Time for a next level UI ?

[saoir]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

Dumbing things down for people who are unwilling to even TRY to learn something will never accomplish anything good.

With respect - 'dumbing down' is a patronising term used by techs and engineers who don't get that the vast majority of people are not like them.
This is not dumbing down. It is about simplifying and making it more effective and streamlined for the actual people who will be needing this kind of app.

I am not criticising Calibre - I want to have a better and more widely used and successful Calibre. That is why I am suggesting the 'shell' structure - a way to retain the tech community who have brought the program to where it is, while accommodating the 'masses' who need and will use Calibre if it empowers them to do so.

[toddos]

Originally Posted by saoir

Keep in mind that the trend is moving steadily ... one might even say briskly to the demise of DRM from more and more publishers. Format conversion would still be needed because of different devices.

Not really. Minus DRM, everything but Amazon uses EPub, even Apple. Conversion can (and should) be provided from the source, rather than the destination, similar to how Overdrive works (do you want the book for Kindle(mobi), Epub, or PDF?).

[saoir]

By the way guys - I realise I am dropping in out of the blue and appearing to be critical. That is not my intention. I have been taking part in eBook discussions elsewhere, and sometimes here, for a few years and care about this subject. I apologise if I give the impression of being a newb smartarse

Originally Posted by DoctorOhh

I agree the concept of basic and advance views has merit, exactly how is not so easy.

I agre - hence a discusion is a great idea ... don't you think ?

DRM stripping is not a feature of the calibre program and will not be added to the main program. So this point is out from the start.

I realise that the US is a very restrictive environment for this and therefore this is probably blocked. But there must be another way of facilitating it to be easy to add, in a simpler way that at present.

The idea Format Conversion (device driven and not technical nerdy file format name driven) is a good one but this may need to be nerdy file format name driven rather than device driven. As an example half of the Kindle formats do not work with half of the kindle devices. Although if you wanted to maintain the separate database/table required to match up the hundreds of devices out there with the various formats that they can handle or have the option to handle I'm sure patches would be accepted.

Each device must have a 'best' format. So Calibre could be made to use this format for that device. Advanced mode could allow that to be changed. In the basic mode, if the default mode is for some reason not suitable is could be made to alert that it is changing to the second choice.
The Kindle Touch can use any of how many ? .. 5 different formats (just guessing) that doesn't mean each is equally desirable or suitable.

Calibre works as most other standard book managers and places the books by default (for Windows) under My Documents in a library. Kindle, Adobe Digital Editions, Sony etc... do the same. From there it is up to user and local OS tools to perform a backup.

I'm guessing you are a Windows user. Isn't it possible for Calibre to ask during installation if the user wants to use a different location ? Your leaving it to the user to go to advanced function to make a change is not what I would call user friendly. When I was a windows user some years ago I rarely backed up My Docs, Because it is a mess of a place. I had a folder called "My Name" where I endeavoured to have everything important to me - documents, music, libraries, etc)

Always room for improvement (ordinary English), specifics though are not as easy.

Does everything worthwhile have to be easy ?

Books on a device can change independent of calibre, but a more automated way of creating a column tracking a particular device might be of benefit. I also believe the Reading list Plugin may accomplish this.

The mere plugging in of a device should offer immediate data about what is on that device. A user would, imho, understand that what is listed for each device is what was on it the last time it was connected to Calibre, and this could be noted on that screen anyway.

A small portion of it is drag and drop now, like Send to Device. If you suggest specific items that can be added and provide benefit they may be able to be added. As you can tell most of the features have been added via user request or developer interest.

For a start ... In a simpler basic user GUI, I would see a large icon of each device in the left column or across the top where items from the listing could be dragged to. I would see clicking on each device producing a listing of items on that device. I would see the moving of an item from one device to another being achieved by a drag and drop, with the final execution being completed when that device is attached.

Maybe specific feature request might help the conversation.

I agree. However a conversation has to be started and minds opened before that stage is gotten to, yes ? Thanks for your thoughtful reply.

