Book covers have disappeared

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I have a Surface Pro 2 and it works as a full fledged computer.

*** Off topic *** Every now and then I flirt with the idea of buying a Surface Pro. Out of interest, is it at all practical to do keyboard-intensive tasks, like epub editing, on this type of device? I fear that if I buy one (not cheap) it's going to lie unused too often because it's never as convenient as a smartphone when portability is important, never as good as a laptop when having a mouse is important and never as good as a TV for viewing TV/films.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

*** Off topic *** Every now and then I flirt with the idea of buying a Surface Pro. Out of interest, is it at all practical to do keyboard-intensive tasks, like epub editing, on this type of device? I fear that if I buy one (not cheap) it's going to lie unused too often because it's never as convenient as a smartphone when portability is important, never as good as a laptop when having a mouse is important and never as good as a TV for viewing TV/films.

The current Surface Pro is very nice. You can get a bluetooth muse to use with it. I have a BT mouse and it works very well. The keyboard does have a trackpad. It is as good as a laptop. I take Surface with me when I go on vacation. I leave the iPad at home. This way I have a true Windows 10 computer. The screen is 16:9 and is better then the iPad for watching video. When I am on vacation, I take the cabling needed to be able to plug into the TV (if it's a TV I can switch inputs to the HDMI port) and can watch TV that way. I download TV programs and/or moves or use Netflix, Prime Video, XFinity Go, or Disney+ to watch TV. I use it to run Calibre and can use the editor. The keyboard I have is not bad for keyboard intensive things. The newer keyboard is better. But you can get a BT keyboard and use that if you prefer.

Overall, I really like my Surface Pro 2. But someday, I'll get a newer one.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Overall, I really like my Surface Pro 2. But someday, I'll get a newer one.

Thanks for replying. I think I haven't changed my mind. I'd like to have one but I suspect I wouldn't use it enough to justify the cost. Maybe next year ...

I'd better stop derailing this thread now.

[idab]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

While tablets have their uses, they cannot replace a full fledged computer unless it's a full fledged Windows tablet. I have a Surface Pro 2 and it works as a full fledged computer.

Tablets cannot run Calibre and to me, that means i need a computer.

Calibre runs fine on my tablet

Linux kernel

Get your facts straight

Surface pro 2 has such terrible battery life and very little processing power, it's an awful device.

The only benefit to windows is its ability to run graphical drivers well, otherwise it benchmarks worse in every other aspect.

Why anybody would want a mobile device with windows, is beyond me.

Windows is quickly dying. We are seeing AMD/Intel/Nvidia move to Linux in the near future. This is where the future of computing is.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by lhkeeper

Im running Calibre 4.17.0 in High Sierra 10.13.6...

We're in the same boat. I found out that my MacBook Pro is a 13-inch, mid 2010 computer now running on High Sierra and that the current version of calibre - the one that solves the cover issue - will not run on High Sierra.

Also, my computer will not accept the newest OS (although there are ways around this hardware issue).

What we need is a plugin, but I don't know if that will ever happen.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

*** Off topic *** Every now and then I flirt with the idea of buying a Surface Pro. Out of interest, is it at all practical to do keyboard-intensive tasks, like epub editing, on this type of device? I fear that if I buy one (not cheap) it's going to lie unused too often because it's never as convenient as a smartphone when portability is important, never as good as a laptop when having a mouse is important and never as good as a TV for viewing TV/films.

I bought my Surface Pro 5 mainly because I wanted a <10" tablet to read comics on. That was my only intended use. But it has wound up replacing my laptop completely. I rarely use my tower, so now the Surface is my daily driver for every computer related task.

I do edit ePub's on my Surface with Sigil fairly often.

I don't often view video on it, mainly because I rarely watch videos on a phone, tablet or PC.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The screen is 16:9 and is better then the iPad for watching video.

No, the screen of a Surface is 3:2. Different aspect ratio than either iPads (which are 4:3) or many Android tablets (which are typically 16:9).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by idab

Calibre runs fine on my tablet

Linux kernel

Get your facts straight

Surface pro 2 has such terrible battery life and very little processing power, it's an awful device.

