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Falling asleep with a good iBook
Gather 'round, kids and Grandpa Dave will tell you a story. Back when I was your age, "iBooks" were computers, not software. They were brightly colored, had plastic handles and resembled a Barbie purse. Plus, you could take a nap beneath one, as Flickr user Pinot Dita demonstrates. You can contribute to our Flickr pool here. We'd love to see your photos.
David Sparks releases Email field guide for iPad
Blogger, author and all-around nice guy David Sparks has just announced the release of the fourth in his best-selling series of MacSparky Field Guides. The latest is a deep dive into the world of email -- the Email Field Guide (US$9.99) is an exhaustive look at email and the inbox as an incredible problem for so many people. By exhaustive, I mean that this iBooks masterpiece is loaded with information. It's over 46,000 words in length (just under one NaNoWriMo novel long), has eight audio interviews, 36 detailed screencasts totaling almost 90 minutes in length and a lot more material to get your email problem under control. Sparks doesn't just talk to the Apple cognescenti about email in his interviews; he's also nabbed such folks as actress/comedian Aisha Tyler and director and writer David Wain to lend their perspectives (and humor) on taming the inbox. The 1.15 GB iBook looks like it's going to be an instant classic, and we hope to have a full review of it soon.
Apple's homepage circa 2001 shows us how far we've come
It's always fun to take a look back at the websites of yesteryear just to get a bit of perspective, and there may be no better example of this than Apple's homepage from 2001. The highlight of the site is a fancy graphic showing off the then-new iBook. The laptop was capable of interfacing with a whole bunch of state-of-the-art devices such as CD players, digital cameras and camcorders, PDAs and Apple's own UFO-shaped AirPort. Of course, today, all the tasks performed by those specialized devices can be accomplished with the iPhone in your pocket. Hell, even the iBook itself pales in comparison to your handy smartphone, but that doesn't mean we wouldn't want to still have one around, just for nostalgia's sake.
Apple adds free iBook offer to Apple Store app
At the beginning of August, Apple launched a new free-content program in their Apple Store app, kicking things off with a free download of Color Zen. Today the latest piece of free content has been released, and it should make parents of small children very happy. The over-the-air update allows users to download Margaret Wise Brown's children's book Away in My Airplane as a free iBook. Apple retail employees were told about the free book release this morning in a note informing them to use the release to promote iBooks and the iBookstore with customers in their stores. The book offer expires on August 28th, and is only available in the United States, United Kingdom, France, Italy and Sweden according to a source for 9to5mac.com. iBooks was announced as a major part of the upcoming OS X Mavericks release at this past June's WWDC event. It is clear that Apple is working hard to get users familiar with the app before it officially becomes a new addition to their Macs in the fall.
TUAW Bookshelf: Hello iPad Tips & Tricks
Longtime developer of training apps and books Saied Ghaffari's It's About Time LLC has a new title out in the iBookstore: Hello iPad Tips & Tricks (US$0.99). Following up on the company's popular Hello Mountain Lion Tips, Tricks & Secrets e-book, this enhanced electronic book collects more than 50 iPad tips and tricks into one fun-to-read tome. As with its OS X Mountain Lion counterpart, this iBook contains a number of annotated screenshots and several videos along with short and sweet descriptions of the tips you'll want to learn. These books always surprise and delight me -- I use my Mac and iPad every day, all day, and I never fail to learn some new tricks that I didn't know about previously. For example, I was totally unaware that tapping and holding the Compose New Email button in Mail.app would show a list of saved draft messages. Each tip displays the icon of the application you're using, the description of the tip and the annotated screenshot. The tips are organized primarily by the application -- for example, there is a section of home screen tips, Safari tips, Messages tips and a large group of keyboard shortcut tips. Hello iPad Tips & Tricks is a perfect gift for someone who is relatively new to the iPad. Although the iBookstore doesn't appear to allow gifting of books for friends, you can always send them a link to buy it. And while you're at it, be sure to pick up a copy for yourself -- you're sure to learn at least a few great tips you never knew.
