Book-related apps

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by Sefiriot

I get irritated with Aldiko because it copies books over into its own folder-- it behaves like iTunes in that respect.

I should say here that I hate iTunes and how it feels the need to duplicate my music into its own vision of what my music storage folder layout should be, when I already have my music stored in folders the way I like them. Hence any program that behaves like iTunes tends to get short shrift from me.

In Aldiko's case, my books are on the external SD card for a very good reason, and having unnecessary duplicates on my device where they're not slated to be just makes me angry. It was fine when my ondevice library was still pretty tiny and I had fewer apps installed, but when the library grows over the 10k mark and you've quite a few apps installed in the SD card, this sort of behaviour goes from irritating to a reason for instant uninstallation.

That is one of the reasons I like it. I can just delete them from the original destination after I have imported them. I am not really a tablet person, although I have a couple, and am often asked for help by people who have a hard time figuring out what to delete and a lot of systems are different, but if the use aldiko at one thing is constant

Helen

[Sefiriot]

Originally Posted by speakingtohe

That is one of the reasons I like it. I can just delete them from the original destination after I have imported them. I am not really a tablet person, although I have a couple, and am often asked for help by people who have a hard time figuring out what to delete and a lot of systems are different, but if the use aldiko at one thing is constant

Helen

Yes, I could delete them off the SD card or wherever they came from; the whole problem here is the location of the book folder in the first place and the lack of choice about it.

Sure the location is constant if you need to troubleshoot; but not giving the user any option to decide where the best place to put a spacehog like their book library is a huge oversight, IMHO. At least asking the user if they'd rather keep their books on external SD, or defaulting the option to locate their library on the external SD if present would make it more palatable; but no, it wants to have it on the internal memory and you can't shift it! Poor design there. I may have 11GB of internal storage, but I want that for memory and apps, not my books-- that's the whole point of having an external card for less important files to live on.

Keeping books is an easier proposition on the external SD since restoring the device to factory settings will not also wipe out your entire book collection on device if it's on external-- it will also prevent slowdowns from lack of memory; on the other hand since Aldiko stores books in internal memory, formatting the USB storage will most likely nuke it, and space for apps and app operations will be limited by how many books I store on device. If you're dealing with a large collection you'd have to resend everything after nuking USB storage too, and that'd be a pain.

Conversely deleting the folder with your books in it on an external SD card is probably safer than if you kept it on internal storage: there's only so many types of things you can move to external SD, most of which are files that are pretty safe to lose like music, pictures, etc. So you're probably less likely to delete the wrong folder on external SD than otherwise.

[Catlady]

This whole discussion about what's on the internal memory and what's on the card is confusing me no end.

Though I haven't added any of my books yet to Aldiko, that app is the only one of the handful I've downloaded that is showing as being on the SD card. Even the few pictures I added directly to the card via USB cable from the computer have disappeared into internal memory. Music has stayed on the card, though at this point it's only two mp3 ringtones.

So are you saying that Aldiko is in the internal memory and on the card both? And books I load will also be duplicated?

[covingtoncat73]

I use Moon+ for the gutenberg.org books I put on my phone.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Catlady

This whole discussion about what's on the internal memory and what's on the card is confusing me no end.

Though I haven't added any of my books yet to Aldiko, that app is the only one of the handful I've downloaded that is showing as being on the SD card. Even the few pictures I added directly to the card via USB cable from the computer have disappeared into internal memory. Music has stayed on the card, though at this point it's only two mp3 ringtones.

So are you saying that Aldiko is in the internal memory and on the card both? And books I load will also be duplicated?

Android sees user-accessible onboard storage as an SD card and external SD Cards, if they exist, as ext-SD. On some of the cheaper devices, onboard storage *is* an SD card that can be replaced.
A legacy of Android's origins as a phone OS.

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by Catlady

This whole discussion about what's on the internal memory and what's on the card is confusing me no end.

Though I haven't added any of my books yet to Aldiko, that app is the only one of the handful I've downloaded that is showing as being on the SD card. Even the few pictures I added directly to the card via USB cable from the computer have disappeared into internal memory. Music has stayed on the card, though at this point it's only two mp3 ringtones.

So are you saying that Aldiko is in the internal memory and on the card both? And books I load will also be duplicated?

Depends on your device and the application. Most tablets have a default place to put imports whether they are music, books etc. Some put them all in one space/folder.

Some applications import the books etc. to a folder of their choosing leaving an extra copy behind, which is good as you may access the same file with different apps on occasion.

Some apps on some devices can do the downloading themselves so you only have one copy.

I prefer the app to put the files in a certain directory and I delete them from the original place. Others like a big giant storage space with everything in it. Each to his own. Still others think that every app should automatically put files where they want them to be. Would be nice of course, but not that common. And others want apps to find all files that might possibly pertain which is commonly done. Media center will if allowed to index every file on your 20 gig of hard drives and use all pictures in its screen savers even those of ugly little arrow icons.

