Kobo Bug thread

[Muttly]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

This is true but in addition, for kepubs, you also need to make sure the Panose Weight settings have values the Kobo software will accept. Otherwise, as you already noted for Bookerly normal Italic renders as BoldItalic. This has also proved to be true for some of the Windows fonts I've transferred to various Kobos. So far, fixing the panose has always solved the kepub problem for me.

I don't think the panose info matters if you're only reading standard epubs. There is a post about it somewhere on the Kobo forum. It was probably at least a year ago.

This might be relevant if in some cases but not in mine because the fonts did work for a two books, then would not work for any.

Had the fonts never worked, I would have been trying a completely different approach. I would even have given credence to the file name hypothesis - even though relying on a file name when there is a header with the relevant information present is very poor programming practice.

[Muttly]

Originally Posted by davidfor

What I have been trying to work out is what actually is happening. That is, what is happening beyond the obvious statement that the font is not being used properly. And why it is happening. And can you get it working again. And, most importantly of all, get detailed information so that when you report the problem to Kobo, you will be able to make it clear what is happening and hopefully make it easier for them to fix. That is important as since you are the only person who has so far reported the problem, it will probably be hard for them to reproduce.

As I have already stated, I mentioned this problem just in case it was a known bug with a work around.

Anyone with any in depth experience of software development would look at the description of the problem paying particular attention to the worked then didn't work aspect and, noting that it was a one off, would have surmised that it was a random corruption somewhere along the line.

Which is why I said I was going to wait for the new firmware and start from scratch. Which would have worked perfectly.

Had I reported it to Kobo I would not for one minute expect them to try and solve the problem. I would expect them to suggest exactly what I was intending to do. It would be the only sensible response.

All this is why I asked the questions about the font files. I wanted to know if they were put onto the device in the manner the firmware expects. I wanted to know if they were still there. And all you can do is state that they worked before, they work under Windows, that you know more about fonts the rest of us (I'm perfectly willing to concede that), that you know more about software development than the rest of us, and in particular me (I've expressed my opinion on that) and that because things work in a particular way elsewhere, they must work the same on the Kobo devices. What you have not done is to is try and work out what is actually going on.

The fact that they worked before is extremely important and your failure to grasp that is what made me think you had little understanding of fault diagnosis.

As explained above, given that and the fact that this is NOT a known problem, I assumed corruption and that some level of system refresh would solve the problem - which it did. As it happened it did not even need the factory reset.

I certainly wasn't going to waste time attempting to diagnose something which I had come to believe was caused by some corruption.

Now, while I have been slowly typing this, I see that you have finally tried replacing the font files, and, no surprise to me, things are working properly.

Yes. Note: replaced the font files. Not renamed the font files. Not fiddled around with settings.

IF you were trying to be helpful, and IF it is no surprise to you, why did you not suggest simply replacing the files?

The only reason I didn't do it earlier was because I wasn't that bothered. And the fact that I had to spend so much time trying to get it through some apparently very dense skulls that the fact that the fonts initially worked meant that file names and parameter setting were virtually certainly not the problem in this case.

Of course, you have decided that it's something in the software and not a fault in the font files. I

It was virtually certain it was something in the software, because files do not generally corrupt themselves. At least, not unless there is some hardware failure, which didn't seem to be the case here.

But, I'll repeat my earlier plea: Please do not use calibre with your Kobo device.

Too late, sunshine.

That's how I've loaded about 20 books onto the Kobo with 100% success.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Muttly

This might be relevant if in some cases but not in mine ...

I don't know why you're replying to my comment, it was addressed to frostschutz, who might, or might not, find it helpful at some point.

When it comes to Kobo font handling I'm inclined to believe the results of my own (and others'), reliably repeatable testing than anything you've contributed so far. If all your fonts are 100% reliable out-of-the-box for both kepub and epub I can only assume you got them out of the "some kind person already fixed them for me" box.

Finally, if you haven't already, you should take steps to ignore all my future MR posts, they won't be aimed at you.

[Muttly]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

I don't know why you're replying to my comment, it was addressed to frostschutz, who might, or might not, find it helpful at some point.

Personal communications should really be sent by PM.

