MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - How to go to a page on Kindle??? Locations are annoying.

Dr. Bob · 09-12-2010, 05:02 PM

Hi all. New here.

My vote goes to page numbers. I don't think it's a good idea to go against a convention that has been in use for hundreds of years. The solution is simple and has been mentioned in this thread a few times. You simply have to make a distinction between 'pages' and 'screens' as units when navigating through a text. When you enlarge your font moving through a single page will just take more screens. If in a given situation it would take 4 screens to make up one page in addition to the page number a percentage of the page you're on could be shown. Like:

Page 82 - 00%
Page 82 - 25%
Page 82 - 50%
Page 82 - 75%
Page 83 - 00%
Etc.

Was this really too difficult to grasp for Amazon?

I have no problem with supplying an additional method of navigating through a text like locations but I do have a problem with offering it as the only method. It's basically a proprietary formatting method that moves away from standardisation across platforms. And that's a bad thing.

Of course in order to use page numbers you have to position Page Break codes in a digital text. If Amazon hasn't taken the trouble to do this when they made their ebooks for the Kindle they have a problem addressing this issue. If indeed a location is a 128 byte chunk from the beginning of the file as I believe was mentioned in this thread then it's clear that no human intervention is required to calculate these location numbers. For using page numbers that human intervention would be required. Someone would have to decide where the page breaks go/ought to be if you want to keep them the same as a paper version of that book.

Of course if a book has never been published in paper format you'd need a different method to define a 'page'. It shouldn't be too hard to calculate the average number of characters/words on an average printed page and agree on using that number to calculate a page number. And if for reference purpose you want an exact location? Page xx (or Chapter xx) - Line yy should work (line meaning sentence). Computers are very good at keeping track of such numbers. They've been using something similar like that for quite some time in a rather well known book. Begins with a B.

I don't have a Kindle and only use 'Kindle for PC' so far but found the use of locations annoying. It would definitely feature on the minus side of my list when deciding what e-reader to buy.

09-12-2010, 05:02 PM	#37
Dr. Bob Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Sep 2010 Device: Pocket PC, Netbook	Hi all. New here. My vote goes to page numbers. I don't think it's a good idea to go against a convention that has been in use for hundreds of years. The solution is simple and has been mentioned in this thread a few times. You simply have to make a distinction between 'pages' and 'screens' as units when navigating through a text. When you enlarge your font moving through a single page will just take more screens. If in a given situation it would take 4 screens to make up one page in addition to the page number a percentage of the page you're on could be shown. Like: Page 82 - 00% Page 82 - 25% Page 82 - 50% Page 82 - 75% Page 83 - 00% Etc. Was this really too difficult to grasp for Amazon? I have no problem with supplying an additional method of navigating through a text like locations but I do have a problem with offering it as the only method. It's basically a proprietary formatting method that moves away from standardisation across platforms. And that's a bad thing. Of course in order to use page numbers you have to position Page Break codes in a digital text. If Amazon hasn't taken the trouble to do this when they made their ebooks for the Kindle they have a problem addressing this issue. If indeed a location is a 128 byte chunk from the beginning of the file as I believe was mentioned in this thread then it's clear that no human intervention is required to calculate these location numbers. For using page numbers that human intervention would be required. Someone would have to decide where the page breaks go/ought to be if you want to keep them the same as a paper version of that book. Of course if a book has never been published in paper format you'd need a different method to define a 'page'. It shouldn't be too hard to calculate the average number of characters/words on an average printed page and agree on using that number to calculate a page number. And if for reference purpose you want an exact location? Page xx (or Chapter xx) - Line yy should work (line meaning sentence). Computers are very good at keeping track of such numbers. They've been using something similar like that for quite some time in a rather well known book. Begins with a B. I don't have a Kindle and only use 'Kindle for PC' so far but found the use of locations annoying. It would definitely feature on the minus side of my list when deciding what e-reader to buy. Last edited by Dr. Bob; 09-13-2010 at 06:01 AM.