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Guys, I read my local paper on my bus journey home each day, it's usually over 40 pages and can be 30-110Mb in size (depending on adverts and photos)
I've tried all the free readers and the only one that works without crashing is the free office app that came with the Tab, however this doesn't have a way to jump a few pages, for example, if I'm on page 20 and nearing home I want to jump to the back page to read the sports pages before I get off, with the office app I have to swipe right to the end
Is there anything out there that can handle the paper and also be able to jump around pages (and preferably, one that is nice to look at and maybe even animates turning pages!)
if anyone has any paid PDF viewers, can you try the paper and let me know how it handles it? (todays happens to be the smallest so far at 21Mb though I'll be putting tomorrows there in 16 hours so it depends when you read this as to which you download)
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
Thanks
EzPDF reader is my favorite, does everything you need and is updated frequently by the developer.
http://www.appbrain.com/app/ezpdf-reader/udk.android.reader
Unfortunately there is no PDF annotation tool available for Android yet...
I've been using RepliGo Reader to handle some of my larger PDFs and find it satisfactory. It has a nice Reading View, supports Bookmarks, lets you go to any page you want, and select text for copying to another app. If the PDF has been set up properly, selecting the Bookmarks option shows a Table of Contents for fast moving around larger documents. It even handles the Adobe DRM files, which is one of the main reasons I use it. So far it has opened everything I have thrown at it, which is not the case with some of the other PDF readers I have tried. There is no fancy page animation, just a solid and usable app.
daniel.weck said:
EzPDF reader is my favorite, does everything you need and is updated frequently by the developer.
http://www.appbrain.com/app/ezpdf-reader/udk.android.reader
Unfortunately there is no PDF annotation tool available for Android yet...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried that, it doesn't like large PDF's
Maris_ said:
I've been using RepliGo Reader to handle some of my larger PDFs and find it satisfactory. It has a nice Reading View, supports Bookmarks, lets you go to any page you want, and select text for copying to another app. If the PDF has been set up properly, selecting the Bookmarks option shows a Table of Contents for fast moving around larger documents. It even handles the Adobe DRM files, which is one of the main reasons I use it. So far it has opened everything I have thrown at it, which is not the case with some of the other PDF readers I have tried. There is no fancy page animation, just a solid and usable app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will give that a go, thanks
I'm currently reading a graphically-rich 12MB book with 740 pages, and RepliGo Reader really lacks the zoom + navigation features that make the reading experience acceptable. On top of that, large books take *ages* to load, the font kerning is often wrong (weird character spacing), and the page refresh logic is really distracting (transition from blurry bitmap to fine text in scalable vector graphics mode).
That's why I recommended the cheaper, but more full-featured ezPDF Reader.
I hope you eventually find what you need
Cheers, Dan
daniel.weck said:
I'm currently reading a graphically-rich 12MB book with 740 pages, and RepliGo Reader really lacks the zoom + navigation features that make the reading experience acceptable. On top of that, large books take *ages* to load, the font kerning is often wrong (weird character spacing), and the page refresh logic is really distracting (transition from blurry bitmap to fine text in scalable vector graphics mode).
That's why I recommended the cheaper, but more full-featured ezPDF Reader.
I hope you eventually find what you need
Cheers, Dan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
can you try it with the newspaper I've linked to?
I've just uploaded todays which is 40 pages and 65Mb (av 1.6Mb per page) which is about normal each day and will be more challenging than a book that's on average 0.016Mb per page
the pages in the 20's are most difficult as they have adverts and classifieds in them
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
ezPDF is one of the best I've used so far
Sent from my GT-P1000 using XDA App
tried them all, repligo is the fastest page render by far.
bubblebob said:
ezPDF is one of the best I've used so far
Sent from my GT-P1000 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
le3ky said:
tried them all, repligo is the fastest page render by far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
how do they cope with the paper I've linked to above?
that's all I'll be using it for
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
mmace said:
Guys, I read my local paper on my bus journey home each day, it's usually over 40 pages and can be 30-110Mb in size (depending on adverts and photos)
I've tried all the free readers and the only one that works without crashing is the free office app that came with the Tab, however this doesn't have a way to jump a few pages, for example, if I'm on page 20 and nearing home I want to jump to the back page to read the sports pages before I get off, with the office app I have to swipe right to the end
Is there anything out there that can handle the paper and also be able to jump around pages (and preferably, one that is nice to look at and maybe even animates turning pages!)
if anyone has any paid PDF viewers, can you try the paper and let me know how it handles it? (todays happens to be the smallest so far at 21Mb though I'll be putting tomorrows there in 16 hours so it depends when you read this as to which you download)
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried the Adobe Android app?
Might also want to look into turning it into an epub. Download Calibre for your PC/Mac, let it do the conversion, and can even be setup to automatically pull down news sources and convert them to the format of your choice, and sync them to your device of choice.
