about Gen 3 battery life...

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ortep

I think the use of tags would be enough. Just like almost any MP3 player does. Sort on 'album name', 'artist', 'song title' and 'genre' For books it would be 'series' (For things like trilogies) 'Author', ' book title' and genre. You don't need directories for that. Only software that is capable of reading the tags and sorting on that. It is standard in mobi type files. But Windows is quite capable of generating tags for any type of file like .doc or .rtf I guess that linux would be able to do the same I really don't care were on my Cybook the files are located. I also don't care were the files on my Creative Zen MP3 player are located. I find them by looking for an artist or a genre, not by browsing a directory structure If that software arranges the files themselves in a treelike directory structure, one master directory or even one big 'database' like Oracle does not matter

Since there is no Linux software for this and no open specifiction this will not work. It is also harder to delete book when you do not see their place in the file structure.

[peterbbb]

Do you use Google mail?

It is very easy and very effective and not a great deal of work at all.

[Ortep]

Originally Posted by tompe

Since there is no Linux software for this and no open specifiction this will not work.

Grin...do you mean that there is something that is very easy to do in Windows and it is *not* possible in Linux? Everyone using Linux is always telling me that it is so much more powerful.

There actually is Linux software for this. On a standard Cybook it is possible to find the author of the book. So tags can be read. And we all know there is software to modify *.prc files and change tags. Mobiperl comes to mind.

It is also harder to delete book when you do not see their place in the file structure.

I have absolutely no problems deleting songs from my MP3 player. The software takes care of that. Simply select the song and use 'delete'. I don't know what operating system my Zen is using. I guess it is Creatives own system. But who cares? It works. Only people using Linux are complaining that it is not easy to connect the player. But that leaves 95% of the population that has no problem at all.

Back in the old days I actually knew on what disk sector a file was located. I also did real sector editing when needed. But we don't need that anymore. It became irrelevant. Today I don't know the exact physical location of any file on any file system. The disk controller in combination with the drivers and OS are taking care of that.

I also do not go out hunting for my food. I buy it in the supermarket.

The same is true for some of the big Oracle databases I use. I do not know were the records 'are' in the database or how/were they are stored on the file system. I don't even care if it is running on Unix, Linux or Windows or VAX VMS. I access the records with 'Oracle'

I also don't care how the crankshaft of my car is made. Or if it even has one. (It does have one, but I don't care as long as the engine runs)

MP3 players are for listening to sound, eBook readers are for reading books. I do not care how the manage to do that. As long as it works. And if that means they throw everything in one big directory/database/trashcan it is irrelevant if you can easily find them by using tags.

But I guess we are getting a bit off topic here. It has nothing to do with battery life

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ortep

Grin...do you mean that there is something that is very easy to do in Windows and it is *not* possible in Linux? Everyone using Linux is always telling me that it is so much more powerful.

It has nothing to do with Linux. It has to do with the wish to use free software.

There actually is Linux software for this. On a standard Cybook it is possible to find the author of the book. So tags can be read. And we all know there is software to modify *.prc files and change tags. Mobiperl comes to mind.

Since the format can be changed anytime this is not robust.

I have absolutely no problems deleting songs from my MP3 player. The software takes care of that. Simply select the song and use 'delete'.

I often have different version of the same book and they have the same meta information but different filename. It is then impossible to know which version you are deleting. You could argue that this is abnormal usage but when developing MobiPerl that situation occured often...

[Ortep]

Originally Posted by tompe

It has nothing to do with Linux. It has to do with the wish to use free software.

That is your wish, and I respect that, but more than 90% of the people don't know or don't care. They want something that works for them.

Since the format can be changed anytime this is not robust.

That is true but not relevant. If the format of a mobi file is changed, it is not a mobi file anymore and no software at all can read it, not even mobireader The same is true for an MP3 file. If the change the format, my Zen cannot play it. Simply because it is not an MP3 anymore


[quote
I often have different version of the same book and they have the same meta information but different filename. It is then impossible to know which version you are deleting. You could argue that this is abnormal usage but when developing MobiPerl that situation occured often...[/QUOTE]

That is true, but it is no problem with my Zen player. The software is quite capable of discerning the differences and will place the file somewere else, based on he differences in meta data. That is the big advantage of using meta data and not a //directory/filename system. You simply do not care what name it has and were it is locted. The software will take care of that.

You do not delete //eBook/Jones/Book1(version2) but you delete the book of author Jones with genre Romance, language Spanish and Date 12th of August 2008

[Ortep]

Originally Posted by tompe

It has nothing to do with Linux. It has to do with the wish to use free software.

