Reading Ebooks on an iPod

DBTC

The iPod does not have an ebook-specific reader or just a text format good for reading ebooks.

It's unfortunate because the style and capabilities of iPods make them perfect for such functions.  Sure, you can use the iPod as a portable hard drive to read ebooks using any PC.  But if you want to use the iPod itself as an ebook reader, it's certainly possible.

Reading ebooks on an iPod consists of just copying the contents of an ebook into iPod Notes and scrolling through multiple notes in order to read the ebook.  But there are limitations.

Each Note can hold no more than 4012 characters.  If an iPod Note contains more, it will still load, but only the first 4012 characters will be displayed.  You may see other references mentioning a 4096 (4 kB) character limit.  Looking at the results from an actual cut-and-paste experiment, the limit is really 4012.

The iPod can hold no more than 1000 Notes.  If you load more, only the first 1000 will be displayed.

Assuming each Note is packed to capacity, that's 4,012,000 characters.  So any given iPod can hold roughly 2,467 pages of printed text, or enough for eight medium sized books.

To summarize these issues with reading ebooks on an iPod:

Problem 1:  To read ebooks on an iPod screen, the best place is to copy plain text information into iPod Notes.  Each Note on the iPod can hold no more than 4012 characters.

Solution 1:  Each ebook much be broken up into a multi-Note format.  iPod Notes use a very simple HTML-derived markup language.  For short stories, it's easy to create the Note-to-Note links yourself.  For longer stories, save yourself the pain by automating this process.

Problem 2:  iPods can only hold a few books before running out of available Notes spaces.

Solution 2:  Keep your ebook collection on your PC and just copy books to and from the iPod as needed.  This is a good solution anyway as iPod Notes aren't backed up anywhere (even from the new backup feature in iTunes 7).

With all that said, here's how to place and read an ebook on your iPod:

1.)  Get an ebook.  Make sure it's in "plain text" format.  Don't spend money unless you have to.  There are plenty of free ebook libraries all over the Internet.  I've compiled a list to get you started: www.andybrain.com/archive/journey_to_the_center_of_an_ebook.htm

2.)  Enable Notes access on your iPod by checking Enable Disk Use in iTunes.  This feature (turned off by default), allows you to use your PC to browse to your iPod, allowing you to copy files directly to the device.  For more instructions and detail, see this link: Using Your iPod as a Storage Drive

3.)  Convert your ebook to a format supported by iPod Notes.  Use this iPod ebook creator service to upload your plain text ebook and convert it into an iPod readable format: www.ambience.sk/ipod-ebook-creator/ipod-book-notes-text-conversion.php

Take the files contained within the resulting ZIP file and place them into a new folder within your iPod's Notes folder.  (To do this, make sure you've completed Step #2 above.  Then browse to your iPod using your PC.  You should see a Notes folder.  Placing all the ZIP files within a newly created subfolder isn't required, but makes navigation much easier and faster.

4.)  Read it.

After disconnecting your iPod from your PC, open Extras -> Notes on your iPod.  You should see the folder you created in the previous step.

Click to view the folder and you should see the documents you moved there, all numbered like mydocument001, mydocument002, etc.  Start with the first document.  You'll see backward and forward arrows at the top and bottom of the Notes.

Selecting with the center button allows you to page back and forth between Notes.

The actual iPod ebook reading process consists of scrolling slowly through the Note as you read it, then clicking on the Next Note Page arrow at the end of the document.

Be aware that hitting the Menu button acts like a "previous page" function.  So if you read, for example, ten Notes worth of linked text, you'll have to hit the Menu button ten times in order to get back to the Extras -> Notes section.

Depending on how much you've read, it may be easier and faster just to reboot your iPod when you're done.  (There is a way to programmatically clear this stored Notes history, but the converter mentioned above doesn't use it.)

The iPod ebook creator mentioned above will do the trick.  If you want a more extensive management system, or want something installed locally, here are some options.  Each program will allow you to keep track on many ebooks on your PC, giving you the option to "activate" just the ones you want for iPod reading.

Mac OS: Book2Pod

Windows OS: iPodLibrary  A Windows program which manages e-books and documents on your iPod.  

iPodLibrary Features

    * Add and remove e-books and documents from your iPod.
    * Imports from most major e-book formats, (.LIT .PDF .HTML .TXT)
    * Gets around the 1000 note limit.
    * Allows you to save your position in each book.
    * Keeps all data on iPod, so you as long as you have iPodLibrary installed on all the computers you use you can manage your books 
	  wherever you are.

Please note - iPodLibrary only works with 3rd Gen (and above) iPods. Apart from iPod Shuffles obviously!

To Import an Ebook

    1. Click the 'Import eBook' menu button.
    2. Select an e-book file to import
    3. Select the title you want to appear in the library and on iPod.
    4. Then hit 'Import'.

Your e-book will be put into the main Notes folder on iPod, with the title you specified. It is broken up into 'chapters'.

These are not the actual book chapters, but because each note can only be 4 kb, the book has to be broken up into pieces 
(which we will call 'Chapters') 

To check your book was imported into iPodLibrary, click back to the 'iPod Library' screen. Your book will appear in the list.

From here you can update your books and remove them.

Setting a book to inactive means that the book will not count towards the 1000 note limit, but you will not be able to view it on iPod.

This means you could have 100 books installed, but at any point in time only some can be enabled.

You can also specify which chapter you are currently up to.

Keeping this up to date means iPod has to load fewer notes and makes it easier and quicker for you to find your place again.

To help you remember the chapter you last read, click the '[Preview]' link underneath the chapter combo box.

This will display the first 500 characters of the selected chapter.

Tips for Book Reading on the iPod

Each chapter contains a link to the next chapter, so it possible to simply read to the end of each chapter and hit the 'Next' link. 

However, this means the hard drive will spool up each time, which takes a while and drains the batteries. What I have found to be the 
best is load a chapter, then hit the 'Next' link at the top of the the page for 10 chapters while the drive is still spinning.

Then go back to the first chapter you want to read, and read the ten chapters using the 'Next' links at the bottom of each chapter.

As they are already loaded the hard drive won't need to spool each time.

One annoying thing about the note reader on the iPod is that hitting the back (menu) button takes you back to the last note you viewed, 
not the main Notes folder. While this is fine most of the time, after reading 10 chapters it means you have to go back through each of 
the 10 chapters to get back to the menu. I have found it best to just hit the back (menu) button lots of times and just wait for it to 
sort itself out!

Using this process, we can read text and ebooks on any iPod with a display screen.  The process, unfortunately, requires a bit more hassle than it should.

Until Apple decides to remedy this with proper ebook support and features like font adjustment and auto-scrolling, we can make do.

More Information

Learn more about the iPod Notes markup language.

Also see user comments at the bottom of the second page for code on compiling your own iPod ebook extractor: iPod Notes: Above and Beyond

Learn about "Building Interactive iPod Experiences."  While the article briefly mentions ebooks, it talks in more detail about the iPod's markup language to run interactive presentations incorporating pictures, sounds and videos.

Mac users may be interested in Text2iPod X, a Mac-only application that copies entire ebooks into iPod contacts, apparently without size limitations.  While this is great, I didn't include it in the main article because:

  1. I wasn't able to test it.
  2. I'd like my "ebooks on iPod" solution to work on all systems.

Here's the link: Text2iPod X

For more from DBTC, visit: www.andybrain.com
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