Aura ONE Kobo Aura One owners thread

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by emilov

- still gotta sort out hyphenation

Use the Kobo Touch Extended driver. You can enable hyphenation there. (I think it adds some CSS to make the rendering engine hyphenate words, but it doesn't work for all languages. It depends on the language set in the book, and the available hyphenation dictionaries on the device.)

Now I have it as I want it, in all of its full-7.8"-screeny glory. I'll do some actual reading this evening (maybe pick a new font).

I've noticed that I can now finally read faster again. In the past, I've not read line by line, but in a zig-zag pattern, scanning the page with several lines at once without explicitly reading each word.

I need a few lines to get started on a new page, however, and the Kindle is too short and doesn't have enough line length. When I'm up to speed, the page already ends. Therefore, on the Kindle, I've been reading line by line, and word by word, which has slowed me down considerably. (The better portability, ease of acquiring books, some for very low prices or even free, no huge book cases anymore, backups so I can never loose my books, front-light, etc... have kept me reading on the Kindle instead of returning to paper books.)

With the KA1, I can get up to speed, and fall into a rhythm; when I reach the bottom of the page, I can touch the screen, and it'll turn just in time to keep reading at the same pace.

I started reading in earnest the day before yesterday, and I read 27% of a 311 page book, which means I read 81 pages (using my own custom page count, so it's not really comparable to anything outside of my library), and I spent a lot less time on it than I had expected. On the Kindle, it would have taken me nearly three hours, on the KA1, it took me less than two.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

As for built-in font faces I only see 10 unless there's a new one added specially for the Aura One (mine hasn't arrived yet but that's another story).
Amasis
Avenir Next
Caecilia
Georgia
Gill Sans
Kobo Nickel
Malabar
Kobo Tsukushi Mincho
Kobo UD Kakugo
OpenDyslexic

There also used to be a second dyslexic font, called Dyslexia, at one time but that was removed a few firmwares ago. So maybe the '11 fonts' is just out of date.

I wonder if someone opened the font list on the device and just counted. There are 11 entries.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by davidfor

I wonder if someone opened the font list on the device and just counted. There are 11 entries.

I haven't; the device is at home, and I'm at work I'll take a look when I get home.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by davidfor

I wonder if someone opened the font list on the device and just counted. There are 11 entries.

Yes, I did Which one did I miss?

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Yes, I did Which one did I miss?

The first entry on the list. Not a font, but if someone simply counted the entries...

And thinking about it, I'm sure there have been few questions here about the font called "Publisher Default".

[Poppaea]

Thank you! I put a space behind the bracket and now, when I turn on wifi, it is not trying to sync. I like that.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by davidfor

The first entry on the list. Not a font, but if someone simply counted the entries...

And thinking about it, I'm sure there have been few questions here about the font called "Publisher Default".

Oh, I see. I thought you were accusing me of not being able to see what was right under my nose (You won't be aware of this but I get accused of this quite a lot at home. It's outrageous.)

[bsabiston]

Originally Posted by emilov

- enabled full screen, prevented autosync and google analytics
- yes, full screen == no progress bar but a middle tap shows that info, that's enough for me
- patched its brains out (@GeoffR, you are the frikking MAN!), very easy. Went conservatively and enabled just a few patches so far (the kepub fixes for full screen were important to me). Now all I see on the screen is text, top to bottom, left to right with almost zero margins in any direction - perfect!
- added a few fonts (I'm used to Amazon's Bookerly)

@emilov or others -- is there a detailed guide somewhere for how to do this, with the patches and the fullscreen? Or did you have to crawl through 35 pages of this thread and piece together the information? It would be nice if this information was collected somewhere.

[emilov]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Use the Kobo Touch Extended driver. You can enable hyphenation there. (I think it adds some CSS to make the rendering engine hyphenate words, but it doesn't work for all languages. It depends on the language set in the book, and the available hyphenation dictionaries on the device.)

Thanks for the tip, it worked beautifully - now I get hyphenation in sideloaded epubs, something that never really worked on the kindle!

