First tests of KOReader - help needed

[Uncle Robin]

After installing KOReader, I have been trying to work my way through i, seeing how it works, and if it will be right for me. The attached screenshots are all labelled "differences" because I'm hoping that the problems are no more than that, differences in how to achieve certain ends, and that the solution lies in my learning the ways KOReader can deliver.

Difference 1: As the screenshot shows, I have been unable to get a "graphical" homepage like the Nickel default, despite selecting an option that I thought sounded right. I really like seeing all the covers on display, and would love to be able to do this in KOReader


Difference 2:
Despite setting the screen>orientation options as mentioned in another thread, I discovered that on powering off and restarting, or rebooting, the orientation inversion returns

Difference 3:
This book of poems has the devanagari (L) and nastaliq (R) text presented as images. The screenshot shows the difference between the way the book opens. Also, the zooming of the image is more easily controlled in Nickel, pinch to zoom functions well to reach the best size available for reading on the 7 inch screen. The zoom in KOReader for these images seems more jerky, and less fine-grained.

Difference 4:
Saving the worst until last. This is a sideloaded copy of a book I bought from the Kobo store. The difference in rendering is pretty extreme.

All the books on my device are kepubs. Are the issues outlines above and depicted in the screenshots fixable?

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

This book of poems has the devanagari (L) and nastaliq (R) text presented as images. The screenshot shows the difference between the way the book opens

I guess one would need to see the actual HTML+CSS code. It could be something as "trivial" as the missing min-width support in KOReader, or it could be that the book uses some non-standard code specifically targeted at the Kobo renderer.

This is a sideloaded copy of a book I bought from the Kobo store. The difference in rendering is pretty extreme.

Does it have DRM or does "sideloaded" imply you removed it? I doubt KOReader supports any kind of DRM.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Jellby

I guess one would need to see the actual HTML+CSS code. It could be something as "trivial" as the missing min-width support in KOReader, or it could be that the book uses some non-standard code specifically targeted at the Kobo renderer.

It'sa Calibre-created kepub from an azw3 I bought at Amazon then de-drmd. Here's the html of that page
https://i.imgur.com/eicHxPH.jpg

Originally Posted by Jellby

Does it have DRM or does "sideloaded" imply you removed it? I doubt KOReader supports any kind of DRM.

No DRM. I have got into the habit of downloading all my Kobo purchases and saving de-drmd copies

[JSWolf]

What about the CSS?

[pazos]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Difference 1: As the screenshot shows, I have been unable to get a "graphical" homepage like the Nickel default, despite selecting an option that I thought sounded right. I really like seeing all the covers on display, and would love to be able to do this in KOReader

On your picture you see folders. These don't have covers. (supported) files within folders might have covers. KO doesn't have a library but a file manager.

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Difference 2:
Despite setting the screen>orientation options as mentioned in another thread, I discovered that on powering off and restarting, or rebooting, the orientation inversion returns

It was fixed and available on a nightly next to you. https://github.com/koreader/koreader/pull/7133

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Difference 3:
This book of poems has the devanagari (L) and nastaliq (R) text presented as images. The screenshot shows the difference between the way the book opens. Also, the zooming of the image is more easily controlled in Nickel, pinch to zoom functions well to reach the best size available for reading on the 7 inch screen. The zoom in KOReader for these images seems more jerky, and less fine-grained.

Umh, not sure what's the question. You can long press the image to zoom it, rotate, etc. If the question is: how do I make it like nickel, which I like more? the answer is: you can't. There're two different programs.

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Difference 4:
Saving the worst until last. This is a sideloaded copy of a book I bought from the Kobo store. The difference in rendering is pretty extreme.

There's no (lib)magic here. Books are delivered to render engines based on their extensions. Your file doesn't have an extension so no render engine is able to handle that. Rename your file to .kepub.epub as calibre is doing when sending kepubs to your device.

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

All the books on my device are kepubs. Are the issues outlines above and depicted in the screenshots fixable?

Probably not all. You're heavily in the kobo ecosystem. I would suggest to keep there as it seems it mostly fits your needs.

[NiLuJe]

The .kobo/kepub folder is where store-bought files end up. There's a rather high probability those will be DRM'ed.

[NiLuJe]

The images are rendered 1:1 by default in CRe, and given the artifacts in the Nickel screenshot, it's just tiny.

There's a "Zoom (dpi)" option in the bottom menu, in the layout tab, that will affect that.

[Frenzie]

Also see discussion in https://github.com/koreader/crengine/issues/360

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

The images are rendered 1:1 by default in CRe, and given the artifacts in the Nickel screenshot, it's just tiny.

There's a "Zoom (dpi)" option in the bottom menu, in the layout tab, that will affect that.

I've attached the image itself, saved out of the epub. It renders in Calibre's viewer much as it does it Nickel.

Also, thanks for the correction on the Hindi book - I had downloaded it and de-drmd it, but did not realize I hadn't replaced the copy on my Kobo.

[NiLuJe]

Yup, tiny.

(To give you some perspective, I don't recall the Libra's resolution OTOH, but a Forma is 1920x1440).

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by pazos

It was fixed and available on a nightly next to you. https://github.com/koreader/koreader/pull/7133

Thank you. I used the One Click Install Package, so the version I had was whatever that package used.

[NiLuJe]

The OCP packages always use the latest stable, never a nightly.

You can update to a nightly from within KOReader itself, though. Just have to do an OTA after switching to the Dev channel.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

The OCP packages always use the latest stable, never a nightly.

You can update to a nightly from within KOReader itself, though. Just have to do an OTA after switching to the Dev channel.

Thanks again. I've used nightlies for other software before, but when trialling software for the first time, I'd rather use the stable, as provided in the OCP.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

The images are rendered 1:1 by default in CRe, and given the artifacts in the Nickel screenshot, it's just tiny.

There's a "Zoom (dpi)" option in the bottom menu, in the layout tab, that will affect that.

Thank you - it was set to 96. I thought I had set the default to 300, I shall have to figure out how to do that. Making it 300 did help a lot. Also, thanks for the tip about changing the update channel to Dev, the OTA update seems to have improved the rotation problem. Even with all the locking options selected, every now and again KOReader still wants to put the text the "right" way up - but Nickel also does that occasionally. It's a dextral world, sadly