Just to reiterate a bit, Calibre rocks.
For epub readers, I'm really fond of Aldiko. And Perfect Viewer is also a nice app for CBZ, PDF, etc (though the UI could use a bit of work).
mmace said:
how do they cope with the paper I've linked to above?
that's all I'll be using it for
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I downloaded the paper and tried it with the free Adobe Reader app from the Market and it works fine. All graphics and text are there. If you use the "Continuous Scroll" you can quickly scroll through a birdseye view of the pages until you find the one you want to view. The "Fit to Screen" view does what it says and a double-tap on an article or text area will zoom it to an easily readable size. It also supports pinch to zoom if you need a different size. Long-pressing the screen brings up a scrollbar across the bottom and some other options.
RepliGo Reader also renders all but the very first page for some reason, but it is a paid app, and for a newspaper, the Adobe Reader does just as nice a job for free.
I tried to take screenshots of the various menu options and choices, but neither app will let me create one. No such thing as a long-press on the back button because they immediately go back until they exit.
Hope this info helps.
Croak said:
Have you tried the Adobe Android app?
Might also want to look into turning it into an epub. Download Calibre for your PC/Mac, let it do the conversion, and can even be setup to automatically pull down news sources and convert them to the format of your choice, and sync them to your device of choice.
Just to reiterate a bit, Calibre rocks.
For epub readers, I'm really fond of Aldiko. And Perfect Viewer is also a nice app for CBZ, PDF, etc (though the UI could use a bit of work).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, I've tried the official Adobe Reader and it never even renders the 1st page, it just crashes the Tab after a minute or 2 of trying
I will look into the ebook thing, thanks
Maris_ said:
I downloaded the paper and tried it with the free Adobe Reader app from the Market and it works fine. All graphics and text are there. If you use the "Continuous Scroll" you can quickly scroll through a birdseye view of the pages until you find the one you want to view. The "Fit to Screen" view does what it says and a double-tap on an article or text area will zoom it to an easily readable size. It also supports pinch to zoom if you need a different size. Long-pressing the screen brings up a scrollbar across the bottom and some other options.
RepliGo Reader also renders all but the very first page for some reason, but it is a paid app, and for a newspaper, the Adobe Reader does just as nice a job for free.
I tried to take screenshots of the various menu options and choices, but neither app will let me create one. No such thing as a long-press on the back button because they immediately go back until they exit.
Hope this info helps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried the official one and it had trouble loading any pages at all and crashed each time
Croak said:
Just to reiterate a bit, Calibre rocks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Or not. I have a few PDF books i bought from Manning, and Calibre fails flat on face on those files. Yes, it does convert them - but all pictures are destroyed during the conversion and because of the signature at bottom of every page, it makes the final epub file even worse.
Only if there would be a reader which could read both epub and pdf formats in one app.
faugusztin said:
Or not. I have a few PDF books i bought from Manning, and Calibre fails flat on face on those files. Yes, it does convert them - but all pictures are destroyed during the conversion and because of the signature at bottom of every page, it makes the final epub file even worse.
Only if there would be a reader which could read both epub and pdf formats in one app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just tried it to convert today's 120Mb paper to an 80Mb ePub, just uploading it now to test
Trying to import todays paper into Aldiko and it's said "Importing Books..." for over 20 minutes now, it;s only an 80Mb book, I think this software has failed at the first hurdle
Any other "decent" ePub readers out there?
mmace said:
Hi, I've tried the official Adobe Reader and it never even renders the 1st page, it just crashes the Tab after a minute or 2 of trying
I will look into the ebook thing, thanks
I've tried the official one and it had trouble loading any pages at all and crashed each time
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry these apps didn't work for you. I didn't have any crashes using the link you provided with either app on my Tab (T-Mo version, not rooted). I'm out of ideas at this point. I even tried it on my Nexus One and had no problems. Sorry.
Maris_ said:
Sorry these apps didn't work for you. I didn't have any crashes using the link you provided with either app on my Tab (T-Mo version, not rooted). I'm out of ideas at this point. I even tried it on my Nexus One and had no problems. Sorry.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
maybe it's because yesterdays paper was so small?
can you try again now?
I just uploaded today's which is 120Mb
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
Hope it's not my Tab
I've also done an ePub, www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.epub which is 80Mb
Converting a PDF with rich column layout (like newspapers or magazines) into an EPUB is a terrible idea. EPUB is designed for reflowable text, not for pixel-perfect ("fixed layout") documents.
I noticed that ezPDF provides "intelligent" navigation features, to automatically move from one column to the next, in order to mimic the human reading flow (eye movement). Unfortunately some PDFs (including the 60MB example kindly provided in this thread for testing) are badly formatted and do not indicate the correct reading flow.
