New Kobo Aura HD eInk eReader 1440x1080

Originally Posted by JSWolf

All I can say is that the folks at GoodEReader just have no clue how to do a good video review.

No argument there.

I've looked up a several reviews on the internet and of those which show photos of text being displayed they all show that gawd awful super large line spacing. I'm inclined to think that is just the way it was designed. The text really doesn't look that dark either. Light text is more difficult to read. And WTF were they thinking with that stupid double-V shaped unit back?!? That will make for a very thick case/cover. The Kobo Touch I briefly owned had a bubble-wrap texture on the unit's back and that was annoying. This back looks even more annoying.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by jswinden

I've looked up a several reviews on the internet and of those which show photos of text being displayed they all show that gawd awful super large line spacing. I'm inclined to think that is just the way it was designed.

The options for customization shown in the video gave me the impression the line spacing was adjustable. Glo owners, feel free to confirm or contradict.

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

OK, now what sounded like a beautifully straight and simple answer from JSWolf has turned into an experts' discussion I am unable to follow.

Learning to follow an expert discussion by context is half the fun of reading it. The exercise can be a bit like reading Ulysses without a skeleton key, h-m-m-?

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

The options for customization shown in the video gave me the impression the line spacing was adjustable. Glo owners, feel free to confirm or contradict.

The line spacing is adjustable, from the look of the GoodEreader review they have it set close to maximum.

[taming]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

From Adobe...

So yes, the SDK does have the rendering engine.

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/readermobile.html

This SDK was from 2011, when Adobe had yet to do its take on ePub3. From what I can tell (and I am no expert) there are three parts to this. The SDK defines what is possible and supports the features it outlines. The device manufacturers choose what features they will implement from among what is possible. The folks who code the books have to do it in a way that is recognized and properly implemented by the SDK.

Now, device manufacturers can override what the publisher has chosen, but the direction (at least from what I can tell from Kobo) is to go as hands off as possible with the CSS the publisher has chosen when we are talking about their proprietary format (Kobo ePUB3 compliant ePUB or kepub) and to use the rendering agent Adobe recently released for Adobe ePUB3 DRM. I doubt that anyone is going back and recoding already released books. I imagine that the publishing houses are all over the place in terms of how they are coding.

I'd expect it to take some time for it to all shake out. By then there will probably be yet another change in standards. The material included in the Aura promos talks about "fixed layout ePUBs". I don't know what that might be, but it could be what we think of as a reflowable PDF.

Time will tell.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

The line spacing is adjustable, from the look of the GoodEreader review they have it set close to maximum.

Thanks, Geoff. Based on that last nudge, I stopped eye-caressing the Aura and ordered one just now.

This will be my first lit e-ink reader and certainly my first exposure to a high-resolution e-ink screen. The only thing I'm debating at this point is whether I ought simply to have gotten a black Aura instead of the Espresso (since the color would match the black text).

To Jon:

There was indeed sales tax on my order. I'll check with my bank whenever the transaction clears to see whether there were additional fees. Ground shipping was free, as advertised.

[Barty]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

All I can say is that the folks at GoodEReader just have no clue how to do a good video review.

No kidding. The review reminds me of "but this one goes to 11"

Did they not notice the horrible wide space on the kobo? And how light the font was?

Only excuse I can make for them is it looked much better to them live, but then did they not review the video before posting?

Regardless, the lighting does look very nice and even and does not tint blue.

[Jozawun]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

The options for customization shown in the video gave me the impression the line spacing was adjustable. Glo owners, feel free to confirm or contradict.



Learning to follow an expert discussion by context is half the fun of reading it. The exercise can be a bit like reading Ulysses without a skeleton key, h-m-m-?

The GoodEReader review (7:20ff) says line spacing and justification are not adjustable on side-loaded books.

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by Jozawun

The GoodEReader review (7:20ff) says line spacing and justification are not adjustable on side-loaded books.

