KOReader freezes while launching on Kindle 3

[kbel]

Hello! After years of browsing without an account, I've joined the forum to ask: can someone please help me get KOReader working on my Kindle 3 (k3g)? I love using KOReader on my Kobos and I love the hardware buttons on this Kindle I just acquired, so the two together would be a dream come true!

So far as I can tell, I've updated the firmware to 3.4.3, jailbroken the device and installed MKK, MRPI, KUAL, and the most recent KOReader for legacy Kindles. KUAL launches fine and includes KOReader items in the menu.

When I try to launch KOReader either with or without framework, the screen displays "Starting KOReader..." and then "Opening file './help/quickstart-en-v2023.10.html'" in the familiar KOREader dialogue box. Then nothing happens, even if I wait for quite a long time, until I reset the Kindle by holding the power button.

I've attached a crash log. (Let me know if I should use a pastebin or something else instead.) To my non-technical eyes, it looks like I'm missing some Lua libraries? I'd appreciate any assistance.

[pazos]

IIRC it should be fixed with https://github.com/koreader/koreader...37d66be7e73318

So try a nightly, like https://ota.koreader.rocks/koreader-...23-12-29.targz

[kbel]

The nightly worked! Thank you very much!

It's such a relief to stop mucking about with mobi files and use the same epubs as my other ereaders.

[PaigheTurn]

Which startup did you use? Was it the regular startup or no framework startup?

[PaigheTurn]

Originally Posted by pazos

IIRC it should be fixed with https://github.com/koreader/koreader...37d66be7e73318

So try a nightly, like https://ota.koreader.rocks/koreader-...23-12-29.targz

Can I ask how this nightly .targz file is supposed to be install? I got scared because I thought Koreader almost bricked my Kindle. I dont want to make assumptions during installation of fixes.

[NiLuJe]

Originally Posted by PaigheTurn

Which startup did you use? Was it the regular startup or no framework startup?

Irrelevant, the issue arises when KOReader is setup to open the last-opened file on start (or on a fresh install, which behaves the same way to display the Quickstart Guide).

[kbel]

Originally Posted by PaigheTurn

Can I ask how this nightly .targz file is supposed to be install? I got scared because I thought Koreader almost bricked my Kindle. I dont want to make assumptions during installation of fixes.

I don't recall exactly how I did it. I may have unzipped the .targz file to the root directory of the Kindle, so that the "extensions", "koreader" and "launchpad" directories ended up there. And/or I may have used KUAL to do a clean KOReader install? Sorry I can't be more specific.

[kbel]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

Irrelevant, the issue arises when KOReader is setup to open the last-opened file on start (or on a fresh install, which behaves the same way to display the Quickstart Guide).

Ahh, good to know! I had wondered something vaguely along those lines and looked in the config files for a while, but couldn't figure out how to change the startup settings in a way that fixed the issue.

[NiLuJe]

2024.01 is now out with the fix (but, FWIW, installing a nightly works exactly the same way, a release is just a nightly taken at a specific point in time and with a fancier name ;p).

[PaigheTurn]

@Niluje and @kbel thank you for the discussions. I am now able to successfully run Koreader.

Its very slow though so I think I'll stick to vanilla. Is this the limitation of an old kindle, or can there be optimizations that I can do?

[NiLuJe]

Depends on what you're (attempting) to do with it. I wouldn't necessarily want to throw PDFs at it, but novel-sized prose in ePub format should handle relatively well.

Yeah, the hardware is crap by today's standards, but it should still skirt the barely usable edge ;p.

[kbel]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

2024.01 is now out with the fix (but, FWIW, installing a nightly works exactly the same way, a release is just a nightly taken at a specific point in time and with a fancier name ;p).

Woot! Thanks for the heads up.

[kbel]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

Depends on what you're (attempting) to do with it. I wouldn't necessarily want to throw PDFs at it, but novel-sized prose in ePub format should handle relatively well.

Yeah, the hardware is crap by today's standards, but it should still skirt the barely usable edge ;p.

Yeah it can be slow and crashes more frequently than on my Kobos. But I find it usable for even pretty lengthy novels--I'm now making better progress through Dune than any time since my Nook's buttons started crumbling . And I find it works for most CD booklet PDFs--opera libretto ones!

One thing that really helped my user experience was to switch every file browser (home, history, favorites) to Classic mode. I disabled a bunch of plugins too, although I don't know if that made much of a difference.