2026-04-07T14:45:20+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com Álvaro García 2026-04-07T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/04/07/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul> <li>Added new parameters to the custom filters in the Reader, invert and rotate hue, and a new default filter, Invert, to use as a quick Dark Mode (resetting the filters to the default ones is needed for the new one to be available if version 3.19.0 was previously used).</li> <li>Added the changelog from GitHub to the info shown in the Check for Updates modal.</li> <li>Added the current track's name to the Media Player's top bar when the advanced controls are enabled and the playlist is hidden.</li> <li>Fixed the Reader's new pages cache manager making the app crash on Windows when changing files in some circumstances.</li> <li>Fixed the Metadata Editor failing to update a ComicInfo.xml's pages list when requested and never ending the operation.</li> <li>Fixed the Metadata Editor failing to update some PDF's entries if the new value in the input field is empty.</li> </ul> <p>&lt;</p> 2026-03-30T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/03/30/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul> <li>Improved, significantly, the average page loading time in the Reader by implementing a pages cache that is filled in the background. The cache size can be increased in the Preferences (Comic Book Reader &gt; Pages Cache), so it can fit more pages if the user doesn't mind the extra RAM usage.</li> <li>Added the option to create new page filters for the Reader (go to View &gt; Filter &gt; Manage Filters, or to the Comic Book Reader section in the Preferences), that can be customized by setting values for gamma, white level, black level, brightness, contrast, sepia and saturation.</li> <li>Added a new advanced image operation, black level / white level, to the convert, create and extract comic books tools.</li> <li>Added a button, shortcut and menu entry to take a screenshot of a video in the Media Player while it's playing.</li> <li>Added a new Preferences option to set the System Monitor size in the Appearance section.</li> <li>Rebuilt one of the libraries' Linux binary so it requires glibc 2.35 instead of 2.38 to run it, making the non-flatpak Linux versions of ACBR now, hopefully, compatible with older Linux distros like Ubuntu 22.04.</li> <li>Made some changes to the conversion tools to try to avoid potential EBUSY errors on Windows.</li> <li>Updated some of the core libraries to newer versions.</li> <li>Fixed not being able to open the metadata in the comicinfo.xml of a CBR file.</li> </ul> 2026-03-17T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/03/17/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Overhauled the audio player and made it a media player. It now also plays video files (supports web-compatible codecs and formats like MP4 and WebM) and youtube URLs and shows subtitles from SRT files. If FFmpeg is installed and in the system&#x27;s PATH, or its path is configured in the preferences, it will support many other containers and codecs (MKV, AVI, WMV, H.265...), multiple video and audio tracks and embedded subtitles. </li><li>Added a section in the Preferences, Third-Party Executables, to configure the paths for optional executables like rar or ffmpeg. </li><li>Added a new localization file, Japanese, contributed by coolvitto. </li><li>Added some improvements to the deletion and move operations to make them more resiliant against potential short external locks by OneDrive or similar external programs of the temporary files and folders created during conversions. </li><li>Set a better default temp folder for the flatpak version. </li><li>Fixed the flatpak version not finding the rar binary in the system&#x27;s PATH (if available). </li></ul> 2026-02-18T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/02/18/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Added support for reading, converting from and extracting EPUB, FB2 and MOBI ebooks (newer formats like KF8 (AZW3) are not compatible). </li><li>Increased the performance reading and converting PDF and CBR files. Also, files of those types bigger than 2GB are now supported. </li><li>Fixed a bug introduced in the previous version that made the app not launch for new users :( I forgot to test launching the app with no config files for that release and, as no one opened an issue about it in the meantime, I didn&#x27;t notice until I did the test for this new one, sorry about that.</li></ul> <p>[Update] v3.17.1:</p> <ul><li>Fixed creating a comic book from only images not working in the previous version. </li><li>Fixed setting a non-writable folder as temp folder in the flatpak version breaking the app. </li></ul> 2026-01-19T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/01/19/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul> <li>Increased, significantly, the speed of conversions that require image processing (scale, change image format...) in the "Convert Comic Books" tool by piping all the image processing operations for a page together, instead of doing them in stages as before, and also using worker threads to work on multiple pages at once. There are now advanced options to fine tune some parameters of this new method, which is now the default, in the tool's settings section (or to select the old method, which has the new operation piping but doesn't use worker threads, just in case it works better in some cases).