Just saw this on the iRex homepage:



Preview of the upcoming software release.

In the upcoming software release you can expect a number of additional features on the iLiad that will extend your electronic reading and digital writing experience.

Herewith a short preview of some features that you can expect in this upcoming release:


Scribble in PDF: With the stylus you will be able to make annotations on PDF documents on your iLiad.
Configurable Flipbar: You will now be able to configure the direction of the flipbar to your liking.
Transfer files via LAN: For easy file transfer you can now mount your iLiad as USB device via your wireless or wired network connection to your PC.
Pin code protection: Protect your iLiad with a personalized pin code. This pin code will be asked on startup of the iLiad.
A release date will be announced shortly.

More software releases to be come available after this one...

Just saw this on the iRex homepage:

Transfer files via LAN: For easy file transfer you can now mount your iLiad as USB device via your wireless or wired network connection to your PC..


:blink: :blink: :blink:

all very nice, but what about suspend mode...???

all very nice, but what about suspend mode...???

Hehe, dont get your hopes up yet. For suspend mode, they have to sort uut quite a bit of the power management part. And they have to get the buttons to wake up the device again. So i guess, you will need some patience.

Any idea about what the file transfer "mount" really meants? NFS into the kernel?

Well, I'm hoping it means you can transfer directly to the mmc or cf card (ie you mount the card as a drive). Then again, I've been known to be wildly optimistic

I think they're saying you will have Windows networking access to the same content as you'd get via USB, except without the annoying PC is accessing iLiad screen.

I already hacked my "personal" ipdf to flip the flip bar. :)

And I already have network file access to my iLiad.

So scribble in PDF.... hmmm.

So scribble in PDF.... hmmm.
AND the sources to it :) . Or, at least, to the scribble libraries.

Configurable Flipbar means what?

a) This means only the reversal of next/previous page?
b) Or even the landscape mode will work properly, i.e. flipbar will now be able to navigate through the same page?

I am afraid we get only point a) which is not much use anyway. You can get accustomed to the direction of the flipbar, but the landscape + Zoom mode currently is pretty useless. :(

b) Or even the landscape mode will work properly, i.e. flipbar will now be able to navigate through the same page?


I think iRex is working on the "width mode" so that you can flip through pages in landscape mode. I dont know, if it is going to be in OS 2.8 though.

Any idea about what the file transfer "mount" really meants? NFS into the kernel?

New and more accurate description on the website now reads:
"Transfer files from your PC to the iLiad using your network."
which is what the function will actually be: a way to transfer files from and to your iLiad by using the (wireless) network.

New and more accurate description on the website now reads:
"Transfer files from your PC to the iLiad using your network."
which is what the function will actually be: a way to transfer files from and to your iLiad by using the (wireless) network.

:p I guess the other one was taken cut/paste from a discussion slide. I can imagine "USB" floating somewhere in the slide, and "wireless" in some other.

I think iRex is working on the "width mode" so that you can flip through pages in landscape mode. I dont know, if it is going to be in OS 2.8 though.

Well I'm bored so I'm putting my rotate crop and view tool trick into ipdf in revision 5.

I hope to get enough source code to be able to add automatic margin removal at some point.

Nice work Scotty...^^

iRex replied me that hardware of iLiad doesn't support suspend mode.

WHAT!!!

From their statement on the Forums, I got a very different impression...anyone care to quote?
If this is true...then...then...I don't know, but I'll get very unpleasant about it.
Low power consumption is one of the key points in E-Ink, Paper-like devices, the Sony can do it, the Hanlins can do it, and the Iliad better be able to do it as well since it's the most expensive by far of all the devices...

iRex replied me that hardware of iLiad doesn't support suspend mode.

Can you clarify this...? Ie, link to post in the forums...? Email excerpt, if possible...? :blink:

I'm hoping that Malder has missed off the "Yet" or "at this time". If not then iRex have some explaining to do.

Quite...

I put this up at the iRex forums...maybe we'll finally get a straight answer on this matter...so far all answers have been a bit "unclear", so the fear and the hope both lived on...

Look here (http://forum.irexnet.com/viewtopic.php?t=611) for an answer...if someone cares to provide one.


@Malder1

Please give us some more input about this...

The iLiad can be made to hibernate, no if's, and's or but's about it.

Just give me the source and I'll show you how. :)

The iLiad can be made to hibernate, no if's, and's or but's about it.

