The Cook'n Cloud service makes it easier than ever to synchronize recipes between all of your Cook'n apps. For example, if you enter new recipes into Cook'n on your PC, they will automatically appear on your iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac, and other PC's. Or, use Siri to speak new recipes into your Cook'n for iPhone app and they will automatically appear in your Cook'n desktop software!

When the mobile apps are released, simply create a new Cook'n Cloud account by entering your e-mail address and password into the Settings window of any Cook'n app. Then, log into that same Cook'n Cloud account on your other Cook'n apps and the apps will automatically synchronize your recipe data.

4/23/2012 Update

Cook'n 10 is sweet and, with the Cook'n Cloud service near completion, it is getting better every day! We're ready for beta testers to begin feeding recipe data into the Cook'n Cloud so we can complete performance testing with bigger loads. If you have access to Cook'n 10 and two desktop computers (this first testing will not include the mobile apps), and you are interested in becoming a beta tester, please send an e-mail message to betamanager@dvo.com. Getting this perfect has been a real challenge but as Sean Connery says "There is nothing like a challenge to bring out the best in man."

4/13/2012 Update

We're making great progress. Even with the extra information we've added, the performance is still outstanding (we were a little worried it would slow down but it didn't!). In my next update, I will ask for a few, select beta testers. If you are interested in being one of the first ones to sync your recipes to the new Cook'n Cloud service, please watch for and respond to the invitation in my next update. It should be fun! I know I'm WAY excited!

4/2/2012 Update

In January of last year, we contracted with a 3rd party developer to create the Cook'n mobile apps which included syncing with the Cook'n Cloud. Everything was supposed to be finished by the end of April...of last year. The apps themselves were done by August but sync was taking longer to complete.

We started getting working builds and sync was coming together nicely at the end of last year. We were successful at getting placement for Cook'n Version 10 in the retail channel and although development was behind schedule, everything looked like it would come together just right. Commitments were made, packaging materials were manufactured, purchase orders were cut, and software development was completed.

However, at the end of the day, the company we contracted with just couldn't deliver. Well, they gave us a working Sync feature but performance was unsatisfactory. It was taking 30 minutes per cookbook to sync the first time! Customers with 60 cookbooks in their database had to wait 30 hours to sync their recipes to the Cook'n Cloud! In some cases, mobile devices were running out of batteries before sync could complete!

In the middle of December, in order to decide the best way to proceed with Sync, we contracted with a different firm to do an analysis on the Sync code and to give 3rd party verification on its progress and potential. The 2nd firm indicated that the design was flawed and that the first firm had no idea how to implement this feature.

At that point, I faced a real dilemma. I could go ahead and release the feature and the mobile apps. That was one option. After all, even though performance was slow, it only took a long time to sync the very first time you synced. After that, only the changes were synced to the Cook'n Cloud and that part happened very quickly. And, since most customers only have a couple cookbooks, the performance problem would only affect a small percentage of people.

What's more, I had sunk over $100K into the development of the mobile apps and I was anxious to release them so I could begin to recoup my investment. Going ahead with the release of the mobile apps was tempting. But, there were some data loss and other issues to consider as well.

In the end, I made the executive decision to delay the release of the mobile apps, scrap everything related to Sync that the one company had created and start over from scratch. But, this time, we're doing the development in-house. The good news is that we're getting really close now. In fact, at this point, it is only taking 2.5 seconds to sync 1,000 recipes! It's amazing how much better things work when you know what you're doing and when you take the time to do it right.

We're getting very close to wrapping up the Sync development. I hesitate to give a release date because I just don't know what that is. However, this is our #1 priority and we're working lots of hours to finish it. I will update this page in one week and give you progress reports so you will know what I know with regard to our progress. Thank you for your patience! When we finish it...it's going to be sweet!