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iLiad watch: Could a better reading program speed up the machine?
June 26, 2006 | 6:43 am
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By David Rothman
A new iLiad video appears on the MobileRead site.
Among the interesting points raised in the video-related discussion: the delays in page flipping. How optimized is the PDF program? How much can it be improved?
And speaking of the iLiad: UPS and FedEx have made their share of iLiad-related queries on the Web. Could iRex’s B2B side be targeting the big delivery services as a market? I hope so. The bigger the volume, the lower the prices will eventually be.
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Comments:
Aha!
I saw you over at the mobileread forum and was wondering which story you would pick up on…^^
Now I know…:-)
On a more serious note…
I think the Software of the Iliad is going to come along ok. It’ll take some time, but it’ll work. Also, if iRex manages to make it’s SDK or dev. information available soon, then the Linux-cracks out there will make their own viewers and those are usually very good and fast. How about dotreader? Could it be ported to the Linux Platform on the Iliad easily? Time will show.
I’ve received an invite now and have ordered the Iliad. If there are no further delays, my device should arrive sometime during the first two weeks of July.
You can rest assured that i’ll provide what information and visual feedback I can either here or at the mobileread forums (or both).
Hey, Roland, it’s flattering for my wanderings to have an audience
Kudoos to Henry the Cat for sharing info, and I hope you’ll do the same at both MR and the TeleBlog (friendly hint to Henry as well). Thanks!
You asked about dotReader. Well, nothing has changed since Mark “dotGuy” Carey spoke out. dotReader on the iLiad would run great; same for similar machines. Dev work is in linux–the favorite OS among OSoft’s geeks by far. A customized port would be a smart move.
Cheers,
David
Talking of…I transported your message about open reader to Jinke and they told me that they’d contact you “at the right time” which I guess is after the device is finalized (it runs linux, but apparently their distributors around the planet have a lot of changes in mind…probably to lock the devie down…).
Here’s the original quote from Jinke:
“About V2,we’re still discussing the business cooperation with the local companies and partners. But the process is slower than we expected, because it relates to many issues, such as format, language, interface, content supply and after-sale service etc.
This week we’ll begin to sell the sample of V2 for evaluation to our agents and collaborators who have already paid for it. For the sample quantities are limited, our leader said that we can’t reach your demand of V2 for the moment.
The battery life of V8 and V2 are the same. But the battery capacitance of V2 is more than V8.
Thank you for forwarding the message of David Rothman to us,we’ll contact him in the right time.”
Thanks, Roland. OpenReader is eager to be helpful to all hardware companies and we’d love to hear from Jinke or anyone else. And I know OSoft feels the same about its dotReader. I really appreciated your forwarding the msg., and meanwhile the very best of luck in catching up with your own unit from Jinke. David
now that’s a new one…^^
that spam looks like it’s trying to use repetition as a sort of unsubtle method of imprinting the names of two (already well known products into our memories…as though anyone would do more than glance at the first word…tsts..honestly…those spammers should learn their jobs before starting to fool around…I certainly hope nobody pays sorry loser like that money…
Actually, Roland, I hope that the spammers’ customers are Mafia types, pay the sleazes a lot, and then murder ‘em when no results come. Meanwhile I’ve done done a hit job on the spam you mention–both with a delete and with the IP blacklist. Thanks. David
In my Librie DJVU reader (which unfortunately nobody has improved after I sit my ass on the machine breaking it) I incorporated a bash script with precalculation of the next page, and it should be expected that any pdf reader does it too. They can just extract the pages with a pstool utility and precalculate the ones they need.
Good News Everyone!
* iLiad shipments about to start: The iLiad will be shipping to customers that have already placed the orders during the first week of July, so depending where you live in Europe, you may expect your iLiad either in the first or in the second week of July. We are doing our best to ship it to you ASAP.
* iRex shop opens to US customers in July: iRex Technologies have recently received the electronics approvation to ship goods to US and Canada. In fact the iRex Shop will be taking orders from selected business to business customers by July 1st.
* Software release V2.4: iLiad Shipments will be using version 2.4 which improves PC USB performance, and brings several bug fixes. The iLiad hardware and design is 100% complete and your iLiad functionality will be upgraded in the coming months via software releases.
* The next software release (v2.5) will take place some time in July or August and will bring Hotspot support, Apabi format support (asia only) and other software improvements.
I’m not sure whether I belive it yet, but all the preorderes got a mail with this content…looks good so far.
@everyone
I don’t even have my Iliad yet, but already I’m looking for ways to make it better…^^
I have this wild idea, that next to books I could also read news on the Iliad. Now I could of course go official and buy newspapers from the IDS the way iRex and it’s partners want me to.
I’m not really all that fond of newspapers however since they contain 97.5% stuff i’m not the least bit interested in.
I know that there are many RSS feeds out there that provide lots of up-to-date news on almost all topics anyone could wish for (and some nobody should wish for).
All I need is a fast and easy way to pack those news I want into a HTML (or maybe PDF if HTML doesn’t work) file that is constantly updated from my RSS newsfeeds. This file can then simply be pulled onto the Iliad when I feel like it.
Any ideas on how to do this?
And please keep in mind that i’m no programmer…^^
Thanks.
Thanks, as usual, Roland! Sorry, I meant to post this earlier but got distracted by some other here-and-now stuff. – David
RSS 2 PDF article
http://www.pdfzone.com/article2/0,1895,1851563,00.asp
Thanks!
It isn’t as good as it could be, (you just get a list of headlines rather than a more newspaper-style file) but it works ok and will do for the moment…^^
re: RSS
Sony is promising this functionality in their Conenct software.
I’m a bit surprised that IRex did not implement it.
This is yet another proof that harware vendors should open up their APIs for 3rd parties because they simply cannot provide sufficient quality software — and even if they could (in the best case) it’s always better for the customer to have the freedom of choice.
well…iRex is promising to provide access…
let me put up a quote:
“About the viewer: We’ll be issuing a development pack where everyone will be able to develop their own viewer. They will be able to put it on the device and use it. Catch: it won’t be formally supported. However, if a viewer is particularly good, we can take it up in the standard distribution, if the writer agrees.
Exact implementation is still being discussed, but this is the general approach. We want to make the system as open as possible for users.”
I don’t know whether they’ll keep their word, but if they do it sounds good enough for me.