Marvin 3.0 feature requests

[Spfamy1]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Kris does quick updates when it's something critical or something super easy that is desired by lots of people. Otherwise its on a normal release cycle...meaning as soon as he finishes whatever he's working on. He will usually put up some kind of notice on his appstafarian blog here when something new is about to come out.

Looks like our prayers were answered with this new update!

[pwalker8]

I'm starting to despair over the sync with Calibre working. No indication at the moment that it's considered a priority and the guy who was maintaining the Marvin plugin is saying to he's moving to other things.

Right now, I'm thinking about using Calibre Companion for iOS when it goes live and just keep the books that I'm actively reading in Marvin. I still prefer Marvin over the competitors for actually reading the book.

[JKenP]

You seem easily driven to despair. Marvin is locked in a proprietary O/S with just API access that Apple jealously guards. The example of that is the old sneak-around plugin that was disabled by an o/s upgrade. Apple has advantages such as security but that weakens other opportunities for programming. Coming up with back-doors get harder and harder.

I am reminded of the Microsoft story of the reporter who got on the staff bus by mistake where they chanted, "The jobs not done while Word Perfect runs." While Apple may be more altruistic about it, the results are the same.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by JKenP

You seem easily driven to despair. Marvin is locked in a proprietary O/S with just API access that Apple jealously guards. The example of that is the old sneak-around plugin that was disabled by an o/s upgrade. Apple has advantages such as security but that weakens other opportunities for programming. Coming up with back-doors get harder and harder.

I am reminded of the Microsoft story of the reporter who got on the staff bus by mistake where they chanted, "The jobs not done while Word Perfect runs." While Apple may be more altruistic about it, the results are the same.

iOS has a pretty well documented API on how to share information. It doesn't require a backdoor. The plug in that Calibre Companion has been using for years on the android side seems to work quite well on iOS. As I understand it, the issue is that rather than use wireless, Marvin uses the USB connection. While I'm sure it made a lot of sense at the time, using wireless might have been less risky.

[JKenP]

Well, what it was was a plugin designed to make the iphone respond like Android or ereaders who use USB. Breaking in the subsequent IOS release was likely intentional. Apple doesn't seem to like USB access. The only way to do it is to use their proprietary, Windows program. Doing it that way is Apple asserting ownership to the user's detriment.

I'm not battling that as I use an iPhone and accept the restrictions. But, it can make it a difficult situation for programmers. That's just the way it is. You accept the secret garden or go elsewhere. And, you get a bit better security in the process.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by JKenP

Well, what it was was a plugin designed to make the iphone respond like Android or ereaders who use USB. Breaking in the subsequent IOS release was likely intentional. Apple doesn't seem to like USB access. The only way to do it is to use their proprietary, Windows program. Doing it that way is Apple asserting ownership to the user's detriment.

I'm not battling that as I use an iPhone and accept the restrictions. But, it can make it a difficult situation for programmers. That's just the way it is. You accept the secret garden or go elsewhere. And, you get a bit better security in the process.

It's a lot more complex than that. There is a well defined API for syncing via iTunes. Trying to use the same interface outside of iTunes is a hack. This particular hack actually lasted quite a few upgrade cycles before it stopped working due to Apple changing their security model. Apple was quite open about what they were changing and why they were changing it.

[chrisridd]

What would technically be the best way for Marvin to sync from e.g. Calibre?

[Turtle91]

Originally Posted by chrisridd

What would technically be the best way for Marvin to sync from e.g. Calibre?

The answer would very much depend on the user's preferences.

Personally I have OPDS set up via Calibre on my home computer. This works well for me as I can get any book from anywhere in the world that has internet access and I don't have to worry about all my book files on someone else's server (like dropbox).

Others may prefer the lesser hassle of using a dropbox interface.

Or, they might like plugging in a wire and using itunes (*shudder*). In my opinion it is not worth the pain of dealing with itunes just for the slightly faster transfer speed.

Ideally the Calibre interface plugin would start working again - it had some really great features. But, it too required a wire plug....which I found really hard to find a USB cable 12450.5 miles long...

[Valkrider]

Personal choice as Dion says. I could never get the plugin to work on the earlier versions of iOS and so I use the iTunes and cable and just drag and drop. It would be great if there was a plugin but it isn't a deal breaker for me as Marvin is the best eBook reader for me.

[chrisridd]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Or, they might like plugging in a wire and using itunes (*shudder*). In my opinion it is not worth the pain of dealing with itunes just for the slightly faster transfer speed.

This doesn't seem like a technically good solution at all. For one, it tethers the device to a computer, for another access sounds like it is at best problematic and should be avoided. Besides, cables are so 2000. :-)

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Ideally the Calibre interface plugin would start working again - it had some really great features. But, it too required a wire plug....which I found really hard to find a USB cable 12450.5 miles long...

That would be slightly out of spec...

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by chrisridd

What would technically be the best way for Marvin to sync from e.g. Calibre?

I should probably be specific on what I mean by sync. When I say sync, I don't mean downloading the books into Marvin, I mean keeping the metadata in sync between Calibre and Marvin. If I finish a book in Marvin and mark it as read, it gets marked as read in Calibre, if I add a book to the reading list in Calibre, it gets added to the reading list in Marvin. The old Marvin plug in would sync things like collections, reading list, percent read and whither a book was read or not. It wasn't perfect, but it did a pretty good job considering the limitations.

[chrisridd]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

I should probably be specific on what I mean by sync. When I say sync, I don't mean downloading the books into Marvin, I mean keeping the metadata in sync between Calibre and Marvin. If I finish a book in Marvin and mark it as read, it gets marked as read in Calibre, if I add a book to the reading list in Calibre, it gets added to the reading list in Marvin. The old Marvin plug in would sync things like collections, reading list, percent read and whither a book was read or not. It wasn't perfect, but it did a pretty good job considering the limitations.

Nod. I played with using Calibre's OPDS server but as far as I can see that's only useful for downloading books.

Any bi-directional sync solution would require code inside Marvin, wouldn't it?

[JKenP]

A partial solution would be to add a bit of script to mark it read when it is transferred to the reader or disk. That wouldn't give you all you're looking for but it would be better than nothing.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by chrisridd

Nod. I played with using Calibre's OPDS server but as far as I can see that's only useful for downloading books.

Any bi-directional sync solution would require code inside Marvin, wouldn't it?

Yes, it would.

[ShellShock]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Yes, it would.

This is where the IOSRA plugin came unstuck. It worked by copying the Marvin database off the device to your Calibre device, so that the plugin could read the Marvin meta data from a local copy of the database. This meant it could keep Calibre's meta data in sync with Marvin, and it did not require any direct interfacing to Marvin.

The IOS security changes put a stop to this by hiding the location where Marvin stores its database, so the plugin can no longer read it. One solution would be for Marvin to store its meta data database in a location that is publically available. Assuming Marvin 3 uses the same database schema as Marvin 2, then this would only require minimal changes to the plugin. However, the schema may be totally different...I have no idea.

I got the impression that Kris was eventually going to provide a more robust API in M3 for third parties to use to connect to Marvin...but I have not seen anything about this for some time.