How does Kobo calculate reading statistics?

[Mrs_Often]

It differs per book. If it is a big book wil complicated chapter structure it does take a "while". I admit if no book is open and the device wakes up to the home screen it is indeed pretty instantaneous, maybe one or 1.5-2 seconds... but I have been annoyed with waiting for the book page to load in the past My Glo is probably also a bit slower than the Aura.

Yes that weighted average sort of system does sound like it makes sense... I'm still curious to know how the Kobo calculation actually really works though. Just so I know how to use it best to get the cleanest possibly statistics. I'm a relatively slow reader and am trying to increase my speed, so I'm picky about how correct the statistics are

[Ksquared]

Originally Posted by Mrs_Often

It differs per book. If it is a big book wil complicated chapter structure it does take a "while". I admit if no book is open and the device wakes up to the home screen it is indeed pretty instantaneous, maybe one or 1.5-2 seconds...

I have not noticed a difference based on the size or complexity of a book, but as you said, I have a different device. I am currently reading Go Set a Watchman , only about 230 pages, and it opens in less than 2 seconds from sleep, about the same as opening to the home screen if I do not have a book open. I had a Kobo WiFi, and from sleep that seemed pretty fast too. My son has the WiFi with him at college now, so I can't test the sleep start up. When I changed to the Aura I realized how slow it was to open a book or to start from a full power off. Painfully slow once your expectations have been raised...

I would bet that one of these smart programmer folks could figure out a way to report words-per-minute based on the pages read in a reading session.

Learning to read faster is a great goal, but it could also increase your lifetime expenditure on books - the faster you read, the sooner have to spend money on a new book! Thanks goodness for library e-books...

[Mrs_Often]

Originally Posted by Ksquared

I would bet that one of these smart programmer folks could figure out a way to report words-per-minute based on the pages read in a reading session.

Oh no doubt they could. I just hope they're interested enough to spend time on it... I do realise it's not in high demand or anywhere near essential

Originally Posted by Ksquared

Learning to read faster is a great goal, but it could also increase your lifetime expenditure on books - the faster you read, the sooner have to spend money on a new book! Thanks goodness for library e-books...

Haha very true! Though at this point my reading is so slow that I get bored and start thinking of different things at the same time as reading because the story isn't streaming to my head fast enough So I wouldn't mind having to spend a little more money on new books if I could read them more efficiently without having the time for other thoughts to pop up...

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Mrs_Often

Oh no doubt they could. I just hope they're interested enough to spend time on it... I do realise it's not in high demand or anywhere near essential



Haha very true! Though at this point my reading is so slow that I get bored and start thinking of different things at the same time as reading because the story isn't streaming to my head fast enough So I wouldn't mind having to spend a little more money on new books if I could read them more efficiently without having the time for other thoughts to pop up...

I have a couple of suggestions for you.
One, the only way to read faster is to read more.
Second, if you are getting bored, that has nothing to do with the reading speed and everything to do with the book.
If you find your mind wandering in a book, close said book and find a different book. The story is not engaging you.
(My nemesis book is Atlas Shrugged.)
Do not think just because you started a book means you have to finish it.
Some books are just impossible.
It has been a few years ago, but at one point I was literally finishing less than 50% of the books I started.

[Mrs_Often]

Thanks for the tips Cinisajoy! Oh nooo but my poor OCD-side will hate me forever if I don't finish every book I start!

But yes I agree it's the book's fault when I get bored... but some books just take a while to get into and then they're suddenly fantastic. So I do want to give books a proper chance (say, 50-100 pages depending on the total book size) before deciding whether the boredom is the book or me. It's just a struggle to get through 100 pages when the reading is so slow... It is probably a concentration issue as well but I also haven't trained my brain to recognise meanings of words without the annoying subvocalisation. So indeed, I just have to read more, and more interesting books... I won't try Atlas Shrugged then!

