Reduce barcode margin / wider barcode on card page

[corobin]

Feature suggestion make the barcode margin smaller so that the barcode stretches across more of the screen width.

Rationale the way that Catima uses a small portion of the display to show the barcode means that it is very squished for longer barcodes, which makes resolving it more difficult and make it harder to read.

Comparison both Stocard and Supercard uses a bigger portion of the screen width for the barcode.

Screenshots Catima

Stocard

Supercard

Side by side

Potential objections and response

1. The example is an artificially created with an exceedingly long barcode A: I only noticed this issue because of a real barcode that is comparably long. It is maybe less common but certainly a realistic scenario. Further, even a relatively minor increase in width makes a pretty big difference in readability as can be seen in the stocard example.

2. you can already full-screen the barcode and adjust the size that way A: yes, and the other apps have that feature too. but for most barcodes i don't even need to do that since the barcode on main card screen is already perfectly readable. a minor adjustment to this page would avoid an extra step to open yet another page. it shouldn't be required to open the barcode in full screen just to be readable, that should be a convenience feature for example if it's awkward to present the middle of the device to the reader or something like that. the balance of convenience might fall the other way if the proposed change is major, but this is a small adjustment.

[stevewoodward]

Additional input: At the moment, it is not possible to use the barcode in portrait mode for the Netherlands largest supermarket (Albert Heijn), unless in landscape mode until this is fixed.

[TheLastProject]

Uhm, that's quite weird to hear because I literally shop at Albert Heijn all the time with no issues

[stevewoodward]

I am using a google pixel 8 pro. I have same issue with at the Hema.

I suspect that it is just a couple of pixels too narrow on my model, and probably a few others.

[TheLastProject]

Maybe. Sadly that screen space is already taken by the previous/next buttons so it's not a 5 minute fix of reducing margins.

As a workaround for now you can tap the barcode to put it in "full screen mode", which increases the size of the display.

I don't think I'll be getting to this soon. First need to deal with Android 15 support before Google kicks Catima out of the Play Store: #2301

Given how badly XML support is nowadays and given people want changes for better Pkpass support in #2274, perhaps this activity is due for a rewrite in Kotlin Compose. Definitely not a small undertaking though, a smaller patch to increase the barcode with a bit could be a better thing (the barcode height is definitely not an issue).