The only benefit to windows is its ability to run graphical drivers well, otherwise it benchmarks worse in every other aspect.

Why anybody would want a mobile device with windows, is beyond me.

Windows is quickly dying. We are seeing AMD/Intel/Nvidia move to Linux in the near future. This is where the future of computing is.

My Surface Pro 2 works rather well. The battery is not terrible. It's not great, but it is an older tablet. The new Surface has good battery life and is better. But then again, I get a lot of good use out of it.

What tablet is it that you have? Did you buy a tablet with Linux on it or did you buy a Windows tablet and put Linux on it?

Windows works well. The one thing give a good laugh is the Linux repository. There are so many of them with botched versions of Calibre. Windows users don't need a repository as we know to go to the Calibre website to download the correct version of Calibre.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by idab

Calibre runs fine on my tablet

Linux kernel

Get your facts straight

What OS do you use on your tablet?

Calibre does not run on Android "calibre itself does not run on phones/tablets but you can connect to calibre running on your home computer, read books and manage your library in several ways"

Calibre does not run on iOS "calibre itself does not run on the iPhones/iPad, but you can connect to calibre running on your mac, read books and manage your library in several ways"

So while you might be running a jerry-rigged version of Calibre that you somehow got to run in Android or maybe you are using a tablet with Linux, your answer is disingenuous.

Windows is quickly dying. We are seeing AMD/Intel/Nvidia move to Linux in the near future. This is where the future of computing is.

It's the year of the Linux desktop!

[idab]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

What OS do you use on your tablet?

Calibre does not run on Android "calibre itself does not run on phones/tablets but you can connect to calibre running on your home computer, read books and manage your library in several ways"

Calibre does not run on iOS "calibre itself does not run on the iPhones/iPad, but you can connect to calibre running on your mac, read books and manage your library in several ways"

So while you might be running a jerry-rigged version of Calibre that you somehow got to run in Android or maybe you are using a tablet with Linux, your answer is disingenuous.



It's the year of the Linux desktop!

My tablet is not running Android and I never said it was.

It it not an ARM processor.

I'm running Fedora 29.

I'm running the latest version of calibre

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by idab

My tablet is not running Android and I never said it was.

It it not an ARM processor.

I'm running Fedora 29.

I'm running the latest version of calibre

So my comment stands.

[BiliBug]

So, to get back on topic...

I'm noticing that a lot of my covers disappear after a restart.

Could this all be related to the new development feature of using a book cover as a screensaver (not yet implemented)? Maybe the Kindle is downloading the related book cover from the server to store for such use?

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by BiliBug

I'm noticing that a lot of my covers disappear after a restart.

That is interesting. Perhaps the Kindle refreshes the images after a restart or perhaps it just retries downloading those images that failed previously.

Originally Posted by BiliBug

Could this all be related to the new development feature of using a book cover as a screensaver (not yet implemented)? Maybe the Kindle is downloading the related book cover from the server to store for such use?

I don't think so. The thumbnail images are too small to be used for that purpose. The code that I looked at for cover-as-screen-saver extracted the full size cover image from the book itself.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by idab

My tablet is not running Android and I never said it was.

It it not an ARM processor.

I'm running Fedora 29.

I'm running the latest version of calibre

What tablet is it? Was it difficult replacing Windows?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by BiliBug

So, to get back on topic...

I'm noticing that a lot of my covers disappear after a restart.

Could this all be related to the new development feature of using a book cover as a screensaver (not yet implemented)? Maybe the Kindle is downloading the related book cover from the server to store for such use?

After the restart, did you have WiFi on? If so, the cover thumbnail bug.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by jhowell

That is interesting. Perhaps the Kindle refreshes the images after a restart or perhaps it just retries downloading those images that failed previously.

I don't think so. The thumbnail images are too small to be used for that purpose. The code that I looked at for cover-as-screen-saver extracted the full size cover image from the book itself.

So does that mean that even books that don't display a thumbnail will be able to use the cover-as-screen-saver as long as a cover is defined in the metadata?

Shari