By the way, this unfortunate mediocre PDF encoding is the main cause for awful EPUB conversions. The misuse of typesetting tools in the publishing industry results in pretty poor content quality, structurally-speaking (because the emphasis is on visual appearance, not raw content organization).
So, the best course of action is to continue testing PDF readers (in depth, not just superficially => use previous/next navigation features, double-tap zoom with column scroll-locking, pinch/stretch zoom for fine margin adjustments, placemarks / bookmarks, etc. etc.).
Some PDF reading apps are better maintained than others on the Market. There may be opportunities to report bugs or request features.
Cheers, Dan
mmace said:
I just uploaded today's which is 120Mb
www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.pdf
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL, even my modern laptop struggles to browse this PDF smoothly
I don't expect a mobile device to offer a smooth reading experience
mmace said:
I've also done an ePub, www.maffmace.co.uk/YEP.epub which is 80Mb
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't bother. EPUB conversion is not satisfactory for this kind of PDF content (as I explained in the post above).
Cheers, Dan
daniel.weck said:
Converting a PDF with rich column layout (like newspapers or magazines) into an EPUB is a terrible idea. EPUB is designed for reflowable text, not for pixel-perfect ("fixed layout") documents.
I noticed that ezPDF provides "intelligent" navigation features, to automatically move from one column to the next, in order to mimic the human reading flow (eye movement). Unfortunately some PDFs (including the 60MB example kindly provided in this thread for testing) are badly formatted and do not indicate the correct reading flow.
By the way, this unfortunate mediocre PDF encoding is the main cause for awful EPUB conversions. The misuse of typesetting tools in the publishing industry results in pretty poor content quality, structurally-speaking (because the emphasis is on visual appearance, not raw content organization).
So, the best course of action is to continue testing PDF readers (in depth, not just superficially => use previous/next navigation features, double-tap zoom with column scroll-locking, pinch/stretch zoom for fine margin adjustments, placemarks / bookmarks, etc. etc.).
Some PDF reading apps are better maintained than others on the Market. There may be opportunities to report bugs or request features.
Cheers, Dan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the 60Mb one was "created" by myself, each page sent to the printers is around 4Mb, I then put them all together in 1 file and then "print" to a PDF file at 72dpi and A6 page size to reduce the file size
If you download the 120Mb one today, that one is the original files just merged into 1 PDF
I cannot test PDF readers in depth because most don't even open large PDF's like todays
Hi all!
I'm in my final year and we're supposed to do a project which is worth 200 marks overall. Most of us in our field have chosen to develop either android or iphone applications. My group and I have chosen adnroid.
Now, I'm in need of simple ideas for the apps. We have absolutely no idea on how to go about with the process. I've seen lots of people here develop stunning applications here! We're in need of ideas for developing simple apps.. which can be completed in a max of 2-3 months (considering the fact that we don't have any background knowledge on android development/programming. All we know is Java)
I'd initially suggested an automatic mobile credit recharge system, where in the app monitors you prepaid account balance from time to time and recharges the account once the credit falls below a user set value.
Although this seemed interesting at first, it can only be simulated with 2 databases (one for the mobile credit and another for the bank account)
After going through the type of apps here, I really want to develop something much better than this.
I'm open to all ideas, in fact, we don't mind developing an app that is already existing (for instance a profile manager or a data wallet etc) All we want is to have a fully complete app at the end of 2 months.
Please assist.
Thanks!
Secret Santa?
That's something that I thought up over winter break and whipped it up over a few days in the App Inventor. If you guys take your time, you can probably learn Android programming and design/code it in a month or so.
There are some "special" features that I added to make the app more useful but I'll leave that for you to think up.
I'll post back if I come up with anything else. I also need some app ideas, but just for recreational programming.
Thanks! I'm currently checking out appInventer.. I somehow find it hard to come up with ideas which is why I'm trying to find help from here :|
I think the credit recharger is a pretty cool idea, personally. But I understand that you might want something with more "impact"
I think part of the key to this would be figuring out what has not already been done to death. There are so many apps with 5, 6, 7, etc versions of the basically the same thing. I would try to find something to develop with less competition, even if it's more of a niche product. I'm trying to think of the things I've previously thought "I wish I had an app for ____" but I'm drawing a blank right now.
If I think of anything I'll be sure to post it back in here
DrDubzz said:
I think the credit recharger is a pretty cool idea, personally. But I understand that you might want something with more "impact"
I think part of the key to this would be figuring out what has not already been done to death. There are so many apps with 5, 6, 7, etc versions of the basically the same thing. I would try to find something to develop with less competition, even if it's more of a niche product. I'm trying to think of the things I've previously thought "I wish I had an app for ____" but I'm drawing a blank right now.
