Which to get?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Serious, non-trolling question here: If you accept that page numbers vary by format, exactly what is the "something" they mean to you? If being at page 50 out of 100 on format A = being at page 75 out of 150 on format B, what is the advantage of these arbitrary progress markers over percentages, which would be format-agnostic?

They give you an indication how long the book is, which percentage doesn't. I've read 5% of what? A novella or an omnibus edition of five novels?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Serious, non-trolling question here: If you accept that page numbers vary by format, exactly what is the "something" they mean to you? If being at page 50 out of 100 on format A = being at page 75 out of 150 on format B, what is the advantage of these arbitrary progress markers over percentages, which would be format-agnostic?

ADE page numbers used 1024 compressed bytes to equal one page. The page numbers do not change if you change the font, font size, line height, margins, turn the headers/footers on/off, etc. So you get used to a good enough idea of how long he book will be.

Access (the KePub renderer) used a similar page number style to ADE. It just used a different number of compressed bytes to represent a page. So if you regularly read KePub, you got used to the page numbers.

Now Kobo have changed the page numbers to be 1 page = 1 screen. So that totally changes the page numbers and they don't mean much of anything.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

ADE page numbers used 1024 compressed bytes to equal one page. The page numbers do not change if you change the font, font size, line height, margins, turn the headers/footers on/off, etc. So you get used to a good enough idea of how long he book will be.

Thanks to the many discussions about different page numbering systems used on e-readers, I am actually already comfortably familiar with the differences between Adobe and Kobo numbering. Neither format was specified in either my post or the one to which I replied. The person I was replying to said they were aware page numbers, quote, " vary over different formats". This is an age-old truth of paper books, and so my question did not specify ebook formats, nor was it restricted to them.

People who are VERY vocal in insisting on a carved-in-stone, immutable system of "page numbers" for ebooks and object with (to me) rather bewildering vehemence at the idea that factors such as font size and line spacing can alter the number of "pages" displayed therein seem to have absolutely no such complaints or or difficulties with the long-established reality that factors such as physical page size and book format can alter the number of "pages" listed for differing editions of a book printed on paper. Hence my question: If page numbers are acknowledged as arbitrary, what is the something they mean to the person whom I asked. Their response may not be the same as anyone else's, and it is their response I'm particularly interested in.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Serious, non-trolling question here: If you accept that page numbers vary by format, exactly what is the "something" they mean to you? If being at page 50 out of 100 on format A = being at page 75 out of 150 on format B, what is the advantage of these arbitrary progress markers over percentages, which would be format-agnostic?

What I mean is that while there is some variation between paper books and eBooks — and even ePub eBooks between one seller and another, there is relative correlation. A Western (for example) is going to be about 200 pages. A novel will be somewhere between 300 and 700 pages, etc. And the Adobe ePub page numbering scheme is designed to show this. Then comes this new KePub system where page numbers can vary from 200 to 20,000 (depending on size of font, etc.) and that just makes page numbering useless.

If I convert Kindle azw3 books (for example) to ePub in Calibre, the page number will be the same whether I read the book on one of my Tolinos, one of my Nooks, one of my Sonys or even my old Jetbook Lite or my EZReader. This is what I mean when I say page numbers mean something to me. There should be some kind of relative consistency — not necessarily one-to-one but to something close.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

They give you an indication how long the book is, which percentage doesn't. I've read 5% of what? A novella or an omnibus edition of five novels?

Exactly. When you pick up a paper book you can instantly get an idea of its length, by size and heft. I want some mechanism in eBooks that will do basically the same thing. Page numbering that varies by screen size, font size and font face, etc., can't accomplish this.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

ADE page numbers used 1024 compressed bytes to equal one page. The page numbers do not change if you change the font, font size, line height, margins, turn the headers/footers on/off, etc. So you get used to a good enough idea of how long he book will be.

Access (the KePub renderer) used a similar page number style to ADE. It just used a different number of compressed bytes to represent a page. So if you regularly read KePub, you got used to the page numbers.

Now Kobo have changed the page numbers to be 1 page = 1 screen. So that totally changes the page numbers and they don't mean much of anything.

Yep. Said better than I'm saying it. When page numbering can change this drastically it's better not to use numbers at all. Just use percentages and give up the pretense.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Access (the KePub renderer) used a similar page number style to ADE. It just used a different number of compressed bytes to represent a page.

