Best and worst of Apple ereaders

[Faterson]

Yes, Kris explained that both the Kindle app and iBooks use different "engines" compared to all the other iOS e-reader apps, so they can afford to work differently. Still, I find them woefully inferior compared to, say, Stanza or its heir apparent, Marvin. The most glaring omission in the Kindle app is the inability to simply copy highlighted text. What were they thinking?

[Trauma Doll]

Originally Posted by Faterson

Yes, Kris explained that both the Kindle app and iBooks use different "engines" compared to all the other iOS e-reader apps, so they can afford to work differently. Still, I find them woefully inferior compared to, say, Stanza or its heir apparent, Marvin. The most glaring omission in the Kindle app is the inability to simply copy highlighted text. What were they thinking?

Isn't that a DRM thing? I guess I assumed it was--otherwise someone could in theory just copy and paste the whole book into a text file?

Originally Posted by Trauma Doll

Isn't that a DRM thing? I guess I assumed it was--otherwise someone could in theory just copy and paste the whole book into a text file?

Amazon limits the size of clippings for that reason, so I assume other book store apps do the same with clippings and copy/paste.

[Faterson]

Can't agree, Jack. Copying highlights is available neither for DRM-protected, nor for "free" books in the Kindle app.

Blocking the copying of highlighted passages, most of which are extremely short, is ridiculous. There is no way to select the text of an entire book, anyway! We've just discussed how it seems impossible to highlight text even across two screens. Besides, iBooks as another "bookstore app" does support the copying of highlighted passages.

As to the clippings file, I love it on hardware Kindles, but it's another big omission that there's no such clippings file in the Kindle app on iOS/Android. Now, Marvin blows both the Kindle app and iBooks out of the water: it allows both the copying of highlighted passages, and their export (soon also import), per book, in an XHTML file. This is the feature I've been waiting for for ages.

[kguil]

I'm actually quite sure that iBooks/Kindle don't let you export text (as highlights or otherwise) because of the piracy argument. They just don't make a distinction between the type of books loaded in it (DRM or not). As I recall, ibooks doesn't let you export highlights at all, just notes attached to them. As a matter of fact when might used to use ibooks to proof read, I used to create a highlight, copy the same text and paste to into the highlight to manage to get text out.

Note, that now, with vertical scrolling, iBooks let's you select text across pages.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Faterson

Can't agree, Jack. Copying highlights is available neither for DRM-protected, nor for "free" books in the Kindle app.

Blocking the copying of highlighted passages, most of which are extremely short, is ridiculous.

It's plainly not a "philosophical" point with Amazon, given that other Kindle devices and apps (eg "Kindle for PC") do support copying. It's not more than that the iOS and Android Kindle Apps are the "poor relations" of the Kindle family, to my mind. Amazon want you to buy a "real" Kindle.

[Faterson]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's plainly not a "philosophical" point with Amazon, given that other Kindle devices and apps (eg "Kindle for PC") do support copying. It's not more than that the iOS and Android Kindle Apps are the "poor relations" of the Kindle family, to my mind. Amazon want you to buy a "real" Kindle.

That's some great business strategy. Enrage your customer, perhaps they will buy more from you, then. Not really. And we should remember Amazon also bought off Stanza just so it could kill it, but they seem to be content with replacing it with that pitiful Kindle version as a "poor cousin" of the real one.

Originally Posted by kguil

As I recall, ibooks doesn't let you export highlights at all, just notes attached to them. As a matter of fact when I used to use ibooks to proof read, I used to create a highlight, copy the same text and paste to into the highlight to manage to get text out.

You're right. What an utter failure -- exporting a note without the associated passage. I wonder what Apple's excuse is here? The Kindle app is intentionally lame because they want you to buy a "real" Kindle, and iBooks is intentionally lame because...?

I've just learned to expect nothing from mega-corporations, no matter if its name starts with an M, G, or two kinds of A. Corporations have typically grown so arrogant they don't give a damn about the user experience, and they couldn't care less about a single unhappy customer. Fortunately, there's still "indie" software like Marvin and formerly Stanza, so that we can still get a superb user experience while reading e-books on iDevices.

[Jessica Lares]

If you use Readmill, it will read the Kindle highlights if you give it access to your profile.

[gwynevans]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Personally, I use three reading apps on the iPad:
...
Bluefire for ePub

Have you had a look at Marvin for ePub? If not, it might be worth seeing how you find it in comparison...

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by gwynevans

Have you had a look at Marvin for ePub? If not, it might be worth seeing how you find it in comparison...

Thanks for the suggestion. I haven't taken a look at it, but I certainly will. It supports ADE DRM, like Bluefire does?

[Faterson]

Nope, but there's no comparison in how well it displays non-DRM-protected EPUBs.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Faterson

Nope, but there's no comparison in how well it displays non-DRM-protected EPUBs.

OK, thanks. That's a pity, because I use Bluefire primarily for library books. I'll certainly take a look at Marvin, anyway.

[flips01]

Marvin is iPad only?

[Faterson]

For now, yes. iPhone version coming up later, Android version still later.

[Meemo]

Originally Posted by Jessica Lares

There's the one problem with iOS reading apps in general. You have to use the File Sharing feature in iTunes or something like Dropbox to load books. Not very user friendly.

If you use Calibre, it's easy to access your Calibre Library via wifi - I do it all the time. Before I figured that out I'd just email the books from Calibre to myself and then open the attachments on the iPad. Either way I found to be simpler for getting a book here & there onto my iPad/iPhone than messing with iTunes. Not quite as nice for moving lots of books at once, then again I try not to keep lots of books on my iPhone/iPad at once, so it works well for me.

And the developer of the Marvin app is adding the capability to access the Calibre Library (as well as Feedbooks, Gutenberg, etc) directly from Marvin in the upcoming update, much like you can do with the Aldiko (Android) reading app.

Of course if you don't use Calibre, all of the above amounts to "Well, big whoop!"