We will see when we have it in our hands, but that would be consistent
with the Kobo device not overriding the css.

Luck;
Ken

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by Jozawun

The GoodEReader review (7:20ff) says line spacing and justification are not adjustable on side-loaded books.

Thanks, Jozawun; I'll look into that.

The interesting thing is that, as far as I've read on this thread, Glo owners haven't indicated there were restrictions to the layouts of side-loaded books as opposed to those which are sold by Kobo.

This thread seems to go into a bit more detail.

Again: Glo owners, please feel free to confirm or dispute that this layout limitation is in fact present on the Glo.

Re the video: At 7:20, the reviewers discuss the virtual keyboard, and I didn't hear anything about layout restrictions to side-loaded books. From about 9:00-12:05, the reviewers talk extensively about layout options and, again, I didn't hear any mention of layout limitations. If this is in fact the video you're talking about, could you confirm the 7:20 point (expressed in seconds) at which you hear that side-loaded options are limited?:

http://youtu.be/pPFfw2sNQ_c

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

We will see when we have it in our hands, but that would be consistent
with the Kobo device not overriding the css.

Ken: The idea of disallowing the user's overriding the CSS seems odd if said "override" is actually a user choosing a preference. Is there a good reason Kobo might choose to do this only in the case of side-loaded books?

[simond]

Some books don't let you change the settings, but the vast majority are fine with it on my glo

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by simond

Some books don't let you change the settings, but the vast majority are fine with it on my glo

Are the vast majority of books on your Glo also side-loaded?

If not, roughly how many of your side-loaded books can be fully customized in terms of the layout?

[paola]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Thanks, Jozawun; I'll look into that.

The interesting thing is that, as far as I've read on this thread, Glo owners haven't indicated there were restrictions to the layouts of side-loaded books as opposed to those which are sold by Kobo. That would be a first, wouldn't it?

Again: Glo owners feel free to confirm or dispute that this layout limitation is in fact present on the Glo.

don't have a glo, but even with epub, at least in all of the "old" models (Touch, Mini, Glo) it is possible to "koboify" epubs turning them into kepub.epub (there is also a plugin for that) which allows you to change e.g. line spacing - just checked on one of them. Plus have the pop up footnotes, etc

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Are the vast majority of books on your Glo also side-loaded?

If not, roughly how many of your side-loaded books can be fully customized in terms of the layout?

All my epubs are sideloaded on the Glo. All of them can be fully customised for font, line spacing, margins, etc ... However, some did need to have their internal css tweaked before transfer to achieve this. None of it is rocket science and you can get help on these forums if you need it. You do need to remove the DRM before being able to tweak the internal css.

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

The interesting thing is that, as far as I've read on this thread, not a single Glo owner so far has indicated there were restrictions to the layouts of side-loaded books as opposed to those which are sold by Kobo. That would be a first, wouldn't it?

All the adjustments to text layout (font style, size, weight, line spacing, left/right margins, justification) work for sideloaded epubs in general, but in some cases the way the .css stylesheet has been coded prevents the adjustments from working. These problem books can be fixed by manually tweaking the stylesheet before sideloading the book, or if you are converting books to epub from another format using Calibre then you can set the layout options in Calibre so that all the tweaking is done automatically. I think the only difference for Kobo kepub format books is that Kobo have already tweaked the ones that need it.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Geoff, Jackie and Paolo:

Thanks very much for the qualification.

Stripping the DRM is not an issue at all. Modifying the CSS isn't something I've had to do so far, but it probably won't be too time-consuming if the steps are always the same. And Geoff's solution sounds like the easiest possible way (though I might prefer tweaking the CSS myself to avoid extra things being done by Calibre).

This doesn't sound like an insurmountable problem for Those Who Like to Tweak.

Knowing that, I'm reasonably satisfied. I'll try to fade into the background now and give others on this thread more room to talk.