We've been working on an application for the iLiad and Feedbooks.com that will have the following features:

Download directly the feeds/sudokus/newspapers that you subscribed
Search & download all of the books available on Feedbooks
Get personal recommendations based on your downloads/favorites
Select between the iLiad template or your custom settings for the overall look of the PDF filesHere's a few screenshots of the work in progress.
We're currently developing the application on Linux, but a skilled iLiad programmer, Adam B., will handle the port.

Hope you'll find some time for porting our app ^_^
Directly downloading books and newspapers on the iLiad should be pretty neat !

Email or PM me the source, and I'll port it in the next few days. :thumbsup:

Very nice looking by the way. It looks like it'll fit well with the iLiad.

Email or PM me the source, and I'll port it in the next few days. :thumbsup:

Very nice looking by the way. It looks like it'll fit well with the iLiad.

We're still tweaking the UI. The UI and the app were made from the ground up for the iLiad. Btw, is there a specific path for books and/or newspaper on the iLiad ? That's part of our final tweaking on the app...

The default books path is: /mnt/free/books/
The default newspaper path is: /mnt/free/newspapers/

The default books path is: /mnt/free/books/
The default newspaper path is: /mnt/free/newspapers/

OK we'll use these paths.
I think that the single coolest thing with the app is the fact that you can get book recommendations directly on your reader and download them as a customized PDF with the right font, margin etc...

OK we'll use these paths.
I think that the single coolest thing with the app is the fact that you can get book recommendations directly on your reader and download them as a customized PDF with the right font, margin etc...

This definitely looks to be a killer app for the iLiad. Very cool indeed.

Something to keep in mind, the fonts may not look exactly the same from the Desktop GTK version as on the Iliad. The iLiad's gtk version is configured to force text in a larger font size, although I don't have the exact numbers.

Also, when you will need to input text, the software keyboard will block around 1/4 of the bottom of the screen. You may want to keep this in mind when designing screens that require text input.

Edit again: With the latest firmware version (2.10), you can modify the path of the News and Books buttons. This path is stored in /mnt/settings/er_registry.txt. It may make more sense to read the configured path from there, and adjust where your program saves the files accordingly.

This looks REALLY cool! The ability to download RSS feeds and books DIRECTLY to the iliad is great. The device is starting to live up to its potential! (Thanks to all the great devs on MB!)

Hadrien, another thing that could be really cool if integrated is the ability to input an ULR (pdf, txt, mobipocket) and the device to download it and save it. Or (even better) an integration with the web browser.

Also, another idea, would be to be able to access the 'personal' library hosted on private (or public) webhosting, browse and download the book you feel to read at the moment.

I feel that your app Hadrian has almost limitless potential in terms of accesing content and making use of the iLiad's wi-fi. Hope that your collaboration with Adam will be fruitfull!

Also, another idea, would be to be able to access the 'personal' library hosted on private (or public) webhosting, browse and download the book you feel to read at the moment.


The application is centered around Feedbooks: http://www.feedbooks.com

Currently with the app, you can search for a book or get book recommendations (we analyze previous book downloads and your favorites, and based on download patterns, books are recommended).
Once you've listed them, you can also select a specific book and ask for similar ones (that's still based on our download patterns algorithm).

What we could add, that would act a bit like a 'personal' library:
- list previously downloaded books
- lists favorites

Edit again: With the latest firmware version (2.10), you can modify the path of the News and Books buttons. This path is stored in /mnt/settings/er_registry.txt. It may make more sense to read the configured path from there, and adjust where your program saves the files accordingly.

How does a sample er_registry.txt file looks like ?

I feel that your app Hadrian has almost limitless potential in terms of accesing content and making use of the iLiad's wi-fi. Hope that your collaboration with Adam will be fruitfull!

Totally agree. This is the application that finally will make iLiad use its strengths (WiFi, Linux, OSS) fully. Imagine the rave reviews when a journalist picks up the iLiad, browses through lots of books and newspapers, downloads them and reads them - all of this on a beach/in a cafe/whatever...

How does a sample er_registry.txt file looks like ?

Here's my er_registry.txt. I've manually edited it to point the news button to the compact flash card. Everything else is the stock location.

Edit: You may want to hold off on adding this to your program. It seems the registry format has changed in 2.11


[BOOKS_CATEGORY]
locationArray=/mnt/free/books;
searchType=or
searchRecursive=false
searchStringArray=;
searchFieldArray=;
sortFieldType=fsname
sortAscending=true

[NEWSPAPERS_CATEGORY]
locationArray=/mnt/cf;
searchType=or
searchRecursive=false
searchStringArray=;
searchFieldArray=;
sortFieldType=fsname
sortAscending=true

[DOCUMENTS_CATEGORY]
locationArray=/mnt/free/documents;
searchType=or
searchRecursive=false
searchStringArray=;
searchFieldArray=;
sortFieldType=fsname
sortAscending=true

[NOTES_CATEGORY]
locationArray=/mnt/free/notes;
searchType=or
searchRecursive=false
searchStringArray=;
searchFieldArray=;
sortFieldType=fsname
sortAscending=true

It won't be a killer app for some, if pdf conversion loses most of the formatting... I read a lot of developer blogs with code samples...

It won't be a killer app for some, if pdf conversion loses most of the formatting... I read a lot of developer blogs with code samples...

Have you tried using feedbooks to convert some of your blogs to PDF?

You can always report any bugs to Hadrien...

If it were possible to also get recommendations from LibraryThing, that might increase the value.

It won't be a killer app for some, if pdf conversion loses most of the formatting... I read a lot of developer blogs with code samples...

We support verbatim mode, but the problem with code samples is that you simply can't change at all the way its displayed. If the code sample is larger than the iLiad, you either need to break the line or scroll through the code. You can't scroll with PDF or even any XML format.

We render those RSS feeds directly on the server, not on the application itself. This mean that we'll keep updating and upgrading the overall look of those PDF files (Epub support will also be available pretty soon).
Our main focus for Feedbooks for the last few months was e-books but this Autumn we're going to work mostly on our newspaper component (the RSS rendering is still in an "alpha" state, and we'll add many more news widgets, not just RSS/Sudoku).