TUAW Bookshelf: iPod Evolution
The iPod is the member of the Apple family that is overshadowed by the newer, more popular kids on the block. Yet it was the iPod that was the "gateway drug" for many of today's Apple fans, opening the eyes of a generation to how consumer electronics should be built and used. Author, blogger and early morning podcaster Tim Chaten has just published an iBook that celebrates the history and future of Apple's media consumption device. iPod Evolution (US$7.99 launch price, regular price $9.99) is currently available for pre-order and will be available for download on January 31, 2013 -- the first day of Macworld/iWorld. In iPod Evolution, Chaten explores the life cycle of the iPod by looking at the devices from a number of different viewpoints: hardware, software, marketing, fitness, accessories, and "beyond Apple" (the MFi program and hardware/software mods). The hardware evolution of the various models of iPod make up the first part of the book. Chaten does his best to make the descriptions of the changes in iPod hardware over the years as interesting as possible. For each device, there are charts showing storage capacities for different generations; the size, weigh, and materials making up each generation; a description of the battery life; screen type, depth, and resolution; the case colors available (where applicable) and the physical interface used to interact with the device. %Gallery-177340% Chaten includes a number of photographs in this section, making it easy for the reader to discern the differences between models. That's important for the reader who may have picked up the book in order to learn more about a vintage iPod, especially one of those ancient Classics from the early 2000's. Each chapter of the book begins with a nice dark gray header page that includes a stylized image of an iPod of one type or another. The book itself is in a two-column landscape orientation that's easy to navigate through. Chaten often puts the second column to good use by including a photo. He notes that he'll be providing a free update to the book soon, adding videos and more photos. There were a few chapters that I thought were outstanding. Chapter 8, on generational similarities, points out that the first generations of most iPod devices were pure and unsullied, the third generations were market failures, and the most recent generations are refined both in hardware and software. Chaten points out a little-known mode in Chapter 9 -- diagnostic mode -- that all non-iOS iPods with a screen can be booted into. It's a useful way of finding out more about your device as well as helping in troubleshooting. While many Apple devices including the iPod touch can easily export screenshots, that's not the case with the iPod classic, mini (remember it?), and nano. As such, it's necessary for authors to take actual photographs of the device screens with a camera. While most of the screenshots are well done, some of the images taken off of iPod classic screens are fuzzy and show some keystone effect. Having had the same issue when publishing an iPod book in the mid-2000s, I know that Chaten did the best possible job getting those screenshots. Some other topics are covered that I don't think I've seen documented anywhere else. For example, the FM radio built into the fifth, sixth, and seventh generation iPod nano is a little-known tool that is really pretty impressive -- especially when you realize that it will display song, artist and station info for those stations that support Radio Data System. Especially effective in the latter part of iPod Evolution is the use of galleries. Tapping on these iBook widgets takes you through a virtual slideshow made up of several images. It's a great way to see related screenshots one after another, and I wish that Chaten had chosen to use them throughout the book, particularly in early chapters where he sometimes drops a few screenshots on a few pages where one gallery would provide a much easier way to view those images. His last chapter reminds the reader that the iPod was the device that taught Apple many things, specifically in the realm of pricing and distribution. Without the iPod's impact on the public psyche and Apple's corporate culture, newer products like the iPhone and iPad may never have become the successful icons we see today. Even the book's title, iPod Evolution, is a subtle reminder that many of Apple's current products include a bit of iPod DNA in their design and construction. All in all, iPod Evolution is a great resource for anyone who owns or collects iPods, or who is interested in the history of this now relatively neglected Apple family member. Chaten writes in a friendly, conversational style that is very readable. While the book may not appeal to everyone, iPod Evolution is certainly the definitive history and reference for the iPod family.
