Quote:
Originally Posted by bfollowell
I'm checking out KyBook3, and I have to say that I'm not all that impressed. I finally figured out how to switch from scrolling, which I hate, to regular page turning, which I prefer, but the book formatting looks horrible. None of the margins or indents that are setup in the stylesheet of the book I'm testing out are used and I don't see any way to force the reader to use the publisher's stylesheet.
Any ideas?
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I’ve tried a lot of different reading apps. Seems like A LOT now.
A few of my main needs are:
1) the ability to easily get to my Calibre library via OPDS
2) multi format support
3) sync across devices
On iOS, I’ve tried KyBook 2 & 3, GoodReader, PocketBook, TotalReader, FBReader, Apple Books, Maple Reader, Play Books (Google), Hoopla, Overdrive, Libby, Kindle, Yomu, TiReader, plus a few more. I’m also just recently trying Reflow, Hyphen (thanks to this thread), and Voice Dream (& scanner app, too). Several of these seem like they should work according to the descriptions and the good reviews and do exactly what I want. However, in practice, the one (and really only one) that’s worked best for me by far, is...TiReader.
So, why this one? Well, it has a lot of great options, I think. Dark mode, light mode (and I think auto adjust, if you like that). Tons of formatting options for you to setup the book in your preferred way. But! It also has a one click option to show the book in the original way that the publisher designed.
But probably my very favorite thing is the way that it handles my Calibre library. I added Calibre as an OPDS (I have it running as a server on my Calibre setup). I entered the computer address and port for Calibre, entered my username and password (since I have one setup) and hit save. When I clicked on the Calibre OPDS I’m greeted with a full 9 different ways of showing my Calibre library:
1) Newest
2) Authors
3) Publisher
4) Series
5) Title
6) Language
7) Rating
8) Tags
9) By Calibre Library
Navigating is easy too. If I click on “Newest” for instance, I get a page with 30 books, when I scroll to the bottom, it automatically loads the next 30 and so on. So, no need to click onto the next page after page. And it loads them fast, as well.
There are a couple of different layout options for it to present your books. Neither one shows the entire book description/synopsis but one of the layouts shows the first sentence or so. However, a long press on the title brings up an info box with all the book details including the full description/synopsis, so it’s pretty easy to get that info without leaving the page or clicking back and forth. You can also sort by tags (as mentioned above), for those that had said they were looking for that feature.
I also like that I can search my Calibre library and it’s works brilliantly. Title, author, tag, whatever. Just enter the data in the search bar to the side and it brings up the titles. You don’t even have to add what data your searching (in other words, you don’t have to specify that “Alcott” is a author search), it just searches all data for you. Pretty easy to get to the books you’re looking for.
It supports a very wide range of files:
eBooks (epub, pdf, djvu, fb2, mobi, prc, azw, html, txt)
AudioBooks (m4b, m4a, mp3)
Comics (cbr, cbz)
Photos (jpg, png, bmp, gif, ico, tif, xbm)
Photo Albums (zip, rar)
(Not DRM, though, which is likely not too much of a problem for most.)
You can download the titles to your device and it organizes them in an on-device library. You can open multiple books at once in the iPad and it organizes them in “tabs” so you can quickly switch between them.
It also can sync your reading location between devices. I think I have it setup to use iCloud for that but there are likely other options, too.
It’s not perfect. I’ve not found a way to switch up the speed on audiobook files. And, it doesn’t yet support iPadOS side by side mode where you can have two books open at once, as another person was asking for. But, at least at this point, it’s the best overall option I’ve found thus far and does make it easy to access and read my Calibre library. I think that for the most part, books look pretty good, too, especially if you start with allowing it to use the publisher formatting. I also use the dark mode a lot for both my eyes and less battery usage.
The app is free to use for up to 5 books at a time. For more than that, it’s a one-time IAP of $4.99, which I think is pretty reasonable. You can get a good feel for the app before that having it access your Calibre setup, etc before you decide to purchase.
I can’t seem to confirm but I think that MarginNote 3 might do the iPadOS side by side mode. I know it has a really powerful setup and supports ePub and PDF. You can do a ton with the books bringing a lot of data together for research, marking up, annotations, etc. I’ve not yet taken the plunge into this one yet but it seems to be a much less buggy alternative to something like LiquidText.
I like MapleReader but haven’t committed to purchase that yet. I’m not sure I see more benefits than TiReader has. Yomu wasn’t bad either but I leaned towards TiReader, again, for the better documentation and other features. I’m probably going to tinker around with a few others like Hyphen, do more with Good Reader (got the Pro version on a crazy sale), etc. But I keep coming back to TiReader for the really, quite slick Calibre integration. It also says has free access to 1 million+ books in OPDS servers. You can read more about it here:
http://www.tireader.com/
I want to stress that I have absolutely no connection with the app or its developers whatsoever. I’ve just done a lot of searching and posting here and elsewhere trying to find a good ebook app option that does most of what I want. I also came from Moon+ Reader on Android (the Pro version) and this felt most like what I had on that. I do love reading on iOS now. It’s easy with such good access to my Calibre setup - and beautiful.
If I remember any more info, I’ll share it. Or if I find another app that is similar, I’ll add that too. I hadn’t seen many posts about TiReader (despite really good reviews on the App Store) and wanted to share my experience. It’s really the Calibre integration that sets it apart. I’m not sure if Maple can do something similar. The version I have is locked down and won’t even let me try without upgrading. This is another thing I liked about TiReader given that I could try to set it up before committing to pay. So, you’d know how it works for you before hand. Oh, it also shows up in the iOS “Share Sheet” so you can share/send a book/PDF/audiobook, etc over the TiReader from pretty much any app.
I hope that helps! Please post your experiences (good or bad) so others can learn more, too.