Glo How to reverse the update's horrible "design choices"?

[DeltaBlast]

Yesterday I hooked up my Kobo Glo to my pc to charge it, and I opened up the application to let it update for a bit. After I turned my pc off later that night, I took the e-reader without looking at it and put it in my bag.
This morning I found that it apparently received quite some changes while hooked up to the pc!

1) The cute kobo dude (e-reader with face) is gone! Now it just says sleeping, or powered off. Bah.
2) The minimum side margin is now rather big. Why?? Now all that space is lost.
3) The margin on the top is even bigger! More space lost! Now it's just unused empty space, while the title used to be there.
4) The home screen looks terrible! A search bar? Why would I need a search bar?! Why can't I just have my book library be my home screen?
5) The light brightness button is hidden in the settings menu.. why? It's not like the space at the bottom is used for anything else...

I don't get it. Why did they do this? Why get rid of your cute mascotte, why make the minimum margins a mandatory .5cm while before we could set the minimum to the actual minimum (.1cm or so?)? Why hide the title?
Why change everything that's logical and intuitive for the worse?

Sooooo here's my obvious question: is there any way to go back to the way things were? Is there some secret way to edit the above settings? Or should I just roll back to a previous version (and if so: how?)?

And for a bonus question: There's a setting that lets the device power down automatically after one hour. Is this useful? I thought that sleep mode didn't use any power? To me it would make sense to make the device auto-power down after say, 24 hours or so, but 6 seems to be the maximum. Is there any way to change that too?

Thanks!

[moffattm]

Originally Posted by DeltaBlast

And for a bonus question: There's a setting that lets the device power down automatically after one hour. Is this useful? I thought that sleep mode didn't use any power? To me it would make sense to make the device auto-power down after say, 24 hours or so, but 6 seems to be the maximum. Is there any way to change that too?

I use this function all the time. Sleep mode does use more power than off mode, so I have mine set to switch to off after its been asleep for one hour. My thinking is that if I haven't used the Kobo for an hour then I'm probably not likely to use it again any time soon so it's better to be turned off and save battery life.

[Lynx-lynx]

I've set my power off to 30 minutes and it works fine.

I think the current front screen sux big time

But I like some of the other changes.

The Kobo firmware really is a work in progress, and gets updated and changed fairly frequently. That in itself doesn't bother me, it's a bit like getting a new device everytime it changes, lol- cos lots of little things, and some big things change and test my memory as to whether it was like that before the update. (But then again, I may go for over a week without turning the Glo on because I use paper books more frequently than ebooks)

RE your interest in turning back the firmware - yep there are threads on here how to do that.

For info - I have my Glo logged into a dummy Kobo account. The reason is because I only ever load Calibre cleaned and side loaded books onto the Glo. I don't want 2 copies of the book on the device, the Calibre cleaned version and the Kepub version.

So - just create a new Kobo account, and then remove your current email account from your device and add your new email account. (You still keep the original account and you can use the Desktop version with that account, just don't plug your ereader into that account)

Another huge advantage is that you don't have to use your Desktop Kobo app until, and if, you want to upgrade the device.

Have a read on here about any firmware upgrades before you make your mind up as to whether or not you'll upgrade.

Well, they're my tips

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by DeltaBlast

2) The minimum side margin is now rather big. Why?? Now all that space is lost.

On my Glo with firmware 2.6.1b, If I set the margin to zero in the epub's stylesheet then setting the margin to minimum on the device (slider far left) leaves about 1mm or 2mm between the text and the bezel. My guess is this is a 5pt margin (5/72 inches).

If your margins are larger than that then you might need to tweak the book's stylesheet to remove the fixed margin before sideloading it. The firmware won't reduce the margin below what is set in the book, but I think it has always been this way, not new to this firmware version.

[Anak]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

On my Glo with firmware 2.6.1b, If I set the margin to zero in the epub's stylesheet then setting the margin to minimum on the device (slider far left) leaves about 1mm or 2mm between the text and the bezel. My guess is this is a 5pt margin (5/72 inches).

If your margins are larger than that then you might need to tweak the book's stylesheet to remove the fixed margin before sideloading it. The firmware won't reduce the margin below what is set in the book, but I think it has always been this way, not new to this firmware version.

Not sure, but if DeltaBlast is refering to kepubs he/she has a point. The Access kepub renderer has hard left and right margins of approximately 10px and can't be modified.

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by Anak

Not sure, but if DeltaBlast is refering to kepubs he/she has a point. The Access kepub renderer has hard left and right margins of approximately 10px and can't be modified.

OK, I assumed epub because of the complaint about the missing title in the header.

[DeltaBlast]

Originally Posted by moffattm

I use this function all the time. Sleep mode does use more power than off mode, so I have mine set to switch to off after its been asleep for one hour. My thinking is that if I haven't used the Kobo for an hour then I'm probably not likely to use it again any time soon so it's better to be turned off and save battery life.

Ok, thanks, I'll leave it set to one hour then!

Originally Posted by Lynx-lynx

I've set my power off to 30 minutes and it works fine.

I think the current front screen sux big time

But I like some of the other changes.