[saoir]

Originally Posted by kiwidude

However I strongly believe that in the case of ebooks we have been stuck in a corner by the fact that there are so many technical issues revolving around them, that mean that unless your only usage is to put the book straight onto the device from purchase to read it you are forced into a learning curve. And I don't think people should be criticised for not wanting to take on that curve, it just means that calibre is not the solution for them, at this point anyway. We all have only so many hours in the day (or as we get older so many things we can remember!) so we pick and choose what things we deep dive on. Obviously the hardcore calibre fans have chosen this app as one to spend countless hours on wrestling to grips with, which is great for them. However there are the other 99% of people out there who read a lot of books who may choose not to take that on. Just like I know nothing about how a car works, or gardening or whatever - we all pick and choose what things are of interest. That people who read ebooks "should" have an easier way I don't disagree with at all, and right now it seems the only option for them is to stay within the vendor specific and closed ecosystems. Which is not what calibre is competing with of course.

I do understand.

My question to this development group is therefore this ..... do you want to stay as a techy - nerdy solution only for this small community as the eBook transforms reading and replaces paper ? Or do you want to be the 'Go To' application for the world of eBook readers across the world ? Having invested so much time and effort over the last several years in this project .. I am hoping that the developer guys will chose the latter.

[saoir]

Originally Posted by toddos

Not really. Minus DRM, everything but Amazon uses EPub, even Apple. Conversion can (and should) be provided from the source, rather than the destination, similar to how Overdrive works (do you want the book for Kindle(mobi), Epub, or PDF?).

I defer to your better knowledge.

[saoir]

Originally Posted by Agama

Calbre is in a constant state of development so there is usually an update once a week: this is a real strength. You are not obliged to install each and every update. Personally I check out what's changed and only get the new version if changes relate to my use of calibre.

You can disable update notifications in Settings > Behaviour. Perhaps there could be another option "Tell me when my version of calibre is obsolete" so that at least this is shown when notifications are off.

My own belief is that Calibre should be like most mainstream programs, and only major updates should come through the alert system automatically. If users are especially technically interested they could then go into the bowels of Calibre and turn that on ....

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by saoir

Keep in mind that the trend is moving steadily ... one might even say briskly to the demise of DRM from more and more publishers.

Do you have references for this statement? Because from where I stand, I don't see any indication that the major publishers are moving towards the end of DRM.

[saoir]

Originally Posted by Sabardeyn

I disagree in one circumstance with the book cover comments made so far. Sometimes, when trying to re-locate a forgotten book, you remember a book's cover and not it's title or author. In such a case a multiple, non-animated, book cover display would be quicker.

Mind, I'm not expecting it to be implemented...

Why not ? A lot ... and I mean a LOT of people are highly visually driven. They simply do not relate to lists as much as visual clues. I mean the info is there in Calibre ! what is so uncool about allowing people to look at a cover thumbnail layout with names below them ? It doesn't mean they wont to manage everything in this mode .... but as an option.
Personally I can manage both list and visual. But I agree that looking for a title .. sometimes the very title I am reading now .. can be much easier visually.

[saoir]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Do you have references for this statement? Because from where I stand, I don't see any indication that the major publishers are moving towards the end of DRM.

If by 'major' you mean the big 6 ... then you are right. But does everything still revolve around the big 6 ?

[saoir]

Originally Posted by toddos

Let's say you have a reasonably-sized library of 500 books. Let's also say you have a 1920x1080 screen and you run calibre full screen. Finally, let's say you display covers at 128x128, because any smaller and they don't convey much information (also assume that covers are perfect squares, which they generally aren't). For usability, let's assume that there's a 20px gap between each cover. So, each cover requires 138x138px to display. Assuming no other chrome and complete edge-to-edge layout of books, you can fit 13 covers horizontally and 7 covers vertically. 13x7 = 91 covers == 6 pages of covers for your library. And that's best-case scenario. If you're a more average user, with a 1366x768 display, with sidebars and other UI chrome enabled in calibre giving a ~800x600 display area. You're now down to a 5x4 grid. 5x4 = 20 covers = 25 pages in cover view. Maybe that sounds fine to you, but that definitely does not work well for me.