If I think of anything I'll be sure to post it back in here
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! I checked out google appInventer tutorials.. theres one which says "no text while driving" -- basically sends back an sms to the sender that ur driving.. It seems interesting so I'm gonna see how best i can use it and pack some more useful stuff along with it.. and see how it all works out.
The reason why I'm giving the auto recharge a back seat is because it can't be implemented in real time.. it can only be simulated in a virtual environment.
You might want to think about doing something that takes advantage of the maps api. It's easy to do but it looks impressive and might help you get high marks.
A great idea?!
Graphics artist here,
Something I just thought of and just started searching for (literally) when I came across your thread, would be: Using the phone as a touch sensitive.. control for editing software, ie photoshop or paint.net. Basically turn the phone into a touchpad control for a computer.
Just an idea!
mirrorhelix said:
Graphics artist here,
Something I just thought of and just started searching for (literally) when I came across your thread, would be: Using the phone as a touch sensitive.. control for editing software, ie photoshop or paint.net. Basically turn the phone into a touchpad control for a computer.
Just an idea!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This would be great! I'd definitely pay a couple/few dollars for something along these lines if it was user-friendly
Thats a really awesome idea!! Converting the touchscreen into a tablet input for PS or any other photo manipulation software.. But the problem is that I don't know where to begin! :|
This is a college project so the idea isn't to make a unique and sell-able application... it's to demonstrate that you can work as part of a team to make an application from design to completion.
I'd try and think of a fun app (i wouldnt care if it's been done 100 times before) that everyone on your team wants to contribute to. If it's unique, brilliant, if not nevermind you've got some good experience working as a team and making an android app.
I do like the sound of the phone touchpad app, it's been done on iPhone by Logitech but i've not seen something for android. If it helps, http://blog.logitech.com/2010/01/29...-touch-into-a-wireless-trackpad-and-keyboard/ .
There are a ton of them on the market: Gmote, MyRemote, UnifiedRemote, etc.
It might be a good idea to email this developers to get a better picture of what to do.
Problem is that all of those tools rely heavily on WiFi so you'll have to understand networking.
biggler said:
This is a college project so the idea isn't to make a unique and sell-able application... it's to demonstrate that you can work as part of a team to make an application from design to completion.
I'd try and think of a fun app (i wouldnt care if it's been done 100 times before) that everyone on your team wants to contribute to. If it's unique, brilliant, if not nevermind you've got some good experience working as a team and making an android app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bingo!! Which is exactly what my instructor said. I tried out the tutorials on appInventer.. I was toying with the idea of integrating more features into those itself. Is that a good idea? Although the concept is from Google, would it be ok to build on it? i'm particularly interested in "No texting while driving" and "Broadcast Hub" -- both these apps are awesome! Are there any notable features that I can add to make them better.
How about an app for the quick oil change places. It could show your last service and what was done. Show any upcoming maintenance and when your next oil change is due.
Maybe integrate Google Maps to show locations of service centers. Maybe offer a "e-coupon" if they use the app. Pretend they offer online scheduling and maybe show them "2 customers in bay, one waiting" - Estimated wait time 20 minutes" yada, yada
As an "older" programmer with 2 degrees, it's nice to see your college offering the mobile platform as a programming choice. Hell, all we got to write were COBOL and CICS mainframe applications and some semi-cool C++ projects.
Good Luck and Congratulations on getting your degree!!
What about a bluetooth hack to where u would be able to hack into someones phone and use their service for texting and calling. I heard of something like that when i was on my blackberry and was really into it. But it would be nice to get something like that on my Incredible
Sent from my ADR6300 using XDA App
I think it would be a good idea to make an app that uses an existing web api for a popular website, could be facebook, ebay(do they have an api?) etc etc.
It's a good way to learn a lot of aspects of android development, with a useful product as the outcome.
It doesn't matter if there is already an app for that site, think of a different way of using the site on the mobile, and go from there.
I would like to see a program that reads the weather API and reflects the current weather and location on the wallpaper. This app would require graphics design, code to parse the weather feed, writing to the OS. When I was on Windows Mobile there was a skin for Weather Panel that did this but with Android's live walpaper it could be really cool.
Thanks for the ideas you guys! I really appreciate it. Everything seems interesting.. but the problem is we don't know where to begin or how to go about it.
I did the broadcast hub tutorial present in the app inventer page. It turned out good. Is there any way I can add functionality to this itself?
blueren said:
Thanks for the ideas you guys! I really appreciate it. Everything seems interesting.. but the problem is we don't know where to begin or how to go about it.
I did the broadcast hub tutorial present in the app inventer page. It turned out good. Is there any way I can add functionality to this itself?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do all the tutorials and learn the blocks, you can create lots of stuff. There is a app in the market that adds more features to the app inventor, app inventor extender
XDA App
A couple of suggestions:
- A chess PGN editor
- A simple picture/document management app where you take a photo using the camera, add some tags or other info, and save all details in a database. You can also provide search functionality and a viewer to retrieve pictures using the index you've built.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
I did some homework on topics and came across this.. A multilingual speech translator.