The Kobo firmware really is a work in progress, and gets updated and changed fairly frequently. That in itself doesn't bother me, it's a bit like getting a new device everytime it changes, lol- cos lots of little things, and some big things change and test my memory as to whether it was like that before the update. (But then again, I may go for over a week without turning the Glo on because I use paper books more frequently than ebooks)

RE your interest in turning back the firmware - yep there are threads on here how to do that.

For info - I have my Glo logged into a dummy Kobo account. The reason is because I only ever load Calibre cleaned and side loaded books onto the Glo. I don't want 2 copies of the book on the device, the Calibre cleaned version and the Kepub version.

So - just create a new Kobo account, and then remove your current email account from your device and add your new email account. (You still keep the original account and you can use the Desktop version with that account, just don't plug your ereader into that account)

Another huge advantage is that you don't have to use your Desktop Kobo app until, and if, you want to upgrade the device.

Have a read on here about any firmware upgrades before you make your mind up as to whether or not you'll upgrade.

Well, they're my tips

I might do that, I'll keep it in mind, thanks

Originally Posted by GeoffR

On my Glo with firmware 2.6.1b, If I set the margin to zero in the epub's stylesheet then setting the margin to minimum on the device (slider far left) leaves about 1mm or 2mm between the text and the bezel. My guess is this is a 5pt margin (5/72 inches).

If your margins are larger than that then you might need to tweak the book's stylesheet to remove the fixed margin before sideloading it. The firmware won't reduce the margin below what is set in the book, but I think it has always been this way, not new to this firmware version.

Thanks for the pic! I suppose the book itself might be at fault, but then again: this problem only appeared last update.

Okay I just checked: you're right. I loaded another book and the margins are a lot smaller on that one. My bad! Maybe it has always been this way for my current book, but I only noticed it just now because of the extra top and bottom space. Oh well. Thanks though!

Originally Posted by Anak

Not sure, but if DeltaBlast is refering to kepubs he/she has a point. The Access kepub renderer has hard left and right margins of approximately 10px and can't be modified.

I hadn't even heard about kepubs until I read about them on this forum today (I just get epubs and load them with calibre)

Originally Posted by GeoffR

OK, I assumed epub because of the complaint about the missing title in the header.

And you were correct

Thank you all for your kind and helpful replies!

Is there any way to get the old kobo mascotte (does it have a name?) back on the sleep screen? I really liked that clean look and people always commented on it

I suppose I can go back to displaying book covers again.

I was just hoping that there was some way to tweak all these settings

[delph]

Originally Posted by DeltaBlast

Ok, thanks, I'll leave it set to one hour then!

Is there any way to get the old kobo mascotte (does it have a name?) back on the sleep screen? I really liked that clean look and people always commented on it

I haven't found a way, short of rolling back the firmware. I don't think it has a name; I called it "smiling Kobo", so Kobo mascotte probably works just as well. I miss it also. It gave the Kobo some extra personality.

[teija]

When I first got my Kobo I was not a fan of the smiley/sleepy face "Mascot"... but now to hear that they've removed it on the latest firmware, I think that is a BAD move. I have grown fond of that little face!

[Barneyabz]

I rolled back my mine. It was a bit tricky. Simply side loading 2.5.1 didn't work and the device completely froze, thought it was bricked. However a reset worked restoring it to factory defaults. This is done by switching it off and then pressing the light button and whilst keeping it pressed sliding the power button. Once reset I had to go through setup. Make sure you set up via pc as it will insist on updating the firmware again. Once it has completed downloading the firmware update do not unplug the USB cord as that will run the update and you will be back on 2.6.1! Instead browse through windows explorer and delete the three update files. One is called the "update" directory and I can't remember the other two but check the forum and you will find their names. After that it is a simple matter of side loading 2.5.1

Good luck

[robko]

Originally Posted by DeltaBlast

And for a bonus question: There's a setting that lets the device power down automatically after one hour. Is this useful? I thought that sleep mode didn't use any power?

The devices all use a little bit of power when sleeping to maintain the "volatile" memory (where your current book and firmware while in use are stored). It requires a tiny bit of power to keep it "alive" and with no power (i.e. when powered down) it gets lost. That's why it takes time to boot up from power down (has to reload all this).

Originally Posted by Anak

Not sure, but if DeltaBlast is refering to kepubs he/she has a point. The Access kepub renderer has hard left and right margins of approximately 10px and can't be modified.

Is this with "sideloaded" kepubs? Left and right margins of "true" kepubs direct from Kobo can be adjusted (barring something funky going on with a specific book and newspapers which are hard set).

[Anak]

Originally Posted by robko

The devices all use a little bit of power when sleeping to maintain the "volatile" memory (where your current book and firmware while in use are stored). It requires a tiny bit of power to keep it "alive" and with no power (i.e. when powered down) it gets lost. That's why it takes time to boot up from power down (has to reload all this).

Is this with "sideloaded" kepubs? Left and right margins of "true" kepubs direct from Kobo can be adjusted (barring something funky going on with a specific book and newspapers which are hard set).

For real kepubs and sideloaded kepubs. The minimum left and right margins of the Access renderer are hard coded by Kobo. Don't know why they've decided this to do as all official released epubs (and therefore kepubs too) contain (page) margins. Which are hardly ever set to zero.