Will dictionary work with side-loaded books?

[darda]

Hi there,

I plan to put a German to English dict (mobi) on my freshly bought 69$ Kindle, (I guess that's 4NT? 5NT?)
and most of my books will be sideloaded, I guess via Calibre's conversion functions.

So my question is, will the dictionary work fine with those side loaded books? No limitiations of some sort on side loaded functionality?

And what about dict supprt with PDFs? I imagine not, right?

Thanks a lot.

[Blossom]

Yes will work for sideloaded books not limited in any way not sure on PDFs I haven't use them on a Kindle.

[darda]

That's great! Thanks!

Still waiting for an answer about the PDFs if someone knows and can share their experience...

I guess that's not really doable, but can I at least sort of "quick access" my dict from inside of the book-reading-view-thingy and then type in the word in question? Cause having to go back to main screen is really too much for more than 2-4 words a page...

Thanks!

[tomsem]

Dictionary lookup works on Kindle Touch and Paperwhite, but not on Kindle Keyboard. I think KNT uses the same PDF render as KK, so it probably doesn't work.

[darda]

Dictionary lookup works on Kindle Touch and Paperwhite, but not on Kindle Keyboard.

You do say it only in regard to PDFs, right?
You're not saying I won't be able to highlight a word (via the lousy directional pad, but still) in mobi's and other side loaded books, are you?

I'm referring to the simplest Kindle available to buy at the moment from Amazon.
(this one, it's the KNT right?)

Thanks.

[HarryT]

Forgive the obvious question, but why don't you simply try it and see for yourself?

[darda]

Forgive the obvious question, but why don't you simply try it and see for yourself?

Because I have just ordered one, and it's make it or break it kind of thing to me, to be able to directly look up inside side loaded books and to at least be able to quick access the dict in pdfs...

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by darda

You do say it only in regard to PDFs, right?
You're not saying I won't be able to highlight a word (via the lousy directional pad, but still) in mobi's and other side loaded books, are you?

I'm referring to the simplest Kindle available to buy at the moment from Amazon.
(this one, it's the KNT right?)

Thanks.

Yes that's only for PDFs, at most. The dictionary will work with sideloaded mobis.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by tomsem

Yes that's only for PDFs, at most. The dictionary will work with sideloaded mobis.

It also works for AZW3 books that are sideloaded.

[darda]

Originally Posted by tomsem

Yes that's only for PDFs, at most. The dictionary will work with sideloaded mobis.

Originally Posted by Blossom

It also works for AZW3 books that are sideloaded.

Thank you both very much!

One last question for any 69$ NT Kindle owner - in PDF reading "mode", is there an easy way to quick access the dictionary from the menu and type a definition? As a rule of thumb, am I even able to look up in the dict any word I want via the on screen keyboard, or do I have to have that word written in my book to look it up?

Thanks again!

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by darda

Thank you both very much!

One last question for any 69$ NT Kindle owner - in PDF reading "mode", is there an easy way to quick access the dictionary from the menu and type a definition? As a rule of thumb, am I even able to look up in the dict any word I want via the on screen keyboard, or do I have to have that word written in my book to look it up?

Thanks again!

I have no idea but I would say the Kindle isn't good for PDF if you read alot of PDFs you need a tablet like the Kindle Fire or a DX.

You can open the Dictionary as book from the home screen where it is listed and search for any word.

[darda]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I have no idea but I would say the Kindle isn't good for PDF if you read alot of PDFs you need a tablet like the Kindle Fire or a DX.

You can open the Dictionary as book from the home screen where it is listed and search for any word.

Oh I don't plan on many PDFs, most of my books are going to be side loaded mobis, but I do have a considerable amount in PDFs, and only in that format.
OCR usually doesn't prove that much functional, so I'd stick to the pdf in lack of better alternative.

Still waiting for someone with a KNT to confirm if you can actually quick access the dictionary to type in words in "PDF mode"...

Thanks

[EbokJunkie]

darda
Kindle look-up dictionaries should work with all pdf books regardless of how they have been acquired or delivered to Kindle.
However, user may come across three pdf varieties:
1. Scanned, that is, purely graphic, no text layer
2. Text layer is present but explicit delimiters (spaces) between words are missing.
These pdfs have words just drawn at predefined positions inside the text line.
3. Text layer is present and words are delimited by space characters.

Apparently, highlights and look-up dictionaries are disabled in first type pdf.
Situation becomes ambiguous with pdfs of second type.
Second type pdf is created, for example, by Prince XML software (www.princexml.com) when full justification is applied during pdf generation.
E-readers that use Adobe Mobile Reader to display pdf cannot use look-up dictionaries with pdf of second variety due to error in Adobe Mobile Reader (desktop Acrobat reader doesn't have this error).
For example, all Sony readers, Pocketbook, and Kindle Keyboard (not sure about Kindle NT) use Adobe Mobile Reader.
Interesting that Kindle Paperwhite (evidently) doesn't use Adobe Mobile because look-up/highlight is working on Paperwhite with second type pdfs.
In conclusion, look-up dictionary works on all readers with pdf of third type. By the way, MS Word 2007 and later always generates third type pdf.

[darda]

Thanks EbokJunkie, what a comprehensive post.

I am very happy to know look ups work with 3rd type pdfs, as I have some of those. Thanks!

I do, however, have the bulk of my pdfs in the notorious 1st type pdf, all OCR attempts where to no avail, these are very old "picture-scanned" books. No text search whatsoever, any attempt to OCR them failed.

Unfortunately I have quite a lot in that format.
I would be VERY HAPPY to find some software that would be able to OCR them, but as mentioned I've tried a few to no fruition.

As I'm skeptical about finding a software like that, I just want to know if on a very basic level would I be able to bring up the dictionary from inside a PDF (1st type), and type in the word manually, even if look ups per se are disabled.

I'd be very grateful if any KNT owner can confirm that I can do that.

Thank you very very much.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by darda

Thanks EbokJunkie, what a comprehensive post.

I am very happy to know look ups work with 3rd type pdfs, as I have some of those. Thanks!

I do, however, have the bulk of my pdfs in the notorious 1st type pdf, all OCR attempts where to no avail, these are very old "picture-scanned" books. No text search whatsoever, any attempt to OCR them failed.

Unfortunately I have quite a lot in that format.
I would be VERY HAPPY to find some software that would be able to OCR them, but as mentioned I've tried a few to no fruition.

As I'm skeptical about finding a software like that, I just want to know if on a very basic level would I be able to bring up the dictionary from inside a PDF (1st type), and type in the word manually, even if look ups per se are disabled.

I'd be very grateful if any KNT owner can confirm that I can do that.

Thank you very very much.

I don't have my basic Kindle with me right now, but as far as I know, it works like all of the other e-ink Kindles in that you can open the dictionary like a book and search for any word. I just did this on my paperwhite and it worked perfectly.

Shari