second beta 2.1.2 has arrived for Pro devices

[LoneTech]

My expectations aren't very high, but initial testing shows this to be a marked improvement. Among the changes that were apparently not mentioned, we find:

The on-screen virtual keyboard has stopped the stupidly long lag, by allowing overlap of the keypress animations. This brings it from horribly slow to usable. One of my major gripes is now fixed.

fbreader must finally have been upgraded, as it now shows epub pictures and formatting rather well. It still has its rather own take on html files, but at least they do load.

The new web browser (seemingly Arora) allows browsing local files, giving a more accurate html viewer (you could enter file: URLs before, but the keyboard was awful). The old Midori browser would just exit if you cancelled internet connection. Unfortunately, this one keeps trying to reconnect, very rapidly, so using it offline still doesn't really work.

The new note taking is indeed now available in adobeviewer, pdfviewer and fbreader. No such luck in djviewer.

The new library browser is much faster, in addition to having more sorting options. The tabbed lists are gone, so it seems we now have to flip page by page. One quirk is that after launching something, it will keep the selection box on the thing you launched, but the direction buttons sometimes move it from somewhere else.

The volume buttons work in text to speech, a large improvement from the far too loud setting the previous beta was stuck at. Still no quick way to fix the language to match the book.

The dictionary list has changed, it can be scrolled quicker by holding a direction, and some dictionaries are now marked "Demo version". The dictionary I actually used and wanted, which was disabled by the great Bait&Switch downgrade, is simply gone.


I've only noticed some minor issues from this update so far:

My bookmarks don't all work. I expect this is a format change issue between versions, much like they don't carry over when you switch viewers for the same book.

Calling up the dictionary in adobeviewer on the last page of a book causes adobeviewer to exit.

The new library/filesystem browser doesn't have an obvious jump to page control.

The new web browser (Qt based this time around, are you just teasing us with these standard libraries we can't use because the SDK and source are missing?) draws menus in a horribly strange and slow manner.

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by skydive

It takes 3 seconds to change pages, including those with images...

Thanks for the detailed reply, skydive, but I'm still not sure from your response whether that delay is fixed or not, since it only occurred at certain times. I guess I would like to know if you used to notice the long delays (10 - 20 seconds) when going to a new section or chapter in AdobeViewer? If you did notice those long delays, can you tell if they are fixed with the new firmware?

I've been using CoolReader for epubs because of those delays in AdobeViewer (I'm still using 2.0.4 firmware), but code examples aren't formatted as well in CR.

[skydive]

i have not encounter 10 to 20 seconds delay on epubs, using adobeviewer. i were using version 2.1.1.

Originally Posted by rkomar

Thanks for the detailed reply, skydive, but I'm still not sure from your response whether that delay is fixed or not, since it only occurred at certain times. I guess I would like to know if you used to notice the long delays (10 - 20 seconds) when going to a new section or chapter in AdobeViewer? If you did notice those long delays, can you tell if they are fixed with the new firmware?

I've been using CoolReader for epubs because of those delays in AdobeViewer (I'm still using 2.0.4 firmware), but code examples aren't formatted as well in CR.

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by skydive

i have not encounter 10 to 20 seconds delay on epubs, using adobeviewer. i were using version 2.1.1.

Okay, thanks! I guess it's time to think about updating the firmware then.

In the new firmware it seems that you can configure the theme to 'education'. The theme shows some kind of personal information and agenda with scheduled activities. But I cannot find a way to change this information???

[LoneTech]

Originally Posted by rkomar

I guess I would like to know if you used to notice the long delays (10 - 20 seconds) when going to a new section or chapter in AdobeViewer?

I have seen such delays, and they're not actually a bug; AdobeViewer prerenders the next page while you read a page, so that the flip time should be not much more than the redraw time. Jumping to an uncached page will necessarily cause the rendering delay before the page shows instead. This is the primary reason why AdobeViewer is faster than pdfviewer on my pocketbook (leaving aside that they render a little differently). The rendering time grows with complex or heavy pages, which has very little to do with document file size (which the device sometimes warns about).

It's possible these times are higher in the betas because of things like compiling unoptimized with debugging in mind, but I'll note my initial tests showed rendering times easily in that range for Underground.


Edit: I must apologize, my sloppy reading led to me missing that this was about EPUB. Those have much simpler rendering, and should not have the grade of rendering time I've seen. On the other hand, the new firmware has an fbreader that is much better at rendering epub formatting and supports the better note system, so I don't reckon this is a reason to hold off.

[skydive]

Just get the version 2.0.4 on zipfile in case you want to roll back, and test it. If you have notes and all that, you will not get them back if you upgrade to 2.1.2 and rollback to 2.0.4.

Originally Posted by rkomar

Okay, thanks! I guess it's time to think about updating the firmware then.

[sify903]

Originally Posted by willyloco

In the new firmware it seems that you can configure the theme to 'education'. The theme shows some kind of personal information and agenda with scheduled activities. But I cannot find a way to change this information???

This information is located in two CSV files: rootinfo.csv and diary2.csv. They are located the root dir. (903 with 2.1.2)

The rootinfo.csv contains:
Name,class,telephone,e-mail,school,school address,school telephone
Kepner James,8-б,050 654 1234,petyaiva@ukr.net,School №314,"Kyiv city, Kniazhiy zaton Str., 7а",Tel.: 5736006

and the diary2.cvs the classroster.
day,#,subject,room,from,till
Monday,1,Geography,43,8:30,9:15
,2,Informatics,23,9:20,10:05
,3,Geometry,45,10:20,11:05
,4,Physical training,15,11:25,12:10
,5,German language,34,12:20,13:05
,6,Foreign literature,43,13:10,13:55
,7,,,14:00,14:45

Goodluck!

Thanks sify.
I will Give it a try.

[MaartenJacobs]

Originally Posted by MaartenJacobs

A couple of days ago I recieved my pocketbook pro 903. With the old firmware I could go on the internet on my the campus of my university, because it came pre-installed with the required certificate. But now that I upgrated to the latest beta firmware the certificate is no longer installed on it and therefor I cannot go on the internet on campus. Does someone know how to install a network certificate on a pocketbook pro 903???

Thanks in advance,
Maarten Jacobs

Does anyone have an answer to my question?

[Tulapi]

With the new beta firmware, is there now the possibility to crop the margins of a PDF ?

[Billi]

Forkosigan published new links in the German part (the explanation is in English):

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...postcount=1022

[paola]

Originally Posted by Billi

Forkosigan published new links in the German part (the explanation is in English):

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...postcount=1022

thanks Billi!

EDIT: it looks like the folder explorer-2 should also go (just in case, make a backup copy of it before removing it)

[skydive]

What do you mean by this?? I did the uprgade I did no find the explorer-2 file.

Originally Posted by paola

thanks Billi!

EDIT: it looks like the folder explorer-2 should also go (just in case, make a backup copy of it before removing it)

[paola]

Originally Posted by skydive

What do you mean by this?? I did the uprgade I did no find the explorer-2 file.

HI Skydive,
well I did have an explorer-2 folder (under "system") after I upgraded to the first 2.1.2 release candidate. If you did not get such a folder, I guess it may be because in this new firmware relsease things might have changed. Stil, no scrolling of pdf with pdfadobeviewer in landscape mode.