If it were possible to also get recommendations from LibraryThing, that might increase the value.

Is there an open API for LibraryThing ? I haven't seen any thing like this on it.
We're using the Amazon REST API though, we could give those recommendations. The only problem with Amazon is that the recommendation system is based on ISBN, and you can have multiple ISBN for a single book (different editions).
We'll keep improving our recommendations algorithm though, and keep in mind that the more people use Feedbooks, the better recommendations will be.

We might work with the french equivalent of LibraryThing in the future: Babelio. And we also have a lot of cool features for Facebook in development. I really love Facebook: their API for Facebook applications is quite wonderful.

Good to know this beta is actually alpha :) On the code rendering - i'm afraid nothing less than converter with browser equivalent rendering capabilities will do, many bloggers use i-dont-know-what tools making use of heavy CSS. Some do it more simple way but feedbooks fails to convert them as well. For exampl, see the picture I attached :)

Good to know this beta is actually alpha :) On the code rendering - i'm afraid nothing less than converter with browser equivalent rendering capabilities will do, many bloggers use i-dont-know-what tools making use of heavy CSS. Some do it more simple way but feedbooks fails to convert them as well. For exampl, see the picture I attached :)

Heavy CSS is pretty stupid in a RSS feed.
Took a look at your screenshot, I can clearly see the problem here, we already support entities encoded using #code; but not those with &code;.
We'll add the support for those too in our new parsing system.

Most RSS feeds are a real mess though, you can hardly imagine how many fixes we need to add to support broken RSS feeds. For example, I've seen a few RSS feeds where the HTML tags themselves were encoded with HTML entities: that's really ugly.

Tried to use tidy in order to transform all of this bad HTML into nice and easy to parse XHTML, but even tidy failed to clean some of these feeds.

Edit: updated the first message of the thread with a new text and another screenshot for the "Books" tab.

Well, because of this complete mess (especially styles) in RSS i've never used any other RSS software than those what came with integrated browser support or run in a browser itself. You might consider alternative output as some sort of HTML package. Though I have no idea how far iLiad-s internal browser html support goes yet, basic things I tested seemed to work.

Well, because of this complete mess (especially styles) in RSS i've never used any other RSS software than those what came with integrated browser support or run in a browser itself. You might consider alternative output as some sort of HTML package. Though I have no idea how far iLiad-s internal browser html support goes yet, basic things I tested seemed to work.

Supporting CSS will be much easier with the Epub output already.

Although some RSS feeds are really messy, some have simple HTML and work really well already. I read TechCrunch, Slashdot and news from the BBC website this way.

I'll keep my fingers crossed then and wish you luck (and even more, speed:P) with a this project :)

I'll keep my fingers crossed then and wish you luck (and even more, speed:P) with a this project :)

It has nothing to do with luck: time & work.

Main problem is that we're working on many different things at the same time.

The main work on the application is now done.
We've added a "history' and a "favorites" button on the tab for books. This way you can display the books that you added as favorites on Feedbooks.com and download them any time you want.

Hadrien, when can we expect to be able to play with the lovely new app?

Hadrien, when can we expect to be able to play with the lovely new app?

Well Adam B. can already play with it on his iLiad ;-)
We're doing a few changes and adding a feature or two: it'll be available in September as soon as everything's ready.

Well Adam B. can already play with it on his iLiad ;-)
We're doing a few changes and adding a feature or two: it'll be available in September as soon as everything's ready.

Yay!

September's upon us, so i keep my fingers crossed! :2thumbsup

Please note that there's an option under iLiad settings for the location of books, documents, newspapers and notes.

Please note that there's an option under iLiad settings for the location of books, documents, newspapers and notes.

Yeah, we're loading the new configuration file (xml). It'll download books and newspapers in the right folder.

Just wanted to give an update.

The port is coming along nicely. We just need to work out some bugs in the download manager, add a few more refreshes, and we're good to go.

Here are some more teaser shots. :D

Just wanted to give an update.

The port is coming along nicely. We just need to work out some bugs in the download manager, add a few more refreshes, and we're good to go.

Here are some more teaser shots. :D

Any news here? I thought September was the target date? This application is, in my view, a killer app for iLiad...

The core code of the software was indeed finished late September / early October. 1-2 bugs kept us from releasing it. I'm still expecting some kind of news concerning a development device from Karel. There's honestly very little left to do, but we're blocked as long as we can't fix this bug.

In the meantime we're working on a full cache system for the RSS feeds. Downloading feeds and newspapers will be much faster as soon as the cache is ready. Nothing really changed for the books though, except that we now output epub files too, and this will be available in the application too (epub support through FBReader on the iLiad).

The core code of the software was indeed finished late September / early October. 1-2 bugs kept us from releasing it. I'm still expecting some kind of news concerning a development device from Karel. There's honestly very little left to do, but we're blocked as long as we can't fix this bug.

In the meantime we're working on a full cache system for the RSS feeds. Downloading feeds and newspapers will be much faster as soon as the cache is ready. Nothing really changed for the books though, except that we now output epub files too, and this will be available in the application too (epub support through FBReader on the iLiad).

right. Thanks for the update! Looking forward to the release. If I'm lucky, it will be before the xmas holiday :)

I just hope that in your port you are going to use the irex API for screen updates and not a "hacked xlib"... Neither replacing the xlib on my irex nor a 6mb executable which includes its own xlib and its own gtklib are a serious option.

Is iRex holding you up on this? Is there anything we can do to help move this forward? Doesn't one of the other guys here have a dev version that he could maybe use to help debug the issue?

I'd love to be able to get a morning epaper with my favorite feeds in at the touch of a button!

FeedBooks have recently received an iLiad. This should help move things along nicely.

Previously, they had to write the program, let me compile, test, and report problems. Then, they had to blindly try to solve the bugs without an iLiad to test with. It was a pretty slow and painful process.

Ouch! That can't have been fun.

Well that's good news. The iLiad is building up quite an arsenal of applications. It looks like I got one at the right time!

Thanks for the update. Good to know they'll be able to progress now.