Apple ordered to pay settlement in Chinese App Store copyright case
Imagine you're an author and you find out that someone has been selling your books on the App Store without your consent -- and, worse, you don't see a dime of the profits. That's what happened to a group of eight writers in China, and a court there has decided that Apple owes them compensation, according to The Wall Street Journal. While the copyright-infringing apps weren't actually sold by Apple, the court found that the company was responsible for allowing them onto the store in the first place. As a result, the company must pay a total of 1.03 million Chinese yuan (about US$165,000) to the writers. When the suit was first filed back in February of this year the plaintifs had requested 23 million yuan ($3.65 million) in damages. The judgment in this case was handed down by the same court that ordered Apple to pay 530,000 yuan ($84,990) to a publisher in September after unlicensed versions of its encyclopedias appeared on the App Store. [Via Cult of Mac]
Meet Heckerty, well-known British children's story, makes its way to the iPad
Meet Heckerty is a delightful British children's story starring Heckerty, a "zany, 409-year-old, upside-down-on-her-broomstick, green-faced witch," and her sidekick cat Zanzibar. The traditional story has made its way to the iPad with a wonderful adaptation that takes advantage of the interactivity offered by Apple's tablet device. Children can choose to read the book themselves or have the voice of Jan Ziff read the story to them. Each page is filled with at least one tappable element that'll jump, move or make a noise when your child touches it. The storytelling is outstanding and the story is the perfect length for the younger set who can only sit still for a short period of time. My children loved the iPad storybook, and there's little doubt that Meet Heckerty sets a high standard for other children's books to follow. We got a chance to speak to Jan Ziff and Allan Davidson, the husband and wife team that brought the Heckerty series to the iPad. We asked them about their experience in adapting the popular children's story to the iPad and their future plans for the series. You can read the interview below. You can also find out more about Heckerty on her website. The Meet Heckerty app is available from iTunes for 99-cents. At that price, it's a must-have for parents with young children. Q: One the first things I noticed about the book is its excellent storytelling. Can you tell me a little bit more about the Heckerty story and the storyteller behind the app? A: The Heckerty stories do have a "secret sauce" - it's the great British oral storytelling tradition that goes all the way back to The Canterbury Tales through Alice in Wonderland to Beatrix Potter and Winnie the Pooh, and recently to Harry Potter. Ann Rachlin created the Heckerty stories and refined them for many years in her renowned Fun With Music classes in London. Jan really was the original Fun With Music student, along with her two siblings, and often served as a test audience for ideas that were later integrated into Fun With Music, and became part of Ann's many records and books for 2-9 year-olds. That's where Jan learned to combine words with the rhythms of music, which you may not always hear but is definitely part of the what creates Heckerty's magic. And Ann's wonderful storytelling skills made all the difference as we developed and recorded the stories for this series. But to your question - it was in late in 2010 that Ann asked us whether we thought Heckerty could be brought to life on an iPad or iPhone. We loved the idea, did some research, thought about it and decided to do it. It's been a fascinating ride with all kinds of unexpected turns and plot twists but Heckerty's now out the door and everybody that's seen the app so far has loved it, something we've all found tremendously rewarding! Q: Did you use iBooks Author to develop the book? If so, can you summarize your experience with the tool? If not, how did you bring the book from printed pages to digital format? A: No, we didn't use iBooks Author for several reasons - first, it wasn't available when we launched, second, even though iOS was the dominant and most creative platform, it was clear that there would be other competing operating systems and that we'd need to serve them. That's how we ended up using Flash for this project. And Flash turned out to have been a great decision - it let us go straight from the original text and Ann's storytelling to the "living" graphics and child-friendly form factor that distinguish the iPhone and iPad and other mobile devices. We could really bring out the rich interactivity and audio that these devices are so perfectly suited to. From a production and technical perspective, we had to shorten and tweak them so that they'd work well, then let Colin and Dave, our extraordinary programmer and animator team do their magic with the images, design and the audio we had developed -- the collaboration turned into Meet Heckerty and additional stories that are already in production. Q: As someone who now has experience with both traditional and digital media, what do you think of the iPad? Will it replace or complement printed books? A: We think the iPad is arguably the most exciting development in the history of personal computing. From its form factor, the screen resolution and the superb audio in the latest version, the iPad