Kobalt: an alternative reader app for Kobo devices

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Your eyes start to get tired so you up the font size and there goes your page numbers out the window. Also, they won't match anything Count Pages generates for a page count.

I never change my font size, margins or line spacing, so the number of screens is good enough for me... or would be if I used any page numbering at all, which I don't. I only have the progress bar displayed while reading. As to the book length, I chose characters per page and stuck with it, so all my books have consistent length in calibre, and that's all I care about. I don't need or want Adobe page numbers. YMMV.

[Dal Bhat]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Before you have the book on your Kobo, how would you measure roughly how long it is?

Calibre gives me a "page" count. Whatever and however it is counting. It's a relative indicator. I can see that a Mrs. Murphy murder mystery is about 250 somethings, while The Fall of Hyperion is pushing 900. The former are fun, quick, light reads, not very long. The latter is an epic.

Whatever Calibre is telling me translates exactly to Kobo in the same relative ratio. With either book file, I know how much reading is there. Doesn't matter what's being counted.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Dal Bhat

Whatever Calibre is telling me translates exactly to Kobo in the same relative ratio. With either book file, I know how much reading is there. Doesn't matter what's being counted.

As long as you are happy with the results, that's all that really matters. Any of the page count algorithms have weak spots (since I ran into base64 images in the Adobe algorithm, I have also seen ebooks designed to break Amazon's APNX algorithm, calibre's page count (both the original and the improved) and most of the other algorithms I've run into.

Word count is still the most reliable indicator of books size but as long as you compare apples to apples, almost any algorithm is useful for most books.

OTOH, debating which algorithm is "best" belongs in a humour forum.

[howyoudoin]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Before you have the book on your Kobo, how would you measure roughly how long it is?

I use the time to read statistic on the subtitle of the book in library view. It is a calculation based off word count and reading pace (default is 250 words a minute, you can change it based on your habit).

[Dal Bhat]

Originally Posted by DNSB

As long as you are happy with the results, that's all that really matters.
...

as long as you compare apples to apples, almost any algorithm is useful for most books.

There you go.

[rantanplan]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

It really is quite surprising how persistently some deliberately choose to find this very, very simple concept impossible to understand. I prefer to measure progress through the book, but of course exactly the same thing holds true - I know the numbers are screens not pages, and I know how far through the book I am by the same very simple maths. Whether 200/400 or 150/300 (depending on font size, margins etc.) it's still halfway.

I find this hard to understand, too. I just need to know the relative position where I am and how long it'll take me to finish a chapter / finish the book. And it doesn't have to be 100 % perfect either, I'm not running a race.

[rantanplan]

Since there is kosync support, OPDS support would be nice. To make everything work fully wireless

[alva]

Originally Posted by DNSB

As long as you are happy with the results, that's all that really matters. Any of the page count algorithms have weak spots (since I ran into base64 images in the Adobe algorithm, I have also seen ebooks designed to break Amazon's APNX algorithm, calibre's page count (both the original and the improved) and most of the other algorithms I've run into.

Word count is still the most reliable indicator of books size but as long as you compare apples to apples, almost any algorithm is useful for most books.

OTOH, debating which algorithm is "best" belongs in a humour forum.

Biggest caveat for word count is different languages. I read in english and german and german words are having more characters on avarage.

But yeah each option has pros and cons.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Dal Bhat

Calibre gives me a "page" count. Whatever and however it is counting. It's a relative indicator. I can see that a Mrs. Murphy murder mystery is about 250 somethings, while The Fall of Hyperion is pushing 900. The former are fun, quick, light reads, not very long. The latter is an epic.

Whatever Calibre is telling me translates exactly to Kobo in the same relative ratio. With either book file, I know how much reading is there. Doesn't matter what's being counted.

If you have a book with graphic images for the chapter headers, then you'll get more pages added. Calibre adds so many pages for graphics. With the majority of images being chapter titles, I think the page count will be off.

[fogice]

Originally Posted by Glennza

Just installed Kobalt beta 6 nightly 1. Now it says animated page turns MAY not work on this device. It's not greyed out now and I turned it on...

And, sure enough, they don't

Same for me with a Libra 2. But NickelDissolve works properly in the built-in reader. I filed a bug on GitHub.

[Dal Bhat]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

If you have a book with graphic images for the chapter headers, then you'll get more pages added. Calibre adds so many pages for graphics. With the majority of images being chapter titles, I think the page count will be off.

Doesn't matter. I'm watching page turns per chapter, not page numbers.

[Desertway]

I'm not sure if I should ask this here, as this is the Kobo thread, but I'll give it a shot. I installed the Android version on my phone, just to see how it works. I've seen no bugs.

If I choose to use it on a proper Android eInk reader, it looks like there is no ability to create tags/categories/shelves. Not a problem on Kobo, since we use the Kobo UI. But that could be an issue with a large library on an Android eReader. KoReader allows for using Calibre tags in it's search options. Will there *eventually* be a way to use tags in Kobalt on Android? Or maybe most contemporary Android eReaders have a built in library view that already allows for the creation of shelves? My old cheap Android eReader (too old to install Kobalt) does not.

[MrSilverstrike]

Originally Posted by Desertway

I'm not sure if I should ask this here, as this is the Kobo thread, but I'll give it a shot. I installed the Android version on my phone, just to see how it works. I've seen no bugs.

If I choose to use it on a proper Android eInk reader, it looks like there is no ability to create tags/categories/shelves. Not a problem on Kobo, since we use the Kobo UI. But that could be an issue with a large library on an Android eReader. KoReader allows for using Calibre tags in it's search options. Will there *eventually* be a way to use tags in Kobalt on Android? Or maybe most contemporary Android eReaders have a built in library view that already allows for the creation of shelves? My old cheap Android eReader (too old to install Kobalt) does not.

Kobalt on Android has a library feature right now. Tagging and collections are planned. What version are you trying right now? Beta 5?

[MrSilverstrike]

Originally Posted by Dal Bhat

Doesn't matter. I'm watching page turns per chapter, not page numbers.

Well, that and there's also a percentage option too, which is very accurate because the entire book is laid out when it loads. Unlike Nickel which estimates anything beyond the current chapter in 4.x.

There's also the progress bar which is visual. I like to think I've covered all bases.

[DNSB]

I installed Kobalt beta 5 on my Sage (fw 4.38.23852). That seemed to go fine but when I opened a book and tried to set the default font, it wasn't fine. The first time I selected my Charis SIL 7 modified font, my Sage restarted. After the restart, I was able to select the font and set it as the default. I then started reading and after 7 pages, my Sage restarted again. I re-opened the book and so far, I've read ~100 pages and no restart.