Aura ONE Improvements to Kobos GUI, want your thoughts!

[johnnyb]

@davidfor: Please stop derailing the thread. As they say, if you are content (and we know that you are), this clearly is not for you.

@Fanki: Thank you for your efforts!

[Mrs_Often]

Originally Posted by Fanki

I did not want to come with suggestions, as I wanted to start with a blank sheet, not influencing what you guys came up with.

Smart 👍🏼

Originally Posted by Fanki

I am unsure on how to proceed, as I was not expecting this reaction.

Please proceed as planned. I for one am very happy with your initiative.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Fanki

I have to admit, I did not know about those threads in this forum. Maybe I was not looking hard enough.

As there are two threads in the stickies at the top of the page, then it has to be not looking hard enough.

I also assumed that my angle on approaching the subject would be somewhat new, and that would affect opinions and thoughts on the matter, which would motivate a new thread.

That statement makes your decision not to start the thread with your own ideas even stranger to me. If you think you have a new angle for this, then why aren't you expressing it and then asking for ideas?

I also did not know there was a need to defend this kind of idea, but apparently there is one. What I want to do is:

• Collect opinions, frustrations and needs from Kobo users regarding the UI/UX aspect of the interface
• Map those needs out and see what are recurring/common themes
• Create UI wireframes out of those needs, and create a clickable prototype which I would share here, and on Dribbble/Behance and similar places to show a clear before and after. After a (hopefully) successful outcome, share that to Kobo.

All good ideas.

I did not want to come with suggestions, as I wanted to start with a blank sheet, not influencing what you guys came up with. I am not doing this for any reason other than a passion for reading and creating great interfaces. I wanted to merge those two interests and create something good. And I do agree, some requests/ideas in this thread are more personal than others, but I think it is possible to sift through and find common themes.

And as we are all exposed to the Kobo interface, plus others on different devices

Here are some of my ideas on improvements to the interface:

• Remove Kobo Store bloat, and use those areas for personal (already bought or side-loaded) content, articles, notes etc.
• Find a way to visually represent the length of books in relation to other books in your library (Kindle has found a way of solving this)
• A global Day/Night Mode, which would invert the whole UI, including Reading Mode
• Let your book collection shine: Display more metadata regarding genre, year, synopsis etc. in a "Detailed Listing Mode".
• A smarter dictionary, which would help non-native English readers (like myself) to easily recognize and learn difficult english words. English has a lot of words.

None of those are new. And the first is either naive or a contradiction. You want to design a new interface for Kobo to use, but the first thing you suggest is to remove Kobo from the interface? And for the forth one, is what you mean what Kobo already does in the Wishlist or Recommendations?

I am unsure on how to proceed, as I was not expecting this reaction. I am still naive enough to think it would have an impact on Kobo. It's one thing to say "This is not working" or "Do this", an another to say and actually show "Here is how it should be done".

OK, the last statement first: It really, "Here is how you think it should be done."

As to the reaction, I stated what my reaction was when the thread was opened. And I only posted it because of your reaction above. And that I was curious about the way you started the thread and your expectations. Is my reaction typical? I don't know, but I am actually surprised by how few responses you have received. I was expecting a lot more.

Where do you go from here? That's up to you. If this is something you are interested in doing, go ahead. I am curious about the result you come up with. But, a better target for the output might be an open source project like KOreader. And if you think my posts are distracting from the thread, I'm completely OK with you asking a moderator to remove them.

[Fanki]

Originally Posted by davidfor

As there are two threads in the stickies at the top of the page, then it has to be not looking hard enough.

That statement makes your decision not to start the thread with your own ideas even stranger to me. If you think you have a new angle for this, then why aren't you expressing it and then asking for ideas?

All good ideas.

And as we are all exposed to the Kobo interface, plus others on different devices

None of those are new. And the first is either naive or a contradiction. You want to design a new interface for Kobo to use, but the first thing you suggest is to remove Kobo from the interface? And for the forth one, is what you mean what Kobo already does in the Wishlist or Recommendations?


OK, the last statement first: It really, "Here is how you think it should be done."

As to the reaction, I stated what my reaction was when the thread was opened. And I only posted it because of your reaction above. And that I was curious about the way you started the thread and your expectations. Is my reaction typical? I don't know, but I am actually surprised by how few responses you have received. I was expecting a lot more.

Where do you go from here? That's up to you. If this is something you are interested in doing, go ahead. I am curious about the result you come up with. But, a better target for the output might be an open source project like KOreader. And if you think my posts are distracting from the thread, I'm completely OK with you asking a moderator to remove them.

Gosh, I don't even know where to start, David. What was your goal here? To make me stop? To remove the thread? I actually think you succeeded. I'm sorry to say, but the interest and joy to pursue this idea with the help of this forum - it's gone. Maybe I'll do the idea on my own, we'll see.

Thank you to everyone who contributed,
E

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by johnnyb

@davidfor: Please stop derailing the thread. As they say, if you are content (and we know that you are), this clearly is not for you.

Why on earth do you think I'm content with the Kobo software? I've expressed my opinion on what I think are the deficiencies are. But, I try to be realistic about what I can change.

[Mrs_Often]

Originally Posted by Fanki

Gosh, I don't even know where to start, David. What was your goal here? To make me stop? To remove the thread? I actually think you succeeded. I'm sorry to say, but the interest and joy to pursue this idea with the help of this forum - it's gone. Maybe I'll do the idea on my own, we'll see.



Thank you to everyone who contributed,

E

I'm very sorry to read this.