Yes we're able to progress at a much better pace now. Now that we have an iLiad, we can also discover a few things, for example why it might be interesting to also download covers and create manifest.xml files.

I'm also quite impressed by the display on the iLiad. Fonts in PDF files are MUCH better than on the Sony PRS-500/505.

Excellent! That's great news. Yes it's a great device isn't it! I was actually thinking about the covers and manifests too after seeing the Mobipocket software.

Let us know when you have an alpha/beta I'm sure people will be happy to test this exciting new product. I think it's a real killer feature for the iLiad especially as it'll be more open and extensible than the likes of Kindle.

BTW, what language/framework did you use on the Feedbooks site?

Ruby on Rails mostly.

Thought so ;)

I'll be glad to see this -- I think it will really make the iLiad shine compared to the Kindle.

Been a little while since any updates have been mentioned on this, I am am eagerly awaiting this application. I could not find any reference to it on the feebooks.com website, any idea as to when we can expect a release?

Well, now that we have an iLiad, work on this software is much easier.
This is an open-source software, we'll release a first beta version for those who'd like to test it in the upcoming weeks, and I hope we'll have something more stable with a few new features like support for manifest.xml files (for books covers), much better speed for the RSS/newspapers and maybe Mobipocket support too (right now, there's already epub and PDF available, but we built the software to make sure that we can easily add new formats on the Feedbooks platform without any software upgrade for the sync tools) before the end of the year.

Thanks Hadrien. Looking forward to all these features. I await the beta for testing.

A format supported by FBReader would be appreciated. (Though epub might do it.)

Yeah epub is supported on FBReader, although it lacks CSS and TOC support. We already output books in epub and we're working on feeds.

I've added extra margin space on the iLiad PDF. 2mm wasn't enough for a decent book.

What I would love is that the pdf created by the software would include the comics that the rss feed would link to. Or am I asking too much?

Finally, here's a first test version. This is purely for testing, and if you have any comment on the app itself, if you encounter any bug, please report it in this thread.

A few extra points:

We've added epub and mobipocket support for the books. This is 100% server side, we could add any other format in the future without any change on the app.
Books should already work very well.
Feeds/Newspapers is still a bit complicated for the moment. As long as we don't have the cache, some feed will work much better than others. For the moment I would advise you to use only single feeds instead of newspapers, and feeds without too many images. This will change in the future: as soon as we're done working on the cache system, everything will work fine and run much faster.
The connection on the iLiad keeps turning off, there's something to keep it on, but you might get the "connection not working" error a few times. This might be the biggest bug/problem left in the application.

Woohoow! Thx!!

Now if only I could find my iliad... :D

Stephen also did a short video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=pu_G5KpAnR8

We'll do a real demo once we're past the first public beta.

Just tried it with 8 feeds and a book. Works great! However, some of the RSS PDFs don't seem to get generated correctly but this ocurrs from the website too.

Just tried it with 8 feeds and a book. Works great! However, some of the RSS PDFs don't seem to get generated correctly but this ocurrs from the website too.

Yep that's what I said in my previous post. It's due to the current lack of a cache system, but we're working on this...

Okay, this is a great application. I think that if iRex could deliver this through the IDS, it would be the killer app for the iLiad.

There are a few notes I have that could make it even better, some I have discussed with Stephen, but I figured I'd put them here for all to see and to keep them organized.


Change the LDFLAGS line in the makefile to the following to get rid of the cairo and pangocairo dependencies:
LDFLAGS=-I`pwd`/include/ -pthread -L/usr/local/lib -L/usr/local/ssl/lib -lgtk-x11-2.0 -lgdk-x11-2.0 -latk-1.0 -lgdk_pixbuf-2.0 -lgobject-2.0 -lgmodule-2.0 -lfreetype -lfontconfig -lpng12 -lm -lXrender -lX11 -lxml2 -lcurl -lssl -lcrypto -ldl -lz -lgthread-2.0 -lglib-2.0
If you use this version of curl (http://curl.haxx.se/download/curl-7.14.0.tar.gz) in your development environment, it will prevent needing the updated curl library.
Using the above 2 methods, I can get the installer down to 190k. This can easily fit inside the main memory and hopefully be distributed via IDS.
If you store the configuration xml file in /mnt/settings it should remain after firmware updates and iNewsStand version upgrades.
The program should trap the upper left button and use that to close out of the application.
It would be nice if the page flipper was able to flip between tabs of the application. Perhaps also update the page counter at the bottom as well.
Perhaps the program could issue a ping command every few seconds to keep the wireless connection alive
Something was wrong with the manifest in the post. I had to recreate it for it to work.


I'm attaching a version that I compiled that does not need any dependencies other than what's built into the iLiad.

Really, this is excellent work. Great job to Stephen and Hadrien.

I've been really looking forward to this program!!!

Unfortunately, I didn't get it to work. Hadrians version crashed my iLiad (an empty error dialog popped up and stayed there, had to reset). Adams version causes the green light to blink for a while, then it is back to the content lister.

Probably just my bad computer karma. I guess I should do some serious work anyway :-|

I've been really looking forward to this program!!!

Unfortunately, I didn't get it to work. Hadrians version crashed my iLiad (an empty error dialog popped up and stayed there, had to reset). Adams version causes the green light to blink for a while, then it is back to the content lister.

Probably just my bad computer karma. I guess I should do some serious work anyway :-|

Are you running firmware 2.11?

Are you running firmware 2.11?

Wow, are you RSS'ing this forum or something? Fast response!

Yes, I'm using 2.11. Any more info I can give you?

Wow, are you RSS'ing this forum or something? Fast response!

Yes, I'm using 2.11. Any more info I can give you?

I could try to start it using SSH, but I have a stupid problem: I'm out of TP-cables, and the wireless connection from iLiad is the most crappy thing I have ever seen. I am lucky for it to remain stable for more than 2-3 minutes.

(But it works perfectly when updating...)

And this while running a ping to the iLiad, and a ping the other way if the connection is alive long enough for me to start it.

