Craft Measure 1.1 for Windows Phone 8.1 or later is designed for the knitter, crocheter, and weaver that is always putting their rulers and specialty measuring widgets in a "safe" place and so can never find them in a moment of need. If you are good about keeping track of your phone, Craft Measure will there for you. You will need a good ruler to do a one time calibration. After that, you can use Craft Measure to:

• Measure small items with a ruler
• Determine the size of a knitting needle
• Determine the size of a crochet hook
• Determine what dent reed you've got
• Get a quickie rough check on your gauge

Craft Measure displays a reference image on your phone. You compare what you are measuring with the reference image. The accuracy you'll experience will vary with your visual skill and will improve some with practice. Based on testing with a small number of people, I believe that most people will be able to reliably distinguish items 2 sizes apart and will more often than not get the exact size.

Caution! Be careful not to scratch your phone's display with the end of a knitting needle or crochet hook!

Note: The images in this document were captured on a phone set to the red theme. Where you see red in the document, on your phone you will see your theme's accent color.

Craft Measure version 1.1 is a free application targetted at Windows Phone 8.1. It does not even have ads.

Craft Measure version 1.1 is a standard Metro style application. The top of the screen has a banner identifying the product (Craft Measure), the Canitag brand, and the page name.

The main page is the launching point for all of the measuring tools offered by Craft Measure. Initially, as the previous image shows, only the link launching the Calibration tool is shown in the bold text that indicates the tool is usable. After you do the initial calibration, all of the links to the tools will be accessible. To launch a tool, just tap its link.

Some of the supplemental pages, such as the help page and privacy page, have more content than will fit on a single screen. You'll need to swipe or drag the content to get the unseen portion of the content to more into view. Since the usability feedback I've gotten indicates that many people need a visual clue to figure out when scrolling might work, I've added a faded out arrow to the right side of areas that are meant to scroll. The image below shows one page with such an arrow.

The main page and the bug reporting pages have an application bar. On the main page and the other application bar pages, if you are holding the phone narrow end up, the bottom of the screen has an application bar with four icons and an ellipsis (...). The application bar will be found to one side or the other if you are on the main page holding the phone long end up.

The application bar on the main page has three icons plus an additional three menu choices that can be brought into view by tapping the ellipsis or dragging the application bar upward with a finger. The icons are:

	Settings - go to a page that lets you change the settings
	Feedback - go to a page that gives easy access to ways to provide feedback about this product
	Help - go to a page giving basic instructions and a link to this documentation.

The additional menu choices that are usually off-screen are:

• Privacy - a page with a summary of the privacy policy and links to more information on this website
• Show Unsent Bug Reports - lists the bug reports created in the last 30 days that you haven't deleted
• Create Bug Report - creates a new bug report

By default, Craft Measure is configured to work with both the inches/feet/yards system of the US and the metric system widely used in the rest of the world. This application has built-in knowledge of how knitting needles and crochet hook sizes are reported in a number of nations. To configure Craft Measure to use the conventions you prefer, select the gear shaped icon in the application bar:

The settings icon sends you to the settings page.

The settings page lets you indicate your preference for how things are sized. You can choose between the conventions used in the US (as recommended by the Craft Yarn Council of America -- a modern standard), the system used in Canada, the system used in the rest of the UK, the system used in Japan, and generic metric system sizing (common in Europe).

Craft Measure version 1.1 no longer gives you the option of opting out of automatic diagnostic reporting -- Version 1.1 no longer has automatic diagnostic reporting. You have full control over if and when to send a diagnostic data in the form of bug reports. Bug reports are sent via email. You can edit out anything you consider to be sensitive before sending the email. Be aware, however, that the more you edit, the less likely it will be that the fault will be identified and fixed.

Calibrating Craft Measure

The Craft Measure application needs to learn how the measurement units it works with (pixels) correspond to the physical dimensions of your phone display. The calibration pages provide you with the means to teach Craft Measure. To get to the calibration function, tap on the Calibration link on the main page. The calibration pages look like this:

Note: Craft Measure 1.1 is a free application. Version 1.1 eliminates the trial mode present in version 1.0. No more need to pay to avoid repeated calibration.

