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iPad There's streaming for videos for iPad, what about PDF files?

K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
Since there are beautiful streaming apps like Plex and Air Video that help stream from a Mac as a server so you can watch videos on your iPad, what about an app that can stream documents like PDFs and Comic Books?

The reason I ask this as its taking up a lot of space on the iPad, mostly because I want to have it all there when I read them. I realised that this is the same reason they stream videos onto iPad to save space.

Any recommendation on how to do this instead of downloading the whole file first? Like reading and loading page by page as you read. Seems like if its on a local network it will be fast enough to do?

There must be an app for that?

Thanks.
 
Night Spring

Night Spring

macrumors G5
Jul 17, 2008
14,612
7,791
No, not really. PDFs and comic books are just not big enough to make it worth "streaming" them like videos. It probably takes a few hundred PDFs and comic books before they equal the size of a typical TV show. How many PDFs and comic books do you have? I would think the solution is to upload them to a service like Dropbox, then download them when you want to read, and delete the ones you aren't reading at the moment.

Oh, and btw, one Japanese publisher did have a system that sort of "streamed" comic books, as in it would download the pages when you opened the app, and would save them locally for a while, but delete them if you didn't open the app for a while. I mainly found this system annoying because I read faster than the pages would download, so I would be waiting forever in between pages.
 
H

hyteckit

Guest
Jul 29, 2007
889
1
How many of your PDFs are more than 5MB?

I have many videos that are 100x to 1000x times the size of my PDF books. A small video is about 500MB and my HD videos are more than 5GB.
 
smoking monkey

smoking monkey

macrumors 68020
Mar 5, 2008
2,335
1,468
I HUNGER
kidclam said:
The reason I ask this as its taking up a lot of space on the iPad, mostly because I want to have it all there when I read them. I realised that this is the same reason they stream videos onto iPad to save space.
.
Click to expand...

I recommend you buy a new ipad with more memory. Do you only have 16gig? Or do you carry around a lot of videos and music as well and that's taking up space? If so then the 128gig version of the iPad will be perfect for you.

Can you convert the PDFs to pages and then access them through the cloud?
 
T

TJ61

macrumors 6502a
Nov 16, 2011
811
3
Have you looked at apps like GoodReader that can access your pdf's, etc. from a local WiFi server? I've never used the WiFi server method, but I'm always downloading from DropBox, which I think would be a similar process.

Unlike streaming, you'd actually be downloading and then deleting when you're done.

Regards,
Tom
 
K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
Thanks for everyone's reply.

I am travelling at the moment and packed all my life's stuff in a container and travelling around the world. I rely on my iPad to store magazines, books, music. I stream movies from Air Video from my MBP so that is sorted.

For the rest, the magazines and comics do add up.

audio 2GB (I want at least 5-10GB)
photos 7GB (mainly reference material for inspiration as I am a designer)
Apps 19GB (I have cut down to only the essentials. I only have 8 games and deleted apps over 600MB)
Books 4GB (many already PDF books and pubs)
Other 23GB (this would probably be comics, magazines and other things?)

I want to have less publications on my ipad as keeping them there I need them until I have time to read them.

Ultimately, I would like to stream the magazines, comics from my mac to clear up the 20GB on my iPad if possible as I also use this also as a reference/inspiration when I do my research/work. I am a bit surprised that there isn't an app that can stream given steaming video is so fast and easy.
 
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Night Spring

Night Spring

macrumors G5
Jul 17, 2008
14,612
7,791
23 GB of "Other" sounds a bit excessive. Which apps are you using to read your comic books and PDFs? I'd try deleting them all and checking to see if the Other goes down. If not, you have corrupted files taking up space on your iPad, and restoring your iPad and setting it up as new would free up that space.