I could try to start it using SSH, but I have a stupid problem: I'm out of TP-cables, and the wireless connection from iLiad is the most crappy thing I have ever seen. I am lucky for it to remain stable for more than 2-3 minutes.

(But it works perfectly when updating...)

And this while running a ping to the iLiad, and a ping the other way if the connection is alive long enough for me to start it.

Yep the wireless connection is a real problem here. Might be the reason why it crashed although it should simply display an error message instead.

Wow, are you RSS'ing this forum or something? Fast response!

Yes, I'm using 2.11. Any more info I can give you?

I get automatic emails any time there's a repsonse to a thread I post in. And I 'm notified of new emails automatically.

That's odd. Try the file attached. If it doesn't work, let me know what's in the error.txt and output.txt

I get automatic emails any time there's a repsonse to a thread I post in. And I 'm notified of new emails automatically.

That's odd. Try the file attached. If it doesn't work, let me know what's in the error.txt and output.txt

Later - I am busy downloading books using the now-working iNewsStand :)

I tried ssh'ing in. I keep an ping -t iliad (from my windowsbox), and the connection is up and down. I have auto-reconnect in my ssh-client, and the connection goes up again quite often.

I then tried starting run.sh thru ssh, and it didn't work. I think the problem might be the connectionmanager part of run.sh - it crashed my ssh-connection and the network connection. I then started a new ssh-session and tried ./iNewsStand, and the application is up and running.

I've even downloaded Also sprach Zarathustra twice - I guess the GUI could need some minor adjustments :)

Do you want me to attach my entire ssh log? There were quite a lot of messages there

Hm, check this out:

root@ereader:/media/cf/books/iNewsStand# ./run.sh
-sh: ./run.sh: not found
root@ereader:/media/cf/books/iNewsStand#

I am not a linux expert - what does this mean?

Anyways, if I start the application using ./iNewsStand it works. I don't know if the command

root@ereader:/media/cf/books/iNewsStand# connectionMgr --background --stay-connected

worked or not, but it could seem as if the connection got back up again whenever iNewsStand needed it. At least I managed to download three books even though my ping sometimes were silent for long periods.

I'll do some more experimenting and report back if I find out anything. Gotta try some of the RSS functionality. I attach the output of the connectionMgr in case it is of interest.

Hm, check this out:

root@ereader:/media/cf/books/iNewsStand# ./run.sh
-sh: ./run.sh: not found
root@ereader:/media/cf/books/iNewsStand#

I am not a linux expert - what does this mean?


Ehem... it means I unzipped the files on a windows box and copied them to a CF card meant to be used on a Linux box:smack:

Anyway: Now i get an error box "Can't connect to FeedBooks.com etc".

This is caused, I guess, by the connection-mgr-thing breaking the otherwise more-or-less-working connection. I'm going to create another shortcut that doesn't use the connection-mgr-thing and see if it works better when I manually start the wlan first and then starts iNewsStand.

As long as I start the connection myself, using wireless.sh start xxx, it works like a charm (slow, but there could be many reasons for that, including some bittorrent stuff running on my computer).

A really great program!!! I can't say how cool I think this is. Personally I think something like this should've been iRex pri 1 from day 1. Exepting the battery life improvements and pdf speed enhancements, this is about as useful as ALL OTHER IREX SOFTWARE UPGRADES TOGETHER!

Finally the "News"-button can be used to something useful. (I have to reorganize my iLiad files now:().

Seems I'm having a conversation with myselves here, so I'll try to involve somebody else :)

1) There is a typo in the manifest.xml, says donwloader instead of downloader :)

2) Are there some documentation on the inewsstand.xml? Can it be used to specify where you want your stuff to go?

And now: Off to read slashdot/bbc/+++ in my bed. Finally :)

As long as I start the connection myself, using wireless.sh start xxx, it works like a charm (slow, but there could be many reasons for that, including some bittorrent stuff running on my computer).

A really great program!!! I can't say how cool I think this is. Personally I think something like this should've been iRex pri 1 from day 1. Exepting the battery life improvements and pdf speed enhancements, this is about as useful as ALL OTHER IREX SOFTWARE UPGRADES TOGETHER!

Finally the "News"-button can be used to something useful. (I have to reorganize my iLiad files now:().

Glad that you love it. Keep in mind that this is the first test version. We'll improve the UI, remove a few bugs and once there's a cache system for the RSS feeds, things will be much better on this side too.

In the future, we'll do much more than just RSS feeds for newspapers, we already have sudokus, but I hope we'll be able to create something very close from a personnalized newspapers, with all sorts of widgets displaying relevant information.

Seems I'm having a conversation with myselves here, so I'll try to involve somebody else :)

1) There is a typo in the manifest.xml, says donwloader instead of downloader :)

2) Are there some documentation on the inewsstand.xml? Can it be used to specify where you want your stuff to go?

And now: Off to read slashdot/bbc/+++ in my bed. Finally :)

It goes where you specified the books/news/etc folders in your iLiad configuration file.

We'll also add manifest.xml support in an upcoming version. This way, you'll also get a book cover for every downloaded book.

Let me know if you have a bug/feature request site, I have plenty of ideas and minor quirks.

It goes where you specified the books/news/etc folders in your iLiad configuration file.

We'll also add manifest.xml support in an upcoming version. This way, you'll also get a book cover for every downloaded book.

For me, higher pri would be to remove old feeds (or specify folder, so that at least only one folder gets messy).

But of course, most important is the connectivity - for me it is still not really usable, since I must use SSH and pings and stuff to try to keep the connection alive long enough to download something.

Let me know if you have a bug/feature request site, I have plenty of ideas and minor quirks.

You can post it in this thread.

I have a problem running every one of the three zips. Like Narve, I only get a blinking green light and nothing else. Firmware 2.11. How can I solve this?

Ow i've tried running the program from an SD card and from the internal memory, all attemps failed offcourse ;)

I'll try to release a new version for Xmas.

I have a problem running every one of the three zips. Like Narve, I only get a blinking green light and nothing else. Firmware 2.11. How can I solve this?

