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Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

cadenceguitar.com

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Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#41

Post by apizon »

thomask1995 wrote: post #39

This is the app I was begging for a few years ago! Ended up buying a ton of Ear Training books and using those little web apps. This would have been so much better. I just started using it, I will say, I feel we can skip the chords annotations and stuff if the ICP is intermediate guitarist. Or do a quick survey at the start and see what fundamentals they know. For intermediate guitar, I think the main gaps are: - Ear…

Thanks for the detailed feedback :)

When I first started working on the app I actually mostly meant to go only with a quiz + flashcards approach with little to no explanation but this felt a bit rough and I was affraid most users would just give up on it too quickly. Also I think some users might have learned guitar theory a different way and might not be too familiar with diagrams, such as classical guitarists.

Hence why I added all these lessons with more details including beginner ones.

I might add something in the vein of a "practice page" with only challenges and the ability to create custom ones in the future for more advanced users + a change to a more interactive onboarding that actually asks what you want rather than showcase the app, we'll see...

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#43

Post by apizon »

jcjmcclean wrote: post #27

Just tried this out and I’m loving it, especially the UI/UX. The welcome screen animations are great, they make the onboarding feel smooth and polished. I love that the navigation icons show labels when active, so you always know where you are. The built-in tutorial on the Learn screen is a really nice touch, and the Library is genuinely useful (I’ll definitely be using it for scales and arpeggios). Also, the Go Prem…

Thanks a lot

The app is made with flutter with mostly just the default widgets that I customized a bit. I'm not really that versed into UI/UX so I just tried to keep things simple design wise. As for performance, I didn't even have to do that much optimization except for the library part to have smooth scrolling when displaying hundreds of diagrams but overall the framework is pretty fast and a joy to work with.

I'd say the hardest part honestly was just staying consistent for more than a year alone without really any feedback and just sticking to it a little every evening and on the week-end rather than playing a game or something. Especially making the content itself was at time a bit repetitive like the lessons or the chords for the library (which were all manually taken from books not auto generated)

I started the app store process quite some time before release so it's just something I did a little here and there in between commits and overall it wasn't that painful.

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#44

Post by apizon »

sschmitt wrote: post #17

Pretty good! Translation by AI? First lessons quite well, but first quiz in German "Welche dieser Noten ist... ganze Tonoberhalb?" makes no sense.

All but english and french (my native language) are machine generated yes sorry about that but there is quite a bit of text with all the lessons so I can't afford man made translations at my scale.

Maybe I will find a middle ground and get translators just for the critical parts such as the challenges, or at least find a better way to translate parameterized strings like the one you are referring to.

EDIT: there is indeed an issue with some localized entries where the parameters are not placed properly, I will fix this for the next version

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#45

Post by apizon »

TrueTom wrote: post #7

Immediately begging for an account is reason enough for immediate deletion.

As the "other Tom" has said you can use the app without an account there is just a warning message telling you that if you do your progress is not backed up online.

I actually shipped without this message at first and realized by talking to non technical family and friends that some people might not realize the implications and didn't want someone ending up in my support email 1 year after buying the app telling me they had lost all their data.

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#46

Post by apizon »

k3nx wrote: post #42

I love your pricing model, enough to make me download the app. Free with limited lessons. $3 a month for more, or $30 for lifetime. It makes folks like me who have subscription-itus smile. Thank you.

Thanks, I too have subscription-itus hence the lifetime option.

The subscription is mostly here for people who aren't sure and because you can't offer free trials on lifetime purchases

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#47

Post by apizon »

distalx wrote: post #21

This looks great! I'm not a guitar enthusiast myself, but the design and color tone look very slick. Congratulations on the launch after a year of work, and I wish you all the best with it! Just out of curiosity, how much time did it take you to get app store approval from Apple and Google in 2025?

Thanks, not being well versed in design I just picked a small color palette I liked and sticked to it

Approval was I think 2-3 days for Google (I had already validated the store page and opened it to preregistration a month before the final build) and a bit more than week for App Store due to some back and forth because of missing privacy policy links in some places of the app and stuff like that.

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#48

Post by apizon »

criddell wrote: post #9

I’m trying this on my iPad. My first bit of feedback is that the icons in the right column should be higher contrast. For me, they are difficult to see. Also, I see the icons are eye, mortar board, and ear. What’s the fourth icon? I’m solidly in the beginner camp (even though I’ve been trying to learn guitar for 35 years now), so maybe this isn’t for me. I’m going to kick the tires this weekend.

Thanks for the feedback

Have you tried the light mode? I find it has better contrast than dark one but I might need to add an accessibility setting too

The fourth icon is a head with a gear inside, it represents your progress on the pure theory challenge

You can still have a look, the beginner lessons are free. But when starting out I think just learning to play your favorite songs is probably the best way to improve at first

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#49

Post by apizon »

stn8188 wrote: post #16

Thank you so much for sharing this! My kids all play instruments and I'm a bit jealous of their skill (I never played anything growing up). Over the last few weeks I've taken to borrowing my son's guitar at night and working through one of his books. I've been looking for more information on music theory, and this is so perfect. I'm excited to go through it. Thanks again!

Thanks :) hope you'll like it!

Re: Show HN: Cadence – A guitar theory app

#50

Post by apizon »

rixed wrote: post #28

Thank you, this looks nice and useful, will definitively give it a try. For now, the only thing to report is that some screens are too long for my iphone7 and therefore I'm missing the end of a few sentences here and there. Would send screenshots if I knew how to reach you.

Thanks for the feedback

I'm not sure if it's allowed to post an email here so I'll refer you to the app itself: there is a "Support and contact" button on the settings page.

I'm definitely interested in seeing those screenshots if you can as text is supposed to wrap around nicely

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