Firmware 4.29.18730 available

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Didn't Kindle finally stop referring to the browser as beta? I seem to remember that, though it wasn't high on my radar.

Originally Posted by rcentros

As of release 5.13.6 it's still called "Experimental."

I nearly commented that the browser on the Kindle was also beta, but, knew there was something wrong with that statement. "Experimental" sounds worse to me.

[cpimentel]

Originally Posted by davidfor

The browser is not out of beta, and never will. It has been part of the Beta features since it was added to Kobo firmware. Which was at least 10 years ago. It is very much a secondary function on the device. And the support reflects that. Kobo does fix problems, but, not necessarily quickly.

The other thing is that this is a relatively primitive browser. But, I would have said it supported session cookies. Cookies are not saved between session, but, I have been able to sign into some sites and keep working. I just tried the Kobo book store and that worked. Overall, the site doesn't work very well in the browser, but, I was able to sign in and continue. It probably depends on the site and how it does this.

Thanks for the reply and interesting to know that in some sites the cookies work.

The 1st thing I tried in the browser was Reabble as I was doing in my Kindle, but no luck. Would be great to be able to read my news feed in my Elipsa.

Once more, thank you for the reply and information.

[Knightreader]

Originally Posted by PeterT

Be aware that you might encounter issues due to the increased storage needs on the device.

No problems during installation and not afterwards.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Knightreader

No problems during installation and not afterwards.

If you read my post above, the issues could come much later. It is related to how much free space in on the root partition and how much space is needed to open a large book. And I don't know the answer to any of the obvious questions.

[Knightreader]

Thanks for the clarification, but I think an official version will come by then.

[Skydog]

Originally Posted by Knightreader

Thanks for the clarification, but I think an official version will come by then.

From davidfor:

"... And when the update is released for the older devices, anyone who has used this package probably should do a full factory reset. I don't thing the install will remove the extra files."

[Crowriver]

Just a quick note to say that I updated my Aura (original edition) to this firmware yesterday. Just did it over wi-fi sync direct from the device, instead of sideloading or using the Kobo desktop app (the latter is my usual M.O.).

I don't use any patches, hacks or third party software on the Aura, I'm just a regular user...

Seems to be working fine, stable, no issues. I was able to sideload books from an older version of Calibre no problem. I'm not sure what benefits there are for my device from this update, but as ever I'm pleased that Kobo continue to support older readers right back to the Touch. It's one of many reasons why I like the platform and will stay with it.

[Semwize]

Originally Posted by Crowriver

I'm not sure what benefits there are for my device from this update

Absolutely none.
You downloaded extra files to your device, why? It is wiser to wait for an update from Kobo, it will be very soon.

Are you sure you updated it to 4.29.18730?

[Crowriver]

Originally Posted by Semwize

Are you sure you updated it to 4.29.18730?

Now that you mention it, no I'm not!

I synced the device via wi-fi, it downloaded an update yesterday, and installed it and restarted. However when I check settings it says the device is still on 4.28.18220, updated in August! That's exactly what it said before I synced...

I just checked for updates and it says my device is up to date. Mysterious!

Did the Aura download and apply an update, then revert back to the earlier firmware? Most odd.

[Crowriver]

Hm, maybe what happened is that I forgot to update the firmware on the Aura last time around? I manage a few Kobo readers for other family members so I may have updated theirs and thought I updated mine too.

Either that, or the sync over wi-fi did not recognise I'd already updated via the Kobo desktop app? Odd if so, but not outwith the bounds of possibility...

[frostschutz]

Originally Posted by davidfor

The size of the root partitions on the Elipsa, Sage and Libra have been increased to handle this. I assume they have simply doubled it from the previous 256MB, but, can't check until I get one.

On the rootfs of the Libra 2 there is also very little free space to work with. It's a 256MiB partition which is nearly full. Kobo always cuts it quite close, so not much room for adding anything big in future firmware upgrades.

The recoveryfs (factory reset image) is larger with 384MiB as it contains the full rootfs twice (a minimal image to boot factory reset environment, plus the full rootfs the kobo normally uses) and also contains the data the user partition will be originally populated with (welcome message manual empty database and what not).