Two things to try:

1) Make sure that you didn't do the windows-unzip-copy-to-linux-mistake I did.
Unzip on a linux box (on the iLiad if you have the patience). If you don't have one available, I'm not quite sure how to avoid it - if you have ssh-access to the iLiad, you can unzip it there, or just edit run.sh afterwards.

2) Copy the run.sh (for backup), and comment out the connectionMgr lines. That did the trick for me, but I then have to start the network stuff manually. (I have a StartHomeWLAN.sh file that I click on first).

I used Adams version, which has some small but useful fixes as far as I could see.

How about: someone unzips the folder on an linux device and zips it on a windows device and uploads it to this forum? :) I'll try to figure out how to get ssh access if I find the time, else it's after my exams ;).

Hadrien a suggestion: make it plug in and play? :)

I get automatic emails any time there's a repsonse to a thread I post in. And I 'm notified of new emails automatically.

That's odd. Try the file attached. If it doesn't work, let me know what's in the error.txt and output.txt

I got the same problem as narve after I touched the icon the green light blinked for
a while and return to the content list. No program run and I can't find out where
are the error.txt and output.txt

edit:Ahhh Blue already asked this question, sorry!! I didn't read thorough this thread

How about: someone unzips the folder on an linux device and zips it on a windows device and uploads it to this forum? :) I'll try to figure out how to get ssh access if I find the time, else it's after my exams ;).

Hadrien a suggestion: make it plug in and play? :)

Hadrien/Adam, didn't you make a magic install-and-run scheme some time ago?

Regarding the linefeed-problem: I'm actually not quite sure how to fix it properly (I hate everything related to charsets/encodings!), but one solution that definitly works is to unzip the files to the CF card and then edit them in a proper text editor that can save in Unix-format. JEdit/TextPad should work, UltraEdit definitely can do this. It is only run.sh that needs to be modified.

While you're in the editor, try removing the connectMgr lines and see if you at least get a proper error dialog (No connection available or something like that).

What is with the name iNewsstand? Is the program related to newsstand.com the website that distributes online newspapers?

Regarding the LF problem, there is a linux/cygwin command-line utility called dos2unix, which will fix it automatically. However, I suspect it's only the first line of run.sh that gives you trouble.

"#!/bin/sh" starts a new shell instance for this script. If you have extra garbage on that line, you won't be able to run the script at all. You will get the blinking light for a few seconds while the contentlister is trying to start the script, and then it will exit. It will never even get to running the application.

You can safely remove this top line, since the contentlister starts a new shell for your script anyway. There's a good chance the rest of the script will parse correctly.

As for the automatic connection, it sounds like you're defaulting to a wired profile. Check your preferences and make sure that the iLiad is set to connect to iDS, and not to your computer. Then, just once, start a manual connection to iDS(hold down the upper right key); make sure you check the wireless button, and connect succesfully. The connectionMgr defaults to using the last successful profile, and if you've told the iLiad to go to iDS, and told iDS to use wireless, it will start the wireless connection every time.

Also, it occurs to me we could be a bit more conservative and try something like:

if connectionMgr --background --stay-connected;
then iNewsstand;
fi;
/usr/bin/wired.sh stop
/usr/bin/wireless.sh stop

The last two calls are much faster than invoking the connectionMgr again, so the contentlister comes back sooner.

I love having this app on my iLiad :)

Ok I finally found some time to install this app properly. Now I've had issues with getting the program to work like I mentioned before. Now the tip that Narve gave me helped me. After trying to edit the run.sh script (removing the first line or that line with background connection) wich didn't work I've opened the run.sh script with metapad (a text editor) and converted the fileformat to UNIX Text (LF) and saved it again. Then it worked.

Just to make myself clear: I had no idea what exactly it was that I was doing :2thumbsup

But for all thoose that don't know how to get it to work I've attached a zip file (zipped on a windows vista 32bit laptop from acer if that matters to anyone). And because I consider myself :xmas: I've removed the mistake in the manifest file (that type error).

Btw: did I mention it is a great program? :D

Ow and here are some first suggestions for the program:
* include some margin space, left right and above. It looks weird without it. (not much)
* resize the tap titles (feeds - books - downloads etc) to a smaller size and include margin left and right. The buttons look way to big compared to the rest.

Wow...This is what I'm looking for.

Thank you Blue :thumbsup:

Very nice Blue !

This is still a first test version for this software, we'll keep on improving everything.

I'd love to see a standard UI provided by iRex, to make these apps consistent with the rest of the UI.

Stephen also had a pretty nice idea: once that you've launched and entered your username/password once, it would add a very simple program in the newspaper folder. Open this program, and it will synchronize your feeds without launching an UI.
If this could be launched automatically like iDS, it would be a perfect way to get fresh content on your iLiad every day.

you're all welcome! :thumbsup:

Yes a standard UI from Irex would simplify alot of things. I've got some ideas for small aps I would like to create so a standard UI would be great. :bookworm:

The idea of making a sync program in the news section is without doubt alot better then opening the app itself.

:bulb2: But why not place an extra button in the connection manager next to IDS and computer so when you want to sync, you just got to press the big round button on your iliad and choose feedbooks. I guess it might not be possible without Irex helping on this one but it sounds more like the iliad to me. Everything you need to sync should be isntalled in one place.

Now that I think about it, the way it is now, syncing either computer or IDS should be different. You should be able to do both at the same time. But that offcourse is :offtopic:
:)

:help: Now about something else. I've got a problem with the feeds I guess. I've subscribed to some rss feeds, a newspaper and a sudoku on the feedbooks site but for some reason, I don't think it gets trough to my iliad. I can download books using the app but when I select 'Feeds' I don't get a list. I am logged in offcourse however, I had the impression that logging in went terribly fast. Can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong? :thanks:

I soooo love theese smilies :o

:help: Now about something else. I've got a problem with the feeds I guess. I've subscribed to some rss feeds, a newspaper and a sudoku on the feedbooks site but for some reason, I don't think it gets trough to my iliad. I can download books using the app but when I select 'Feeds' I don't get a list. I am logged in offcourse however, I had the impression that logging in went terribly fast. Can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong? :thanks:

I now have some feeds in the list but I don't know how they got there. I removed a few from the feedbook site (thought it may overload something) and tried again without luck. But now that I've start up the program again, I got one in the list. I've gradually increased the number of feeds and now I get them all (the same as before) without any problems. I guess something got stuck somewhere (to give it an experts opinion :rolleyes:)

Also another bug I think, after closing the program with 'exit', I can't seem to use my stylus untill I use one of the buttons.
...
Ok something just happened :) I closed the program and like I said, I couldn't use the stylus except to use thoose buttons on the lower right. But before I closed the program I was syncing my feeds and I had just placed a new feed in my list. So when I closed the program and I couldn't use the stylus, I was waiting a bit and then all of a sudden that new feed appears in my contentlister. Could it be that the program doesn't quite close completely but is still running on the background untill I use one of the hardware buttons?

