Aura HD Possible 2.8.1 bug

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Part of my current employment is spending time being there just in case in the middle of the night. Editing ebooks is one of the things I do to keep myself awake. Beats endless games of solitaire.

Regards,
David

Good for you

Helen

[jgoguen]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Kobo seems to be schizophrenic in this regard, on the one hand they advertise "Read On Almost Any Device!" "Read Freely" on the other they make their own proprietary version of the most open format around.

A KePub file, from what I've seen, is a fully-compliant EPUB2 document. I have a KePub file, from Kobo, in my calibre library and I haven't had any problem reading it on a non-Kobo device. Sure I'd like it if my reading position would synchronize across every device from every vendor (but without any compormise to privacy!) but I know when something is just wishful thinking

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

If they are deliberately making their "special" renderer a brick in their version of the garden wall, and upgrades making it more so, then how does that bode for the future?

Kobo is one of the companies involved in Readium. Until such time as Kobo does something with that to make it apparent that they're trying to maintain the status quo, or they make their files unreadable on non-Kobo devices, I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Originally Posted by HansTWN

...is a hack (and I mean that in a positive way...

You listen to the mainstream media too much Hacking in the context of technology is unlike other contexts in that it is inherently positive. When journalists and newscasters talk about "hacking", 99.9% of the time they would be more accurate to refer to "cracking" instead.

[Anak]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Unless they eliminate the Adobe renderer I really don't see what the fuss is about. "Kobefying" books is a hack (and I mean that in a positive way, I am using it myself). They want to offer something special for those who buy their books rather than just buy their readers, what is wrong with that? They don't make money on the hardware.

You are turning it around, imo. Kobo wants to offer something extra to readers that use Kobo hardware (and Kobo software apps).
To offer additional features there is no need for an other (proprietary) ebook format (in this case Kobos kepub) because the trigger to "unlock" additional features is hardware (Kobo readers) based.
There are many other ebook manufacturers around (at least in Europe, which may or not be available in North America. Or vice versa.) who offer different or similar features that Kobo reader offer but they've implemented them without the need for a new ebook format (kepub) because the devices "unlocks" or overrides the styles of a particular ebook.

Every renderer (Access, Adobes RM) has at least a bookmark, note, dictionary feature (natively or through a plugin) that work fine.

Take the recently discovered kepub-book.css. On opening a kepub or rendering a book page it searches for kepub-book.css and if present it is cascaded/merged with the existing stylesheets of the kepub but kepub-book.css defined styles override or have a higher importance than the stylesheet in the book.
This is a good example to override the existing stylesheets to enable device specific features (fontsettings, margins, etc.) on the side of the device instead on the software (kepub) side.
In the real world it is probably a little more complicated to achieve this but if other ereader manufacturers can do it, why can't Kobo?

[svda]

As I am new to Kobo may I ask what the purpose is to kobofy an epub to kepub, since you can sideload epubs ? What are the advantages of kepub over epub ?

[Mutisk]

See https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kepub for the purportedly advantages.

But I'm doubting this now, because with my v2.8.1 Mini, I don't have a kepub folder at all and is still able to do dictionary lookups at least.

[samhy]

Originally Posted by svda

As I am new to Kobo may I ask what the purpose is to kobofy an epub to kepub, since you can sideload epubs ? What are the advantages of kepub over epub ?

You'll find more information here
In short

The main benefits of using the kepub renderer (which some may prefer not to have) are:

• Page numbers show the number of page turns remaining in the current chapter instead of the estimated number of pages for the entire book.
• Reading statistics (time left in this chapter, time for the next chapter, time to complete the book)
• The book title is shown at the top of each page.
• The chapter title, if any, is shown at the bottom of each page with the page numbers.

The footnotes also appear in a pop-up window, which is very convenient

[svda]

Thank you samhy and Mutisk

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by samhy

You'll find more information here
The footnotes also appear in a pop-up window, which is very convenient

Quite, which is the main reason for me to use kepubs (and I like the look better, but the footnote handling is the biggie for me).

You can have it display pages per book instead of the default pages per chapter (which I find annoying, personallY) by setting 'FullBookPageNumbers' to 'True' in the Kobo config file (as per this post)

[booklover6]

Quick update, I reconverted epub to epub, and sent it to the Kobo Glo (as a kepub) and no problems.

edit: spoke too soon. Now it's doing the same thing. I wonder if it has something to do with Calibre.

[jackastor]

Originally Posted by svda

As I am new to Kobo may I ask what the purpose is to kobofy an epub to kepub, since you can sideload epubs ? What are the advantages of kepub over epub ?

The purpose and only purpose is to enable features in the book that you can only enjoy on a Kepub book that is purchased from Kobo, Features that are not enabled in a traditional Epub publication.

Regards

Jack

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by svda

As I am new to Kobo may I ask what the purpose is to kobofy an epub to kepub, since you can sideload epubs ? What are the advantages of kepub over epub ?

The only real advantages for me is that footnotes show in a popup rather than showing on a page which I need to return from and that images alone on a page can be zoomed (handy with some graphs and maps if they are stored in a high resolution image). Otherwise, the chapter read time, showing the number of pages in a chapter rather than in the whole book, etc. are cold pancakes and no honey.

The kepub format adds some extra <span id="kobo.xx.xx> tags which seem to be used for more accurate positioning within the chapter (annotations, re-opening a chapter).

If you are reading non-Latin alphabet languages such as Arabic or Hebrew, the ACCESS renderer used for the kepub files can take advantage of epub3 features to display text in right to left or vertical formats.

Since epubs and .kepub.epubs use different renderers, there are times when I've checked issues with an ebook by renaming the files to switch renderers. I also use the .kepub.epub filetype when playing with epub3 documents since the ACCESS renderer is close to epub3 compliant. You can check the ACCESS and Readium sites for more information.

Edit: One further item is that you need the Adobe Reader Mobile renderer to handle Adobe's ADEPT DRM -- library books and other Adobe DRM protected epubs. Kobo has their own DRM scheme for kepubs which is not compatible with Adobe's DRM.

Regards,
David

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by DNSB

If you are reading non-Latin alphabet languages such as Arabic or Hebrew, the ACCESS renderer used for the kepub files can take advantage of epub3 features to display text in right to left or vertical formats.

Regards,
David

That is interesting, not that I would use it but I am sure many would.

Helen

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by speakingtohe

That is interesting, not that I would use it but I am sure many would.

I've had fun generating several ebooks that I can't read but others have let me know look like a good starting point.

Regards,
David

[alism]

Originally Posted by trekk

To escape from the stuck loading screen, I tap the header and next the middle of the screen. Everything is fine then.

Thank you. This worked perfectly.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by DNSB

showing the number of pages in a chapter rather than in the whole book, etc. are cold pancakes and no honey.

You know you can fix this by adding...

[FeatureSettings]
FullBookPageNumbers=True

to your “kobo eReader.conf” file?