Talk in a language, it converts the speech to text, translates that text to a target language, and reads the translated text aloud.
Is this feasible? What is the difficulty level?
Also, is it possible to develop a call blocker app? I looked around but wherever I search, I only find fully built apps but not pointers on how to go about creating one by yourself.
Please assist.
I am considering buying one of these but would like to try it out in a store before I buy it. Does anyone know of a US retailer that stocks them?
I am mostly curious about the following things:
1) How good is it for taking notes in college/university classes? Can you rest your palm on the screen while using the stylus?
2) Is there a way to view the notes taken on pdf on a computer?
3) Is it pretty solid feel wise? Or does it feel like it will fall apart after a couple years?
4) How much bloatware comes on it and is it hard to remove via rooting?
5) Does the screen go dark enough for comfortable reading in dimly lit rooms?
Thanks for the info.
the notes are great, I use Quill, as it works nearly perfect, in the app i have turned on pen input only and jot tons and tons of notes all day long.
You can export the notes to various files, while im not sure about PDF there is certainly a format that can be read on your desktop
Like all lenovo products i've had its built to last like an enterprise system should be. as long as you take care of it it will last a long time past EOL
Bloatware isnt too bad, theres still some stuff lenovo managed to get into the system pretty deep (like the status bar wheel widget thing.) but its never bothered me that much as it only comes up at the home screen.
screen brightness works great in dim rooms, i tend to read books by a small lamp in bed most of the time with minimal strain.
I purchased mine from lenovo direct so I dont know about any local retailers.
Thanks for the info. However when I asked about notes on PDFs I should have clarified a bit. I was asking about their PDF viewer that lets you take notes on the PDF document and weather that can be exported to something useful.
Also I thought of one more thing: If I have my notes backed up with something like spideroak, can the notes be converted on a computer? I ask because I am worried about taking a semesters worth of notes on it then having it die and there being no way to read them without getting a new tablet.
FearTheCron said:
Thanks for the info. However when I asked about notes on PDFs I should have clarified a bit. I was asking about their PDF viewer that lets you take notes on the PDF document and weather that can be exported to something useful.
Also I thought of one more thing: If I have my notes backed up with something like spideroak, can the notes be converted on a computer? I ask because I am worried about taking a semesters worth of notes on it then having it die and there being no way to read them without getting a new tablet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ezPDF allows you to fill out pdf forms, underline, strikeout, and add freehand drawings as well as circles/squares/etc. It should do what you're looking for.
https://market.android.com/details?id=udk.android.reader&feature=search_result
and if you have the file saved as a pdf on your sd card you should be able to open it with any pdf reader (pc or otherwise).
The quill note taking app he mentioned allows you to export your notes to sdcard pdfs
Thanks for the info.
One last thing: has anyone used connect bot or another ssh client on this? I am curious if the keys on the keyboard folio such as escape quotes tild and whatnot all send the proper characters. I had a bluetooth keyboard for my N1 a while back that sent some weird unicode characters for the quotes making terminal usage very difficult.
https://market.android.com/details?id=berserker.android.apps.sshdroid&hl=en
I have used SSH droid with WINSCP worked like a charm, I'm by no means an experienced user with SSH, i just used it to dig around the file system.
SSH droid is a server for the android device, I am asking about using a client on the android device.
My bad, I left my brain at home today... I will test it for you this evening and let you know if the client works with the keymapping
Cool thanks, I look forward to hearing your results.
Update: I just ordered one, so if its too much of a bother don't worry about testing the connect bot thing. My shiny object syndrome overwhelmed my frugal side. Can't wait to get my hands on it.
It works like a charm tested with Moba SSH home 1.22 and connect bot, all the keys from the folio map properly and I haven't seen anything odd at this point, also SSH'd into a couple of Access points over my VPN at work with the TPT to test as well.
Congrats on the TPT! you're gonna love it!
Unfortunately the keys do not map properly, escape is still connected to "back" in the android os and ctrl is connected to "menu". Does anyone know if there is some way to map these to their proper functions?
Thanks
S
Dear XDA community,
First I apologize for the long post, if you want to see only my actual question, just skip the next 2 paragraphs.The stuff before is for context on why your help will be so crucial to us!
Friends and I have started a non-profit organization with the aim of bringing Nooks Touch loaded with literature and DIY books to Kenya (the website is readandprosper.org) The idea is to provide children in their last two years of secondary education with choice and easy access to both Kenyan, pan-African, and US/European literature, as well as replace their textbooks with electronic versions. Currently, up to 5 children share a single textbook (generally in bad shape as well). We also would like to include lots of Do It Yourself books to encourage children to learn useful trades (carpentry, irrigation, mechanical repair, etc).