And there's no reason all your PDFs and comic books have to stay on your iPad. They can stay on your MacBook, and you can transfer them over wifi when you want to read one. It's pretty much the same as when you stream video with Air Video, only instead of streaming, you transfer whole files, and delete them when you are done. Somebody already mentioned that GoodReader will do this. I use an app called FileBrowser. Apps like them can access shared drives on a wifi network, browse through the file system, copy the files to your iPad, and open them in apps registered to handle that file type. Try it, it's like having Finder for your iPad.

Like I said before, while you are right that technically straming books should be simple to set up, nobody does it because nobody needs to -- individual book files are just so small that downloading one takes no time. It's only when you have large collections like yours that space becomes a problem.
 
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K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
Night Spring, thanks for the feedback.

I will ultimately use some fileserver app.

I just checked my usage on my iPad.

ComicGlass (which is the best PDF and comic reader IMHO) loads up as 8GB of comics and magazines. That seems right. Its about 30 magazines and 20 odd comics. They also have dropbox function. I tried it before and it takes forever to download through even a high-speed wifi network.

What does "Other" represent? Is it the total file size of all documents and data for every app?

I am restoring my iPad now.
 
Night Spring

Night Spring

macrumors G5
Jul 17, 2008
14,612
7,791
kidclam said:
ComicGlass (which is the best PDF and comic reader IMHO) loads up as 8GB of comics and magazines. That seems right. Its about 30 magazines and 20 odd comics. They also have dropbox function. I tried it before and it takes forever to download through even a high-speed wifi network.

What does "Other" represent? Is it the total file size of all documents and data for every app?

I am restoring my iPad now.
Click to expand...

I haven't used ComicGlass, but it seems odd that downloading a comic book or magazine should take "forever." Have you tried downloading the same files through the Dropbox app and see if they take as long?

"Other" is basically just things that iOS can't recognize. While some app documents and data do end up as "Other," the problem is that sometimes files get corrupted, especially if a download is interrupted, and the incomplete files don't get deleted off the system. There is no way to distinguish such junk data from legitimate data in "Other." Only way to clear it out is to restore the iPad. Do let me know if that shrinks down your "Other" space. Management of corrupted files is something Apple could improve in iOS, as it is a pain to have to restore in order to get back the space!
 
K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
I will try ComicGlass and compare with dropbox own app for speed comparison.

I tried to restore my last back up but since I am on jailbreak, somehow it did not restore properly.

I restored the iPad to new default and added my own apps again. So there are no comics, mags etc. Only photos and apps.

"Other" came to staggering 13.3GB! I am shocked!!! Itunes told me on first sync that 18,000 items did not sync properly, could it be this? :mad:
 
D

db2431

macrumors regular
Sep 13, 2007
173
1
Install Calibre on your pc/mac, start it as a server then connect directly in to it using Stanza On your ipad.
 
T

TJ61

macrumors 6502a
Nov 16, 2011
811
3
kidclam said:
"Other" came to staggering 13.3GB! I am shocked!!! Itunes told me on first sync that 18,000 items did not sync properly, could it be this? :mad:
Click to expand...

Yes, very likely! You need to stop everything else and get your "Other" sorted out. Until then, anything you do will be wasted effort. 13GB is insane, and almost definitely orphaned data as you surmise. If you try to restore from backup (unless you have a back up from well before your current situation), you'll only restore your problem.

It's very likely that your only course of action is to restore to factory, and then reinstall apps/media from scratch. On the bright side, you stand to regain maybe 10 - 12 GB of space.

I do not have any experience with JB'ing, so you'll need to determine at what point to do that again. Also, you would do well to get a second opinion on what I've said from someone with JB experience, just in case that has any bearing.

Regards,
Tom
 
bufffilm

bufffilm

Suspended
May 3, 2011
4,227
2,536
'Other' can be two things:

1) orphaned data
2) data beyond the scope of what Itunes recognizes. eg. outside of what it syncs for the preset categories - books, music, video.

before you start thinking that you have 13GB of oprhaned data, go into Settings - and check your Usage numbers for ComicGlass, whatever magazine app you use, and your other app data.

i use comicglass and do an app 'import' in Itunes to import comics into the ipad. all this data is classed as 'Other'.


