Google books iPhone-friendly; Amazon Kindle books next? - Page 2

I've found that in Stanza you can adjust the text size to be larger than that found in a book.

You also don't need an external light source.

And as has been pointed out before iPhone applications can save their state when closed, when reopened it's at exactly the same place, just like emails and a lot of other things.

You missed my piont. Your software (I'm assuming Stanza Edit, sorry Webscriptions) had to be updated to save the page you were on when you closed the application. This is the case for most apps.
One of my favorites is AP (Associate Press). They just recently added it because of user complaints. They should have said that if Apple allowed background Apps they wouldn't have had to waste the development time but they added it as a feature.

This was done for the most part because Apple can't do background, push or multi-tasking.

You must have great eyes or a big ass Magnify Glass on your side of the bed because reading books on the iPhone is a joke. You read 2 paragraphs at most and must turn the page. Does this really allow you to get into the story when your turning the page every 30 seconds?

Not in the first rev of Stanza. It was put in because of Apple's failure to deliver background apps.

It's sort of like hitting the back button in Safari on the iPhone. The ENTIRE page has to reload.
Apple can't even save the state of a page in Safari and they haven't been kind enough to get off there ass as the app developers have and fixed this for us.

It's a waste of time and battery.

I know, I know... don't feed the trolls ... damn...

Apps have done that from day 1, if they wanted. It's not a new feature.

Oh, and all developers have to work within what a device can or can't do. Unfortunately every thing in the world has it's limits, which we work within.


Actually I find they under promise usually, but they do let hype take over (they want it to). Yeah they occasionally over promise.

But Apple NEVER promised background apps.. think you're leaping at shadows here - they did promise a push solution as you say.


How much you want? Let me know.

I really doubt that, given how much you rag on Apple and their products, it seems to be your raison d'être for visiting these forums. I really don't understand why you buy their products if you actually do. It seems to be some form of masochism, if you think that Apple's service and products really are so horrible yet for some reason, you can't stop yourself from buying them.


So? Applications must be written to do lots of things. But it can be done, despite what you said in post #36, where you basically said it was impossible without allowing background tasks, but now you've contradicted that with the line that I've quoted. Not getting your story straight in the first place is a little suspicious at best, so no, you are still not convincing me. You're just adding up to be a shifty character.

The programs I use seem to do it extremely well, I really don't see what the problem is. At the very least, this method can be made to work reliably with a number of programs, so getting it right doesn't seem to be a random fluke.

For most consumers, reading a book on an iPhone is not going to happen. I'm sure it works for some but it is not the norm.

I think it is great that Google digitized all these books and I hope that they are viewable on the Kindle or other real e-book readers.

I think his motivation can be deduced from some of his other posts:





It appears to me he is bitter about buying AAPL stock near the top of the market. His exceptional
level of bitterness in today's thread gives the impression that he might have sold near the bottom, January 20th,
and now feels even more chagrined, since the stock has bounced 25% in less than 3 weeks.

Spare me the dime store analysis.

Im bitter (as youve diagnosed) at Apple because they have put out nothing but problematic software and hardware for the last 3 years.

This is bad enough but they dont even acknowledge it. Their PR recover is non existence and they hide behind the walls of Apple denying one problem after another until the point it gets to legal action.

In the business world businesses dont have the option of sitting in our Moms basement waiting for the 17 MPB to be shipped when they likely have sales people waiting for them if they placed an early order.

Same goes for every other problem, Nvidia Graphic Cards, 3G cracks and Network Problem (dont blame it on AT&T, Apple chose to partner with them knowing the problems), Monitors (numerous problems), Hard Drives, Mobile Vista (still a joke and they are still charging for beta software).

My name is MacOldTimer, not because of age, but because I said good bye to Apple for computers and have been computing happy ever since (didnt upgrade to Vista).
I got sucked back into Apple first with the iPod and then with each iPhone.

Both will be gone at the end of my contract or if the Pre takes off as I hope it will.

Correction: Apple has been rolling out consumer electronics with problems since day one. This is the same for all consumer electronic companies as well as most companies. I've had less issues with my Apple products than with other products, especially over the last 3 years.


Are you referring to anything in particular?


Ah, so your current issue is with Apple shipping a machine with problems but with Apple not making a self imposed deadline. Do you have evidence that the delay is from faulty HW and/or SW, and not from a 3rd-party vendor's delay in getting components to Apple?


How would partnering with Sprint or Verizon or T-Mobile have been better? T-Mobile would have had to build a 3G network from scratch to support millions of iPhone around the US and both Sprint and Verizon would have had to invest millions in beefing up their infrastructure to support the iPhone data. Verizon would have wanted to charg extra per month to use the Maps app and rthe data package fee would not have been $20 or even $30. Then you have the issues of making two iPhones with two sets of HW and SW, one for CDMA/CDMA2000 and one for GSM/UMTS networks. Except for T-Mobile, but Apple would still have two different HW platforms for T-Mobile USA and the rest of the world as their frequiency is unique among most UMTS networks. Or should have Apple have just tried to sell the iPhone unsubsidized with no carrier assistance, so the phone AND the carrier package is pricey? Exactly what part of those senerios would have helped the stock price? BTW, my experience with AT&T has been phenomenal.