The goal is to make the white bar as close as you can to the size specified in the text. The little white triangular projections are intended to help point out how big the target size is. Put your finger on the screen on or near the big white bar, then move your finger along the length of the bar. The length of the bar will change to track your finger. You'll need to hold a ruler against the face of your phone to measure the length of the bar. When you've got the size right, tap the button Size is Good.

Because digital displays sometimes have pixels that differ in length and width, you'll need to do this calibration process once for the long dimension of the phone and once for the short dimension. You can hold the phone either horizontally or vertically while calibrating it. Whichever way you hold the phone, adjust the bar until it is the specified size. Do calibration for both the length and width of your phone.

The Standard Ruler link on the main page leads to a page that shows a ruler running the long direction of your phone's screen. The image that follows shows what the ruler will look like if you are holding your phone upright and have configured Craft Measure to use inches.

Different phone models have different screen sizes. The length of the ruler will vary depending on your particular phone. The ruler is a bit longer if you hold your phone sideways (i.e. in landscape mode) because the ruler is not cut short by the banner on top of the page.

If you have configured Craft Measure to use one of the metric sizing systems, the ruler will be labeled in centimeters and have a small tick for each millimeter.

Craft Measure has built in knowledge of how big knitting needles are in the US, Canada, the UK, Japan, and Europe. Tap on the Knitting Needle Size link on the main page. Craft Measure will jump to a page that has a horizontal white band in the middle. The white band is as close to the actual diameter of a knitting needle of a particular size. Below the white band, Craft Measure will tell you the size of the knitting needle it drew and two double-triangle icons. Tapping the rightmost icon tells Craft Measure to show the next bigger size. Tapping the leftmost icon tells Craft Measure to show the next smaller size.

Place the knitting needle you want to size on top of the white band. If the needle completely obscures the white band, ask Craft Measure to show the next smaller size. If you see white above and below the knitting needle, tell Craft Measure to show the next larger size. The goal is to find the size needle that just barely blocks the image. Our limited user testing indicates that you should look for either the largest needle size that completely obscures or, if there is a size that has a bit of halo without clearly showing a band of white, go with the halo.

Hints: If you hold your phone very close to your face or don't hold the needle against the phone display, you'll get less accurate results. Try holding the phone about a foot away from your face.

The size won't always be perfect, particularly when you get into the smaller sizes of knitting needles. The image is made up of tiny dots of light that can't be split in half. In addition, manufacturers vary a bit in how big they make needles. In the US, there has been disagreement and changing definitions about what size number to assign to a particular diameter. Craft Measure uses the Craft Yarn Council of America's current size number / needle diameter definitions for US sizes, plus a couple of oddball sizes that seem to still be fairly common.

Empirically, I observed that the person with the most practice using Craft Measure could reliably size needles when the nearest alternative sizes were 0.5 mm or more different. Sizing needles in this fashion is nowhere as fast as sizing them with the special-purpose needle sizing plastic or metal tool with holes (at least, the holes are faster if you can find your tool).

Craft Measure has built in knowledge of how big crochet hooks are in the US, the UK (including Canada), and the rest of the metric world such as Europe. Tap on the Crochet Hook Size link on the main page. Craft Measure will draw on its screen a horizontal crochet hook hook portion plus white band for the shaft. The diameter of the shaft will be as close as possible to the actual diameter of the shaft of a crochet hook of a particular size. Below the white band, Craft Measure will tell you the size of the crochet hook it drew and two double-triangle icons. Tapping the rightmost icon tells Craft Measure to show the next bigger size. Tapping the leftmost icon tells Craft Measure to show the next smaller size.

Place the crochet hook you want to size on top of the white band. Specifically, place the portion of the hook between the end of the shaping of the hook proper and the start of shaping for the handle against the straight portion of the band. You want to compare the nice, cylinder shaped portion of the hook against the nice straight portion of the image.

If the shaft of the hook completely obscures the white band, ask Craft Measure to show the next smaller size. If you see white above and below the shaft, tell Craft Measure to show the next larger size. The goal is to find the size needle that just barely blocks the image. Our limited user testing indicates that you should look for either the largest hook size that completely obscures or, if there is a size that has a bit of halo without clearly showing a band of white, go with the halo.