[koboy]

Originally Posted by Fanki

Gosh, I don't even know where to start, David. What was your goal here? To make me stop? To remove the thread? I actually think you succeeded. I'm sorry to say, but the interest and joy to pursue this idea with the help of this forum - it's gone. Maybe I'll do the idea on my own, we'll see.

Thank you to everyone who contributed,
E

i'm sorry to read this. if i had started this thread my own input would have been extremely short something along the lines of old home screen (great) new home screen (crap by comparison) and any possible negative comments would have made me FAR MORE determined to carry on with the thread not less and i certainly wouldn't have stopped.

thank you. your efforts are most definitely appreciated by me.

best wishes koboy

[Ripplinger]

As davidfor said, I also think this would fall on deaf ears at Kobo. The only hope we'd have would be if someone could do a patch to give us a different layout for the home screen. I was really hoping this thread might be headed there.

I hope Fanki will reconsider. And who knows, maybe if Kobo sees enough of these complaints about what doesn't work for avid readers on the home screen, maybe they'll consider another change. I just wouldn't hold my breath for that.

[johnnyb]

Originally Posted by davidfor

Why on earth do you think I'm content with the Kobo software? I've expressed my opinion on what I think are the deficiencies are. But, I try to be realistic about what I can change.

You should have started a new thread „What can we realistically expect from Kobo in my opinion“ then.
Also, kudos on successfully blowing the project up right away. You’re such a great guy!

[crane3]

I would like to see that the gui does NOT display a book that has been "removed"; takes up space & is misleading. If the book is removed, then it should be actually removed from the books listing; there was no indication that the book has been removed.

I selected the removed book(s) & get a DRM failure msg that the reader is not "authorized" to read the book. That is very stupid as the books were not DRM'ed. A problem with having the book management in a database where it takes "forever" to remove/delete the book & it still is not removed. The removed book even shows up on the home page!

This is a basic setup & koreader was not installed after a factory reset.

There should be a setting where I can disable the bedtime orange/peach/citrus background; for me it sucks. The only way I can 'disable' the bedtime/night(?) is to change the default 11:00 PM to much later. The orange background on the Aura One LE makes reading less legible for MY eyesight which need more light than what others may require.

So far, the Galaxy Tab S2 is much better than the KA1 LE even in sunlight for readability for me.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by crane3

I would like to see that the gui does NOT display a book that has been "removed"; takes up space & is misleading. If the book is removed, then it should be actually removed from the books listing; there was no indication that the book has been removed.

I selected the removed book(s) & get a DRM failure msg that the reader is not "authorized" to read the book. That is very stupid as the books were not DRM'ed. A problem with having the book management in a database where it takes "forever" to remove/delete the book & it still is not removed. The removed book even shows up on the home page!

This is a basic setup & koreader was not installed after a factory reset.

When I remove books on any of my devices, they definitely removed. And fairly quickly. The symptoms you describe are usually a sign the database on the device is corrupted. You need to check that and fix it to get past this.

There should be a setting where I can disable the bedtime orange/peach/citrus background; for me it sucks. The only way I can 'disable' the bedtime/night(?) is to change the default 11:00 PM to much later. The orange background on the Aura One LE makes reading less legible for MY eyesight which need more light than what others may require.

So far, the Galaxy Tab S2 is much better than the KA1 LE even in sunlight for readability for me.

The "Natural Light" automatic colour changing can be turned off. The option is on the light control popup. If you can't find it, I suggest you have a look at the manual as how to do this is covered.

And the light control popup also allows you to mix the colours as you want. Or at least in a white to orange-red range. You need to play with these until you get one you like. But, it sounds like you want it at the whitest end and fairly bright.

[Owl_]

Many people get an ereader for health reasons (the screen is safer for the eyes than monitor, tablet, smartphone and so on). To improve the Aura One's readability I would suggest:

-easy accessible full-screen-reading mode; even in the kepub file (and without bug)
-Landscape mode available in ALL kinds of file
-Free advanced fonts control in the custom fonts added by the user (possibly with customizable kerning)
-Font's setting for the popup windows of the dictionary
-The touch zone must be the same of the respective area that you see on the screen; above all when you select a word
-The night yellow light must be even spread, indeed it has green halos when used at the 1-5%

To improve the performance:

-Long battery life (It would be better to get a device slightly bigger then run out of battery fastly)
-PDF and mobi files are usually too slow, they must be read fluently as other formats
-A system of folder and subfolder for the collections (possibly the same of the folders you arrange via pc inside the device)

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Owl_

-PDF and mobi files are usually too slow, they must be read fluently as other formats

Why would you want Kobo to waste their developers' time and effort trying to chase the moving target that is Amazon's proprietary formats?

As for PDF? Despite what some people claim for KOReader, I have never found a small screen device that can handle my collection of PDF manuals with what I would consider to be reasonable quality and ease of use -- a page oriented A4 sized PDF with the occasional A2 sized "foldout" page is not going to work unless you truly enjoy scrolling and zooming. As for fiction? Why bother with PDF when epub is reflowable unless declared otherwise.

Originally Posted by Owl_

-A system of folder and subfolder for the collections (possibly the same of the folders you arrange via pc inside the device)

Again, why bother? Considering there is no way in the Kobo GUI to directly access files and that my own tests show that using search allows me to access my ebooks with far fewer taps than would be required to dig down through a directory tree to find a specific ebook. I won't even get into the ease of finding a series even one with multiple authors or an anthology with multiple authors using search compared to trying the same with a directory tree.