Perhaps, but you do sound as if your day job is to sit in a baloncy heckeling muppets.


Good luck with that, and I sinceraly mean that. There is no one device that will fit everyone's needs, especially something as complex as multimedia focused smartphone. If the iPhone has turned out not to be the right product for you, there is nothing wrong with that. Perhaps you will do a little more research before buying the Pre to make sure it is the right product for you, but seems like you are set on it despite never using one so I have a feeling you will be disappointed again.

Why don't you buy a G1 right now, or as they are known over here a HTC Dream?

Selling your iPhone for 4 times what it is worth should cover the cost and at least you can take some comfort in making at least one wise investment decision, it'd be network unlocked so you can continue using your SIM and you can multitask to your hearts content, heck there are 800 free applications waiting for you.

Then you can go whine over at Android.

I dont know if people have focussed enough on this - Apple will not be ready to release a product using e-Ink or e-Paper for some time. That simply does not gel with Apple's vision for the future. e-Ink/e-Paper does not fit well with the "touchscreen" and "multitouch" paradigm that Apple is pushing now - The only way to support touchscreen with e-Ink, is to use an overlay on top of the actual e-Paper. When you have light black on a light grey black ground, the overlay actually makes the contrast pretty unbearable. Sony tried this out, but even today people prefer the 500-series of Sony's reader over the 700-series for this one reason.

On the other hand, if Apple does not use e-Ink, and goes with a bigger version of the screen they currently use on the iPhone/iPod touch, the device will be unusable as an eBook device because of battery life.

ePaper technology uses the battery only when the screen is being refreshed. Once screen is drawn, there is no further battery requirement till the next refresh takes place. You can keep the device on for indefinite periods without consuming any battery. This paradigm works beautifully for an eBook reader, because you can get extended battery life. The current screen technology used by Apple on the other hand is backlit LED - which consumes battery on a constant basis. You cannot read even one book before your iPhone runs out of battery in 2-4 hours. With the screen on, 2-4 hours is the maximum life you can expect. If you dont have the book downloaded, and need to download over the air, then your battery life will be even lower.

This would be a fundamental problem for Apple to overcome. Even if they come up with low power processors and System-on-chip from PA Semi, all the power gains will still not make a big difference when it comes to the screen being left on constantly - which is what an eReader demands. They will have to find a better screen technology, and I am not sure if they can get something at low enough cost to make a viable eReader. Remember Steve Jobs saying they cant make a net book for $500?

I think this will be a particularly bad hurdle for Apple - because if they give up touchscreen and multi-touch, then they have very limited ways to distinguish themselves from the competition. I dont think Steve Jobs and Apple will be too keen on coming out with a device unless they have significant differentiating factors.

I wonder if it is actually possible to combine both the technologies - ePaper and LCD on a single screen. That way, the page can be displayed in full color LCD to begin with, and then once backlight is switched off after a preset timeout, the screen changes to ePaper. That way the screen will be readable even after backlight is turned off, and the battery life would become excellent. It can also be configured that if the Book Reader application is running, backlit LCD will be turned off, and only ePaper would be used. If some such combination is possible, even at a higher cost, this will be the best option for Apple.

Apple has been patenting some ideas about light permeable LCD screens - so that a camera can be placed behind the LCD, or a solar panel can be placed behind the LCD to charge the device etc. Maybe Apple should look at ePaper as well as one of the options to explore.

the Kindle is a one trick pony


when Apple decides to release a tablet (bigger iPHONE/iPOD touch) then it's GAME OVER for Kindle

that google's service... no convenient redirection, and the need to enter another google-style url... can't say it's finger-ready in any way. iphone went to sleep before having loaded a book the toolbar isn't kept on the screen while scrolling, after having been accustomed to google's devotion to javascript that seems strange, you know... no more than another frustration... \

That doesn't happen with the iPod function on an iPhone now; why would a book be any different?

Depending on how Amazon is monitizing the Kindle and the individual downloads, Amazon may be more than happy to provide content for iPhones or even a wider-format touch/netbook if they are getting a margin on every downloaded book.

No, your point was simply wrong.


So? Either way my place in the book isn't lost.


Apple can and does. It just doesn't for 3rd party apps.


Except there's no "turning" of the page. There's this thing called scroooooolllling. Every so often there is a "page" boundry where the next set of text is loaded on the screen but that happens probably every 5 screens or so.

Not being able to access my books on other devices is a worse joke.

In any case, reading has been reasonably comfortable for me but then my eyes don't suck as badly as yours despite being blind in one eye.

How odd, I've been buying Apple gear these past three years without either problematic software or hardware. Perhaps you simply are bitter.


Buh bye. So why bother posting on an Apple rumor site shorttimer?