Is there a way to go directly to a page in an e-book?

[kjturner71]

I have the Kobo Wireless e-reader.

I was about 250 pages into a book but I recently did a "restore to factory defaults" in order to troubleshoot a problem with my wi-fi connectivity. I understood that doing a factory reset would cause me to lose my bookmarks. But now I want to resume where I left off but there doesn't appear to be a way to go directly to a page by page number.

This particular book, The Idiot by Dostoyevsky is divided into "Parts" and each part is subdivided into many chapters. Unfortunately those chapters are not part of the table of contents (only the "Parts" are). So now it appears the only way that I can get back to where I was is to keep hitting next, next, next..

Please tell me there's a better way of doing it.

[Duiker]

No, there is not. If you have Chapters the best you can do is skip chapters till you get close to your page then individually page through.

[Psyke]

If the book was purchased, it should have remembered your bookmark if you had at least synced it with the software in the absence of the wi-fi component. However if it was a sideloaded book, then yeah, unfortunately you're SOL.

Hoping this will be something that will get added on sometime in the near future though.

[ModReader]

This is something that needs to be included. Since the first Kobo had some database problems it kept wiping out my books. Imagine flipping through 300+ pages each and everytime you had your database wiped. Not fun. I don't think we have recived an offical answer as to why it hasn't been done.

[Psyke]

an official answer would be nice, but looking at the books I have, it might come down to the way books are formated. Some books show total pages, others show the number of pages within a chapter (page 8 of 36 of chapter 16 for example). So while having a goto page probably wouldn't be difficult per say, actually know what page to input might be difficult.

but in any case, something in addition to what we currently have would be nice.

[taming]

If you have a smart phone capable of running the Kobo application, and sync, then there is a Rube Goldberg solution (and yes, I have used it). On Android, there is a slider to move through the book. Other phones/devices have other ways to do this. Use the mobile app to find your page. It will sync through the Kobo server, and then when you sync your reader, it will be in the right place.

Rube Goldberg on Wikipedia

Originally Posted by taming

there is a Rube Goldberg solution

I'd suggest that what was presented, while a way to arrive at the solution from a different path, is actually quite pragmatic and not too convoluted (a hallmark of Goldberg). Of course, I tend to think of most Goldberg methods to be quite practical.

A possible Rube Goldberg solution would be to have a ball roll down a ramp into a boot on pole pinned at the top. This would swing as a pendulum into a lever that opens a rabbit cage and sets off a firecracker. The scared rabbit would bolt from its cage past a dog tethered to winch. As the dog runs after the rabbit the winch would unwind and a step-down gear would move a pointer that activates the switch on the Android to page through the e-book.

[ModReader]

Originally Posted by shall1028

I'd suggest that what was presented, while a way to arrive at the solution from a different path, is actually quite pragmatic and not too convoluted (a hallmark of Goldberg). Of course, I tend to think of most Goldberg methods to be quite practical.

A possible Rube Goldberg solution would be to have a ball roll down a ramp into a boot on pole pinned at the top. This would swing as a pendulum into a lever that opens a rabbit cage and sets off a firecracker. The scared rabbit would bolt from its cage past a dog tethered to winch. As the dog runs after the rabbit the winch would unwind and a step-down gear would move a pointer that activates the switch on the Android to page through the e-book.

Look for it in the Kobo Goldberg. Unfortunatly we will have to wait until a firmware update has been released because the dog would randomly go to sleep and we would have to poke it with a paperclip untill it woke up.

[Duiker]

Originally Posted by ModReader

Look for it in the Kobo Goldberg. Unfortunatly we will have to wait until a firmware update has been released because the dog would randomly go to sleep and we would have to poke it with a paperclip untill it woke up.

I am actually laughing out loud at a Kobo joke! What a nerd I am.

[neilmarr]

Certainly on my old PRS 505 I can go directly to a page by using number buttons on the right (which also serve other functions). There's also bookmarking, of course. I didn't realise this direct-to-page facility didn't exist on some newer devices. I would have thought it a must. Good luck. Neil

[kjturner71]

Originally Posted by Psyke

an official answer would be nice, but looking at the books I have, it might come down to the way books are formated. Some books show total pages, others show the number of pages within a chapter (page 8 of 36 of chapter 16 for example). So while having a goto page probably wouldn't be difficult per say, actually know what page to input might be difficult.

but in any case, something in addition to what we currently have would be nice.

I agree with you in that the problem lies partly with how some of the books are formatted. In my case, "The Idiot", as I mentioned in my original post, is divided only by very large "Parts". Even though there are chapters within the "parts", the chapters are not reflected in the Table of Contents. I have a physical copy of this book and Part I is 164 printed pages, so that translates to many e-Book page turns!

With regards to my problem about not being able to easily jump to a desired page, I'm just kickin' it old-school and reading the paper book until I get to the end of Part I.

[kjturner71]

I think to ease the problem about not being able go directly to a desired page, it might be wise for Kobo to implement either/both of these solutions:

1) Provide a menu item like "Skip Ahead xx number of Pages"
3) Provide a menu item like "Go to page" option, where you put in a page number and it takes you to the page number relative to the current paging scheme (i.e. based on font-size and paging-within-chapters/book").

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by neilmarr

Certainly on my old PRS 505 I can go directly to a page by using number buttons on the right (which also serve other functions). There's also bookmarking, of course. I didn't realise this direct-to-page facility didn't exist on some newer devices. I would have thought it a must. Good luck. Neil

That is part of a larger issue I am finding with newer readers. The software is not up to snuff with important features like ...

Goto page
History
Bookmarks
Easy to use working hyperlinks

It's issues like these that make me wary of trying an unknown reader. The hardware could be good but if the software is not all that good, that makes the reader not all that good.

I am surprised there is no goto page on the Kobo. That's just something that should have been there from day one with ADE.

[pleochroic]

a kludgy method (if the book is side-loaded, and isn't DRMed or you have eliminated the DRM) is to go into whatever desktop manipulation app you use for the format, bookmark the page you were on, and re-download the book to your kobo. you can then go straight to the bookmarked page via the MENU. stanza can do bookmarks, for example.

i go through every book i buy before downloading it and check whether it's formatted well, and if not, i do it myself -- because as you can now see, paging one click at a time through a book to get to page 250 is incredibly user-unfriendly (and one doesn't only need to do that if the database got scrambled or reset; i sometimes want to go back and re-read a section or look something up). it's amazing how bad some publishers are at formatting; i'd be ashamed to output some of the books for which i pay.

i'm really hoping for a firmware upgrade soon that has a better option for fast-forwarding in a book though. kobo can't expect that their regular readers get intimately familiar with reformatting and conversion software.

[elmago79]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Goto page
History
Bookmarks
Easy to use working hyperlinks

I am surprised there is no goto page on the Kobo. That's just something that should have been there from day one with ADE.

That AND hyperlinks. It's just plain silly.