Not useful outside Aspecto garden... – Common Rocks Reference Review

The name of this application is completely misleading, it should be called "Rocks I found around my house in Scotland" not "Common Rocks Reference". This mini rock database is a major letdown and way too expensive at $2.99. There is a really uneven distribution in the presented rock types. Overall you get a total of 19 rocks: 6 igneous, 7 metamorphic and 6 sedimentary. This is nowhere close to covering the common rock types, and the author lost himself in useless distinction. Why separate “Brown” and “Red” sandstone and not even mention siltstone? Why go into the texture difference between basalt and porphyritic basalt but skip important volcanic rock types like andesite or komatiite? As a geologist I love to see good sample photos but they are nowhere to be found here! All the specimen photos are low resolution and when you zoom in it is impossible to see the details. Also the photos are landscape but presented in portrait mode and they don’t take advantage of the landscape view when you turn your device. The majority of the rocks have only one photo (a bad hand sample), but some like the dolerite has 4 including PPL and XPL thin section photo, and the red sandstone has 5 including a quartz crystal and 2 hand specimens that look the same. Why so much love for the sandstone and the dolerite, yet the author never explains what a thin section is... I did not buy this for myself but for my friends to show them examples of different rocks. But this app is totally useless as a beginner learning tool. And finally there is the quiz! While doing the quiz there is no way to know what the correct answers are, you are only informed of how many questions you got right at the end. The developer will need to do some major work on this app to get a better score! Don't buy this unless you want to waste three dollars!
Review by Géologue on Common Rocks Reference.