Hello everyone!

I just joined today. I live in the East Bay (near San Francisco, Ca).

After about six months of studying the different readers I had decided to get a new 10" Fujitsu stylist with a 10hr battery.

Before I could buy the Fujitsu, and to my surprise, my wife and mother presented me with a Sony Reader PRS-505. I didn't let on, but I wasn't happy. The reviews were terrible. I loaded up a math book as a PDF and couldn't read it because the print was too small.

Then I discovered this wonderful forum. I downloaded PDFLRFwin-0.99 and WOW!!! What a difference! It digests everything I throw at it and produces perfectly readable mathematical books. Now I love my reader! It has replaced a banker box of books and papers that use to accompany me on car trips (which explains why my wife was so happy to provide me with the Reader).

I am so glad I have the Sony Reader instead of the bulkier Fujitsu. It is pretty darn near perfect (oh sure, nested TOC/bookmarks would be slick and so would searches, but I'm doing fine without them).

Two weeks ago I flew coast to coast then back with no entertainment save my Reader. On my return I still had two bars of charge left on my battery.

I hope to return to college next year so I'm studying my undergraduate math and first year graduate math classes.

Are there any other math guys out there using the Sony Reader?

Not a math guy myself, but I think that's pretty damn great! Well done!

Hi Mike's Place and welcome to the Forum. Not a math guy either but I do have a 505 and love it. Like you I'm delighted with the battery life

Welcome, Mike. I'm a professional chemist and math enthusiast. Like you, pdflrf made lots of things possible after my initial horror from looking at an unconverted pdf on my Reader. Six months later the thrill is still there, but without the ability to easily flip between sections of a document, search, take notes, have multiple documents open at once, etc., I've concluded that I really can't use my Reader efficiently for technical work. I'll need a tablet for that. But if I just want to read one thing from beginning to end, whether technical or not, it's terrific. I'm glad your satisfied, too.

As I remember Bob Russell is a math guy and HarryT is a physics guy. I did a minor in math in college. The Sony is a great machine for reading all sorts of things.

Glad to have you as a member of the forums.

I'm a Math and Physics double bachelors, followed by a Comp Sci masters and "ABD" (90% of a phd, but no thesis). But I haven't tried any technical stuff yet on my 3 days old Kindle. Just fun reading. :)

I tried a couple math book samples (from Springer) on my kindle and they did not look good. I think the format is the so-called Topaz, and most of the embedded fonts just look horrible.

On the plus side though, you don't need to transpose your head for Amazon's Topaz files. :D

but without the ability to easily flip between sections of a document, search, take notes, have multiple documents open at once, etc., I've concluded that I really can't use my Reader efficiently for technical work. I'll need a tablet for that. But if I just want to read one thing from beginning to end, whether technical or not, it's terrific. I'm glad your satisfied, too.

Yes, that's the trick. It should pretty much be a book you are reading from start to finish. The way I get around that is with lots of notes. Next to my notes I jot down page numbers for everything. Then it is easy to flip back and forth. It works very well actually.

Oh, I also use a lot of 3x5 cards for formulas, methods, tables, definitions and shorter proofs. I jot the book and page number on these also. It is basically "active" reading - very important for learning math.

Mike

As I remember Bob Russell is a math guy and HarryT is a physics guy. I did a minor in math in college. The Sony is a great machine for reading all sorts of things.

Glad to have you as a member of the forums.

Thanks, I'll drop them a hello.

I'm a Math and Physics double bachelors, followed by a Comp Sci masters and "ABD" (90% of a phd, but no thesis). But I haven't tried any technical stuff yet on my 3 days old Kindle. Just fun reading. :)

Very cool. I was a math/physics major but I did a lot of Comp sci as Unix was being developed on microcomputers (Sun and Intel). Never heard of an ABD... sounds interesting.

Mike

I tried a couple math book samples (from Springer) on my kindle and they did not look good. I think the format is the so-called Topaz, and most of the embedded fonts just look horrible. :D

I purchased an online book from Amazon (a V.I. Arnold classic) to read on my laptop. You have to stay online to change pages. I was quite happy with the annotative aspects of their viewer. I thought the Kindle would have a similar display, but I guess now no.

