Firmware Update - 4.5.9587

[compurandom]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

IMHO, I find reading ePub a much more enjoyable experience than reading kepub.

Funny, I feel the same way, but reversed. I like zooming images in kepubs.

And finally, there is the annoyance of the font size being different than ePub so when going from ePub to kepub, I get a different font size.

I thought I was crazy and the only one that noticed this.
My solution is that I have the default font size set to what I want for kepubs, and then after I load a new epub, I select it and go to koboutilities -> set reader font for selected books -> OK and it resets the font to the last size I selected there.

It seems there is only one global font size that the slider adjusts, but if you use koboutilities to set the font size on a book, it keeps it.

[El Duderino]

Well all the best for you who prefer kepubs, you're made of sturdy stuff!

Unsure if it's relevant, but I run a 32GB class 10 card in my Aura (1st gen) and no matter the firmware version, I get the "could not read sd card" message almost every time it powers on. I exit the dialog and everything loads fine. That's just with epubs, running 4.5 at the moment...

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by El Duderino

Boy, am I ever glad I didn't go down the kepub route! I'm reading issue after issue with it.

Most of the kepub vs epub decision is personal. For example, Jon has a bee in his bonnet about what he considers to be wasted space on the screen. But, a lot of people like a little extra space on the sides or at the top and bottom. And the advantages of kepubs (zoom on images, footnote popups, lot easier to tap a footnote link, the in-book stats) might compensate for any problems seen. And Jon constantly rants about the hyphenation being bad. I wouldn't have a clue as I don't use the fully justified mode in either format so I have no idea how bad either is. And Jon does forget that the epub renderer isn't perfect.

Of the things Jon mentioned, the only one that bugs me is the difference in font size. For someone who has chosen a format and sticks to it, that won't matter. I tend to read books I have bought from Kobo as kepub and sideload as epub. I worked out how to handle this ages ago. I will sideload as kepub if I think there is an advantage for a particular book. Lots of images and footnotes are the major reasons.

Not sure if changing your Kobo driver in Kobo Utilities is necessary, but if one has a managed library in Calibre, couldn't they convert their kepubs to epubs, replacing the kepubs on the device rather simply? I say simply knowing it would be time-consuming, especially if epubs are then polished, and you may lose reading stats, annotations, etc.

From the point of view of the device, a kepub version and an epub version of a book are two unrelated books. You can have both on the device and swap between them. If you swap, the reading stats are separate for the two versions. If you start reading one version, remove it and put the other on and read it, you only lose the visibility of the stats. The total reading time will include the time from both versions. The sensible way to handle this is try a few books as kepubs and decide if you prefer it. Then go forward from there with the format you like. And leave the older finished books there unless you want to reread.

These issues really only affect side-loaded kepubs, correct?

Most of the problems people report for kepubs will affect downloaded books as well. There have been problems that were sideloaded only, but the generation of kepubs by the extended driver or a conversion has been improved to the point that I don't think there are any real differences. Except for the recent problem with kepubs on the external SD card. I haven't checked, but I am sure that won't affect purchased books.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by davidfor

Most of the problems people report for kepubs will affect downloaded books as well. There have been problems that were sideloaded only, but the generation of kepubs by the extended driver or a conversion has been improved to the point that I don't think there are any real differences. Except for the recent problem with kepubs on the external SD card. I haven't checked, but I am sure that won't affect purchased books.

I did a test where I filled the internal storage of my Aura H2O so purchased books were stored on the external storage. I noticed that starting up after power on was quite a bit slower. Not sure if this is because of the purchased books on the external uSD card or just that the internal storage was 99% full.

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

I'm finding the per-book and total reading time stats are still quite inaccurate in this version.

I finished a KePub book synced from Kobo that took me about 12 hours to read, but the stats page at the end of the book said it took 24 hours, and the total reading time reported in the activity page increased by over 35 hours.

After reading some more books, it seems the stats are accurate for newly-purchased KePubs, but not for older ones. The ones where I've noticed the inaccurate stats were purchased over a year ago. I'm not sure if I had opened them before or not.

Perhaps this is something to do with the stats changes that happened after firmware 3.19.5761, and it might be that logging out and starting afresh would fix it, but its not a big enough problem for me to bother with that.

[lkmiller]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You would need to have Kobo Desktop installed along with the Obok and Modify ePub plugins for Calibre. Once you removed the DRM (if there is any) from the kepub, you can then use Modify ePub to remove the kepub added code and convert the kepub to ePub. It's that easy.

Or you could download the epub versions from the Kobo website with ADE, right?

I read kepubs downloaded directly to my Kobo, but save the epubs to calibre.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by compurandom

Funny, I feel the same way, but reversed. I like zooming images in kepubs.