is changing the way stories can be told and the way they are told. Will the iPad and similar devices completely replace the printed book? We don't think so but it will continue to rapidly take over many of the functions that many print products like books, magazines and newspapers have traditionally provided. And the reason is simple, we think - where the iPad offers a substantially better experience, people will naturally gravitate to it, and over time, the capabilities of the iPad will both grow rapidly and the cost will drop dramatically. There will always be people who want a book, who enjoy the smell and the heft of a book, and love to see rows of spines on shelves. And then there are the voracious readers who could never take 12 printed books on vacation with them, but who can easily take an iPad - each sees different benefits in the book experience, each for different reasons. We also believe that the iPad is changing the way stories are told. And that rather than replacing or even complimenting printed books, the iPad and similar devices will have material written and produced for them, bringing the best of the story and leveraging the strength of the device to better tell that story .... that's what we've tried to do with Heckerty. Q: What was your biggest challenge in producing the iPad version of the Heckerty story? Did you have to modify the storyline (make it longer or shorter, for example) to accommodate the digital reading experience? A: We shortened and tightened the story to suit the iPad and how kids use the devices - the most pleasant surprise was how well-suited the Heckerty stories turned out to be for the iPad and iPhone - the biggest challenge on from a story perspective was letting the story's strengths come through and let the iPad make each one a unique experience. Q: Do you have plans to bring additional titles to the iPad? A: Absolutely!! Several stories are already in production - the next one to appear will be "Heckerty Cook" (that's the working title). Let's say that Heckerty's cooking skills and menus leave a lot to be desired ... and her cousins decide to fix the problem. Until you see the story, we'll leave the ingredients of the story to your imagination, but we can tell you that we still break down laughing every time we come to some of the scenes as we work on them! Hopefully, you and your audience will have time to talk about Heckerty again once Heckerty Cook ships!
Hello iPhoto for iPad & iPhone is an amazing new way to learn
If there's one thing about iPhoto for iPad and iPhone that I've never been too happy with, it's that the apps aren't exactly self-explanatory and Apple doesn't provide much in terms of an onboard guided tour. Long-time Apple developer and publisher Saied Ghaffari has just published a new iBook titled Hello iPhoto for iPad & iPhone (US$1.99) that provides a unique way of learning the tricks of iPhoto for your iOS device. I had the opportunity to talk with Saied recently about the book, which was created in iBooks Author and has been featured by Apple in the iBookstore. He's no newcomer to the how-to book market, having created the popular "It's About Time: Learn the Switch to Mac" application that led a generation of switchers to the OS X platform. That app made it into special bundles with Parallels Desktop as well, providing a way for switchers to painlessly make the way between Windows and OS X. Times change, and now Saied has embraced iBooks Author and created a helpful companion to the iOS version of iPhoto. Once purchased and downloaded to your iPad, the book appears on the shelf in iBooks. With a tap, it opens to a gorgeous photo of the Grand Canyon -- an image repeated on other chapter headings. In the lower left corner is a small thumbnail that opens a launch page when tapped. %Gallery-155531% The launch page provides a portal to learning a bit about iPhoto and iTunes on your Mac, iPhoto on your iPad, or iPhoto on your iPhone. Tapping any one of the images on the launch page takes you right into that specific book chapter. Going to the iPad chapter brings up three more images, any one of which can be triggered with a "tap to learn." The main topics are an Overview of iPhoto, Browsing & Sharing, and Editing. If I select Browsing & Sharing, for example, I see a more focused page with descriptions of two lessons -- one for Browsing, one for Sharing. With a tap on either description, I'm into the lesson. Once you're at this level, the document is readable in the usual "swipe to turn a page" manner. This is where Saied's experience in computer-based training really shines. Through the placement of small "magnifying lenses" on the page, your eye is drawn to a feature of iPhoto that you're going to learn about. Saied then takes you through a succinct written description of the feature to accompany the images. To be honest with you, I pretty much ignored iPhoto for iOS until I read Hello iPhoto. In the short amount of time that it took for me to go through the book, I was able to pick up a lot of hints and tips about iPhoto for iOS that I wasn't previously aware of. I feel that the $2 price tag of the book is a perfect price point for Hello iPhoto, as it definitely provided much more value in terms of a learning experience. If you have purchased iPhoto for iOS, but still find yourself not using the app all that much, you owe it to yourself to buy Hello iPhoto. It will get you up to speed on iPhoto in no time at all.