When it comes to Kobo font handling I'm inclined to believe the results of my own (and others'), reliably repeatable testing than anything you've contributed so far. If all your fonts are 100% reliable out-of-the-box for both kepub and epub I can only assume you got them out of the "some kind person already fixed them for me" box.

Quite honestly, who cares?

I put working fonts on the Kobo, they worked, it fouled up in some way, they didn't work, I reloaded them and they worked again. Why you are getting your panties in a bunch as to how I got working fonts I have no idea.

My advice to you would be to take a chill pill and relax. Font files really aren't worth getting in such a tizz about.

Finally, if you haven't already, you should take steps to ignore all my future MR posts, they won't be aimed at you.

That's nice to know. I wonder if it is true, though.

[Rev. Bob]

Originally Posted by Corpsegoddess

Also, can somebody PLEASE suggest to Kobo that when you mark a book as finished using the menu, it updates in your reading count--at least for the first time?

Speaking only for myself, I would strongly dislike such a feature. Sometimes I find it useful to put books I've already finished onto my device, and it is logical that I would mark them as "finished" immediately thereafter. I don't want my read count going up in that circumstance - and if I do, the "open and skip to the end" method gives me a way to do so. I can therefore choose whether a book gets "read" or not in both contexts. Changing the software so that "mark finished bumps read count" would lock me out of those options and artificially inflate my read count whether I like it or not.

My general working principle is that, whenever conflicting use cases exist, there should be a relatively easy way to handle all of them. In this situation, we already have that.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Muttly

As I have already stated, I mentioned this problem just in case it was a known bug with a work around.

And as I stated it wasn't a known bug, I was trying to get some details to find out if it was a new bug that needed to be worried about.

Anyone with any in depth experience of software development would look at the description of the problem paying particular attention to the worked then didn't work aspect and, noting that it was a one off, would have surmised that it was a random corruption somewhere along the line.

Yes, you stated vaguely what happened (a reasonable first report) and after a while gave explicit steps. That was very helpful in know what was happening. And of course, I knew it was a once off. After all, I am the person who stated that. But I wanted to know if it was really a once off and if it could be fixed.

Which is why I said I was going to wait for the new firmware and start from scratch. Which would have worked perfectly.

When? In the last post before you actually did something?

Had I reported it to Kobo I would not for one minute expect them to try and solve the problem. I would expect them to suggest exactly what I was intending to do. It would be the only sensible response.



The fact that they worked before is extremely important and your failure to grasp that is what made me think you had little understanding of fault diagnosis.

I had complete understanding of the small amount of fault diagnosis you had done. I was really hoping you would spend a few minutes doing some more.

As explained above, given that and the fact that this is NOT a known problem, I assumed corruption and that some level of system refresh would solve the problem - which it did. As it happened it did not even need the factory reset.

I certainly wasn't going to waste time attempting to diagnose something which I had come to believe was caused by some corruption.



Yes. Note: replaced the font files. Not renamed the font files. Not fiddled around with settings.

IF you were trying to be helpful, and IF it is no surprise to you, why did you not suggest simply replacing the files?

You mean the several times I asked that you check on the font files? And of course in post #775 where I explicitly suggested replacing them? Maybe I should have been more explicit earlier, but as you were so adamant that the idea of a corrupted file was ridiculous, I didn't.

The only reason I didn't do it earlier was because I wasn't that bothered. And the fact that I had to spend so much time trying to get it through some apparently very dense skulls that the fact that the fonts initially worked meant that file names and parameter setting were virtually certainly not the problem in this case.

But, as they stopped working, something had to have changed. And I was trying to work out WHAT had changed. Something you obviously didn't understand.

It was virtually certain it was something in the software, because files do not generally corrupt themselves. At least, not unless there is some hardware failure, which didn't seem to be the case here.

You are right files do not corrupt themselves, something had to do it. I made some attempts early on to explain some possibilities so that you could decide if they were likely to have happened. YOU dismissed these out of hand.

Too late, sunshine.

That's how I've loaded about 20 books onto the Kobo with 100% success.

Goody. But, have you worked out why I made that plea?

