What do you say when asked what page you're on?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by mike_bike_kite

Perhaps the original question might not have much meaning but discussing how you enter a given location into your ereader is definitely worthwhile. At the moment there seems to be no standards what so ever which makes the interface a bit clunky. Perhaps you're happy entering location 2846 on your Kindle 1 to get to a particular part of a book, perhaps you never use this interface, but this shouldn't stop folks from discussing how to improve it for others.

It will also become more important as users can communicate between their ereaders about a given book - this is a new feature in the current firmware.

Ever try and figure out where you are in relation to the TOC? 52/559 does not convey that at all
Is 59 (of 559) in chapter 1, chapter 2? I can GOTO 59, but where is 59???
Yep! Some improvements might be needed.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Since most of my e-Books are PDF scans, I have actual page numbers. Sadly, they don't correspond with what a reader would say.

[mike_bike_kite]

Originally Posted by Lady Fitzgerald

Since most of my e-Books are PDF scans, I have actual page numbers. Sadly, they don't correspond with what a reader would say.

Don't worry - if you try reading those PDFs on a normal sized ereader then you won't be able to read the text anyway

[calvin-c]

What I get annoyed with is how the 'page' numbers don't stay the same. (Palm version of MobiPocket). I think it has to do with overlap when I page backwards, but after I page back a couple dozen 'pages', then page back forward again, I find that the 'page' number of where I stopped reading is different. The amount of difference seems to vary depending on how far I went back & how I did it, i.e. 'paged' back or used the scroll bar, or GoTo.

Frankly, I don't care what the page number is, nor whether it's the same on different devices, or with different fonts, but I do think that a given place in a book should stay on the same page, no matter how you get to that place.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by mike_bike_kite

Don't worry - if you try reading those PDFs on a normal sized ereader then you won't be able to read the text anyway

Wanna bet?

[SkyDream]

I'm always on page 1

Honestly, there are page numbers on scanned pdf's or ePub or whatever i'm currently reading on my Sony. That's the number.

[mike_bike_kite]

Originally Posted by Lady Fitzgerald

Wanna bet?

Perhaps it depends on the PDF concerned and how well you prepare it. I found the text is too small and too grey in portrait mode and I just couldn't adjust personally to reading in landscape mode. I suppose more accurately I could read the text but I didn't want to. Obviously I can read PDFs perfectly on the larger screen of my PC but that wasn't what I was saying.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Wordcrasher

I think the best answer is the percentage I've read. That's an objective measure not related to the format.

It is related to the total length of the book so just because you have read 70% does not mean you can estimate how long it will take to finish the book. You have to know the otal length also.

[banjobama]

Originally Posted by tompe

It is related to the total length of the book so just because you have read 70% does not mean you can estimate how long it will take to finish the book. You have to know the otal length also.

Huh? If you know the percent you have finished, then you HAVE to know how much makes 100%. If you know you've read half, then you know the total length.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by banjobama

Huh? If you know the percent you have finished, then you HAVE to know how much makes 100%. If you know you've read half, then you know the total length.

How? I personally do not write down how many hours I have read the book. So how would I know how much I have left to read in time if I do not know how long the book is?

[mike_bike_kite]

Originally Posted by tompe

How? I personally do not write down how many hours I have read the book. So how would I know how much I have left to read in time if I do not know how long the book is?

If you've spent a day reading 1/2 the book then it's a fair bet that it will take another day to finish it. Obviously the amount of time you can devote to reading will vary so this time won't be accurate but does it really matter? Do you really want to know how long it takes (or will take) to read a book?

Perhaps a small application could be written that could take the word count, your average reading speed and your age and then tell you whether it's a good idea to start War and Peace.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by mike_bike_kite

If you've spent a day reading 1/2 the book then it's a fair bet that it will take another day to finish it. Obviously the amount of time you can devote to reading will vary so this time won't be accurate but does it really matter? Do you really want to know how long it takes (or will take) to read a book?

I often need to know how long time it will take to finish a book. With a paper book that is easy to estimate.

But my point was really that percentage does not give you the same amount of information that you have in a paper book were you not the total amount of pages and what page you are on. And I would be very unhappy if ebook reader designer thought that percentage was enough or equivalent to what you have in a paper book.

[mike_bike_kite]

Originally Posted by tompe

I often need to know how long time it will take to finish a book.

Can I ask why? How does your paper book tell you how long it will take to finish? These days I know I'll never finish a book if it has more than 350 pages so I just don't start them.

Originally Posted by tompe

With a paper book that is easy to estimate.

I guess with a paper book it's easy to see if you're half way through etc but my Kindle also tells me when I'm 50% through (or 25%, 75% ...). I don't see any difference. What other method would you propose?

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by mike_bike_kite

Perhaps it depends on the PDF concerned and how well you prepare it. I found the text is too small and too grey in portrait mode and I just couldn't adjust personally to reading in landscape mode. I suppose more accurately I could read the text but I didn't want to. Obviously I can read PDFs perfectly on the larger screen of my PC but that wasn't what I was saying.

Because of the sheer number of books I'm having to scan, I do not have time to "prepare" my PDFs; each one is just a concatenated collection of images of each page. Readability of these books depends on the reader and how much compromise I'm willing to accept. I have two readers right now: an Aztak 6" Mentor and a 5" JetBook Lite. The Mentor is built better than the JBL but will not zoom on images so is almost usesless for books with larger physical dimensions (they can be read but the text is very tiny. The JBL, even with only a 5" screen, has a setting called Fit Width that provides a persistant zoom that centers on the text of a page, even if the text is not centered on the original. Even books scanned from larger sized books becomes more readable, especially when in landscape mode. While more scrolling is required in landscape and lines are carried over, I find that to be an acceptable compromise until something else comes along that will work better, have acceptable battery life and will fit in a reasonably sized purse. See here, post #26, for more details.

[mike_bike_kite]

Jeanie

I guess you're just more willing to compromise than I am. Zooming is ok depending on how it's implemented but I find it useless on the Kindle without reflow and most text in PDFs reflow quite poorly.

Mike

PS You should update your personal settings to show what ereader(s) you have. I had to assume when you first replied that you read the PDFs on a PC screen