Ow and this feed:
http://www.deredactie.be/cm/de.redactie/newswire?mode=atom
isn't showing any text after the titles. But I suspect it has something to do with the 'summary' tag. That's the only container for the text and I don't think that feedbooks is extracting any text out of thoose? Well it doesn't matter, their feeds aren't really any good... :) But on the feedbook's site there is a button under 'Beta' that says: "This feed is not working" but it doesn't work :rofl:
Ok enough of the laughing, I don't recieve any feedback when I push the button so I don't think it does anything.

And then a little trick most of you will probably already know ;): if you want the iNewsStand to be on the top of the list in the contentlister, you can rename the directory it is placed in to 0_iNewsStand for example. The manifest file will keep the name of the directory that is displayed in the contenlister the same as before but the postion of the file will change.

Now I'm going to :book2: thoose wonderfull feeds! :) the formatting is really super! Even my own feed displays so nicely on my iliad that I can't believe I wrote that :thumbsup:

Great super nice program! :thanks:

I think I found another bug. I wanted to sync all but 1 feed after I deleted all the feeds in my news directory. So I start up the program and I press 'select all' and then I deselected the feed I didn't want to sync and then I pressed: 'sync selected feed' and the only feed I had in my inbox was the one I didn't wanted ... ow... wait. Ok I get it, when you press 'sync selected feed' it only syncs one feed wich you last pressed, right? The one that's highlighted... And 'Sync!' selects the feeds that have a V in the boxes, right? Ok that makes sense :D So it's not a bug after all ;)

I now have some feeds in the list but I don't know how they got there. I removed a few from the feedbook site (thought it may overload something) and tried again without luck. But now that I've start up the program again, I got one in the list. I've gradually increased the number of feeds and now I get them all (the same as before) without any problems. I guess something got stuck somewhere (to give it an experts opinion :rolleyes:)

After long :chinscratch: I what went wrong here. :bulb2: I was playing a bit with my feed subscriptions on feedbooks.com and I found out that from the moment that I subscribe to a sudoku from feedbooks, that I don't get my list of feeds on my iLiad anymore! So if you have a problem with that list, just delete the sudoku subscriptions and you should be fine again.

Sorry for spamming this thread, it looks like I'm going solo on this one :( I hope that I give some interesting information :blink:

After long :chinscratch: I what went wrong here. :bulb2: I was playing a bit with my feed subscriptions on feedbooks.com and I found out that from the moment that I subscribe to a sudoku from feedbooks, that I don't get my list of feeds on my iLiad anymore! So if you have a problem with that list, just delete the sudoku subscriptions and you should be fine again.

Sorry for spamming this thread, it looks like I'm going solo on this one :( I hope that I give some interesting information :blink:

Interesting... I'll make a few test too, I don't see why adding a sudoku would be a problem. In the meantime, try adding a newspaper with sudokus inside it !

Edit: Found the bug, I'm working on it. Once again, thank you Blue for pointing this out.

Interesting... I'll make a few test too, I don't see why adding a sudoku would be a problem. In the meantime, try adding a newspaper with sudokus inside it !

Subscribing to a newspaper with sudokus is no problem but it's like I can't open the pdf files with the sudokus in them. I tried it with 'Sudoku Maniac' and 'Gadget newspaper' and both won't open. Offcourse I'm not sure if it's due to the sudokus but the other newspaper do work ('BBC full content' and 'Iliad ebook' and 'Tech News'). I've tried downloading the sudoku newspapers two or three times.

Edit: Found the bug, I'm working on it. Once again, thank you Blue for pointing this out.

Hey, it is I who has to :thanks: for solving the bugs, it's easier to spot problems then to solve them. I'm just doing my job as an annoying customer who wants a perfect program :D (You should read my e-mails that I sent my professors with 'suggestions' for their course textbook :p)

mmh wait, I can't open the newspaper 'Tech news' either and that's not one with sudokus in them...

Ok it's me again ;) I've once again subscribed to the Sudoku Maniac newspaper but now I've asked for a Custom PDF format (that I gave the same settings as the Iliad template). And now I can open the pdf file.

I've tried the Sudoku Maniac one a few times on the iLiad and it worked just fine. Sudoku are a lot of fun on the iLiad !

I think I've solved the bug, I'll put it online tomorrow or monday (currently working on a mobile edition of the website).

Problem with the subscriptions on the sudoku should be fixed now.

Problem with the subscriptions on the sudoku should be fixed now.

That's right! Thanks! :thumbsup:

I am able to download and read books successfully using this app. I downloaded Don Quixote; it ended up in the Iliad's internal 'Books' folder as a PDF, nicely formatted etc.

However, my 3 different newsfeeds (BBC news/BBC science/custom NYT hed&bbc hed), while reporting successful downloads, do not actually show up anywhere, either in the internal memory or on the SD card.

I am currently running Blue's last version off an SD card over a wireless connection, on a developer package Iliad. As I said, a book successfully downloaded.

Where is this 'mht' folder where the news feeds are supposedly ending up?

I am able to download and read books successfully using this app. I downloaded Don Quixote; it ended up in the Iliad's internal 'Books' folder as a PDF, nicely formatted etc.

However, my 3 different newsfeeds (BBC news/BBC science/custom NYT hed&bbc hed), while reporting successful downloads, do not actually show up anywhere, either in the internal memory or on the SD card.