That is your wish, and I respect that, but more than 90% of the people don't know or don't care. They want something that works for them.

Since the format can be changed anytime this is not robust.

That is true but not relevant. If the format of a mobi file is changed, it is not a mobi file anymore and no software at all can read it, not even Mobireader The same is true for an MP3 file. If the format is changed, my Zen cannot play it. Simply because it is not an MP3 anymore

I often have different version of the same book and they have the same meta information but different filename. It is then impossible to know which version you are deleting. You could argue that this is abnormal usage but when developing MobiPerl that situation occured often...

That is true, but it is no problem with my Zen player. The software is quite capable of discerning the differences and will place the file somewere else, based on he differences in meta data. If I keep the meta data different I can give all MP3 files the name: Music.mp3

That is actualy the case on my Zen. I listen to AudioBooks a lot. And most of them are named Chapter1.mp3 Chapter2.mpr etc. They all end up in different places because the meta data says Harry Potter 1, Dark Tower 4, ....

That is the big advantage of using meta data and not a device/directory/filename system. You simply do not care what name it has and were it is located. The software will take care of that.

You do not delete dev1/eBook/Jones/Book1(version2) but you delete the book of author Jones with genre Romance, language Spanish and Creation Date-Time 12th of August 2008 17:00

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ortep

That is true but not relevant. If the format of a mobi file is changed, it is not a mobi file anymore and no software at all can read it, not even Mobireader The same is true for an MP3 file. If the format is changed, my Zen cannot play it. Simply because it is not an MP3 anymore

MobiPocket just releases a new reader that uses some additional meta information. So of course they can change the format. Ol readers just ignore the new information.

That is true, but it is no problem with my Zen player. The software is quite capable of discerning the differences and will place the file somewere else, based on he differences in meta data. If I keep the meta data different I can give all MP3 files the name: Music.mp3

For my example there was no difference in meta-data. The difference was in the content.

[Ortep]

Originally Posted by tompe

MobiPocket just releases a new reader that uses some additional meta information. So of course they can change the format. Ol readers just ignore the new information.

So? That is true for everything in life. Anybody can change anyting at any moment. If it will be accepted is someting else. But is the power behind it is stong enough it will happen. A couple of years ago the governements descided to get rid of the lead in gasoline. That was a problem for old cars that couldn't run without it. Guess what happend? The lead went out, some cars got converted others went to the junkyard. New cars never had a problem to start with. Now everybody is running lead free.

Computers are easier. If Mobipocket wants to change its file system what's stopping you from using the old system for the next 50 years? Is it suddenly impossible to read your old books? Of course not. I'm sure they *will* change something somewere at some time. That is a process called progession. We do not use CP/M or OS/2 as an OS anymore. Almost nobody uses Word Perfect anymore. We do not us steam engines for trains anymore. Today I run software on my computers that has no chance of running on the computers I owned 20 years ago. Is that a problem? Not to me.

Any system you can think of can and will be changed in the future and at some point it wil be difficult to use the old system. To me that is irrellevant. When/if I buy a new reader in 3-5 years I will look at what is at the market then. Conversion is possible now between almost anyting to almost anything else. So it will also be possible then using today's software. The big exception of course is the 'standard' PDF format. That cannot be converted to anything in a reliable way.
It is simply not possible to make anything futureproof for the next 5 generations. So I'm not going to try. That is wasted time. I can use that time reading books

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ortep

So? That is true for everything in life. Anybody can change anyting at any moment. If it will be accepted is someting else.

That is not true for a non-propietary format or for a open standard format.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by tompe

That is not true for a non-propietary format or for a open standard format.

Of course it is. HTML 3.2 was updated to HTML 4, for example. Any standard can change over time; applications have to change accordingly.

[tompe]

Yes, but the html specification is open so you know you will be able to change the application.

[HarryT]

With respect, a standard being "open" or "proprietory" has nothing whatsoever to do with how well it's documented. Eg, the format for audio CDs is proprietory (it's owned by the Dutch electronics company Philips) but that doesn't mean that it's not documented well enough for anyone to be able to use it.

[igorsk]

Is "proprietory" an actual word? You keep using it quite consistently but I always thought it's spelled "proprietary"...

[HarryT]

I'm sure you're right, Igorsk. I'm not a very good speller!

[tompe]

Originally Posted by HarryT

With respect, a standard being "open" or "proprietory" has nothing whatsoever to do with how well it's documented. Eg, the format for audio CDs is proprietory (it's owned by the Dutch electronics company Philips) but that doesn't mean that it's not documented well enough for anyone to be able to use it.

My point was that the it can change to a closed standard anytime since the entity that "owns" the specification can do anything they want.