I think you would like how PDFLRF works with the Sony Reader. I don't mind cocking my head 90 degrees, but I've found it measurably more convenient to rotate the reader -90 degrees. It sits comfortably on my exercise bike in that position too.

Mike

Mike, you will have already seen a post by Recycledelectron (I love that name) here who teaches math at a university somewhere. I'd say he's completely committed to using his Reader for math work.

Never heard of an ABD... sounds interesting.



"All But Dissertation" I've heard it used in various settings. :)

"All But Dissertation" I've heard it used in various settings. :)

Ah, thanks for clarity.

Mike, you will have already seen a post by Recycledelectron (I love that name) here who teaches math at a university somewhere. I'd say he's completely committed to using his Reader for math work.

Yes, I think he goes by the name Andy in another realm. He's done an amazing job of integrating all his schooling into the Reader. He even listens to class audio while flipping through jpegs of black boards. I have to admit, I'm enough of a gadgeteer that it makes my mouth water to hear such things.

Yes, very fun name - 'Recycledelectron':2thumbsup . Wonder if he's a fan of Italo Calvino?

Mike

After about six months of studying the different readers I had decided to get a new 10" Fujitsu stylist with a 10hr battery.

Which one is that? I use a Stylistic 3400, and get 1 hour at most. I've seen external batteries, but they weigh more than the stylistic.

Then I discovered this wonderful forum. I downloaded PDFLRFwin-0.99 and WOW!!! What a difference! It digests everything I throw at it and produces perfectly readable mathematical books. Now I love my reader! It has replaced a banker box of books and papers that use to accompany me on car trips (which explains why my wife was so happy to provide me with the Reader).

I've been using a PRS-505 is my math classes, but never though that ANY converter would convert a math text reliably. I'll have to try it.

Are there any other math guys out there using the Sony Reader?

See my posts here: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19059

I've basically decided on an UMPC as a replacement for a PRS-505, but I might go with the Fujitsu tablet you mentioned.

Andy

Which one is that? I use a Stylistic 3400, and get 1 hour at most. I've seen external batteries, but they weigh more than the stylistic.

I was looking at the ST5111 with the 9-cell battery.


I've been using a PRS-505 is my math classes, but never though that ANY converter would convert a math text reliably. I'll have to try it.

get it here: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13135


See my posts here: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19059

That's where I first saw your posts.


I've basically decided on an UMPC as a replacement for a PRS-505, but I might go with the Fujitsu tablet you mentioned.

Andy

I played with the Samsung/Microsoft UMPC yesterday. It didn't leave me with a desire to buy it. It feels a little thick and bulky. I might be able to get use to the keyboard, but I don't think I would every be as fast as a I am on a normal KB. The touchscreen is a little kludgy, not at all as effortless as the iPhone touchscreen. Maybe that's adjustable.

I also played with the Fujitsu UMPC. Same opinion.

I'd like to try out the HTC or the OQO - I'm a fan of keyboards.

My kids all have Sony TZ series 11.1" laptops. These are just as thin and compact as the tablet PC's and UMPC's and they have other great features (like a useable keyboard). The extended battery gives you about 9 hours, but I think it's cleaner just to carry two standard batteries. If you buy the older one (the core duo, not the core2duo) and just use 512M of ram you can get over 6 hrs from a single standard battery. If you set the screen to blank after only one minute you save a lot of battery.

The thing I like about the TZ is that it supports a 24" flat panel at home with very high resolution, 2049 X 1536 (or something like that). So it is one of my daughter's only device.

I'm thinking about writing a keyboard driver for the Sony Reader. If one could implement a terminate-stay-ready pop-up window and some other data features, it might be possible to annotate an LRF. I don't know enough about the data format to know if that's possible yet, but usually with computers: "Where there is a will, there is a way" (not necessarily a pretty way, though).