Look matey, throughout this "conversation" I have been polite and trying to help. I have been impolite on one, maybe two previous occasions. But, you have been rude, argumentative and unwilling to consider any suggestions. You have cast aspersions on everyone who came into the discussion. Including accusing people of exactly what you are demonstrating.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

This is true but in addition, for kepubs, you also need to make sure the Panose Weight settings have values the Kobo software will accept. Otherwise, as you already noted for Bookerly normal Italic renders as BoldItalic. This has also proved to be true for some of the Windows fonts I've transferred to various Kobos. So far, fixing the panose has always solved the kepub problem for me.

I don't think the panose info matters if you're only reading standard epubs. There is a post about it somewhere on the Kobo forum. It was probably at least a year ago.

What panose values are bad and what are good? I've not dived into this and would like to know so I can double check my side loaded fonts. Thanks.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

What panose values are bad and what are good? I've not dived into this and would like to know so I can double check my side loaded fonts. Thanks.

There may be multiple "good value" combos but the ones I've used which have always worked so far are:

• Regular & Italic: set panose Weight to "Book"
• Bold & BoldItalic: set panose Weight to "Bold"

I have a vague memory that someone had success setting all 4 to "Any" but I didn't test that option myself.

Of the fonts that didn't initially work as-is in kepubs, I seem to remember them having Weight values such as "Medium" and "Demi".

I think it must be only the Access kepub renderer which reads the panose info because I never noticed any "wrongly-displayed-as-Bold" problems when I read only standard epubs with the Adobe renderer.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

There may be multiple "good value" combos but the ones I've used which have always worked so far are:

• Regular & Italic: set panose Weight to "Book"
• Bold & BoldItalic: set panose Weight to "Bold"

I have a vague memory that someone had success setting all 4 to "Any" but I didn't test that option myself.

Of the fonts that didn't initially work as-is in kepubs, I seem to remember them having Weight values such as "Medium" and "Demi".

I think it must be only the Access kepub renderer which reads the panose info because I never noticed any "wrongly-displayed-as-Bold" problems when I read only standard epubs with the Adobe renderer.

I had a look at Bookerly and in the Panose settings, the weight for bold italic is set to demi. That could be why with kepub bold italic is not working properly.

[luX0r.reload]

Hi,
in my Kobo Glo firmare was updated to 3.19.5761 and all works fine with book reading. Yesterday I open settings page and I discover this page cannot close! The "X" button doesn't work anymore.
E-Ink display problem? No, cause the menu button sit in the same place works fine.
What's appened? Anyone with my same problem?

Thanks in advance

[Trenien]

For a few weeks now, I've had the worst trouble opening books, be they on the sdcard or in the internal memory. In most cases, the books open on a blank page with the page count at 1/1 (with books that are well above 100 pages). To have any hope of opening them, I most often than not must rebbot the Glo, and I have to keep fidling with them, sometimes being successful when using the table of content or bookmarks to directly access a chapter.

This happens for pretty much for all books (although it gets worse with big files that have some images inside).

Any idea of what I could do to repair that? Could it simply be because of the number of books loaded (around 400)? Also, a few weeks ago, my glo synchronized and updated itself without me paying attention to it. I'm not certain, but it seems the problem started around that time.

[davidfor]

@Trenien: The most likely cause for that is a corrupt database on the device. You can check the database to confirm this. If you are a calibre use, my Kobo Utilities plugin has an option to do this. Otherwise, you need an SQLite database management application.

The fix, if you don't have a good database backup, is to sign-out of your Kobo account. When you sign back in, it will create a new database and process all the books on the device back into the database. Unfortunately, you will lose the reading status and bookmarks for any sideloaded books.

[Trenien]

Well, after checking it up, that's not it. The database checks as ok.

I guess I'll keep looking.

[davidfor]

OK, the only other times I've seen something like that is with books with errors. You can get some fun things happening if the ToC does not match the internal structure of the book. If there are errors in the code of a page, then you can get empty pages like you describe. Checking the books with ePubCheck or the checks built into either the calibre editor or Sigil should show this.

[Rev. Bob]

Originally Posted by davidfor

OK, the only other times I've seen something like that is with books with errors. You can get some fun things happening if the ToC does not match the internal structure of the book. If there are errors in the code of a page, then you can get empty pages like you describe. Checking the books with ePubCheck or the checks built into either the calibre editor or Sigil should show this.

Chiming in to endorse this answer. There are positively loads of books on the market where the navigation TOC (the .ncx file) is messed up, or the code is so bad that chapters refuse to render in the Adobe engine.