Hints: If you hold your phone very close to your face or don't hold the hook against the phone display, you'll get less accurate results. Try holding the phone about a foot away from your face.

The size won't always be perfect, particularly when you get into the small steel lace crochet hooks. The image is made up of tiny dots of light that can't be split in half. In addition, manufacturers vary a bit in how big they make crochet hooks stamped with the same size number or letter. In the US, there has been a lot of disagreement and changing definitions about what size number or letter to assign to a particular diameter. Craft Measure uses the Craft Yarn Council of America's current size number / hook diameter definitions for US sizes, plus a couple of sizes not included in the Craft Yarn Council of America's standard.

I found (with admittedly a small number of testers) that it is difficult to reliably nail down the size of a crochet hook to 0.5 mm or less. Generally, the errors tended to estimate crochet hooks as having smaller diameter than the size specified by the manufacturer would suggest.

If you are knit or crochet, you've doubtless had the experience of starting a swatch square and having to decide if the gauge you're getting is close enough to warrant continuing on to make the square large enough to get an accurate gauge. Craft Measure has a tool to help. Tap on the Gauge Ruler link and you'll be sent to this gauge measure page.

The gauge measure page shows two series of white lines that merge along a diagonal. Each series of lines is spaced out evenly to provide a visual reference. Each series is labeled by how many lines there would be in a standard gauge square (4 inches or 10 centimeters). The double-triangle icons to the either side of each label can be tapped to increase or decrease the number of lines per gauge square.

The procedure here is to lay your still-small gauge square against the phone so that one set of lines run parallel to the rows and the other set of lines run parallel to the columns of stitches. Now you can eyeball to see if the lines parallel to the rows are more or less closely spaced than the rows. Tap the double-triangle outline until the lines and rows are pretty much in sync. Now repeat the process for the columns of stitches. When you are done, you can read off the phone a rough measure of your gauge.

If you are shooting for a particular gauge, use the double-arrow icons first to set the phone for your target gauge. Then compare your swatch-in-progress to see if it looks close.

Caution! This tool will not give you a gauge accurate enough to know that you can proceed with your project and get a good result. You need to do a full sized gauge square and give the square a chance to rest (or be washed into) a size representative of your finished project. The gauge measure tool is only intended to make it less painful to decide if your needle or hook size is close enough to warrant working up a full gauge square.

If you happen to find that one of the reeds for your loom has lost its label identifying how many dents per inch (or per centimeter) it has, you can use Craft Measure to figure out the spacing of dents. Tap on the Reed Dents link on the main page. You'll be sent to a page that shows a miniature reed.

The image is labeled by how many dents per inch it is playing. The pair of double-triangle icons to either side of the label can be tapped to select a larger or smaller number of dents per inch (or centimeter). Select your best guess for the dent spacing of your reed then hold your phone on the other side of the reed. Look through the reed. If all of the white lines are nicely centered in the gaps in your reed, you guessed right. If not, tap a double-triangle icon to try a different spacing.

Try to stay a full arms length from the phone. If you get too close, you'll be looking at a significantly different angle through each of the gaps in the reed. That will throw off your observations. You want your eyes to be looking as close as possible to perfectly straight through the reed at the phone.

Craft Measure's peg spacing tool is much like its reed dent spacing tool. You reach this tool by taping on the Loom Peg Spacing link on the main page. The tool will depict a row of pegs spaced evenly. If you have a knitting loom or weaving peg loom and would like to know how many stitches or threads per inch (or centimeter) a project will have while on the loom, you can use this tool to find out.

The line of pegs is accompanied by a label identifying how many pegs per inch (or centimeter) are shown by the image. On either side of the label is a double-triangle icon. Tapping one icon increases the number of pegs per inch (or centimeter). Tapping the other decreases it.

Set the spacing of the pegs to your best initial estimate, then hold your phone behind the pegs of the loom to compare. Tap the double-triangle icons until the image and the pegs line up as exactly as possible. Then read off the number of pegs per inch (or centimeter).