Mike

Hi all,
I am a mathematician too (University of Vienna) and was looking forward for employing the e-ink for storing/reading all the research papers, books with me on the trips. I use a laptop for that purpose now, but have to admit it's hard to read from the LCD + holding/placing the laptop for long reads on the sofa is not too convenient.
As well as Mike, having concluded to buy the Fujitsu flepia A4 size:
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10480
I decided to wait until it is available (it is not on sale now, correct?),
but fund Mike's post.
Could you please confirm that PDF lrf works for FORMULAS ? Is it possible to convert a standard latex research article from PFD to lrf
RELIABLY with this tool?
Norayr

Could you please confirm that PDF lrf works for FORMULAS ? Is it possible to convert a standard latex research article from PFD to lrf
RELIABLY with this tool?
Norayr

As long as you have a PDF file to begin with, you will be very happy with the results, with one exception: If there are notes or logos in the margin of each page, PDFLRF cannot completely get rid of the margins so the text is not as big as it can be. In this case I suppose you could strip everything from the margins before processing. There also is a way to process PS files, but I have not investigated that.


Why don't you post a document you are currently reading and I'll process it for you. You can download an LRF viewer here:

https://libprs500.kovidgoyal.net/download_windows

The text will look a little thickened and grainy in the viewer, but it will look good on the Sony Reader, but you will be able to see what a good job it does with tiny greek subscripts and symbols and such.

If you want your own copy of PDFLRFwin-0.99, get it here:

http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13135


Mike

Most research articles in my field (theoretical physics) have their latex sources available, so all you need to do is add a \usepackage{geometry} with the appropriate page size for the reader just before the \begin{document} and you get a nice custom formatted PDF for your reader.

Most research articles in my field (theoretical physics) have their latex sources available, so all you need to do is add a \usepackage{geometry} with the appropriate page size for the reader just before the \begin{document} and you get a nice custom formatted PDF for your reader.

Thanks. Are you doing this conversion with the command line pdflrf?

By the way, just on the off chance: Do you know Larry Romans? I went to high school with him. He received his PhD in theoretical physics at Caltech in the early 80's. He wrote a seminal paper in 86' on symmetry breaking... a real sleeping beauty. He works at JPL now. I also have a daughter attending Azusa next door to you.

Mike

The PDF that this technique produces is optimized for the 6 inch screen, so there's no need to convert it to LRF. Though I have to say that when reading papers I have an irresistible urge to scribble in the margins, which means I end up using my tablet most of the time :)

Can't say I know Larry, though I'm sure I must've bumped into him a few times. I work on quantum information theory so I don't go to JPL often. Is your daughter planning to go to Caltech?

The PDF that this technique produces is optimized for the 6 inch screen, so there's no need to convert it to LRF. Though I have to say that when reading papers I have an irresistible urge to scribble in the margins, which means I end up using my tablet most of the time :)

Can't say I know Larry, though I'm sure I must've bumped into him a few times. I work on quantum information theory so I don't go to JPL often. Is your daughter planning to go to Caltech?

Larry is strictly strings and gravity as far as I know. Is your work purely theoretical or is it applied to quantum computing or such?

My younger daughter, who is 16yrs old now, may go to Caltech for graduate school. Her interest has always been in biotech, but from a mathematical side. She became facinated with Dr. Cameron Jones' neat trick of identifying pathogens spectroscopically by using a common CDROM drive (with just an MD5 hash!). Her idea is to find a signature that is common to all cancer cells.

Jones claims that his results are only explained by quantum entanglement. Do you know about this?

Mike

Thanks very much Mike, I did convert some pdf-s, and the conversion seems quite reliable.

A typical article that I am reading is:
http://www.math.purdue.edu/~arshak/pdf/geom-energ-corr.pdf

Of course, for the articles available in ARXIVE, I do get the latex source file, and there is a special latex style that one can use for different e-readers. But unfortunately most of the papers in my direction are not available there...

On a side not thought I am not sure about how it would actually look on the screen...
I mean to me it seems that the conversion is basically a scaling process, in landscape mode you have the feeling that too little is shown at a time, and you have to scroll to often, and some of the fonts might look too small in portrait mode when actually shown on the device. It is too bad Sony does not sell them in Europe, so I can't check it in a shop... (while I can ask my brother to order one in US).