To me a known stable location is good for each type of file, but personal preference only.

Helen

[calvin-c]

FWIW I use Moon+ Pro. I tried Montano & don't remember what there was I didn't like about it. After reading this thread I suspect it was something that was included in the Premium version but missing from the free version. Obviously when I'm trying something to see whether or not I like it I'm going to try the free version. Even a developer should be able to figure that out.

I find Android naming internal storage 'sdcard' objectionable-but I haven't found anything I can do about it. As for reasons for putting as much as I can on extsdcard, that's because some apps require internal storage. Poorly written IMO, but there it is-just like calling internal storage 'sdcard' there's nothing I can do about it except stop using 'it'. So there's the reason I dislike Aldiko. I had many others on my list but stopped with the first one that did everything I wanted. I discovered years ago that people who insist on the 'best' are the ones who get conned. I insist only on 'good enough for me'.

[apesmom]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

That is one of the major reasons I favor Coolreader; it is non-judgmental on location and it will merrily track ebooks I open whererever they might be.

Originally Posted by Blossom

Mantano is the same way.

I think it used to copy files into it's own directory but it doesn't appear to be the case anymore. I just did a big initial load onto a new tablet via Calibre sync, it placed the files into the generic "Books" folder. I then "imported" into Mantano, the books were added to my library but copies weren't added to the Mantano directory. Now the only files that get added into the Mantano directory are the new files I add via OPDS.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by apesmom

I think it used to copy files into it's own directory but it doesn't appear to be the case anymore. I just did a big initial load onto a new tablet via Calibre sync, it placed the files into the generic "Books" folder. I then "imported" into Mantano, the books were added to my library but copies weren't added to the Mantano directory. Now the only files that get added into the Mantano directory are the new files I add via OPDS.

Mantano has never added books to its own folder. Those folders are just for thumbnails. It keeps track of all books in a database file. The books you import into Mantano must remain in their original location in order to be accessible. Nothing has change I just today have imported a batch of books. I keep all my books in a folder called epub.

[Catlady]

I tried the Moon+ app today, but I uninstalled it after about 5 minutes.

Whereas the Aldiko app seemed really easy and intuitive, I felt like it was much harder to figure out how to do anything with Moon+. (Yes, I can be pretty impatient!) Even the first screen of options that I got with Moon+ had me scratching my head (no idea what the different graphics were meant to illustrate regarding page turns, or layout, or ...?). Also, Moon+ didn't automatically adjust the screen orientation as Aldiko did, it was harder to change font size in Moon+, and Moon+ had annoying little ads (so small, yet so distracting!) while Aldiko didn't. Everything in Aldiko simply seemed more sensible.

So now I'm soured on testing the other apps--I think I'll stick with Aldiko unless I run into some specific shortcoming.

Thanks to everyone for the invaluable input!

[AditiTyagi]

Aldiko's free version seems to be working fine for me.

[cortman]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Mantano has never added books to its own folder. Those folders are just for thumbnails. It keeps track of all books in a database file. The books you import into Mantano must remain in their original location in order to be accessible. Nothing has change I just today have imported a batch of books. I keep all my books in a folder called epub.

This is what I thought too until I found out that my sdcard/Mantano folder was absolutely balloooning. Here I found that it had indeed copied every epub to its own folder and that the new epubs it copied were as much as triple the original size!
Check /sdcard/Mantano/.metadata/storage/emulated/0/ebook_folder_name on your device. Do you see the books there?
I'm trying to resolve this with Mantano support but they are not being very helpful.
Space is a premium for me with a Nexus 4 with no sdcard option.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by cortman

This is what I thought too until I found out that my sdcard/Mantano folder was absolutely balloooning. Here I found that it had indeed copied every epub to its own folder and that the new epubs it copied were as much as triple the original size!
Check /sdcard/Mantano/.metadata/storage/emulated/0/ebook_folder_name on your device. Do you see the books there?
I'm trying to resolve this with Mantano support but they are not being very helpful.
Space is a premium for me with a Nexus 4 with no sdcard option.

No I just have folders named titleofbook.epub and inside are thumbnails. I've checked all 3 devices and none have what you described. How do you load your books on your tablet?

[Dhevi]

Originally Posted by Blossom

No I just have folders named titleofbook.epub and inside are thumbnails. I've checked all 3 devices and none have what you described. How do you load your books on your tablet?

Likewise on my devices. It appears to store 3 thumbnail image files for the cover of the individual epubs in this directory.

[cortman]

Originally Posted by Blossom

No I just have folders named titleofbook.epub and inside are thumbnails. I've checked all 3 devices and none have what you described. How do you load your books on your tablet?

After a reinstallation and wiping of all caches and data, I too now only have the thumbnails. Strange. Maybe a faulty installation.