Apple iBooks 2 textbooks video walkthrough and screenshots (hands-on)
We had a few minutes to browse through iBooks 2 textbooks following Apple's press conference this morning, but now we have a fully-loaded iPad 2 to play with, so we decided to spend some more time getting educated in the comfort of our in-house studio. You already had a chance to get familiar with the new app and associated media earlier today, so this time it's all about the visuals. Browse through the galley below as we explore Life on Earth before taking a front seat in Biology and getting our hands dirty with Frog Dissection. And if you're feeling brave, there's a juicy video walkthrough just past the break.
Apple launches iBooks 2 e-Textbook platform (video)
We're here at Apple's education-flavored event at the Guggenheim museum in New York City. Phil Schiller has just taken to the stage and announced the first half of Apple's platform that's going to "reinvent the textbook:" iBooks 2. Saying that there were 1.5 million iPads currently in use in Education (using 20,000 specific apps), the revamped book-stand now includes education-specific features to help the budding students of the world. You'll be able to paw through content, stopping to flick through detailed 3D animated models of elements within, access video and definitions without leaving the page. VP of Productivity Applications, Roger Rosner said that "Clearly, no printed book can compete with this:" given the constantly-updated data available, that's kinda obvious. Still, you'll be able to read in a text-heavy portrait or picture-biased landscape mode and there's also the option to have random pop-quizzes appear to keep you on your toes. Annotations is an integral part of the system: you can add stickies to individual pages and aggregate them into virtual 3 x 5-inch note-cards for revision during finals. You'll also get the same purchase, download and re-download rights you enjoy in the company's other stores. The company's partnered (initially) with textbook makers Pearson, McGraw Hill and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, as the trio are responsible for 90 percent of all textbooks sold -- as well as DK and the E.O. Wilson Foundation. Phil was gushing, saying that he couldn't "overemphasize the importance of these partners working with us." Pearson's High School Science, Biology, DK's Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Life, Natural History Insects, Animals and My First ABC as well as the first two chapters of E.O. Wilson's Life on Earth will be available at launch -- the latter is free. You'll be able to download iBooks 2 from the app store free of charge, whilst textbooks themselves will cost $14.99 or less : a far cry from the $80 dead-tree textbooks we shelled out for in college. Update: We've got a hands-on up live from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City!
Apple faces trademark infringement lawsuit over the use of iBooks
Apple is facing yet another trademark infringement lawsuit. This time the company must defend its use of the term iBooks. Apple is being sued by New York publisher John T. Colby who bought Byron Preiss Visual Productions and Ibooks, Inc during a Chapter 7 Bankruptcy proceeding back in 2006. These assets became available when founder Byron Preiss died unexpectedly in a car crash. Ibooks, Inc began selling books in September 1999 and sold over a thousand books under the Ibooks name. Colby claims Apple's use of the term will render his company's use of Ibooks and Ipicturebooks brand virtually worthless. He also points out that, though Apple owns the trademark for ibook and sold iBook computers, the Cupertino company never used the term in book sales until the iPad debuted in early 2010.
