Other features to address on JBL since 0.15

RobertJSawyer wrote:Well, kmrowley, you certainly do like to do your own whining -- about what you perceive as other's failings in making postings here.

Not sure what you hope to accomplish; the forum exists for the posting of questions and views about ECTACO products, so comments like your one-word "Seriously?" or your repeated references to others whining or the sarcasm of your latest replies don't seem to be very helpful to ECTACO, the people making the comments, or anyone else. So why bother?

Ouch! But thanks for your input. I bother cuz I think people are being too demanding, too unrealistic.. too "I want it NOW!".. basically being whiney.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 01/13/2010 23:03:56

kmrowley wrote:
I apparently missed the part of the advertisement for this JBL where it said that it had all the same features of a Rocket book

kmrowley,

Apparently you are reading someone elses posts and replying to me for some reason. I never said Ectaco claimed the JBL had the Rocket reader feature set, I spoke about the Rocket reader to discuss nice features that another product has (for a decade) as a comparison.

When I spoke about what was missing or buggy on the JBL, I am speaking only about the features claimed by Ectaco on their website.

Is it wrong for me to point out when something doesn't work as advertised? I _hope_ you don't think there's a problem with someone having a wish list of what would be nice. They're 2 different things. You need to try to recognise the difference between the two before trying to start a flame war.

Panagiotis

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 01/14/2010 07:24:36

pgovotsos wrote:
kmrowley,

Apparently you are reading someone elses posts and replying to me for some reason. I never said Ectaco claimed the JBL had the Rocket reader feature set, I spoke about the Rocket reader to discuss nice features that another product has (for a decade) as a comparison.

When I spoke about what was missing or buggy on the JBL, I am speaking only about the features claimed by Ectaco on their website.

Is it wrong for me to point out when something doesn't work as advertised? I _hope_ you don't think there's a problem with someone having a wish list of what would be nice. They're 2 different things. You need to try to recognise the difference between the two before trying to start a flame war.
Panagiotis

I suggest that you go back and reread your posts...

And what exactly did the JBL NOT do out of the box that YOU think it claimed to do? (.14i) (cont.)

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 01/14/2010 07:23:48

Yeah, there were some issues with it reading the pdb file format, but it still was able to do that to some degree. And the company was successful in making it do that better and I think they did that in a very timely fashion.

I've been thinking about that - the problems with pdb. Why is it that only a few of the ereaders even include that format on their devices? Is it that hard to use? It originally was Peanut Press’ and then Palm got it, then eReader and now B&N. So it's been around for awhile, you might think that being such an established format that everybody would want it on their device - yet, not many do. My guess is that the format is a bit too specific for the palm devices / os, and making it work on something else isn't easy.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 01/14/2010 08:59:27

kmrowley wrote:Why is it that only a few of the ereaders even include that format on their devices?

kmrowley, eReader is supported on the following devices:

Android
iPhone / iPod Touch
Macintosh
OQO
Palm
Pocket PC 2002 or later
Symbian
Windows
Windows Mobile
BlackBerry
Barnes & Noble Nook
ECTACO jetBook - Lite
Foxit eSclick

The reason PDB with DRM was not on a lot of dedicated devices is Mobipocket has an onerous clause in their DRM licensing agreement that barred manufacturers from including any other DRM system on dedicated ebook-reading devices, and, for a time, it looked like Mobipocket was going to win the format wars, so people played ball with them.

As for plain PDB (no DRM, not eReader), PDB is just a wrapper around plain-text files (possibly compressed) with no italics or anything like that; it's not a hard format to deal with.

===

ROBERT J. SAWYER, Science Fiction Writer
Author FLASHFORWARD, basis for the TV series
http://sfwriter.

kmrowley you continue to speak from ignorance and refuse to be enlightened. I will no longer engage you or encourage your behavior.

Goodbye

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 01/14/2010 20:20:51

RobertJSawyer wrote: kmrowley, eReader is supported on the following devices:

Android
iPhone / iPod Touch
Macintosh
OQO
Palm
Pocket PC 2002 or later
Symbian
Windows
Windows Mobile
BlackBerry
Barnes & Noble Nook
ECTACO jetBook - Lite
Foxit eSclick

(had to snip - k)

Problem with that list is I see it as being apples & oranges.. (cont.)

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 01/14/2010 20:36:28

(cont. from previous post)

Apples, devices such as the JBL which uses a software application that the manufacture developed to read pdb files. Oranges, devices which allow you to load applications that you obtain from the publisher to read their books. If I don’t like the software used on my Palm device to read these eReader pdb books, who do I complain to? Palm or eReader?

I’m wondering that since B&N has the rights to the eReader software, shouldn't they also be porting it to dedicated readers too? Like they do to all those other devices..

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 01/20/2010 10:44:19

There are a few things that really need to be addressed with the JBL, considering this IS 2010.

More fonts

Margin control

Definitely look-up linkability to an aftermarket dictionary- I don't care if it costs me $50. The JBL dictionary is so pathetic in every way that if I were a "dictionary" company like Ectaco, I would have left it off entirely out of sheer embarassment.

The dictionary thing is not rocket science- just a few lines of firmware code so the dictionary source is selectable. Unless there is some sort of hypertext linking incompatibility we do not know about. Linking seems to work for pdf files.

So many people have mentioned this and Ectaco seems to simply ignore it.

I agree!

After using the jetBook - Lite for several weeks:

My number one desire is to be able to set the left and right margins, so that the text doesn't start and end so close to the bezel.

My number two desire is more font sizes, espcially one in between the second-largest and the largest.

My number three desire is to be able to use the eReader dictionaries I bought from eReader.com (Barnes & Noble) when reading eReader-formatted books.

===

ROBERT J. SAWYER, Science Fiction Writer
Author FLASHFORWARD, basis for the TV series
http://sfwriter.com * sawyer@sfwriter.com