We have made significant progress in our work, identified the school where we will pilot the project, identified the books we'd like to use (though publishers are giving us a hard time; shocker!) etc. Right now, we are working on the monitoring and evaluation plan and are looking into collecting data about the use of the devices by children and professors. This is where the XDA community's help would be crucial!
Our hope is that there is a way to record what books are being read and also basic information about basic reading patterns, like how many pages are being read in sequence vs. just browsing through the book. Do you guys and gals know any way this can be done via a script/app?
I have a pretty good understanding of Android, having rooted and tested lots of roms on my G2x and having done some basic customization work in the guts so I'm OK with a not super simple and easy solution. It would be really helpful for us to understand use patterns and what books have the most value so we can better tailor our approach!
Thank you so much for any suggestions/help!
Depending on how in-depth you wanted the info, this could get complicated.
You'd need to modify the reader.
You'd have to safeguard against logging as read when somebody holds down a side button continuously.
You can look in the Nook and check the content provider content://media/external/docs and see if a book was ever opened.
If you took occasional snapshots of this you might make some sense of reading.
There's also content://com.bn.nook.reader.providers.lastreadingpointprovider/
It's not what you want, but the easiest data that you can get is if people are using Adobe Digital Editions to borrow from libraries.
You can look in C:\Users\Whoever\My Documents\My Digital Editions and see all the books ever borrowed.
Renate NST said:
Depending on how in-depth you wanted the info, this could get complicated.
You'd need to modify the reader.
You'd have to safeguard against logging as read when somebody holds down a side button continuously.
You can look in the Nook and check the content provider content://media/external/docs and see if a book was ever opened.
If you took occasional snapshots of this you might make some sense of reading.
There's also content://com.bn.nook.reader.providers.lastreadingpointprovider/
It's not what you want, but the easiest data that you can get is if people are using Adobe Digital Editions to borrow from libraries.
You can look in C:\Users\Whoever\My Documents\My Digital Editions and see all the books ever borrowed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for the info Renate!
I think our first interest is in finding out which books are read most often. Number of pages read would be interesting, but as you said, it will be difficult to collect the data without getting a lot of "noise" or some kind of access to the reader's innards.
We are also open to installing a different reader than the Nook standard, like Moon+ or Aldiko (after root of course). Do any of these third party readers provide an API-type access that would enable more extensive data collection? Otherwise we might try to talk to the app makers and see if they might be able to cook up something for us.
The ADE aspect doesn't really work for us, there is no WiFi where the e-readers are going and we will be sideloading all the books.
We'll continue to think about all this. I got one of our refurbished Nook yesterday to play with, and so far I haven't really gone the rooting route just yet, but I think it will be happening pretty soon.
I just wanted to revive this thread on logging how students use their e-readers.
Since my last post, I haven't really been able to find much more information, which is incredible frustrating.
School libraries, public libraries, and so forth are all using or at least beginning to use e-readers and I can't believe that there exist no app or reading software that tracks reading habits or use. I understand there are some privacy issues, but anonymized data would carry incredibly useful information. In our case, we will have multiple kids using each reader, and no log-in so the privacy issues is essentially void. Plus the data will inform what books we should load up on our readers in the future.
Does anybody on XDA have any clue about an app that can collect reading data? I know Moon+ Pro has some reading statistics for example, but do you guys/gals know what data is available?
While looking for something completely different, I stumbled across this and thought some people might find it interesting:
Turn an old eReader into an Information Screen (Nook STR) – Terence Eden’s Blog
shkspr.mobi
I wouldn't fixed NST to a wall and think that I have read here about app used here to do that job. Either someone is gonna fix TLS issue or maybe if we assume using NST as display it could be possible to use home Wi-Fi router or mobile phone as secure server or part of VPN that will negotiate TLS issue for NST. I always doubted slightly that NST can offer full internet browser experience but something in line of htttp web grab in reader mode might be good enough for some application. News (RSS), weather and I believe that maybe EPG TV guide are not impossible to accomplish. Only question about this remains will NST embedded HTML browser will be good for the job of showing the grab from web pages or is Opera in reader mode better for such job. Time to look up for a good web grabber...
SJT75 said:
I wouldn't fixed NST to a wall and think that I have read here about app used here to do that job. Either someone is gonna fix TLS issue or maybe if we assume using NST as display it could be possible to use home Wi-Fi router or mobile phone as secure server or part of VPN that will negotiate TLS issue for NST. I always doubted slightly that NST can offer full internet browser experience but something in line of htttp web grab in reader mode might be good enough for some application. News (RSS), weather and I believe that maybe EPG TV guide are not impossible to accomplish. Only question about this remains will NST embedded HTML browser will be good for the job of showing the grab from web pages or is Opera in reader mode better for such job. Time to look up for a good web grabber...