As for reading speed, I agree that a larger page makes for a more relaxed reading experience, less page turns, etc. But there are those studies which discuss the length of a line of text. I believe the results were that longer lines make reading more tedious because the brain "stack" has to keep more info (I don't recall where I read that). This is one of the reasons why newspapers have narrow long columns of text instead of just plastering full length lines along the whole pages.

The above is the reason why I think the KA1 would be perfect for a two column display in portrait mode (enter koreader). I'm yet to try it and I'm not sure how well it will work with the KA1, especially regarding the comfort light. My hunch is that the latter won't work with koreader at all. I'll report once I've tried it.

[Sweetpea]

I've been reading several remarks, some I might agree with and some I don't. But there's two I don't understand:

1. paging speed. I only uses epubs (don't see why I should put everything in kepub), and I just don't see slow paging...
2. huge top margins. I don't have that full screen thingie, but I don't have a header at all, only a footer with my percentage read (which I want to keep). And my top and side margins are equally small...


About those 11 fonts: I've tried them all, didn't like any of them so I installed my own

[emilov]

Originally Posted by bsabiston

@emilov or others -- is there a detailed guide somewhere for how to do this, with the patches and the fullscreen? Or did you have to crawl through 35 pages of this thread and piece together the information? It would be nice if this information was collected somewhere.

It is but not all in one place. Regarding patching, check out this thread.

For fonts: this one.

Full screen and other tips: here.

[emilov]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

1. paging speed. I only uses epubs (don't see why I should put everything in kepub), and I just don't see slow paging...

Try kepub and you will be surprised. Also, it is not necessary at all to convert anything into kepub. Keep your epubs/mobis (as I do) and the kobo touch extended driver will convert them on the fly as you send the books to the device (from calibre, that is). Check it out.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by emilov

Try kepub and you will be surprised. Also, it is not necessary at all to convert anything into kepub. Keep your epubs/mobis (as I do) and the kobo touch extended driver will convert them on the fly as you send the books to the device (from calibre, that is). Check it out.

Why would I? What does kepub give me what epub doesn't?

Edit:

Beside these features as I don't want any of those...
•Page numbers show the number of page turns remaining in the current chapter instead of the estimated number of pages for the entire book.◦If you don't want this, there is an option in the driver settings to force full-book page numbers.
•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.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by emilov

Thanks for the tip, it worked beautifully - now I get hyphenation in sideloaded epubs, something that never really worked on the kindle!

Hyphenate This! (calibre plugin) can soft-hyphenate AZW3 (and EPUB) files using a hyphenation dictionary. It works, but physically hyphenating the books is slow, as the plugin is not multi-threaded (only one book at a time); at least the last time I used it.

As for reading speed, I agree that a larger page makes for a more relaxed reading experience, less page turns, etc. But there are those studies which discuss the length of a line of text. I believe the results were that longer lines make reading more tedious because the brain "stack" has to keep more info (I don't recall where I read that). This is one of the reasons why newspapers have narrow long columns of text instead of just plastering full length lines along the whole pages.

Indeed, and I have a feeling that the KA1 is, for the font-size I'm using, about the correct size. IIRC, the 'perfect' line length would be 65-70 characters; this is the reason why the typesetting software LaTeX uses 67 characters for one line. I'll be a major geek and count the number of characters per line when I get home

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I've been reading several remarks, some I might agree with and some I don't. But there's two I don't understand:

1. paging speed. I only uses epubs (don't see why I should put everything in kepub), and I just don't see slow paging...

Maybe KEPUB is faster, and you just don't know (or don't care) what you are missing in this regard.

2. huge top margins. I don't have that full screen thingie, but I don't have a header at all, only a footer with my percentage read (which I want to keep). And my top and side margins are equally small...

EPUB files only have a footer with the read percentage. KEPUB files have a header *and* footer with the title and read percentage. Especially the title, which obviously isn't going to change, wastes space in the opinion of many.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Maybe KEPUB is faster, and you just don't know (or don't care) what you are missing in this regard.

Not missing at all, I already thought the paging speed was fast

EPUB files only have a footer with the read percentage. KEPUB files have a header *and* footer with the title and read percentage. Especially the title, which obviously isn't going to change, wastes space in the opinion of many.

I updated my post and the "advantages" of kepub are huge disadvantages to me...