Just give me the source and I'll show you how. :)

OK, but can you make it hibernate in between pageflips?
I guess you can dfinately do it with the on/off switch.
But can the flipbar wake up the machine?

Although a hibernate after 10 minutes beeing idle and waking up after flipping the power switch would suffice for me.

OK, but can you make it hibernate in between pageflips?
I guess you can dfinately do it with the on/off switch.
But can the flipbar wake up the machine?

Although a hibernate after 10 minutes beeing idle and waking up after flipping the power switch would suffice for me.

Depends on what you mean by "hibernate" and "standby"...

suspend to RAM is what I mean by that...doing the PocketPC thing...^^

...wrong post ...ignore

suspend to RAM is what I mean by that...doing the PocketPC thing...^^

Meaning, stopping the CPU clock but keeping refresh on RAM? That should be "suspend", and then "hibernate" should be to push the memory into the flash memory and closing with a special flag somewhere.

The iLiad can be made to hibernate, no if's, and's or but's about it.

Just give me the source and I'll show you how. :)
Which code do you need and which hibernate do you mean?
Do you mean something like suspend to RAM?
If it is possible, please tell how to, or send just little bit information, code which can hibernate iLiad. I saw, that it can be down with APM or ACPI. But is it possible to create APM or ACPI support for iLiad - I don't know...

I also owner of iLiad (maybe you remember I wrote utility that renders text to images for PDF to reach better sharpness of text for reading).

I sent a question to iRex (techsupport@) - will they realize hybernate mode to quickly start up ilIad within several seconds like Sony Reader. They replied me during several hours that hardware of iLiad doesn't support suspend mode.

Thank you Malder1

I will get a straight answer out of iRex about this, even if it means I'll have to go to Eindhoven myself...

For me, this is the death of the Iliad. Being patient, waiting for them to get it done is one thing, knowing it won't be possible at all...unbelievable...

CommanderROR,
I agree with you, I need only this feature and nothing more. All other things work fine.

The strange thing, why iRex choosed this hardware if it doesn't support suspend mode? Suspend mode the top required feature and for usual users and for B2B users.

The iLiad can be made to hibernate, no if's, and's or but's about it.


So can you clarify how this can be done...? Apparently Irex say it can't...

Does anybody know about "/proc/sys/pm/suspend"? What is it? Trying to read from this file puts iLiad to sleep. Don't ask me how to wake up :) May be there is a problem?

I also owner of iLiad (maybe you remember I wrote utility that renders text to images for PDF to reach better sharpness of text for reading)

Now about to be obsolete with new pdf display technology I helped develop for the iLiad. :D

Can we take a deep breath and then let it out slowly here?

Power will get better. I've read the PXA-255 CPU manual, I've poked and prodded. I'm not worried as I see so many things to change for the better its like being a kid in toy store with Daddy's Black Amex Card. :)

The code base is very fat and bloated and much can still be done at the application layer.

Today I've removed nearly all the X server code from ipdf. It now writes directly to the frame buffer and bench marks show that I'm consistently decreasing memory foot print and CPU usage as I pare down the code.

Poppler is next. As I put in the iRex required error distribution routine(s) I'll code them, as well as the zooming logic, using the PXA-255 CPU's MMX opcodes to increase their efficiency.

In addition, right now benchmarks in ipdf show it takes Poppler 1.5 seconds to 2.6 seconds to draw a single page of just text (like say my Baen RTF encoded as PDF 1635: Canon Law). That is an outrageous amount of time and thus I know there is something just waiting to be optimized in the text rendering logic. Ditto my Jack Rabbit Performance Test, a simple CCITT 2D encoded bitmap takes 30 seconds to decode on a 32 bit 400MHz PXA-255? I don't think so! A frickin' FAX machine running an 8 bit CPU at 16MHz can do it faster than that!

Things are going to get better.

Just remember, iRex didn't write Poppler. And the Poppler writers didn't write it for a hand held. Nothing personal in all this, it just needs to be re-worked for the new reality it finds itself in.

We need to encourage iRex to continue collaboration and let us knock off a few things that are higher on our priority list than they are on iRex's so iRex is free to spend more resources on their B2B priorities.

