s website, linked to above, has a guide to building a liturgical library which I followed; indeed I have pretty much everything he recommended except the monthly Menaion, which has an eye-watering $1200 price tag, and also the need for it is further reduced by the fact that there are freely available monthly Menaions online, as well as his own site, which make having the Monthly Menaion even less important (and the most important material is in the Festal Menaion translated by Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, memory eternal, and Mother Mary, and the Orthodox Prayer and Services anthologion compiled by Fr. Seraphim Nasser, affectionately known as “The Nasser Five Pounder.”

Could you please share the other resources you mentioned? We're working on the calendar right now and won't switch to any other projects at this time but it would be very helpful to keep as a reference as well as for my personal use.

Translations of liturgical texts are a whole separate subject unfamiliar to me. It's easy to navigate texts like Church Slavonic because that's the church I grew up in and the texts are pretty unified. But when it comes to English translations it's hard to tell which ones are actively used as I simply don't have enough experience and context, even though I'm fluent in English