I am currently running Blue's last version off an SD card over a wireless connection, on a developer package Iliad. As I said, a book successfully downloaded.

Where is this 'mht' folder where the news feeds are supposedly ending up?

It should be downloaded in your default folder for newspapers, I think that's "mnt/news/".

I do not have any feeds displayed - probably because I have not subscribed to any.
I registered on the feedbooks site, and immediately logged on in the iNewsStand, which worked. I then tried to log on the site, but was asked to confirm my account. Each time I try to log in, I get an empty "Confirm your account on Feedbooks" message - there is nothing to click or paste. Hence I cannot subscribe to any feeds...

I do not have any feeds displayed - probably because I have not subscribed to any.
I registered on the feedbooks site, and immediately logged on in the iNewsStand, which worked. I then tried to log on the site, but was asked to confirm my account. Each time I try to log in, I get an empty "Confirm your account on Feedbooks" message - there is nothing to click or paste. Hence I cannot subscribe to any feeds...

That's a problem with some webmails. Yahoo used to have it although it seems that they corrected this bug on their end. Don't know why exactly though, our e-mail are standard. Check the source of the message to get the link, or e-mail me and I'll manually confirm your account.

Thanks!
It is a yahoo.co.uk email account. I clicked "Save Message Test" and the saved "invisible" attachment did contain the activation link. Weird...

Thanks!
It is a yahoo.co.uk email account. I clicked "Save Message Test" and the saved "invisible" attachment did contain the activation link. Weird...

Just took a look at our recently registered users, and all yahoo.co.uk e-mails had this problem. People with @yahoo.com e-mails used to have it, but they all work perfectly now.

presumably it is mnt/news which opens when I click the news button; that folder is entirely empty (as it is when I navigate to it from the content lister). As I said above, a book came down, but no news feeds. I would have guessed it was the standard feedbooks cache problem, but i am after all trying to get the BBC which is one of FB's most popular items and presumably cached.

presumably it is mht/news which opens when I click the news button; that folder is entirely empty (as it is when I navigate to it from the content lister). As I said above, a book came down, but no news feeds. I would have guessed it was the standard feedbooks cache problem, but i am after all trying to get the BBC which is one of FB's most popular items and presumably cached.

Might be the case. Try with Slashdot, it's the best way to test things.

I also encountered a problem with the BBC UK feed. But BBC full content and several others are working as expected.

I remember having problems with that feed as well. I tried it again and it seems that this one: http://www.feedbooks.com/feed/view/?id=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2Fbbcnewswor ldfullfeed doesn't work. Like has been said before, you can see it in the list of feeds and when you select it and press 'sync !' the green light on your iliad does turn green for a bit but there is no new file downloaded.

I remember having problems with that feed as well. I tried it again and it seems that this one: http://www.feedbooks.com/feed/view/?id=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2Fbbcnewswor ldfullfeed doesn't work. Like has been said before, you can see it in the list of feeds and when you select it and press 'sync !' the green light on your iliad does turn green for a bit but there is no new file downloaded.

I know why. Just tried it on the website and it worked perfectly. But there's a | in the name, which might be a problem with Linux. I'll have to escape a few characters from the file name.

And then they say Linux is better then Windows :D

ok... just tried to make a file with a | in windows and it doesn't work either.. hehe ;)

And then they say Linux is better then Windows :D

ok... just tried to make a file with a | in windows and it doesn't work either.. hehe ;)

| is a pipe, a special character that's very useful in a shell.

While we're working on speed and cache issues for the RSS, I think I'll remove image support. A lot more feeds/newspaper will work, and it'll be much faster to get the files.

This way, I'll also work on epub/Mobipocket output for this feature.

Thanks Blue!

The application seems to work now, except that i get the "Cant conect to FeedBooks.com ..."

Im not sure if i started the ineternet connection the right way: I clicked on the 'Click on me for establishing a connection' file that comes with the Dillo Web Browser. The little icon at the bottom left of the page shows me I am connected.

Any solution for the regular user?

:thanks:

Ok I finally found some time to install this app properly. Now I've had issues with getting the program to work like I mentioned before. Now the tip that Narve gave me helped me. After trying to edit the run.sh script (removing the first line or that line with background connection) wich didn't work I've opened the run.sh script with metapad (a text editor) and converted the fileformat to UNIX Text (LF) and saved it again. Then it worked.

Just to make myself clear: I had no idea what exactly it was that I was doing :2thumbsup

But for all thoose that don't know how to get it to work I've attached a zip file (zipped on a windows vista 32bit laptop from acer if that matters to anyone). And because I consider myself :xmas: I've removed the mistake in the manifest file (that type error).

Btw: did I mention it is a great program? :D

Ow and here are some first suggestions for the program:
* include some margin space, left right and above. It looks weird without it. (not much)
* resize the tap titles (feeds - books - downloads etc) to a smaller size and include margin left and right. The buttons look way to big compared to the rest.

Hey vranghel,

Please guys, don't thank me, I have very little to do with this nice app working :) But you're welcome anyway!

For the program to connect to feedbooks, you don't need to start a network connection. Just boot your iliad and open the program. When you supply your username/password it should connect to your preffered network by itself. Atleast, that is what's happening here :)

Very nice aplication, finally i tried and its wonderful, thanks. I´m having some problems to download some feeds, some of them doesn´t download eventhough the download section says downloaded, i imagine it is because the software is still in a beta fase.

Thanks again, and i hope you´d keep improving this aplication.

Jose

I'm expecting my first ever Iliad to be delivered tomorrow of Friday! Woohoo! Anyway, is this thread the official place to get the iNewsstand app? The lastest version is back in January if I've read the thread correctly and was posted by Blue.

Any tips on installation would be appreciated.

Cheers,
James

EDIT:EDIT: Great application! HAving a bit of trouble with the BBC rss feeds, but apart from that really working well

I'm attaching a version that I compiled that does not need any dependencies other than what's built into the iLiad.

Really, this is excellent work. Great job to Stephen and Hadrien.

hi Adam,

I can't get your version to work.
Should I copy the other folders to the same directory?
i.e. the Lib folder?