Thanks again,
Norayr

Larry is strictly strings and gravity as far as I know. Is your work purely theoretical or is it applied to quantum computing or such?

My younger daughter, who is 16yrs old now, may go to Caltech for graduate school. Her interest has always been in biotech, but from a mathematical side. She became facinated with Dr. Cameron Jones' neat trick of identifying pathogens spectroscopically by using a common CDROM drive (with just an MD5 hash!). Her idea is to find a signature that is common to all cancer cells.

Jones claims that his results are only explained by quantum entanglement. Do you know about this?

Mike

No my work is purely theoretical. It may well be applied by experimentalists in a decade or so :) No, I'm not familiar with Jones' work, though it sounds interesting? Do you have a reference?

No my work is purely theoretical. It may well be applied by experimentalists in a decade or so :) No, I'm not familiar with Jones' work, though it sounds interesting? Do you have a reference?

Ok then - are you into high-energy physics type theory? I work at Fermilab particle accelerator - shooting protons into things to see what comes out the other side. I guess that's experimental, but there's lots of theory involved too. :)

No I'm on the low-energy side. Quantum computing, typically with systems very near absolute zero :) Though my roomate, Pedro Ochoa works on MINOS and often goes to Fermilab.

No I'm on the low-energy side. Quantum computing, typically with systems very near absolute zero :) Though my roomate, Pedro Ochoa works on MINOS and often goes to Fermilab.

What a fun life you guys have! I hope you enjoy it. I wanted to study theoretical physics after undergrad school, but I decided I wanted more money than that paid at the time. I started a business, grew it for twenty years, and I'm just about to step out of the way of it now. Not really retiring, just stepping back into the role of a "consultant". If that ends up giving me enough free time, I'd really like to go back to school and pursue my first love.

Kovid. Guys like you are shaping our future. You're making a lasting mark.

Props to you,

Mike

BTW - I'm looking for one of Dr. Jones' more mathematical papers - there is one out there that bumps up to information theory.

Yeah, we do :) But growing a business must have been pretty rewarding as well.

Just saw this thread. Welcome to MR, Mike!

I'd have to say that the work for these quantum physics guys and gals must be fascinating, although probably not fascinating in the way a layman might think. Just to work in quantum physics, they probably are also amazing mathematicians as well.

Wood is quite right (and has a mind like a steel trap that never misses anything, doesn't he!?). I do have a Math Ph.D. in Algebraic K-Theory. And an ABD in Economics after that as well. It is frustrating, though, isn't it? I was ABD with an Economics Ph.D., plus 50% done with my dissertation, and had to leave school with an M.S. instead due to a family emergency. Never had a chance to return or work as a researcher. It worked out, though, and after all that I end up with, of all things, ... a job in IT! But I love working with computers so it worked out for me. I'm probably one of the few people crazy enough to work with computers all day and yet still rush back to my home PC after work! ;)

As far as reading math texts, I have long desired to do it, but I've just had other topics that have been more interesting (like Warped Passages by Lisa Randall, which is an awesome book, and her talks and interviews are fascinating as well!) Mostly, in terms of tech reading, I read computer materials. And, despite my love of e-books, I generally prefer to read on paper when I can. I even print out sections of online manuals for that purpose. But at least with the advent of paperless manuals, I have the option of loading up my tablet with materials to read. When I was in school, way back when, I learned to study off paper, so that may be the reason for my preference. But paper still seems easier to handle and is slightly easier on my eyes.

I've also found that, thanks to folks like Kovid, while you can read technical texts on the Sony Reader if you have decent eyesight (for example, I am reading Warped Passages there), I really prefer to read technical books on a tablet pc. As mentioned previously, e-ink seems to work great for something you read beginning to end, but navigation is a bit slow and clumsy for books that you jump around in. A laptop would be great if you don't get eyestrain from it, but the form factor is not the best. Believe it or not, there is a HUGE difference between looking up at a screen on a laptop versus the flat form of a tablet on a desk or lap. I can't read a book on a desktop display or laptop, but with a tablet it's great. The only issues are heat (depending on the tablet model), battery life (which is getting better all the time, but some cheaper models only get a couple of hours), visibility in outdoor sunlight (newer screens are often pretty decent for this now) and weight (they are generally pretty heavy still, especially when a convertible form with keyboard instead of a slate form factor).

