Researcher: Discover & Discuss 4+

Useful app to follow all the new articles published in scientific journals and really nice feature to look for key words, which at the end seems better than a google scholar notification, and to be honest just more natural than reading a “newsletter” type stuff from gscholar.
However, even if the main features are here, I think some useful things would be interested to implement, like putting in greyish the articles already seen (which makes it able to see where we left last time we update the research) and the possibility to have push notifications for the keywords selected. The “my article” are linked with Mendeley, which in my opinion is a limitation as many people don’t use it (part of it because it is owned by Elseveir) so it could be great to link it with a zotero account (although I am not familiar if there is any API limitation for that...).
Also I noticed that some journals are missing (such as Optica) which makes me still stick with arXiv newsletter + google scholar email notifications on keywords.

Hi Gregelliom, Thanks for the review and for your suggestions. We will soon be introducing push notification. We will hopefully be adding both Zotero and Endnote. If there are any journals you want, you can tell me by simply filling in this short form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdItKW1cVTBDYapugbbSShO3D9ADfLCIb-PPpOHZJ-CT0ri4A/viewform?usp=sf_lin. Also, I really like your idea of the grey read article, I will forward this on to the team to discuss. Thanks, Joe from Researcher

It has all the necessary functions (filters, journal feeds etc) that help me see the recent publications in my area.

One problem I found is that the journal feed does not allow me to filter out “just accepted” papers from ASAP (as soon as publishable) articles. As least I did not find such a function.

The difference is that for most journals I follow, “just accepted” articles are pre-galley proof and they do not have TOC graphics, which makes them much harder to navigate through than ASAP (as soon as publishable) or already published articles. For some journals (for example, Agnewandte Chemie), the feed page is overwhelmed by “just accepted” papers without any graphics, and I find it really hard to read through all the tittles and abstracts without any graphics.

Dear user, Thank you for your valuable feedback. We're sorry that you are facing this issue. This has been shared within the team and we will look into it. If we can help you with anything else you can contact us via info@researcher-app.com. Thanks, Maria.

What I love:

The fact that I can keep up with a bunch of journals all in one place.

What I hate:

The interface is awful. It is slow. It freezes. The fact that to delete an entry I have to swipe AND then hit the X button, which is often when it freezes. I had switched to the desktop app because I could just hit an X and get rid of the things I didn’t care about but they’ve removed that feature from the desktop app. I tried the updated iPhone version again today and it’s as bad as it has always been.

What would make the app great:

Bulk delete, something that you can select edit and then mark everything you don’t care about for deletion. Smoother interface that doesn’t freeze. The ability to delete from the abstract screen would also be helpful.

Bottom Line:

If you like a quasi useful app that will occasionally frustrate you until you want to scream. This app is for you. When it works it’s great but it doesn’t work all that often or for very long.

Update:

I’ve discovered a wonderful new bug. Now the app recycles the same abstracts over and over again. While scrolling through my feed looking at article I noticed they were all looking similar. Many of the same abstracts scrolled past several times despite my swiping left on them earlier. I’ve uninstalled/reinstalled multiple times but no change.

Hi, thanks for taking the time to leave a review and for providing us with your valuable feedback. I have forwarded your suggestions on to our product manager who will investigate the potential of adding these to the app and website. In regards to the app being slow, this sounds like a bug, so please do email us at info@researcher-app.com so we can gather more information from you and investigate this issue.

Edit: Thank you for making us aware of this bug. We recently fixed this in our most recent update, so please make sure that you are on the most recent version. If this issue still persists, please do get in touch with us and we will investigate this further.

Thanks, Joe