Desktop widget to ask CC to "read" a book

[chaley]

This was posted in the wish list:

Originally Posted by RichieTheK

I like to have shortcuts to the books I am currently reading on my home screen. I know that some reader apps, such as Mantano, have their own widgets to do this, but that requires using that app to maintain the library, in addition to having CC maintain it. There are also some reader apps that do not have this feature, such as Perfect Viewer (for graphic novels).

I know that there are file managers that can create such shortcuts, but they are not able to use the book cover as the shortcut icon.

My wish is that CC have the ability to create a home-screen shortcut to a book using its cover as the shortcut icon. Tapping the shortcut would open the book for reading in whatever app I have specified for the book's format.

Interesting request. I am making a thread for it because I think it needs discussion.

Questions:

1. Is there anyone besides RichieTheK who would use it? It isn't exactly trivial to implement etc etc, so I am gauging interest.
2. How would a book get "into" the widget? Is it the last book read from CC? Is is an explicit operation on a book like a menu line "Show in desktop widget" in book details? Is it something else?
3. What would the minimum size be? A book cover in a standard widget cell would be very small.
4. Can one show more than one cover in the widget? How? By making the widget huge? By having some kind of scroller?
5. What happens if the widget is put onto the home screen more than once?
6. Is there a better way to do this directly from CC? For example, a "last read" group that shows the library sorted by CC date read descending?

for your thoughts.

[Dhevi]

1 & 6. I use widgets with Mantano and Play Books for the simple fact that they are quick access shortcut to resume reading where I left off. Granted it does not take much more to access the app, to return to reading.

2, 3, 4 & 5. I have seen/used 1x1 widgets where upon adding the widget to the home screen the widget takes the user to the app to select which book to display. The 1x1 widgets are small, but usable and cannot typically be resized. The widget would have to be Removed/Added to select a new book. Adding multiple widgets allows the use to select several books to have quick access to.

Play Books also provides a 2x3 widget that displays several books stacked, that can be scrolled through with an upward/downward gesture. The widget is resizable. I find this widget nice... however, I do not generally read multiple books at a time. Perhaps if a reader selects a CC or Custom Group to display books from if a similar stackable/scrollable widget is used?

Maybe a button on the widget to manually refresh the displayed books like the ComicRack for Android app uses?

....

Issue that comes to mind: A CC widget would be unnecessary for users who only use Play Books unless Play Books is able to be selected as default reader for epub/pdf through CC, which I do not know that it can. Even then if it can, the user must upload the book to Play Books first, and in that case would be better off using the Play Books widgets directly.

I've not experience with other reader apps to comment.


Here are a few examples of widgets in use.





Edit: On a side note - The option to "Clear default reader apps" may not be working. I had selected Mantano as my default reader for epub but CC still remembers and does not allow to changing of the reader app.

[chaley]

@Dhevi: Thanks for the comments. It hadn't occurred to me to "pin" specific books as widgets. The problem is that CC cannot put widgets on the home screen itself, so adding the pinned books would require going through the widget manager. Hmmm...

I saw the Google Play books widget. Nice looking, but TBH I am not up to learning how they did all that eye candy. On the other hand, it could be that the built in stack widget does it (so much to learn). I think I can make a 1x1 resizable/scrollable widget that displays the last N (5 or 10) book covers (by date read or whatever). Depending on the vertical size you would see more than one cover. Depending on the horizontal size you could see some text such as as much of the title that would fit.

One note: I am rather sure that I must restrict such widgets to Android 4 or higher. Given that Gingerbread (2.3) is only 2.5% of CC installations, this restriction is probably not an issue.

Originally Posted by Dhevi

Edit: On a side note - The option to "Clear default reader apps" may not be working. I had selected Mantano as my default reader for epub but CC still remembers and does not allow to changing of the reader app.

It works for me. Send me a debug log. Send it only to me by deleting the multipie.co.uk address. If you want to converse about this, please make a separate thread.

[RichieTheK]

First of all, thank you for opening up my suggestion for discussion. I wish more developers would do this. Here are my thoughts on your topics.

2. Mantano has a widget that is listed under "widgets" in the app drawer. When dragged to the screen, it opens a list of books and the user selects the one that the widget will link to. Moon+ allows the creation of a destop shortcut from its shelf. I would prefer this method, either from the CC shelf directly or from the book details screen.