</li> <li>Added the total time the conversion took to the end of the log in the "Convert Comic Books" tool.</li> <li>Added advanced image operations to crop and add borders in the "Convert Comic Books" tool.</li> <li>Added an advanced input option, "Input Folders Contain", in the "Convert Comic Books" tool to select how to treat the contents of folders in the input list: either look for comic book files inside them (as up to now) or for images (that will be treated as the contents of a single comic book). With this second option, it's now possible to batch convert folders containing images into comic book files.</li> <li>Added an advanced output option, "Keep Subfolders Structure", in the "Convert Comic Books" tool to choose to keep the subfolder structure from folders in the input list when the advanced input option "Search Input Folders Recursively" is enabled and an output folder for all files has been selected in the output options. This will replicate the folder and subfolder structure from the folders in the input list in the selected output folder and place the converted files in the corresponding place.</li> <li>Increased the default history capacity to 50 and made the "History" tool show the current number of entries vs the current capacity in the "Recent" section title.</li> <li>Added small tags to the file icons in the "Home Screen" for known extensions and other small quality of life improvements.</li> <li>Added a new section in the history file to remember files in the "Home Screen" lists but not in recent.</li> <li>Fixed toast notification's close button's color in light color mode.</li> <li>Fixed "Home Screen" breaking for rtl languages.</li> <li>Fixed book in user list in "Home Screen" not opening if it wasn't in the recent history.</li> <li>Fixed the final log being truncated in some of the tools if errors occurred.</li> </ul> 2026-01-02T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2026/01/02/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul> <li>Added the option to create more lists in the Home Screen besides the Favorites and Latest ones.</li> <li>Added a representation of a book's completion percentage in the Home Screen lists. It shows as a thin line at the bottom of a book's card which gets longer the closer the last page read was compared to the total number of pages (if the page was the last one, the line will have a 100% length). It'll only appear for books in the history that have also been opened after this feature was added, as it needs some data not stored in the history by previous versions.</li> <li>Added expand and collapse buttons to the lists in the Home Screen.</li> <li>Added a button to open the integrated file browser in the Home Screen.</li> <li>Added a "Home Screen" section to the preferences.</li> <li>Improved PDF page rendering time and image quality.</li> <li>Changed some buttons in the reader's toolbar (zoom, pages direction and page mode) so that they now show the icon corresponding to the current state for the corresponding setting and clicking them opens a vertical submenu where the user can choose from all the available options.</li> <li>Fixed not showing any space between the text and the icon in the list titles in the Home Screen for rtl languages.</li> </ul> 2025-12-21T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/12/21/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Added some small quality of life improvements to the Home Screen, like drag and drop to sort the favorites list, new options to open the containing folder of a file in one the lists or add one in the recent files list to the favorites one... </li><li>Added two new theme preferences: one that automatically sets the theme to &quot;ACBR Light&quot; or &quot;ACBR Dark&quot; based on the operative system settings and the other based on the time of day (the time at which the light and dark themes are set can be customized). </li><li>Added &#x27;Open Containing Folder&#x27; entry to the reader&#x27;s context menu. </li><li>Fixed CBZ files containing __MACOSX folders failing to load in the reader and convert in the tools as they included invalid image files. __MACOSX folders are now ignored. </li><li>Fixed invalid page images breaking the reader. When the image corresponding to a page can&#x27;t be loaded it&#x27;s now replaced by a generic &quot;file not found&quot; page. </li></ul> 2025-08-29T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/08/29/art-breakfast-club <p> Fan art illustration I made inspired by the movie The Breakfast Club. </p> <p> <img src="http://www.binarynonsense.com/imgs/art/full/alvaro-garcia-breakfast-01-reducedforweb.jpg" class="tall-img" /> </p> <p>My art portfolio: <a href="http://www.binarynonsense.com/art/">http://www.binarynonsense.com/art/</a></p> 2025-08-05T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/08/05/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul> <li>Added the option to show two pages at once in the reader. You can now switch between "Single Page", "Double Page" and "Double Page (Center First Page)" in the "View &gt; Layout &gt; Page Mode" entry of the menu bar, or change it using the tool bar.</li> <li>Added more scaling options to some of the tools (convert comic books, create comic book, convert images and extract comic books). Now the pages can be scaled by percentage, height or width.