I would respectfully say that when I made my suggestion of this in this thread, I in no way meant that this would be the ONLY method of display.
I would also envisage it being used only in what I would call sub-libraries. Such as after applying a filter, such as someone who wants to see all of their titles by one author, or genre, or date added.
Ultimately you answered your own question. It wouldn't work for you ... and you wouldn't make use of it. And that is absolutely fine.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by saoir

My question to this development group is therefore this ..... do you want to stay as a techy - nerdy solution only for this small community as the eBook transforms reading and replaces paper?

See: http://status.calibre-ebook.com/

New users in the month:

Jan, 2013: 485,975
Dec, 2012: 782,005

Sounds like a big community to me. Enormous, even.

The people who value simplicity the most will probably stick with their vendor's semi-closed garden.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by saoir

If by 'major' you mean the big 6 ... then you are right. But does everything still revolve around the big 6 ?

Hmm? Yes... Just because Smashwords and Baen don't use DRM has *little* impact on the other 9(5-6-7-8)% of the ebooks sold to the general public that still use DRM.

[SteveEisenberg]

More on the alleged "small community."

I just googled to find rankings of software popularity. They aren't as easy to find as you might think, but three years ago Calibre was already number 18 on the list of "Most Popular Open Source Software Ever:"

http://www.tripwiremagazine.com/2010...re-ever-2.html

If you believe the above link, Calibre was, three years ago, when eBooks were a way smaller phenomenon, already more popular than any Linux distribution. I have to be a little skeptical because the link above failed to state a methodology for its ranking. However, of the millions of programs available for download, Calibre is easily more popular than 99.99 percent of them.

With numbers already this high, no one really knows whether those put off by the new interface would outnumber new adapters.

[kovidgoyal]

Here are some more data points about calibre's popularity:

Number of unique IP addresses that have used the calibre Fetch News feature:
13 million
http://status.calibre-ebook.com/recipe_stats

Current calibre-ebook.com website ranking: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/calibre-ebook.com
Top 5000 of *all* websites in the US and top 7000 in the world. And this is with a website that employs no traffic generation tricks, SEO, advertising, whatever.

According to google analytics, there were 2 million unique visitors to calibre-ebook.com in the last week. Of which 60% were new visitors and 40% were returning visitors. Unfortunately, I can't create a public link for this, so you will have to take my word for it.

Assume that 40% returning visitors implies at least 30% active users. That would put calibre's active user number somewhere between 4 and 6 million active users (from a total of 13.7 million).

I doubt very much that there are 4 *million* computer geeks/nerds in the world that are also avid e-book readers.

[Sabardeyn]

Wow... Apparently you heard negatives in places where none were intended. Before posting my previous message I cut out a lot of material, perhaps losing meaning in the process.

I've seriously edited down your quoted responses while trying to maintain a semblance of context. I'm sure they're not perfect, but hope they convey the conversational thread fairly accurately. There is no intent to take things out of context.

Originally Posted by toddos

Let's say you have a reasonably-sized library of 500 books. [...] Maybe that sounds fine to you, but that definitely does not work well for me.

It's not fine. It's the closest approximation of what we do in the real world. We look through covers. We limit the books displayed as best we can and go from there. It's not a perfect method - but it is as realistic as any other form of book search - and this idea is the closest calibre equivalent.

Originally Posted by toddos

People have tried. Multiple times. [...] but the people who want ... never come through with anything. Kovid and crew aren't opposed to making the GUI better

I'm not arguing that point, I'm agreeing with you. I said no one, GUI speaking, came up with a better widget than what we are currently using - and that if anyone did, Kovid (et al) would consider it.

Originally Posted by toddos

The documentation has what the documentation needs [...] What you're asking for is more of a "user guide" [...] and there's no reason you [...] couldn't write [...]

You are absolutely correct, I could. If I felt I was sufficiently competent with the software to do the subject justice, or had a unique perspective to convey, I might do so. I've done it before for other software. I might still do so provided the competency and perspective checks are valid.

Originally Posted by toddos

According to the stats page (emphasis added by me):

Here, I absolutely make an error. I remembered the ID but did not recall that it was kept despite uninstalling. So the numbers cited are correct, reflecting new user installations only, not a mix of new installs & re-installs.

Sorry if I seemed to push your buttons. It wasn't intentional. I was just trying to convey my opinion(s) on the subject(s).