How can I get the error message?

Thanks for the help.

Try the one that Blue posted in this post: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showpost.php?p=140286&postcount=78

Try the one that Blue posted in this post: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showpost.php?p=140286&postcount=78

Thanks!!

It works!! What a killer application.

I'm hving issue that was discussed in thread 6, 7. Is there any issues with feedbooks?

BTW, If I created a wrong newspaper, how can I remove them??
I can't seem to find a delete button or any kind from the feedbooks.com web site.

Please help.

Thanks heaps:thanks:

Thanks. It's working now.

However, I'm still hving issues with the Feeds. It seems to download feeds for SlashDots only. none of others works. Was there anything I had done wrong?

** Nah, I was wrong. I think Feedbooks must had fixed it by itself. **


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I think I just fixed this issue myself.

For anyone who is having the same issue, here is how I resolved the problem. (It's kinda stupid, but it works.)

1. Login to iNewsStand
2. Change the "format setting" to Mobipocket/Kindle instead of "iLiad PDF"
3. Sync the Feeds.
4. Vola!!!

SIGH!!!!!!!!!!
I guess it's not quite FIXed.
My Newspapers Button somehow gets mixed with Device Manager.
When I press the News button, it displayes icons from Device Manager.
Why!!

Hmm you had to change the format to download the feeds ? That's pretty strange: the format setting is strictly for books, you set up the format for the feeds at the time where you subscribe on the website.

Thanks

I have only had my iLiad for a couple of days. I have been trying to figure it out. I just downloaded this fantastic program and ran it. WOW! This is one step closer to getting real newspapers!

I ran it from a MMC (SD) card. But how do I run it again? Does it install the actual iNewsStand program to the internal memory or do I have to run it each time from my MMC card run.sh?

Also, how do you unsubscribe to RSS feeds on FaceBooks?

thanks,
GM

I have only had my iLiad for a couple of days. I have been trying to figure it out. I just downloaded this fantastic program and ran it. WOW! This is one step closer to getting real newspapers!

I ran it from a MMC (SD) card. But how do I run it again? Does it install the actual iNewsStand program to the internal memory or do I have to run it each time from my MMC card run.sh?

Also, how do you unsubscribe to RSS feeds on FaceBooks?

thanks,
GM

Answer to your questions.

1. Yes, You will need to run it from your memory cards unless you have the programs in your internal memory.

2. log on to www.feedbooks.com and remove the subscribe from your "newspaper" section.

cheers :D

I also had to modify the shell script to fix the line endings (with vi on the iLiad itself) and needed to disable the automatic connectionMgr since my iLiad boots up with the ethernet already configured. It gets an IP address, but doesn't bring the wlan0 interface up and is unable to connect.

The other minor problem is that the zip files are in a format that the busybox unzip program doesn't understand. So I must unzip it on my desktop and then re-tar it over to the iliad:


unzip iNewsStand.zip
tar -zcf - ./iNewsStand \
| ssh root@10.0.0.200 tar -C /mnt/free/documents -zxvf -


My only feature request at first would be to be able to sort the downloads in some fashion. I organize my /mnt/free/books directory by author so that there are not a bazillion pages to scroll through.

My only feature request at first would be to be able to sort the downloads in some fashion. I organize my /mnt/free/books directory by author so that there are not a bazillion pages to scroll through.

We will release the source code on iRex dev hub as soon as it is launched.
Lately we've been mostly busy working on the website, adding new features and integrating covers. We'll start working on the iLiad application again once iRex releasee some of the extra tools & source code that they promised.

The community can also improve this software: I consider it far from something final for the moment although it already works fine with books.

Our API will evolve into a full REST service in the future, and we'll have some brainstorming with everyone involved: both developers and users.

Answer to your questions.

1. Yes, You will need to run it from your memory cards unless you have the programs in your internal memory.

2. log on to www.feedbooks.com and remove the subscribe from your "newspaper" section.

cheers :D

pop_593 thanks for the response however I am still uncertain about the answer to question 2. When I log onto feedbooks I do not have a newspaper section that lists the RSS feeds I am subscribed to. In fact, I only see the number of the subscriptions in my profile but not the actual names?:blink:

pop_593 thanks for the response however I am still uncertain about the answer to question 2. When I log onto feedbooks I do not have a newspaper section that lists the RSS feeds I am subscribed to. In fact, I only see the number of the subscriptions in my profile but not the actual names?:blink:

Go to http://www.feedbooks.com/news
If you're logged in you'll see the list with your subscriptions.

Go to http://www.feedbooks.com/news
If you're logged in you'll see the list with your subscriptions.

Thanks Hadrien. Yes I can see the list of my subscriptions. But, how do I cancel the ones I don't want?:blink:

Thanks Hadrien. Yes I can see the list of my subscriptions. But, how do I cancel the ones I don't want?:blink:

Click on the little red cross and it'll remove it.

Thanks Hadrien....that worked!:)

I have put a few RSS feeds into the newstand and have got the synching working like a treat.
The problem is the content for any of the RSS feeds (or the Economist newspaper version) is only "above the fold". So snippets of newstories only, unlike the Mobipocket news functions which give you the whole stories from the RSS feeds (but require you to synch via USB cable).
So question is, has anybody else figured that one out?

First, let me say credits to whoever created this, because it's truly amazing!
Now I created an account on the Feedbooks site, subscribed to some feeds like the Wall street journal, Tech news and BBC and installed the program on my iLiad.

It seems to work just fine, I see and am able to sync my feeds on the iLiad and on the download tab it says they're succesfully downloaded. But if I quit the program I only see the Wall street journal pdf in my folder and none of the others. On the feedbooks site those feeds in particular are flagged as 'maybe broken' so the problem might be on that end instead of my setup... or isn't it?
Is there someone with the same feeds (as they're in the most-popular list as well) who doesn't encounter that problem?

Hi guys
it all looks great.
Just one question where I can get feedbooks application ?

Cheers
Piotr

To keep things organized, I've started a new thread in the software release forum here: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=22491

thanks Adam