Alpaca: Your Ravelry Companion

This is one of my favorite apps on my phone and I definitely spend way too much time perusing and collecting patterns using it. I’ve never had any issues with it before this week, but now whenever I try to click a link within a pattern to another pattern (e.g., I clicked the “grains of good sweater” that was linked within the “grains headband”), it brings me to a pattern called “Library”, which is not at all related (by designer, pattern name, type, etc). Multiple times this has happened on multiple different patterns, always bringing me to the “library” pattern, which is for a sweater vest that, while I’m sure is lovely, I have no intention of making or adding to my pattern collection. I’ve looked to see if there are app updates (there aren’t) and tried restarting my phone to determine if it’s an issue with my device (it isn’t), all to no avail. My current theory is the designer of the “Library” sweater vest has hacked the app in a subtle way to get her vest pattern out there to the masses haha. But in all seriousness, that glitch aside, this is a great app. If they can fix that bug I will change my rating to 5 stars.

I love how this app makes Ravelry more easy to use on my phone. It’s clean, fresh, and fast. It’s easy to use and has most of the functionality of the full site. I’m quite impressed! I actually downloaded the app primarily to work on my projects. I often take wip photos on my phone and uploading them to Ravelry was a time consuming process. This app is really helpful for editing and uploading pictures to existing projects. I’d really like the ability to add new projects directly from the app and to filter my projects within the notebook section (my oldest finished ones are showing first), but I can workaround that with my laptop. Overall, I’m quite happy with this app. Thank you for making it available!

So I’ve used this for a few months now and it’s over all a great app. I’m having some issues though. Like when I set up filters requesting to see FREE patterns, I select one I’m interested in and I see it costs $5. If I ask to see free things I want to see free things. I’m also confused as to why I start a project and half way through I am now being asked to pay for said pattern. I feel like if you have saved it and/or hooked it, you should be able to finish it without paying since you started it while it was free. I understand that people have to charge for their patterns. But some people don’t or can’t afford to pay for them and we shouldn’t be punished for it. Also if a pattern is no longer available why does it still show up in the lists? I see something I like, click it, lo and behold it’s no longer available. That’s called clickbait and no one wants it.

I really enjoy this app, and I think it’s great for people who crochet, knit, loom. I use this app a lot, and it’s very very enjoyable. Although there is one tiny problem. I can’t view the patterns I have saved. (I don’t know if it’s that I can’t find where, lol, but I spent time looking) This is a problem for me because when I see a pattern I like, I have to remember the name and when I want to see the pattern, I must search it in the search bar. (Not good at remembering, lol) thank you for having the patience for reading this

This is THE BEST Ravelry app. There are a lot of wonderful things about Ravelry, but their mobile site is not one of them. I was thrilled when Alpaca was released. It is super intuitive, very user friendly, and has a great interface, all things Ravelry severely lacks. I open and use Alpaca at least 5-10 times a day. It has changed my mobile Ravelry game considerably and I now only log on to the actual Ravelry website maybe twice a month. This is a must download for knitters.