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Curl can often bypass SSL checks and grab web content. It runs on the NST. I've used it in a few of my apps. Whether the data it gets can be used by the app the blogger mentions is something else.
@nmyshkin that is nice idea! And seems exactly in line of what I wrote. I do not know is curl accessible from Android layer. I pondered the same thought more in line of trying to use port of Lynx to Android I have seen someone did although who knows is that possible to do on this version of Android?
I've written a status app (that I never use).
It polls two different servers for JSON info and displays it using regular Android graphics stuff.
It uses Retrofit for polling.
And one more! (although this one uses a Sony PRS-T1)
Reusing my ebook reader – Fluffyelephant
Hmm, you got me thinking about this stuff.
There's the whole let the Nook poll some data service and display it on a web browser sort of thing.
I don't really need or want that.
I was thinking more of like as a status output device for a headless Raspberry Pi.
No, not as a terminal, more like status for a solar/home/whatever system.
The Nook doesn't poll anything, it just sits there waiting for text or graphics.
But here's the part I like, you don't use any WiFi.
You just plug your Nook into the Raspberry Pi.
Of course it has adb.
You can get adb for Raspberry Pi: sudo apt-get install android-tools-adb
Now you can set up port forwarding:
Code:
[email protected]:~ $ adb forward tcp:6666 tcp:6666
Then all you need is something on the RPi to connect to port 6666 and spit out stuff.
On the Nook you need an app to serve port 6666 and do display stuff.
I've already made a clock as proof of concept and it works fine.
You could just use text fields or compose a whole graphic frame on the RPi and send that over.
Heck, if you send whole frames you wouldn't even need to run the Android subsytem.
I could probably get that working on a Kobo.
A very sophisticated example follows.
It allows you to individually update separate fields.
These could be in tables with borders or labels or whatever.
Edit: Okay, a better screenshot.
You know, the thing I like about this is that the NST is the server.
It's a bit like running X11, but much more lightweight.
And if you want you can still run this over WiFi instead of ADB forwarding.
This electric sign app is really close to something I'm looking for. What I'd like to do is, instead of a screenshot of a URI, to take a screenshot of what I've got open in the device.
I'd like to use this with Google Calendar, and Opera Mini surprisingly seems to work with the HTML version. I think Opera Mini keeps the calendar updating with AJAX or something, so all I'd need an app like this to do would be to, when it's running, take a screenshot of what's on the screen right before sleeping and set that as wallpaper, then wake every X minutes, screencap what's there and go back to sleep with that as the new wallpaper. The end result should be an always-on, low power Google Calendar.
EDIT: For anyone looking later, I was wrong. Opera Mini does not keep updating Google Calendar, you have to refresh it manually, which makes this slightly more complicated...
jptiger said:
This electric sign app is really close to something I'm looking for. What I'd like to do is, instead of a screenshot of a URI, to take a screenshot of what I've got open in the device.
I'd like to use this with Google Calendar, and Opera Mini surprisingly seems to work with the HTML version. I think Opera Mini keeps the calendar updating with AJAX or something, so all I'd need an app like this to do would be to, when it's running, take a screenshot of what's on the screen right before sleeping and set that as wallpaper, then wake every X minutes, screencap what's there and go back to sleep with that as the new wallpaper. The end result should be an always-on, low power Google Calendar.
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Somewhere on the site there is a discussion of a setup that copies the current screen into a screensaver folder so that, for example, a map remains visible when the device sleeps. Search for it.
Edit: https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/q-fridge-calendar.3057759/#post-59527882
Edit: https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/...uestion-o-noob-friendly.2941262/post-57216860
Eh, I'm not fond of browser-based anything,
For plain HTML stuff you could throw something together with Webkit instead.
For the adventurous you could use the Google Calendar API
Renate said:
Eh, I'm not fond of browser-based anything,
For plain HTML stuff you could throw something together with Webkit instead.
For the adventurous you could use the Google Calendar API
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I tend to agree with you. As I already wrote above something akin to Pocket/ReadItLater and similar might be accomplished using simple web grab I presume and offline HTML browser. I have thought that it looks odd that beside "hidden" (and sadly for us practically unusable) browser NST have another HTML viewer. Reason for that might be it was intended to be used for B&N "browsing" through their shop that they periodically download to NST or maybe for presentation of e-book material of older type that was for all intents and purposes just web archived HTML page or perhaps for viewing magazines purchased through B&N.