TenFourFox brings Firefox 4 to PPC Macs
Firefox 4 received quite a bit of fanfare when it finally rolled out of beta. Unfortunately for some Mac users, Mozilla decided to drop support for PowerPC processors and therefore Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger from FF4, meaning that G3, G4 and G5 users were left out in the cold. If you're one of these users lovingly still using PPC Macs, the folks behind the Mac Classic browser, Classilla, have come to your rescue and brought Firefox 4, with nearly all the trimmings, to the now discarded Mac architecture. TenFourFox takes code from Firefox 4 and tunes it for OS X 10.4 (compatible with 10.5) and the PPC-architecture. In fact, TenFourFox is offered in hand-tuned builds for each PPC processor: the G3, the G4/7400 and /7450 and, of course, the G5. With the upgrade from Firefox 3.6, you get all the JavaScript speed improvements that Mozilla rolled into Firefox 4, making it by far the fastest browser available for the PPC-Mac. You'll also get WebM video support, access to most of the Firefox 4 add-ons and, of course, HTML5 and CSS3 support. If you're using a perfectly decent and still loved PPC Mac, now is the time to furnish it with a modern browser and extend its life on the Web for years to come. [via MacStories]
Have an old iBook? Turn it into an iPad case
Gary Katz is at it again, this time gutting an old iBook and turning it into an iPad case. To create this one-of-a-kind case, Katz gutted the body of the iBook, then used a Dremel to remove anything left inside that was sharp or could put pressure on the iPad's glass screen. Next he fastened some "soft fuzzy material" inside to line the case and removed the opaque Apple logo so that you could see the iPad's screen through it. As you can see from the video below, the Apple logo's space can be quite a head trip in this case if you leave something running on the iPad's screen. Sure, it might be a lot of work for an iPad case, but you can bet this has to be one of the stronger cases out there. Those old iBooks were built like bomb shelters. I literally dropped a 5-pound weight on mine one time, and there was hardly any damage to it, just a black smudge from the weight. Katz has made some other pretty cool Mac-related mods in the past, including this "antique" iPad case and this iPhone shoe box theater.
Tennessee's Webb School makes iPads mandatory, still looks down on note-passing
We've seen the Kindle DX fail as a textbook alternative, but the iPad marches ever onward as a pioneer of wireless education. Or so it seems, anyway. This time the tablet has set its sights on a private school in Knoxville, TN, where all students from fourth to 12th grade will be required to carry iPads starting this August. Webb School students can either provide their own slate or lease a WiFi-only model for $20 a month. Just like administrators at Seton Hill University, the folks at Webb School see the iPad as an eventual replacement for traditional textbooks, as well as a tool for interactive learning. We've voiced our skepticism about the in-school iPad trend before, and while we still wonder just how effective the devices might be in the classroom, we're interested to see how this thing turns out. You know, we love the Oregon Trail and everything, but don't today's students deserve to see more than pixelated trailblazers dying of digital diphtheria? [Thanks, Jordan]
Apple developing iNewsstand to support iBooks?
Apple has been doing what it can to bring publications of a more periodical nature to the iPad and other iDevices, but hasn't exactly offered a stunning portfolio of papers and such. That's set to change according to a Bloomberg report citing the ever popular people "familiar with the matter," indicating that Apple is currently building partnerships with various parties to develop pricing strategies to bring that content to consumers. This will supposedly be presented through a new storefront especially dedicated to periodical content, which could be launching as soon as a few months from now -- though there is also speculation that Apple will sit on it until the launch of a next-gen iPad. There are a number of roadblocks, including an apparent resistance from Apple to release the specific sales metrics that publishers want to tailor their content. Oh, and there's the traditional 30 percent cut of revenue rubbing some the wrong way. Will Apple succeed in bringing all these pubs together? It's certainly succeeded at herding the music industry...
