Reading stats are completely broken (probable explanation included!)

[sgeiger]

I know someone else with a Kobo Touch and we both have the same issue with the Reading Life stats -- they're completely broken. Specifically, the "minutes each session" number is always really, REALLY far from reality. Here's a perfect example: Last night I started reading a book for the first time (it had never even been opened on any of my devices). I read for 50 minutes straight. I never left the reading app, and never put it into standby. When I finished reading, I went into Reading Life to see that with that particular book my average "minutes each session" was "7" instead of "50". It got the "hours read" and "pages turned" numbers right, but somehow managed to calculate my average session length incorrectly. Seeing as the math for this would be "sum of lengths of all reading sessions" divided by "number of reading sessions", that math would simply be 50/1.

I think I've figured out the problem though (and I sure hope the Kobo devs are reading if they're not aware of this) -- every time you add a highlight or note, have a word defined, and/or invoke the in-book menu (tap the centre of the screen), it sees that as closing your reading session and starts a new one once you're done. In my 50 minutes of reading I did one of those things about seven times (50/7 DOES equal about 7).

I tested this by picking up the same book again today (for the second time ever) and read for 25 minutes straight, this time not highlighting, defining etc etc etc. When I was done, the "minutes per session" figure had lept to "9", which, if you assume it had indeed decided I had seven sessions averaging seven minutes each, makes perfect sense when you add a 25 minute session to that calculation (7+7+7+7+7+7+7+25=9).

This would also explain why my global stats on iOS say that I average only 1.8 pages per session. For this to be true I would have to have had 411 reading sessions. I've had the Kobo for 15 days and doubt I've ever picked it up more than five times in a day (which would be 75 sessions -- a far cry from 411)

I can't imagine this is by design. If I sit down for an hour and read one book -- even if I stop to get a definition or add a note, I would consider that one hour of reading ... all at once. Not multiple consecutieve tiny bursts of a few minutes .

Personally I find the stats keeping option to be a pretty cool feature of eReading. I would really hope that the kobo devs would iron this and all the other stat-keeping features out.

Can anyone confirm the same issue? It's very easy to try out!

[robko]

You are correct in your assumption of why you are getting the stats you are. There was discussion of this previously that is now buried somewhere many pages back on here.

[JedV]

They've always been wonky. So much so that I ignore this feature completely. The reading stats would be much more interesting on the KT if they were cumulative like they were on the Kobo apps. The feature is great on paper, crap in execution.

[Lunchtray]

This is almost exactly the issue with the reading time statistics. I believe I've posted about the problem in the past in the future kobo touch firmware thread and listed on a high level the problems you've described in detail here.

Opening the in-book menu via touching the center of the screen doesn't mess with the timer as far as I can tell. Using the options within will though. If you bring up the in-book menu to simple check the time and then close it it will not mess with the timer.

[sgeiger]

Ok but making highlights or annotations, or getting a defintion or reading a footnote does... still completely ridiculous.

[HarleyB]

Originally Posted by JedV

They've always been wonky. So much so that I ignore this feature completely. The reading stats would be much more interesting on the KT if they were cumulative like they were on the Kobo apps. The feature is great on paper, crap in execution.

The stats sound fantastic in theory but in my experience they have never been accurate and so it becomes just a gimmick. I have also lost my stats so many times with factory resets that I now have the entire Reading Life area turned off.

[frankieGom]

In my case, not only the average session length seems off, but also the stats seem to overestimate the page turns. The book I'm currently reading, Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson, has about a thousand pages and I am two thirds of the way through it, but if I am to believe the stats, I have already spent close to 32 hours turning almost 2500 pages!

[The Terminator]

Originally Posted by frankieGom

In my case, not only the average session length seems off, but also the stats seem to overestimate the page turns. The book I'm currently reading, Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson, has about a thousand pages and I am two thirds of the way through it, but if I am to believe the stats, I have already spent close to 32 hours turning almost 2500 pages!

I think that's because of the font being bigger, unless you're using a really small font it takes a few page refreshes to get the Epub standard page numbers on the bottom to change.

[Lunchtray]

Originally Posted by The Terminator

I think that's because of the font being bigger, unless you're using a really small font it takes a few page refreshes to get the Epub standard page numbers on the bottom to change.

This is why. Unless it's an officially download Kobo Kepub book the pages due to formatting, text size etc won't line up with how many pages are in the epub.

If you use the advanced settings within the book and turn on the pages for the epub you'll notice that most books depending on your formatting preferences will have a page every 1.5-2.5 page turns indicated as a small page number off in the margin.

From my experience a 1000 page epub will be between 30-40hrs for reading (really dependant on how fast a reader you are) and 2000ish page turns.

[JedV]

Originally Posted by Lunchtray

This is why. Unless it's an officially download Kobo Kepub book the pages due to formatting, text size etc won't line up with how many pages are in the epub.

If you use the advanced settings within the book and turn on the pages for the epub you'll notice that most books depending on your formatting preferences will have a page every 1.5-2.5 page turns indicated as a small page number off in the margin.

From my experience a 1000 page epub will be between 30-40hrs for reading (really dependant on how fast a reader you are) and 2000ish page turns.

Well, I should set my font size super large, then get the Juggernaut award. I was at 70% completion, and lost my progress after needing to do a factory reset. All of my awards were retained. Boo-urns.

[frankieGom]

Originally Posted by The Terminator

I think that's because of the font being bigger, unless you're using a really small font it takes a few page refreshes to get the Epub standard page numbers on the bottom to change.

The page number at the bottom increments with each page turn.

François

[frankieGom]

Originally Posted by Lunchtray

This is why. Unless it's an officially download Kobo Kepub book the pages due to formatting, text size etc won't line up with how many pages are in the epub.

If you use the advanced settings within the book and turn on the pages for the epub you'll notice that most books depending on your formatting preferences will have a page every 1.5-2.5 page turns indicated as a small page number off in the margin.

From my experience a 1000 page epub will be between 30-40hrs for reading (really dependant on how fast a reader you are) and 2000ish page turns.

The book I'm currently reading is a Kepub.

François

[filmo]

It's just page turns not what you actually read.

[The Terminator]

Originally Posted by frankieGom

The page number at the bottom increments with each page turn.

François

The bigger the font the more pages there are at the bottom in kepubs. So like a previous poster said the page numbers won't change in a regular epub they will just stay the same until all the words that make up one page has been passed.



So regardless to the format of the book the larger the font more pages read will register.