No it didn't. The kepub full-book page numbering was 320 words per page.

Now Kobo have changed the page numbers to be 1 page = 1 screen. So that totally changes the page numbers and they don't mean much of anything.

Except that it is exactly what happens when you read a paper book. Each sheet of paper is a page. Turning one of those sheets of paper changes the page number. Now, each screen full of words is a page. "Turning" one of these changes the page number. That is what people are used and expect when they use these devices.

I believe there have been a lot more, "Why doesn't the page number change when I turn the page?" questions than any other sort of question about pages numbers in ebooks. The next closest is probably "Why doesn't the page numbers match the paper book?" And using per-screen page numbering solves a lot more problems that the other methods. It lets the reader easily see where they are in the book and how much is left. And, as I'm pretty sure that most people use the same size font when reading fiction (the adjustment is used to compensate for formatting in the book), they will quickly learn how long it takes to read these pages. And they will get a more consistent answer than they ever did with paper books as even for mass-market paperbacks, the page size and word density changed between books.

The only problem that the per-screen page numbering doesn't solve it getting to the same location in another device or edition of the book. And to use ADE numbers requires the same edition (without any repacking or other fiddling) and a device/app that supports ADE page numbers. Which means it is useless for finding the page in a paper book. Or a Kindle.

[John F]

Originally Posted by davidfor

No it didn't. The kepub full-book page numbering was 320 words per page.


...

Just to nitpick, I believe there is more to it. From what I've seen, chapters cause a page break. And in the beginning of ebooks (dedications, little burbs, ...), where there often are few words, I believe there are hard page breaks.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by John F

Just to nitpick, I believe there is more to it. From what I've seen, chapters cause a page break. And in the beginning of ebooks (dedications, little burbs, ...), where there often are few words, I believe there are hard page breaks.

I was being simplistic, just like Jon was. But, yes, the page counts was done for each chapter and added to give the total for the book. If there was a one-to-one relationship between the ToC and internal files, this was simple. If there wasn't, it was more complicated, but, I never completely worked out the rules. But, it basically was the word count for the file, but, there might have been an extra page for each ToC entry.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Serious, non-trolling question here: If you accept that page numbers vary by format, exactly what is the "something" they mean to you? If being at page 50 out of 100 on format A = being at page 75 out of 150 on format B, what is the advantage of these arbitrary progress markers over percentages, which would be format-agnostic?

AARGH!! No! Please don't tempt them to refighting the "ONE TRUE PAGE NUMBER" wars.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by DNSB

AARGH!! No! Please don't tempt them to refighting the "ONE TRUE PAGE NUMBER" wars.

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea MAXIMA culpa - forgive me, I knew not what I did!

[4691mls]

Here's a link to the pre-existing long thread about page numbers in case anyone wants to continue the discussion there. Since this was in the Kobo forum, non-Kobo people may not have seen it already.

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=323591

[Tomk2]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Serious, non-trolling question here: If you accept that page numbers vary by format, exactly what is the "something" they mean to you? If being at page 50 out of 100 on format A = being at page 75 out of 150 on format B, what is the advantage of these arbitrary progress markers over percentages, which would be format-agnostic?

I look at the book contents and determine what page is last. There might be 10 pages or even 75 pages of acknowledgements, notes, references, samples of different books, or other stuff after the book is done. If there is a lot of stuff that is not part of the novel, you might be "done" at 88 percent!

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[Tomk2]

Expand your list of requirements. How thick should the bezels be? Page turn buttons? If so, how many and where? Size of screen? Type of lighting? These physical characteristics can have a large impact on how your reading experience feels. And then there are ecosystem comparisons!

For example, I like thick bezels for my fat fingers, and page turn buttons on both sides. The clear winner is the Nook. But with B&N I can't download ebooks to back up on my desk PC. I also can't sync borrowed books across devices. Those ecosystem failures make the Nook drop off my list.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Tomk2

If there is a lot of stuff that is not part of the novel, you might be "done" at 88 percent!

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

Thank you, I hadn't thought of that despite having experienced it often, particularly with the better pop-sci books, which tend to have extensive reference/acknowledgments sections.