3. A small icon is OK with me. I do not need the be able to read information on the cover; I just need to be able to tell one book from another. Because I would be actively reading these books, I would be able to recognize the one that I want from a small picture of the cover. I rarely have more that 4 books active (1 fiction, 1 non-fiction, 1 magazine, 1 graphic novel)

4. I would not need to see multiple covers. Each shortcut would be to just one book, so just one cover.

5. There are just two links to the same book. Each would open the book at the same position. I envision the short as simply a pointer of some kind.

6. If you want to do this in CC itself, perhaps a local (on-device only) flag that I could set on those books that I am currently reading. A grouping of books with that flag set would work. (Actually, perhaps having two or three such flags would be nice. The user could use them for various purposes: e.g. Currently being read, Read next, etc.)

[jackie_w]

I'd definitely be interested in this

Some of the reader apps have very nice Home screen widget options and I suppose they're sufficient for anyone who only ever uses a single reader app. I think CC may be even better, though, especially if CC could 'remember' which app was last used to open any particular book.

As background I've attached widget screenshots from my Galaxy Note 3 of the offerings from 3 apps - Pocketbook, Moon+ and Mantano. The best I've used have been Pocketbook and Moon+ (unfortunately IMHO Moon+ makes such a mess of css styling that I can't reconcile myself to using it for epubs).

• Pocketbook (see 1st pic) has 3 different widgets to choose from:
  1. Top left: Most Recent x4 (size 2x3, not resizable) which shows a vertical cascade of the last four books read in PB. Each of the 4 images is clickable and big enough to read author/title.
  2. Mid right: Most Recent x1 (size 1x1, not resizable). The last book you read. Because there is no text, I find the cover icon quite easy to read, despite it being 1x1.
  3. Bottom row: Any book (size 1x1, not resizable). You can have as many of these on the Home screen as you want. I find the covers a bit too small, but you do get the Title as well.
  The beauty of widgets 1 & 2 are that you can put the widget on your Home screen once then forget about it, because the contents are auto-updated whenever you read in Pocketbook. Widget 3 needs to be added whenever you start a new book - not exactly onerous, of course
  
• Moon+ (see 2nd pic) has 2 different widgets to choose from, but only one of them is offered via the normal Home screen long-press/Apps&Widgets/Widgets. The other is only accessible whilst in a Moon+ book list.
  1. Left side: Most Recent x many (size 2x2 - 4x4 on my Note3, resizable) which shows a vertical scrollable list of (all ???) recently read books. The image size is just about big enough for me, but as you can see you also get quite a bit of helpful text. This widget is really very nice indeed. Of course I'd like options to custom design it, too Demanding? moi.
  2. Right side: Any book (size 1x1, not resizable). You can have as many of these on the Home screen as you want. I find the covers a bit too small. The text appears to be the start of Filename which is less helpful than being Title only if you happen to have set a calibre save template which begins with author_sort.
  Once again, widget 1 can be put on your Home screen once then left alone. Widget 2 needs to be added whenever you start a new book and can only be created (I think) whilst in Moon+ MyShelf or MyFiles.
  
• Mantano (see 3rd pic) only has one widget.
  1. Any book (size 1x1, not resizable). You can have as many of these on the Home screen as you want. I find the cover image icon to be so small as to be utterly useless - it's been this way for years. However, you do get the Title as a text caption. One should be thankful for small mercies.

In summary, my prize for 'Best Home screen Widget' goes to Moon+, for it's resizeable 'Recent Books' widget. However, as I find Moon+ too poor at css rendering I actually use one of the Pocketbook 'Recent Book(s)' widgets instead.

Finally, in answer to your actual questions:
1. Yes. No rush, take your time - next week would be fine
2. My vote is for auto-adding/positioning a book in the widget whenever you read it. I like widgets which are customisable when you first set them up, but once added can be left alone.
3 & 4. Depend whether the widget is for one or multiple books. 1x1 is OK if it's the cover image only. If you add a caption the text needs to be in small-print if the cover image is going to be readable. Make sure the text is Title only (configurable ?). Personally, I don't need a caption.
5. You see it twice? so what?
6. I don't think I'd use a special "last read" group. I can already sort CC by 'Date Read (CC)' when I want.

This concludes the voting of the UK judge

[chaley]

At this point we have what I expected: conflicting opinions, all valid and reasonable.