[filmo]

I don't get bored reading books but some books I will stop reading. Can not listen long to audio books as easily distracted while wife likes to listen to audio books while driving and in stead of radio. Old radio dramas with sound effects and music I can listen to.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Mrs_Often

Thanks for the tips Cinisajoy! Oh nooo but my poor OCD-side will hate me forever if I don't finish every book I start!

But yes I agree it's the book's fault when I get bored... but some books just take a while to get into and then they're suddenly fantastic. So I do want to give books a proper chance (say, 50-100 pages depending on the total book size) before deciding whether the boredom is the book or me. It's just a struggle to get through 100 pages when the reading is so slow... It is probably a concentration issue as well but I also haven't trained my brain to recognise meanings of words without the annoying subvocalisation. So indeed, I just have to read more, and more interesting books... I won't try Atlas Shrugged then!

Well now if you love dialogue, it would be great.
My problem with some books is too many errors. I read one that the story got lost because half my brain was going how many paragraphs to the next error.

The worst one I ever started reading was one I offered to look at for the author. It took me over 30 minutes to get through the first page. There were an average of 3 errors per sentence. I quit on page 2.
Needless to say I recommended talking to an English as a second language instructor.

So not all books need finished.
Though my husband did request I not throw books across the house. This was after too many info dumps.

[Mrs_Often]

I used to really like dialogue, but only because it's "fast" to read because the sentences don't fill the page haha. I don't not enjoy them now, I just find they slow the reading down because of all the phrasing. And then of course you have interesting/gripping dialogue and boring "get on with it" dialogue so it all depends

Oh my yes I hate errors too! Annoy me to bits. 30 minutes for one page! Agh! Haha what a waste of time. Some authors I just don't understand how they get published without proper editing.

Ooh I do like listening to audio books... but only when driving longer distances. If I have my eyes/hands available I prefer actually reading because what should I be doing if I just sit there listening... maybe messing around in Calibre but then I'll just ignore the narrater

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

So not all books need finished.
Though my husband did request I not throw books across the house. This was after too many info dumps.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Mrs_Often

I used to really like dialogue, but only because it's "fast" to read because the sentences don't fill the page haha. I don't not enjoy them now, I just find they slow the reading down because of all the phrasing. And then of course you have interesting/gripping dialogue and boring "get on with it" dialogue so it all depends

Oh my yes I hate errors too! Annoy me to bits. 30 minutes for one page! Agh! Haha what a waste of time. Some authors I just don't understand how they get published without proper editing.

Ooh I do like listening to audio books... but only when driving longer distances. If I have my eyes/hands available I prefer actually reading because what should I be doing if I just sit there listening... maybe messing around in Calibre but then I'll just ignore the narrater

On the published without an editor, it is easy. Just go to Amazon, Apple, Kobo, B&N, maybe Google Play and essentially hit the publish button.
No editor or proofreader required.
That is how.

I can't do audiobooks.
Anyway good luck with your reading a bit faster.

[oren64]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

From looking at some of the functions in the firmware the KePub stats are based on a word count of each chapter in the book. A 'reading velocity' is calculated as words per minute, and so I guess the estimates for how long the chapter/book will take to finish are based on that.

There is also a facility to ignore frontmatter and backmatter when calculating the reading stats. I think not enabled by default, but can be activated by adding a feature setting in the device's configuration file. However from what I see the accuracy of this feature would depend on the publisher marking the front/backmatter sections of the book in a recognisable way, it looks for titles like Acknowledgements, About This Book, Copyright, etc.

For ePubs the stats calculation might be different, I have a feeling that no word count is computed for ePubs, which would explain why the time to finish stats are not available. They would have to be based on the page count instead, which would be less accurate.

Edit: I would be good if Kobo made the book's word count available in the library, it would be much more useful to be able to sort books by word count than by file size. Also displaying the words per minute statistic would be more interesting than pages per minute.

Why the reading statistics don't work on PDF, even not the total reading time?