@Scotty1024

I agree with what you said, but...
iRex said they aren't going to give us root access...and that probably means you won't get to play around with the PM features...
And, iRex apparently actually told somebody that they CAN'T support Suspend mode...which would mean hardware limitations, like the PageBar not being wired up correctly to wake the device up or something along those lines...

I'll wait for an official Statement from iRex before I really start going mad, but the way it's looking at the moment...

Optmizing code for iRex is a very cool thing, and you have my Thanks for that (and the thanks of most other Iliad users I guess... :deal: ) but if something is fundamentally wrong with the hardware design...
Well...I'll keep hoping for the moment... :uhoh2:

Scotty:

Is there an easy to use manual on how to install your PDF reader on the iLiad?
A kind of manual for dummies? I have only a Windows PC and a G4 Mac at home, I would like to see the performance improvement you are talking about, but I am not able to hack it myself (still running 2.7 though). I would be able to do it if there would be a step by step instruction which covers everything in one document. I think it would be great help to the community...

I put this up at the iRex forums...maybe we'll finally get a straight answer on this matter...so far all answers have been a bit "unclear", so the fear and the hope both lived on...

Their official answer:

The iLiad hardware was not designed to be capable of doing a suspend-to-flash or suspend-to-ram. This implies that the CPU and the DRAMs have to be powered all the time if the user does not want to boot the iLiad every time.

Current situation:
At this moment (software v2.7.1) the processor and the DRAMs are always running at their full speeds. Also some of the circuits -like the audio sub-circuit- are not yet shut down when they are unneeded. We are working continuously to improve the power management system to achieve the maximum battery life possible.

Progress on this power management system is slow since it must be tested very thoroughly. A failure to test all cases in the power management system could result in very unstable iLiad units and that should be the last thing we want. This awareness has lead us to implement the power management system one subsystem at the time.

Battery life:
iRex tests battery life using an automated setup in which a fully charged iLiad is booted and used to read a book at 1 page per minute speed. The result of this test is reported as battery life to the users.

Conclusion:
So to add things up the iLiad will feature an advanced power management system, but its hardware was not designed to be able to suspend (or hibernate) to flash or ram. To achieve maximum battery life future software versions will throttle down the CPU to 33MHz and put the DRAMs into low power self refresh mode, when the user is reading. The iLiad will then react almost instantly when the page flipper is used.

Uhm, uhm... I am very curious how they want to underclock an X-Scale 400MHz to 33MHz while keeping things stable.

the xscale processor is designed to change cpu speed on the fly. going fromm 33 to 400 mhz should be almost instantly.

tribble, that's not my point. As far as I know the PDA255 400MHz was not meant to run at 33MHz while keeping a stable environment.

I think we're having some language issues here.

A true clock stopped "suspend" is never going to happen with DRAM.

DRAM consists of tiny little leaky buckets of electrons. If you don't go along the rows of buckets and inspect them and re-fill them they will leak down to no electrons and thus destroy their contents.

In normal high power operation the DRAMs are refreshed by the PXA-255 CPU. But in "deep sleep mode" the CPU can turn that responsibility over to the DRAMs and live out of its on board cache memory at a highly reduced clock rate of its own.

If iRex wanted to that could be using DRAM's with tighter testing specifications. The DRAM makers inspect their chips and those with the lowest leakage rate in their buckets get sold at a premium for use in devices that need the lowest of deep sleep states. DRAM with tightly picked specs can cut their onboard self-refresh rate way way way down. The normal refresh rates are selected to let the maximum number of devices operate stably. I've personally worked with DRAMs that were so low leakage they could go a minute at room temperature with no refresh and still have their contents remain intact.

The PXA-255 CPU itself is rated to drop its clock down to 33MHz and still be stable.

A "hibernate" to FLASH would indeed require a reboot. That doesn't make it impossible unless the device can't turn itself off. But with the 2.7 updater iRex showed the iLiad can do that.

The technical issues are where to get enough FLASH to hibernate to, there isn't enough onboard. So MMC, CF or USB stick. Well waking up USB stick to reocver from is not something one wants to code in a boot loader. So MMC or CF. So far though the MMC performance has been pretty slow. So then CF.

But how badly does iRex want to write a feature that only works with a 3rd party optional accessory?

Plus, as with sleep mode, there isn't any code to just go grab. Some clever person would have to code it just for the iLiad.