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Some of the reader apps have very nice Home screen widget options and I suppose they're sufficient for anyone who only ever uses a single reader app. I think CC may be even better, though, especially if CC could 'remember' which app was last used to open any particular book.

The default behavior would be to do exactly what CC does when you "read" a book. If you have set a default reader for that format then it would be launched. If you have not set a default format then you would be queried. Is it OK? Real question: is worth storing on a book basis what reader you last used for the book?

Finally, in answer to your actual questions:
1. Yes. No rush, take your time - next week would be fine

2. My vote is for auto-adding/positioning a book in the widget whenever you read it. I like widgets which are customisable when you first set them up, but once added can be left alone.

We are agreed that "read" means "read using CC's command"?

This concludes the voting of the UK judge

Given that you (and we as well) are now in election season, I am not sure that claiming a "vote" is a good idea. Labor, Tory, UKIP, Liberal Democrat, SNP, ???.

(Perhaps a bad attempt at humor)

I think that a widget that auto-updates with the top N (1? 5?) of last read books is a good idea. I need to spend some time determining whether and how this can be built. I am fairly sure that N=1 is easier than N>1, but I don't yet know how much easier it is.

Originally Posted by RichieTheK

2. Mantano has a widget that is listed under "widgets" in the app drawer. When dragged to the screen, it opens a list of books and the user selects the one that the widget will link to. Moon+ allows the creation of a destop shortcut from its shelf. I would prefer this method, either from the CC shelf directly or from the book details screen.

3. A small icon is OK with me. I do not need the be able to read information on the cover; I just need to be able to tell one book from another. Because I would be actively reading these books, I would be able to recognize the one that I want from a small picture of the cover. I rarely have more that 4 books active (1 fiction, 1 non-fiction, 1 magazine, 1 graphic novel)

4. I would not need to see multiple covers. Each shortcut would be to just one book, so just one cover.

It turns out that it is straightforward to create single book desktop shortcuts that don't change, with the proviso that for versions of android before 4.4 (Kitkat) it might not work because the API didn't become "official" until then. Given that, I can add a menu item to CC's book details that looks something like the following:


The result on the home screen looks like


This shortcut would live without changes until the user deletes it. Without further work, clicking the shortcut will launch CC, which will immediately launch the reader app. I don't yet know what the user will see during this process. The problem is that the user might be required to select a reader app (the original might have been uninstalled etc) so CC might be forced to show something during the transition. At this point I simply don't know.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by chaley

At this point we have what I expected: conflicting opinions...

Oh, yes, I think we should indeed all discuss it reasonably and rationally ... then we can all agree that I was right all along (only joking)

Originally Posted by chaley

The default behavior would be to do exactly what CC does when you "read" a book. If you have set a default reader for that format then it would be launched. If you have not set a default format then you would be queried. Is it OK?

Yes, I think so.

Originally Posted by chaley

We are agreed that "read" means "read using CC's command"?

I'm not totally sure what you mean here. Once a book widget is on the Home screen I wouldn't anticipate needing to manually open CC to continue reading. I wouldn't care what is doing the actual launching behind the scenes.

Originally Posted by chaley

I think that a widget that auto-updates with the top N (1? 5?) of last read books is a good idea. I need to spend some time determining whether and how this can be built. I am fairly sure that N=1 is easier than N>1, but I don't yet know how much easier it is.

If N=1 is easy, perhaps that's what the first iteration should be. Save N>1 for a possible future enhancement.

Originally Posted by chaley

I can add a menu item to CC's book details that looks something like the following: ...

It looks easy enough to use and at least it's accessible from the same place where you actually open each book for the first time. However, I'd still prefer a persistent widget which automatically contains the book I last opened in CC. Maybe next time ...

Originally Posted by chaley

The result on the home screen looks like

Please tell me that cover image isn't going to be square Unlike some, I don't get overwrought when aspect ratio isn't strictly kept but even I draw the line at distortion to square. How about a simple user choice of 2 different configurations:

1. cover image only, no caption - max. size possible for 1x1 widget. Perhaps it varies by device but a 'completely full' 1x1 gives reasonable aspect ratio on my Note3.
2. small cover image (or square standard CC icon ?) plus a Title caption underneath.

I would choose the former and RichieTheK, probably the latter.

