Aura - 2 questions re: % stats & pinch zoom

[snaz pizaz]

Hi
I've just got an Kobo Aura.

1. I'm finding the % read stats on my home page gifs are not climbing higher than 1% on all but any pdf i might read. (i.e not on mobi and epub files)
Is there anything i can do to correct this ?

2. The pinch to zoom facility : Is this the annoying circle that appears in the bottom third of the screen when you try and turn the luminescence up or down using your fingers ? I can't figure out how to use that circle - it just seems to slow everything up and cause major screen flashing and then the fonts to become giant. There's no instructions about that circle thing anywhere. Any advice about how to use it and it's actual usefulness welcome.

thanks everyone

sp

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by snaz pizaz

2. The pinch to zoom facility : Is this the annoying circle that appears in the bottom third of the screen when you try and turn the luminescence up or down using your fingers ? I can't figure out how to use that circle - it just seems to slow everything up and cause major screen flashing and then the fonts to become giant. There's no instructions about that circle thing anywhere. Any advice about how to use it and it's actual usefulness welcome.

I also found that trying to use pinch-zoom on the Aura 6" for font-size adjustment was incredibly annoying - far too imprecise and too easy to activate by accident. I switched it off via Settings - Reading settings - Pinch to adjust font size.

[snaz pizaz]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

I also found that ..... incredibly annoying - far too imprecise and too easy to activate by accident. I switched it off via Settings - Reading settings - Pinch to adjust font size.

I did do that but i just wondered if it really could have been so terrible as i said or if im being dumb. It seemed totally crap feature - perhaps that's why they don't mention it in the manual. I'd still be interested to know how it's really meant to work because i tried everything and nothing about it made sense.

Meanwhile any feedback about the 1% read stat still welcome

thanks
sp

[Dryhte]

It's about the worst feature the firmware for Aura has. I turned it off the moment I'd tried it once.

About the 1% - sorry, don't read PDFs...

[snaz pizaz]

Originally Posted by Dryhte

About the 1% - sorry, don't read PDFs...

unbelievable re: that font size adjustment tool being so crap and undocumented anywhere.

The stuck at '1% read' stats issue on the kobo aura home-page for 'currently reading' book gifs affects every file format EXCEPT pdfs - for me.
Is there any kind of fix for getting this feature to work for side-loaded ebook files ?


thanks
sp

[dickloraine]

Don't know, works fine on my aura. Maybe your database is corrupt. Maybe you have to rebuild it.

[snaz pizaz]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

Don't know, works fine on my aura. Maybe your database is corrupt. Maybe you have to rebuild it.

so how do you do that ? My kobo is less than 2 weeks old !

sp

[PeterT]

@snaz pizaz; go to Settings | Accounts and Signout from the Kobo account. This will delete the database and force you to redo the device setup.

Sideloaded content will not be deleted from the device.

[Dryhte]

Originally Posted by snaz pizaz

unbelievable re: that font size adjustment tool being so crap and undocumented anywhere.

The stuck at '1% read' stats issue on the kobo aura home-page for 'currently reading' book gifs affects every file format EXCEPT pdfs - for me.
Is there any kind of fix for getting this feature to work for side-loaded ebook files ?


thanks
sp

Hi,

Sorry, I misunderstood.

I have 99% side loaded books on my Aura, and I haven't seen this bug ever. My current book displays 14% read and a couple that I've opened and closed again show 2% read (since I've skipped until the first real text).

Could it be there's something wrong with one or all of the epub books you've loaded onto your Aura?

You might want to try with a 'known good' book at first (e.g. the epub feature peeker which is floating around on this forum, since that works fine for me, it's sitting at 12% read) without loading any other books. Then afterwards when you've confirmed that it does work, you can load your other books again; if it breaks again than one of the other books is the culprit...

Here is the Feature Peeker: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=211123

EDIT: You may want to simply put this book on the kobo via drag&drop, not via calibre, so that you're sure that nothing interfered with the .epub after you downloaded it.

[snaz pizaz]

ok tried both of those tips:

1. The reset didn't do anything except lose all my bookmarks on the books im currently reading.

2. The epub test bk you asked me to test out DOES show % read as active and working ; which must mean that loads of my archived ebook collection ; epub; mobi files dont seem to activate the % read on a kobo.

q1) Is that just a common issue in ebook reader-land ?
q2) Is there a simple tweak i can do in calibre or via another method to alter my ebook epub / mobi files / meta data or (?) so files can use a kobo % read correctly ?

thanks again
sp

[PeterT]

First suggestion would be to read ePub and / or kEpub format but not mobi. Use calibre to convert the mobi's.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by PeterT

First suggestion would be to read ePub and / or kEpub format but not mobi. Use calibre to convert the mobi's.

I've seen this recommendation so many times on this forum, and I need to ask why? What is so bad about reading mobi books on a Kobo? I have a few on my HD and I've never noticed any problems with them?

Shari

[PeterT]

I think it's safe to say that the mobi support on Kobo is an afterthought; that few bug fixes get made to it; that new features that are added to Kobo's are probably not added for formats other than ePub / kepub.

[snaz pizaz]

i've got about 50/50 mobi & epub currently in my kobo device book library.
I'm finding the stuck at 1% read issue does affect both the mobi and epubs i've got installed on my device.

Still wondering if that simple tweak exists to put this right ? What is it the kobo stats tool is failing to read ?

I notice that the dictionary, highlight and 'look up' info features are a bit random too - working on some books but not others.

Seems like these ebook reader features get messed up by DRM/source of purchase issues which is a shame when they could so easily be universally applicable.

sp

[Dryhte]

Hi Snaz,

I'm sorry, I don't know the background of the issue, I just had a hunch that it would work if you'd just sideload (drag&drop) a known good epub. Unfortunately, that doesn't mean I know what could cause the % breaking (either in Calibre or just in a badly formatted epub). Maybe you should rephrase the title of your thread into 'what causes % read to break?', someone more knowledgeable may pass by and have a solution.

I can just tell you that I've never had the slightest issue with it, if I'd had one, I might have looked more deeply into it because I can imagine I'd be pissed off

I looked on my reader, and I found one .mobi (only ) - I leafed through it, and I noticed that it, too, seems stuck on 1% read. So let's just say that Kobo's .mobi support is very superficial