But the best solution might be on the way. I'm really looking forward to the rise of cheaper UMPCs/MIDs with longer battery life and nice screens. I think that sort of device will be perfect for technical reading, and priced more reasonably than a $2000 tablet pc.

Andy (recycledelectron) - you'll have to let us know how it goes for you with a UMPC if you go that way. When you choose, watch out for battery life and memory/processor speed. But if you know the limitations, it sounds like a perfect choice. And when the next generation lower-power faster mobile processors come out, things will really get interesting whether the market goes Windows or Linux!

BTW, off topic, do any of you folks know how the Hadron collider is progressing? I'd sure love to know when results of experiments might start coming in. I hope the popular press covers the progress of those upcoming experiments. It's a race for fame now between Fermilab and Hadron for potential discovery of the Higgs Boson, isn't it? So maybe the Fermilab folks wouldn't mind a little more time before Hadron goes online...

BTW, off topic, do any of you folks know how the Hadron collider is progressing? I'd sure love to know when results of experiments might start coming in.

They haven't started running beam yet. Here are some articles that might or might not be of interest!
http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/cms/?pid=1000562

In addition to being sort-of their competitor, Fermilab is also their collaborator. We have a remote control room set up here, where physicists can monitor the operations that are going on in CERN, in Switzerland.

P.S. Fermilab's daily e-newsletter for today, Feb 8, 2008 has a short bit about the search for the Higgs.
http://www.fnal.gov/pub/today/archive.html

Thanks bgDeb! Great articles, and a link to this site also... http://www.uslhc.us/ where scientists are blogging the LHC. It's now on my feed reader list!

Thanks very much Mike, I did convert some pdf-s, and the conversion seems quite reliable.

On a side not thought I am not sure about how it would actually look on the screen...
I mean to me it seems that the conversion is basically a scaling process, in landscape mode you have the feeling that too little is shown at a time, and you have to scroll to often, and some of the fonts might look too small in portrait mode when actually shown on the device. It is too bad Sony does not sell them in Europe, so I can't check it in a shop... (while I can ask my brother to order one in US).


After processing the file a couple different ways you can view it in Libprs500. I had the same reservations about the landscape mode, but I'm really quite happy with the way landscape displays. 1/2 page at a time is fine for most of the stuff I read (math, physics, exercise physiology papers). Especially since the conversion handles images and tables so nicely. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised once you get it.

Good Luck,

Mike

Yeah, we do :) But growing a business must have been pretty rewarding as well.

Thanks, Yes it has been and is rewarding.... Sports nutrition. We're in about 50 countries and have well over a hundred SKU's in our line. We create a lot of incomes for a lot of people, and that feels real good. My favorite part, though, is developing the products and working with the athletes. That's what I will continue to do in my "consulting" role. After nearly 25 years, the day-to-day "business" side of running the company is is not terribly challenging, but the "research and development" side of human performance is fresh every day. Especially in the last year. Some new investigation techniques have opened up a whole new arena of research and the papers are getting much more interesting.

Mike

I'm still looking for a good paper by Dr. Jones that explains his device's dependance on entanglement.

I'm surprised to see how many people around here are scientists and mathematicians. I just completed a Bachelor in Science in Nanotechnology and my honours project was in theoretical physics (effective field theory of nucleon interactions). It was a very interesting year but I've decided theoretical physics isn't for me so I'm looking for work in something a little more applied. However I'd love to work at somewhere like Fermilab or CERN one day.

Back to the original topic... I am amazed how well PDFLRF works. I've just tried converting some of my maths and physics books and they look great! The LRF files turn out a bit big (in filesize) but with a 2 GB SD card this isn't a problem. And I agree with Mike that having the files rotated 90 degrees makes them very easy to read. Articles with lots of equations and graphs look great as well. I'm going to try out some magazines next.

I now have so many physics ebooks to read that I don't know where to start. :happy2:

I'm not a math guy either. But reading all your post entice my mind. It's really clever if your a math wizard. You're all great!