[Josieb1]

I only use CC on a Kindle Fire and Fires can't use Widgets. I just thought I'd mention that.

[cybmole]

kindle fire does not do widgets, so no use to me, no use adding it to amazon store version...

[chaley]

[QUOTE=jackie_w;3077208]

Originally Posted by chaley

I'm not totally sure what you mean here. Once a book widget is on the Home screen I wouldn't anticipate needing to manually open CC to continue reading. I wouldn't care what is doing the actual launching behind the scenes.

I mean that a widget, as opposed to a shortcut, would show the last book (or books) that have been "read" from CC. There is no interaction with reading apps.

If N=1 is easy, perhaps that's what the first iteration should be. Save N>1 for a possible future enhancement.

It seems that doing 1 or doing N has the same level of difficulty, neither is particularly straight-forward. More study needed.

It looks easy enough to use and at least it's accessible from the same place where you actually open each book for the first time. However, I'd still prefer a persistent widget which automatically contains the book I last opened in CC. Maybe next time ...

There is a big difference in Android between a "shortcut" and a "widget". A shortcut is a fixed item on the home screen (desktop) that launches an application but otherwise has not interaction with it. A widget is an active item on the home screen that interacts with a running application. I have shortcuts worked out. I am now looking at widgets.

Please tell me that cover image isn't going to be square Unlike some, I don't get overwrought when aspect ratio isn't strictly kept but even I draw the line at distortion to square. How about a simple user choice of 2 different configurations:

1. cover image only, no caption - max. size possible for 1x1 widget. Perhaps it varies by device but a 'completely full' 1x1 gives reasonable aspect ratio on my Note3.
2. small cover image (or square standard CC icon ?) plus a Title caption underneath.

I would choose the former and RichieTheK, probably the latter.

I am always amazed by what is important to people.

Shortcuts have captions and fit in a fixed 1x1 square. No options possible. I can make the cover icon preserve its aspect ratio inside that 1x1 square.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

I only use CC on a Kindle Fire and Fires can't use Widgets. I just thought I'd mention that.

Originally Posted by cybmole

kindle fire does not do widgets, so no use to me, no use adding it to amazon store version...

They don't have shortcuts either. Oh well.

[RichieTheK]

Originally Posted by chaley

It turns out that it is straightforward to create single book desktop shortcuts that don't change, with the proviso that for versions of android before 4.4 (Kitkat) it might not work because the API didn't become "official" until then.

This shortcut would live without changes until the user deletes it. Without further work, clicking the shortcut will launch CC, which will immediately launch the reader app. I don't yet know what the user will see during this process. The problem is that the user might be required to select a reader app (the original might have been uninstalled etc) so CC might be forced to show something during the transition. At this point I simply don't know.

This would be sufficient for me. I just did not want to have to maintain my device library in the reader apps.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by chaley

There is a big difference in Android between a "shortcut" and a "widget". A shortcut is a fixed item on the home screen (desktop) that launches an application but otherwise has not interaction with it. A widget is an active item on the home screen that interacts with a running application.

Ah, OK, sorry. My previous use of the word 'widget' in this thread was carelessly chosen without regard to this distinction.

[cybmole]

Fyi the Kobo reader app on my Kobo arc tablet has various book related widgets ,
could be a source of ideas, or if disassembled......

[chaley]

I have made some progress on the widget. Currently it shows the last 5 books read, where read is that a reader app was launched from CC. The following screen captures show it in 1x1, 1x2, and 2x2 boxes. Adding more on the Y axis shows more books. Adding more than 2 on the X axis shows more black borders. This is a list view, so it scrolls vertically.

1x1
1x2
2x2

The widget refreshes automatically whenever you read a book from CC or update metadata by connecting as a wireless device.

Added to yesterday's progress with shortcuts: shortcuts are created from book details. The menu looks like:


When you tap a book in the widget or in a shortcut the book opens in the default reader app without showing CC at all. If there isn't a default reader app for that format then you get the following:


For various reasons that for me are unexplicable, if you open a book from a shortcut or a widget then CC is removed from the task list. If you tap a CC shortcut then it starts where it was, so I think that this isn't a very big deal.

None of this is available on Android < 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) or on Amazon devices.

I am going to let this sit for a few days to see if there are any more comments, then after a bit more testing release it to the CC beta group.