It could be very cool though. Suspend your iLiad onto a CF card, pull it out, put in a different CF card and resume from it. Suspend it again, put the other card back in... When tabbed readers become available this could be a very nice feature to have.

the xscale processor is designed to change cpu speed on the fly. going fromm 33 to 400 mhz should be almost instantly.

It is instant in human terms but the CPU has practical realities that must be observed. There is a time delay in going from 33MHz to 400MHz that must be accounted for in the management code.

The best example I can give in lay terms is that when the CPU is shifting frequencies it is sort of like a lady changing her clothes. The CPU wants a bit of privacy. It doesn't want the WLAN card to suddenly burst in upon it during the wardrobe change. :)

Scotty, thank you for your explanation.

There is this guy who wrote XCPUScalar (http://www.immiersoft.com/index.html) and who said that unclocking the PXA255 to something like 33MHz is not feasable for various stability issues. Perhaps Windows Mobile is the culprit, but that's not how I understood it.

About the annonations of PDF:
Does the handwrited annonations "map correctly" after the PDF zooms +/- or rotates?

About the power management:
Discussions above seems if an iLiad user want to have maximum using time now,
he should turn off his iLiad entirely when he does not read anymore
and should reboot it with long 45 sec when he wants to read the ebook even just to take a look of 1 page?!

However, before you read a paperback book, you don't spend 45 sec to reboot, right?

The iLiad is an e-"book"; thus, in my opinion, it should be turned on as soon as possible, with whatever mode, to reserve the "basic" demand and advantage of the conventional book.

I care the "waiting time" before I read an ebook much more.
The hibernate or suspend mode should resolve both the "waiting time" and power consuming problem.

I hope the Linux OS should have the potential and possibility to overcome the hardware limitation.
Therefore, the iLiad can write the SDRAM data into the internal flash memory or external flash card to make itself into hibernate mode such as Windows does into HDD
or the iLiad can perform standby/resume mode (with very few power consuming) as the same as the X-scale CPU based PPCs or Palms can.

I just don't turn my iLiad off if once turned on.
It still runs for about 10 hours. :-)

Oh dear...I'll open a new thread for this...

Go here (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=8372) to continue the Power-management discussion.
For talk about the 2.8 release, please continue in this thread.

Thanks,

...So then CF.

But how badly does iRex want to write a feature that only works with a 3rd party optional accessory?

Plus, as with sleep mode, there isn't any code to just go grab. Some clever person would have to code it just for the iLiad.

Hey, I know a clever person! How about if Scotty1024 does it? :wink:

Scotty1024, I say again what I said before. If I end up buying one of these things, it will be because of the work you've done, and iRex should compensate you. (Meaning no disrespect to the others who have also worked hard to get the word out about the iLiad, or dig into its mysteries, just that the issues Scotty has been working on most directly relate to my willingness to potentially purchase.)

Thank you for the clear explanation of the differences between the various power saving modes. I think you may be right about the language problem. But I think you may also be right that it isn't in iRex's biggest interest to find the workaround to this problem. Looks like it will be up to the user community-- if iRex will come through and publish the full SDK and make it possible for ordinary mortals to install 3d party SW.

On the iRex forums, I recommended that iRex find a vendor who is more interested in the consumer market and do an OEM deal. I think Scotty1024 should be the chief engineer in that organization.

The following is my wishes and question about iLiad V2.8 upgrade.
I wish
1. The rotate direction of landscape mode can be clockwise and count-clockwise.
2. The flipbar definition about direction of page-turning can be different in landscape and portrait modes.

3. In addition to 'fit to screen', iLiad also has 'fit to (page) width' and 'fit to visible (width of text)'.

4.iLiad can further search the text inside the files.

5.WLAN supports user defined static address and other encrypted method beside WEP.

My question about subscribbing PDF:
Is the handwrited annotation directly recored/embedded into PDF-file as Adobe Acrobat and Foxit Reader do, or just recorded in the BMP/JPG/PNG files?

I hope it will be the conventional highlight, underline, annotation functions on PC. Then, exchange your annotation will be smooth and fast.

Let's magine a teacher annotates students' PDF files and sends those back to student to see the handwriting correction, score, annotation.
It may be a new education style and market. (if iLiad cheap enough. ;-))

On the iRex forums, I recommended that iRex find a vendor who is more interested in the consumer market and do an OEM deal. I think Scotty1024 should be the chief engineer in that organization.

I strongly agree that! :) :)