TJ61 said:
Yes, very likely! You need to stop everything else and get your "Other" sorted out. Until then, anything you do will be wasted effort. 13GB is insane, and almost definitely orphaned data as you surmise. If you try to restore from backup (unless you have a back up from well before your current situation), you'll only restore your problem.

It's very likely that your only course of action is to restore to factory, and then reinstall apps/media from scratch. On the bright side, you stand to regain maybe 10 - 12 GB of space.

I do not have any experience with JB'ing, so you'll need to determine at what point to do that again. Also, you would do well to get a second opinion on what I've said from someone with JB experience, just in case that has any bearing.

Regards,
Tom
Click to expand...
 
K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
Thanks guys for all your advice.
I had a whopping 20GB of Other before I restored.

What is interesting is that I unsynced each category to see if the Other would go down. I turned off Music, Movies, Podcasts etc. and in the end switched off Photos too. Amazingly, I still had 6GB of photos that could not be wiped, and 15GB of Other. This is on an iPad with nothing synced!!

Once restored as a new iPad, I then have downloaded most of my apps again, small amount of music for Traktor DJ app and slowly grouping a few albums of photos at a time to do syncs. Sometimes iPhoto will hang on a sync and I assume thats where the Orphan data gets dumped on my iPad unknowingly.

I haven't copied any Mags and Comics yet. This time I will see if it really is categorized as Other by looking at the numbers. Will let you all know if its there or as part of the Usage in preferences (or both).

So far Other is only 1.63GB which I am thrilled. I have over 40GB of free space. Once the photos are all synced, I predict I will have 30GB of free space!!

Update you soon after I add more stuff.
 
K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
I installed my photos, about 5GB at a time. After first sync Other was 4GB, on second 5GB sync Other reached to 9.4GB. Does that mean in Photos synced from iphoto that there will be double the amount of space needed? Could it be its generating thumbnails of each photo? Since I am on iPad 3 retina thumbnails are very high?

I tried to Reset Network Settings as suggested in the Apple forum but no help.
This is really upsetting.:eek:

I copied 2GB of Magazines and Comics to ComicGlass. The Other meter did not move beyond 9.4GB. So the Usage data in the Settings of your iPad is an accurate guage of stored content with a specific app.
 
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T

TJ61

macrumors 6502a
Nov 16, 2011
811
3
kidclam said:
I installed my photos, about 5GB at a time. After first sync Other was 4GB, on second 5GB sync Other reached to 9.4GB.
Click to expand...

It sounds like you've got a problem with iPhoto. I would suggest loading up everything but photos for a while and see how it behaves after a number of syncs. Once you're happy with how it's working make a known good backup before you tackle the iPhoto syncing.

Beyond that, I can't help since I don't have iPhoto (Win7 machine).

Good luck!

Regards,
Tom
 
K

kidclam

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 13, 2008
13
0
I tried your suggestion and saving a backup after installing all apps after one restore to a new system.

Here is the breakdown:

1. Newly Restored + 14GB Apps installed through iTunes
Other 0.73GB

2. Adding Music 2.8GB
Other then increased to 0.93GB

3. Adding Photos (973 photos) 0.68GB
Other then increased to 1.63GB

4. Adding more Photos (1222 photos)
Other increased to 2.2GB

This is quite crazy and I don't understand what I should do. Basically on my third sync adding photos, the Other capacity increased almost 1:1 of the total memory of the photos.

I unplugged, restarted my iPad and plugged it into iTunes again. The total iPhoto size now went down to 0.61GB but the Other retains 2.2GB. Strange...

I read on another post someone using DiskAid app to delete files to alleviate the Other capacity but its related only to music. Does anyone know what temp files I could try to delete for photos?
 
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