</li> <li>Added an automatic check for updates. Periodically, the program will look during its start process for a newer stable version of ACBR on GitHub and show a small notification if there's one (if you click it, it will open the corresponding release page in the system's browser). It can be configured, or completely disabled, on the preferences (by default it will check for updates if more than a week has passed since the last time it did).</li> <li>Added a "copy log" button to the results modal of some of the tools (create comic, convert comics, convert images and extract comics) and a list of failed files, if any, at the end of the log.</li> <li>Added a "Reset All" button to the preferences.</li> <li>Added a list of configuration files, and their paths, to the advanced section of the preferences.</li> <li>Updated some of the core libraries.</li> <li>Fixed some minor issues.</li> </ul> 2025-07-29T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/07/29/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Redesigned the layout and added a new section to the RSS Reader tool to search for feeds. You can now search for website feeds (based on the feedsearch.dev API) and podcast feeds (based on the iTunes Search API). For the podcasts one, once you select a feed from the results it opens in the content view, like any other feed, and then you can listen to any episode listed in the feed using ACBR&#x27;s audio player by clicking on the play button. </li><li>Added a new section to the Internet Radio tool to save favorite stations and support for m3u8 streams in the Audio Player. </li><li>Added a &#x27;Scroll to Top&#x27; button to the RSS reader. </li><li>Added a &#x27;Copy Image URL&#x27; entry to the context menu that appears when right clicking an image in the RSS reader. </li><li>Added a &#x27;Save Image As...&#x27; entry to the context menu that appears when right clicking an image in the RSS reader. </li><li>Added a &quot;Clear List&quot; button to the create comic book, extract comic book, convert comic books and convert images tools. </li><li>Made all menu shortcuts customizable. </li><li>Tweaked the themes&#x27; colors. </li><li>Updated some of the core libraries. </li><li>Fixed some minor issues. </li></ul> 2025-06-16T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/06/16/high-entropy-challenges-update <div> <p>The main feature this update adds is gamepad support. The game can now be played using one and all the controls, prompts, menus and user interfaces in general have been adapted for that type of input device, including the in-game computers, that will show a virtual keyboard as part of their GUI in the command line interface to be able to enter commands.</p> <p> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/c29d67a6711320ce7bc3c19fa37c2595ef74fa01.jpg" /></span> </p> <p>It's been a bit of work as originally, due to my lack of experience playing with controllers, especially FPS games, and the fact that the in-game computers required being able to type commands, I didn't give it much thought and decided the game would be keyboard and mouse only, so I didn't build things with gamepad in mind. But the last couple of years I've been playing mostly on my Steam Deck so I recently decided to give it a try and implement gamepad support and a custom virtual keyboard and see how it felt... and I'm pretty happy with the results, hope you feel the same (and that I haven't broken anything / added new bugs :)).</p> <p> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/fbef9112b8e3a909d7f1cea47fc383f4f73cbc3b.jpg" /></span> </p> <p></p> <p>I've also included a bunch of new configuration options, some gamepad specific (dead zones, sensitivity curves, buttons mapping...) and others related to accessibility (image brightness and gamma correction, UIs scaling, toggle/hold options for running and aiming, separate audio levels for SFX and UI sounds...).</p> <p></p> <p>Hope you like it!</p> <p>Álvaro</p> <p></p> <p></p> <p>P.S.: I've added custom button prompts for Xbox, Dualshock and Steam Deck controllers but I have only tested the game with an Xbox 360 controller and the Steam Deck, as I don't own a more modern Xbox or Dualshock one and they are too expensive for me to buy just for testing so, although the correct ones should show depending on the type of controller, I haven't been able to test all possibilities with real hardware.</p> </div> 2025-04-17T00:00:00+02:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/04/17/high-entropy-challenges-update <div> This update brings an extensive overhaul of many of the game's components: tweaks to all the levels to improve their design, visuals, the amount of different ways they can be completed and how they fit together progress-wise (with levels 1 and 15 redone from scratch); enhancements to how things work internally (interactions, enemy AI, performance...); changes to some of the models and the inventory, HUD and other user interfaces (including quality-of-life upgrades); edits and rewrites to all the tutorials and documents (and the way they're presented); fixes for some small issues and bugs, new achievements...<br /><br />It's been quite a big undertaking but I'm really happy with how things have turned out. <br /><br />I've tested it as much as I've been able to but so many things have changed that I'm a bit afraid of having missed something. Please, let me know if there are any issues (I'll create a new topic in the discussions for this update for bug reports and feedback) and I'll try to fix them as soon as I can but, with a bit of luck, there won't be any disastrous bugs and people will be able to enjoy it.<br /><br />Hope you like it!