But for eBook that don't have images (other than cover, title page, maybe a logo in the copyright, and maybe an author image in the about the author page), you'd be better off (IMHO) with ePub. Just save kepub for when you have images you might want to zoom.

[haydnfan]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

But for eBook that don't have images (other than cover, title page, maybe a logo in the copyright, and maybe an author image in the about the author page), you'd be better off (IMHO) with ePub. Just save kepub for when you have images you might want to zoom.

Why? I haven't read any epubs on my Kobo ereaders. What does it offer that kepub does not? I was under the impression that pages per chapter (my favorite progress setting) was only available on kepub. And the adjustable font weight was also only available on kepub. Are these true? If that is then for me kepub is the superior format on Kobo.

[icallaci]

Footnotes are another area where kepubs excel. Easier to activate the links, and the footnotes pop up in their own window. Much nicer, in my opinion.

[John F]

Originally Posted by haydnfan

Why? I haven't read any epubs on my Kobo ereaders. What does it offer that kepub does not? I was under the impression that pages per chapter (my favorite progress setting) was only available on kepub. And the adjustable font weight was also only available on kepub. Are these true? If that is then for me kepub is the superior format on Kobo.

I believe adjustable font weight is available in epubs; I may be wrong.

+1 for the kepub software being the better implementation (for me).

[dordale]

Add me to the "kepub" camp. I'm with haydnfan--much preferring the pages per chapter progress display over those available in epubs. I also like the progress graphic showing the relative length of each chapter in the book that is available for kepubs. I don't mind the header and footer information taking up a little room--although it is unnecessary.

And I haven't seen the other problem that Jon mentioned--of lines of text being cut off in several months (maybe even years). I did see that from time to time after I first got my Aura HD, but either Kobo has made adjustments to their firmware that got rid of this or with the font settings I choose now it just doesn't happen.

I sideload all my books with Calibre and use the Kobo Utilities to convert from ePub to KePub when adding books to my Aura and Aura HD. The only version on my computer is ePub and the only version on my Kobos is kepub.

[El Duderino]

Well I won't knock somebody for making an informed choice. If it fits your reading style, all the power to ya.

My uneducated choice is to stick with epub, because I know it's universally supported, and my next device won't likely be Kobo thanks to them ditching the SD card slot. Actually there's plenty of reasons to ditch Kobo, but having all my books on one device is the clincher.

Despite these petty first-world gripes, I'm very happy Kobo exists.

In Reading Settings in 4.5, "display progress for current chapter" is an option. I don't have any kepubs on the device. The only epub book I've tried this setting with shows the total # of pages in the book as opposed to what's remaining in the chapter.

I'm quite confused how font weight variance is practically applied while reading a kepub? Do they dynamically change throughout the book to help differentiate content, or is it meant to be set manually?

If manually, I've loaded a few of my favorite fonts at varying weights, and can choose the weight preferred while reading epubs. My only regret was loading Amazon's Ember and Bookerly. What a waste of bits!

[John F]

Originally Posted by El Duderino

...

My uneducated choice is to stick with epub, because I know it's universally supported,
...

In case you are unaware, Calibre can convert epub to kepub (on the fly) when you send it to your Kobo.

[Stevex]

Originally Posted by icallaci

Footnotes are another area where kepubs excel. Easier to activate the links, and the footnotes pop up in their own window. Much nicer, in my opinion.

I 100% agree with this. I wish Kobo would have an option to use the kepub footnote algorithm for epubs. I mean, I appreciate that the footnote feature is out of the epub spec, but I dont see why it couldnt be added as an option - it's just an algorithm and doesnt rely on the kepub format, it would work identically on a normal epub so they could just port thecode over into the epub reader.

PS I only use the kepub for a few books where the footnotes are unusable as epub

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Stevex

I 100% agree with this. I wish Kobo would have an option to use the kepub footnote algorithm for epubs. I mean, I appreciate that the footnote feature is out of the epub spec, but I dont see why it couldnt be added as an option - it's just an algorithm and doesnt rely on the kepub format, it would work identically on a normal epub so they could just port thecode over into the epub reader.

PS I only use the kepub for a few books where the footnotes are unusable as epub

The code to do pop-up footnotes would have to be added to the Adobe RMSDK code which is used to render epubs.

Personally, I use the ACCESS renderer for footnote heavy publications. Otherwise as I really disliked it's odd rendering such as the issues with centered text and blank space (scene breaks), I seldom used it. While some of those issues are more or less fixed, there are no real improvements over using RMSDK for the type of books I read to make me feel switching is necessary.

As for zooming images? Very few of the images in the books I read are sufficiently high resolution to make zooming a valid choice. Bigger fuzziness is not all that appealing.