Craft Measure version 1.1 supports creating bug reports that you can either manually send in or delete. If Craft Measure crashes, it will automatically attempt to log a bug report for the crash on your phone but will not automatically upload it anywhere. In addition, Craft Measure version 1.1 provides a page that enables you to create a bug report whenever you choose. Please use the create bug report feature only to report once on each feature that confuses you or that you feel is not working properly.

Craft Measure 1.1 logs your most recent actions in memory. When you exit Craft Measure, this log goes away. When a bug report is created, the log of recent actions along with information about your phone's manufacturer and model plus all software versions is added to the bug report. This information is intended to help me figure out the conditions under which the bug happens. I promise that I'll only use it for the purpose of figuring out how to fix bugs in Craft Measure and improve the experience of its users. Craft Measure does not save data about your activity except in bug reports on your phone. Craft Measure only sends bug reports off your phone when you tell it to send a bug report.

Bug reports are delivered to me via email, by handing over the entire bug report to Microsoft code that hands the email to (one of) your email program(s). You can see the whole bug report and edit out any details that you consider private before you tell your email program to send the bug report. You can always decide that you don't want to send the bug report after you read its content.

Suggestion: if you replace information that you consider private with some word like PRIVATE, you will be giving me information about what kind of data my users find sensitive. I'll think hard about not collecting such data for bug reports in future versions of the application.

If you tap on the ellipsis (...) in the application bar of any page, you'll see at least the following two menu choices:

• Show Unsent Bug Reports - a page that shows a list of automatically or manually created bug reports
• Create Bug Report - a page that lets you manually create a bug report

When you click on the menu choice Create Bug Report, you'll be sent to a page prompting for two pieces of information.

The first field is a short description of the bug. It will appear in the listing of bug reports logged on your phone and in the subject of the email reporting the bug to me (if you choose to send such an email). Don't try to describe everything that went wrong. Just give enough to give me a general idea of the kind of problem.

The second field is for a longer description of what you find confusing or think is incorrect behavior. It is helpful if you also add what you remember doing that led to the bug. The purpose of this is to tell me what to do to get the bug to happen on my phone. Anything you remember doing that was different from what you've done in the past without trouble is extra helpful. Craft Measure supplements the details you remember with details it holds in memory (not storage) so please don't get stressed out with worry that you might forget something.

When you have filled in the two fields, click on one of the three icons in the application bar.

	Upload - hand off the bug report to your email program right now
	Save - save the bug report on your phone now and email it later
	Delete - discard any data you've entered without saving a bug report

If you decide you don't want to create a bug report now, click the Delete icon. If you want to create the bug report but don't feel like sending out an email now, click the Save icon. If you want to create the bug report and send an email now, click the Upload icon. If you click the Upload icon, the bug report is also saved on your phone. After sending your email, Windows Phone will return you to the Report Bug page. You'll be asked whether you want to delete the bug report or leave it around. If you successfully sent the bug report email, I recommend deleting the bug report so that you aren't confused later about whether you sent it and aren't nagged about pending bug reports.

The Show Unsent Bug Reports sends you to a page listing all bug reports that you haven't deleted and that haven't expired after 30 days. Note that if you have uploaded a bug report via email but chosen not to delete the bug report, it will still appear on this page.

There are two things you can do with a bug report: upload it via email or delete it. If you just ignore a bug report for 30 days, it will automatically be deleted. Click on the bug report that you want to act upon (its text will change color to your accent color) then click on the appropriate icon in the application bar.

	Upload - hand off the bug report to your email program right now
	Delete - delete the bug report

The list of bug reports includes both those you create and those Craft Measure creates when it is crashing.

Because bug reports are most valuable to me when they are delivered in a timely fashion, I've written Craft Measure 1.1 to remind you that you have pending bug reports when you first start the application. You'll see the following dialog pop up:

If you click the Now dialog button, Craft Measure will send you to its page listing pending bug reports. You can choose to individually delete or upload each of the pending bug reports.

If you click the Never dialog button, Craft Measure will delete all pending bug reports. You won't be reminded about any of them again. If you see the dialog again, it will be because new bug reports have been created.

If you click the Later dialog button, the dialog will be dismissed. You can use Craft Measure normally. If you exit Craft Measure entirely without deleting all of the pending bug reports and start Craft Measure afresh later, you'll see the dialog again.