<br /><br />Álvaro<br /><br /> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/62a8aca07f96a5d687a5cbc5f60afbc80636e97d.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/795478ed454d57d7df59570420b658680056bcb9.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/171019bca37f720d291eea6ee61762ad1b0391ce.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/e70aa7e039c7e67b0251eccc4433e9b57052e48c.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <span><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/be77af53bccd47613e297185acd08867bd392083.jpg" class="undefined" /></span> </div> 2025-03-10T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/03/10/high-entropy-challenges-devlog <div> <span class="_16SknI_KfMn45zQAvi-Xrs"><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/d5ba3399f9919b15a2a598222295739624d6fa58.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <h4 class="_6-VR2WCBCDupCcUN5INQM BB_Header2 QuKtTJ4LCPUlQeWYfLNyX"> I'm back at it </h4> <br />After having to put it aside for a long time, due to personal circumstances, lately I've started to get back into game development working on a new update for “High Entropy: Challenges”. Although it's going slowly and there's still work to do, I'm really happy with how it's shaping up and close enough to the final result that I feel like I should share here some info and work in progress screenshots of what will, hopefully, one day become update 1.3.<br /><br /><span class="_16SknI_KfMn45zQAvi-Xrs"><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/c212a879840b90e8b3123aeb1c44d44b88d5c2fc.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <h4 class="_6-VR2WCBCDupCcUN5INQM BB_Header2 QuKtTJ4LCPUlQeWYfLNyX"> What’s changing? </h4> <br />This will be quite a comprehensive update of the current content, a lot having to do with how things work internally but also with some of the visuals and level design. I've been tweaking all the levels to improve their design, how they look and how they fit together progress-wise (and redoing levels 1 and 15 from scratch), adding more paths to some of them so most can be completed in different ways, enhancing some of the models and the inventory, HUD and other UIs design, fixing some small issues and bugs, improving/rewriting the tutorials and documents... <br /><br /><span class="_16SknI_KfMn45zQAvi-Xrs"><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/b6adda9f95043511825a93d30aa712f713eb28e9.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <h4 class="_6-VR2WCBCDupCcUN5INQM BB_Header2 QuKtTJ4LCPUlQeWYfLNyX"> When will it be ready? </h4> <br />No idea. I'm really eager to being able to share this update with everyone as soon as it’s completed and, as I said, things are now close to what I envisioned for this update, but can't make any promises as to if or when that'll be possible, as I still don't know if at any time I'll have to stop again for a while or how long will it take me to finish what’s left to do and test it all.<br /><br /><span class="_16SknI_KfMn45zQAvi-Xrs"><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/21a420001186f1e398a81e4d1321a5da5feba42d.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <h4 class="_6-VR2WCBCDupCcUN5INQM BB_Header2 QuKtTJ4LCPUlQeWYfLNyX"> What about the full game? </h4> <br />I still dream about / plan on making “High Entropy”, the extended/commercial version of the game, a reality and some of the changes this update will introduce come from work I made and are making for that but, for now, I’m trying to focus on making this update for “Challenges” as a way to get into the rhythm of things, gain confidence, and later on restart really working on it. We’ll see what happens… First of all I need to finish this update :)<br /><br /><span class="_16SknI_KfMn45zQAvi-Xrs"><img src="https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images//38478693/ff3fd55cbd5456ac8638eaef661a9a5d093f9073.jpg" class="undefined" /></span><br /><br /> <h4 class="_6-VR2WCBCDupCcUN5INQM BB_Header2 QuKtTJ4LCPUlQeWYfLNyX"> Thanks!! </h4> <br />I just wanted to take this opportunity to give thanks to everyone that’s tried the game and for all the kind, positive feedback and words of encouragement I’ve gotten since release. I really, really appreciate it and truly helps me keep motivated.<br /><br />Thanks a lot!<br />Álvaro </div> 2025-01-24T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/01/24/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Added a new tool: "RSS Reader". A basic RSS and Atom feed reader that includes some default feeds relating to comic books. </li><li>Made the tools' sliders always show their current value. </li><li>Removed an unused image quality slider from the 'Extract Pages' tool. </li><li>Made some small tweaks and visual changes to the user interface. </li><li>Updated some of the core libraries to newer versions. </li><li>Fixed the updates checker wrongly reporting the program's version as up to date in some situations (v3.8.0 to v3.9.0 had this bug and will not report v3.10.0 as newer).</li></ul> 2025-01-18T00:00:00+01:00 https://blog.binarynonsense.com/2025/01/18/acbr-progress-log <p>Changelog:</p> <ul><li>Added a settings section to the 'Convert Comics', 'Create Comic', 'Convert Images' and 'Extract Pages' tools where the user can reset the tool's options to their default values or configure it so it remembers the ones selected the last time it was used (this is disabled by default). </li><li>Fixed choosing the option to split output files into multiple parts no longer working correctly. </li></ul>