In essence even epub use elements of CSS/HTML but that is another story. Maybe it could be possible to make some poor man Pocket like offline browser if we somehow find the way to cobble together parts of some RSS, bookmarks syncing, e-mail listing, forum/blog viewer and approach that me or nmyshkin proposed here. In my opinion hardest part if some web grab is possible would be to render it in usable form for this device. That mean turning of ads, flash/video, loading pictures only on demand (or better in on/off way) and show only text information. Now what "browser" is suitable for this is yet to determine. I know that very old Opera could turn off animation an pictures but as I remember it did that in such way that it didn't download them at all to save bandwidth. Maybe it could be somehow set to load web archives in such manner? Think about it as giving an command that some web page be "printed as epub". It might be to large task to accomplish. Pocket worked if I remember right in such way that selected page was sent to dedicated server which did the trimming part for user and allowing him/her to download that content on other device to be read later on. Here I think that if we could sync for example one of bookmark folders from a computer with NST and achieve web grab of those links in usable form we might have something. It is a matter for the debate isn't Opera mobile and style management already wrote on here in forum same or even better. Problem would be that page reformat/rendering would be tasked to NST itself and I am not sure if it is up to the task or am I capable to cobble such thing alone for that matter. Something flashed in my mind didn't Calibre had some news reader? If it does then I am inventing the wheel here. Still it would be nice to be able to have some even limited ability to open a link to a news story from RSS feed or a forum/blog we follow or e-mail listing etc.
For Calendar I hope that some kind of dedicated app combining Calendar, planner and to do list can be found to already exist for this device.
Did anyone inspected this option? https://greycoder.com/a-list-of-text-only-new-sites/ It might be interesting
SJT75 said:
Did anyone inspected this option? https://greycoder.com/a-list-of-text-only-new-sites/ It might be interesting
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Thanks for these! The ersatz Google News is amazing in that even the external links are text-only! It makes my Google News app obsolete! Great with Opera Mini. Many, many things to look at there
nmyshkin said:
Thanks for these! The ersatz Google News is amazing in that even the external links are text-only! It makes my Google News app obsolete! Great with Opera Mini. Many, many things to look at there
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I am glad that I have contributed with something useful. As have already guessed from mine posts in this thread I have contemplated heavily about what could be more useful for NST some text-only browser akin to old trusty Lynx or some rewrite/redefinition of working Opera. One thing lead to another and at first I thought to maybe open and disclosed source for firefox readability extension/addon ported for working version of Opera somehow is a way to go but as I always check all aspects of mine quirky ideas I stumbled upon this. It is poor man solution but as I remembered that you follow NPR and they have text mode only site felt obliged to mention it here.
In line with nmyshkin's idea of using curl if some information display akin to the one linked in the first post is needed does something like cron from Linux can be run on NST?
"Print as epub" exist as web form. Here is the result of that one. https://dotepub.com/ I tried to use online form there and results were mediocre but as I understand they also offer their API to developers etc. That I presume might draw attention from someone on xda.
In defense of the intended idea for using NST as info screen arguably touch technology it uses is best for those screens. Mine guess is that its deemed as such because it is most easily scalable from the currently available techniques. This also raise the question why B&N did not already made readers of much larger format like A4 paper size screen. Is the display cost really that high and prohibitive? On the other news rumors have spread that they have partnered with Lenovo not only for the new generation of tablets but also for new e-readers. Has anyone find some leek about possible specifications?
SJT75 said:
... rumors have spread ...
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Say, what? After my buying a Poke3?
Edit: See https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/no...ovo-barnes-noble/1139012795?ean=9780594080503
1200 x 800 for a 10" = 144 DPI, not drop dead impressive.
I agree. Cheap bastards! I can't say is that 149DPI good for LCD screen but is sub par for e-reader. They obviously targeted minimum resolution comparable to low resolution printing and hope to get away with it. Considered that I expressed criticism to level of development of current color e-ink technology being bellow resolution of NST by about 60% you can bet I find this to little question is does it comes to late for B&N. Still I am more interested about e-ink display device that rumor say is also planned but nothing is revealed so far.
Renate said:
Say, what? After my buying a Poke3?
Edit: See https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/no...ovo-barnes-noble/1139012795?ean=9780594080503
1200 x 800 for a 10" = 144 DPI, not drop dead impressive
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Nothing to report that is mine work now still in the spirit of this thread I want to post few links with things people did with e-ink screens that might be done with NST also.
1. Raspberry Pi powered news scrapper - something Renate might like as she as I understood work on something similar
https://www.reddit.com/r/raspberry_pi/comments/ksgomp
2. Weather display that I believe was made using software already mentioned somewhere on forum
https://www.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/lcyos9
3. Something completely different! Device made as platform to enable development many things e-ink made. Link shows RSS implementation.
4. In the old days when e-readers were unobtainable on my location I was in desperation contemplating the idea to convert available photo frames to a e-reader. This is as you guess the other way around.
https://www.reddit.com/r/raspberry_pi/comments/liadda
5. Someone developed site for games for e-ink screen as I understood browser only
https://e-ink.club/index.php There is in my opinion plenty of room for some sort of games on e-ink and this is not comprehensive list but it is nice someone started a dedicated page/project for that.