myFry: Stephen Fry's second autobiography becomes an interactive app
I've been following actor, all around wit, and Apple enthusiast Stephen Fry's career since I saw him play the wonderfully droll and brilliant butler, Jeeves in the English TV series Jeeves and Wooster back in the early 90's. Hugh Laurie, probably better known as Dr. House, played Bertie Wooster over the four seasons of tales from the P.G. Wodehouse's books. Since (and before) then he's done an amazing amount of work, from appearing in V for Vendetta to narrating the English versions of the Harry Potter Audiobooks books. The second volume of his autobiography entitled: The Fry Chronicles has been released in England as a hardcover book (UK£20.00), AudioBook, iBook (£12.99) and an iPhone app titled myFry (£7.99) in the British iTunes store. It's not yet available in the US store. The digital versions are enhanced with seven videos. The myFry app looks quite intriguing. Instead of linearity, (which is so passé) these days Fry opted for a color wheel that can take you to any themed section of the book where you can read sections of that theme. So the book isn't meant to be read in any particular order, at least on the iPhone. Without seeing it, (being a bloody Yank), I can see this working, since Fry's writing is quite anecdotal and randomly breaking it up might be just the thing. I can't wait to get my hands on it. [via 9to5 Mac]
Apple looking to hire iBookstore marketing manager
Apple has posted a new job listing looking for a marketing manager specifically for the iBookstore. The listing seeks an experienced business marketer "to drive awareness and sales of iBooks through co-marketing programs with publishers and authors, strategic partnerships, and via online and direct marketing tactics." It seems like a lot of the position will be self-driven, as whoever's chosen will be asked to come up with some interesting schemes to push iBook sales, both with publishers, and even across the other divisions of iTunes (buy an iBook, get an iTunes download free?). But the bottom line is of course sales -- Apple wants someone to push iBooks, specifically in the US. More power to them, we say. Apple has some staunch competitors in terms of book sales -- while I'd consider the iPad a much better e-reader than Amazon's Kindle, I've actually purchased more books from the Kindle store just because I feel it's a better experience. Maybe with someone in charge of getting readers into the iBookstore, we'll see more reasons to stick with Apple's digital editions rather than going elsewhere. [via Macsimum News]
A quick tutorial on how to read PDF-formatted ebooks in iBooks
When me and my fellow TUAW bloggers Erica Sadun and Mike Grothaus recently had our collaborative effort "Taking Your iPad to the Max" published by Apress in both ebook and printed format, I wanted to make sure that I had a copy of the book on my iPad so I could show friends and prospective buyers examples of the content in the book. The ebook comes in a PDF format, but I wanted to read it in the iBooks app since it does such a wonderful job of displaying the printed word. Was I going to have to convert the PDF file to the app's native EPUB format before I'd be able to read it in iBooks? Fortunately, no. Apple's recent update to iBooks added the ability to read PDF documents natively. The only thing you really need to do in order to read any PDF in iBooks is to move it to the iPad, and that can be easily done in iTunes: Connect your iPad to your Mac or PC. Drag the PDF to the Books icon in your iTunes Library, and drop it. Note that you can edit the name and author(s) of the book if you don't like the way the file name is displayed. Click your iPad or iPhone in the Devices list, then click the Books tab. Make sure that the book title box is checked and that Sync Books is also checked. Click the Sync button. The sync should go very quickly. Most PDF-based ebooks are relatively small, and even over the somewhat pokey USB 2.0 sync connection, it will move to your iPad in less than a minute. What's interesting is that a new "PDFs" button appears on your iBooks bookshelf, and a tap displays all PDF documents that are in your library. While the PDFs don't have the nice side-by-side view in landscape orientation, they can be searched and bookmarked in the same manner as EPUBs. By the way, expect to see the TUAW-labeled "Taking Your iPad to the Max" in your local bookstore soon!
Apple releases iTunes 9.2.1 and iBooks 1.1.1, fixes galore promised
Merely days after iTunes 9.2 hit the pipes in order to enable iPhone 4 syncing, Apple's software team has pushed out the first "minor" update since with 9.2.1. Truth be told, the list of changes, fixes and tweaks is rather lengthy for a simple point-point update, with this one allowing users to organize apps on the iOS 4 home screens into folders using iTunes, organize and sync PDF documents as books, etc. As for fixes? For starters, it'll "disable older versions of some incompatible third-party plug-ins" (thanks?), while also addressing "minor issues with dragging and dropping items, a performance issue when first syncing to some devices with iTunes 9.2" and other general speed issues that users were reporting. As for iBooks 1.1.1, that one still seems to be propagating through the iTunes server factory, promising support for books with audio and video, improvements for PDF documents and other miscellaneous bug fixes. Feel free to toss your impressions of the new builds in comments below, but don't blame us if your eagerness ends up breaking something you love dearly. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