So all in all it uses 24MiB (bootloader, kernel) + 256MiB (rootfs) + 384MiB (recoveryfs) and at the end of the card it wastes another ~16 MiB for nothing whatsoever, probably to take into account that SD cards are not always exactly the same size. That leaves 29152 MiB to the user.

There should be very little write activity in the rootfs from day to day use, wifi network credentials are stored there but not much else. So there is no problem with reading books, all that should be happening on the user data partition (and in RAM naturally)

[Carmelocotonto]

Hello. A question from my ignorance. I changed the sd card of my ClaraHD, to put a 32Gb one. I had to resize the user partition. Could we change the size of the rootfs in the future, if necessary?

Originally Posted by frostschutz

On the rootfs of the Libra 2 there is also very little free space to work with. It's a 256MiB partition which is nearly full. Kobo always cuts it quite close, so not much room for adding anything big in future firmware upgrades.

The recoveryfs (factory reset image) is larger with 384MiB as it contains the full rootfs twice (a minimal image to boot factory reset environment, plus the full rootfs the kobo normally uses) and also contains the data the user partition will be originally populated with (welcome message manual empty database and what not).

So all in all it uses 24MiB (bootloader, kernel) + 256MiB (rootfs) + 384MiB (recoveryfs) and at the end of the card it wastes another ~16 MiB for nothing whatsoever, probably to take into account that SD cards are not always exactly the same size. That leaves 29152 MiB to the user.

There should be very little write activity in the rootfs from day to day use, wifi network credentials are stored there but not much else. So there is no problem with reading books, all that should be happening on the user data partition (and in RAM naturally)

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by frostschutz

On the rootfs of the Libra 2 there is also very little free space to work with. It's a 256MiB partition which is nearly full. Kobo always cuts it quite close, so not much room for adding anything big in future firmware upgrades.

That's not what I was expecting from comments made to me elsewhere. They didn't say how the partitions had changed, but the warning for using the the Libra 2 update on the older devices implied it would have.

Has anyone looked at a Sage? Or Elipsa for that matter?

The recoveryfs (factory reset image) is larger with 384MiB as it contains the full rootfs twice (a minimal image to boot factory reset environment, plus the full rootfs the kobo normally uses) and also contains the data the user partition will be originally populated with (welcome message manual empty database and what not).

So all in all it uses 24MiB (bootloader, kernel) + 256MiB (rootfs) + 384MiB (recoveryfs) and at the end of the card it wastes another ~16 MiB for nothing whatsoever, probably to take into account that SD cards are not always exactly the same size. That leaves 29152 MiB to the user.

There should be very little write activity in the rootfs from day to day use, wifi network credentials are stored there but not much else. So there is no problem with reading books, all that should be happening on the user data partition (and in RAM naturally)

The warning was that there would not be space left to unpack some larger files. It came up because I tried it on my Aura H2O and had about 29MB free.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Carmelocotonto

Hello. A question from my ignorance. I changed the sd card of my ClaraHD, to put a 32Gb one. I had to resize the user partition. Could we change the size of the rootfs in the future, if necessary?

I would expect so. I think my main concern would be that it moved the recoveryfs. I don't know how that is addressed when doing a factory reset. I try not to play at that level of things.

[Deobulakenyo]

Originally Posted by frostschutz

On the rootfs of the Libra 2 there is also very little free space to work with. It's a 256MiB partition which is nearly full. Kobo always cuts it quite close, so not much room for adding anything big in future firmware upgrades.

The recoveryfs (factory reset image) is larger with 384MiB as it contains the full rootfs twice (a minimal image to boot factory reset environment, plus the full rootfs the kobo normally uses) and also contains the data the user partition will be originally populated with (welcome message manual empty database and what not).

So all in all it uses 24MiB (bootloader, kernel) + 256MiB (rootfs) + 384MiB (recoveryfs) and at the end of the card it wastes another ~16 MiB for nothing whatsoever, probably to take into account that SD cards are not always exactly the same size. That leaves 29152 MiB to the user.

There should be very little write activity in the rootfs from day to day use, wifi network credentials are stored there but not much else. So there is no problem with reading books, all that should be happening on the user data partition (and in RAM naturally)

an ignorant question also here, since the sage has about 153MB update file and the Libra has 115MB, does it mean the sage has a larger rootfs, or the same 256MB with smaller empty room?