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Multi-Touch Page Flipping eBook Concept Shown on an iPad

ombrenelcielo said:
Paper based navigation is simply waste of resources and bad interface on medias different from paper I'm afraid.
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Endless scroll bars are better ? How would you present the content equal to 100 pages of a book ? Like Egypt papyrus rolls ?

A paged presentation (in shape of paper or it's close relative: the album view) is not too bad. Very traditional, but well established.
Maybe not reading anymore and switch to audiobook ? (actually I like those)
 
The one that shows the edge of the pages, then you can flip to a spot - put a colored mark there and bam, one of the biggest complaints I've encounter is taken care of. An easy way to flip back and forth between a page of questions and the spot in the book.

I'm excited!!
 
Wasting time translating "chrome" to something that does not need it. Hated this function in iBooks and everywhere else it has shown up on the web in Flash form. Sure, it's cool the first time you see it, but it really slows the experience down in daily use.

Glad Apple is venturing away from this type of functionality with the new iBooks Author.

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ChristianJapan said:
Endless scroll bars are better ? How would you present the content equal to 100 pages of a book ? Like Egypt papyrus rolls ?

A paged presentation (in shape of paper or it's close relative: the album view) is not too bad. Very traditional, but well established.
Maybe not reading anymore and switch to audiobook ? (actually I like those)
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What's wrong with scroll bars per chapter in a book or article in a magazine? Do you enjoy articles on the web that are stretched over 5 pages?

It makes more sense for a device like the iPad to scroll, since users change font sizes which changes the page numbers. If I'm on page 35 in a book, an iPad user might be on page 20 or 50. But I can easily search for the sentence they are referencing with a few touches.
 
Digitalclips said:
I suspect Apple considered this silly effect and dismissed it for the very reasons we agree on. Now I think about it, how many people over the many centuries of reading a paper book got excited about the visual look of pages turning? "Oh look at this new work by Leonardo I have ... no never mind the helicopter .. look the page turns so beautifully!"
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<sheepish />I used to waste hours flipping pages just because their motion so intrigued me. :eek: (At the time I was young and though I might understand some wonderful overlooked principle in things like that. I still splash water just to watch the motion.)
 
Those are indeed neat tricks but why are we trying to recreate the old physical analog interface on a purely digital touch sensitive device.

Again neat bit of programming, but I am sure there are even better ways of quickly flying through an eBook. Why can the same interactions with the edge of the screen display small thumbnails that can be scrolled by then sliding your finger up and down the screen for example?

Apologies for bringing this point up again, I rushed to post before reviewing others postings. Glad to see I am not alone.
 
Meandmunch said:
Those are indeed neat tricks but why are we trying to recreate the old physical analog interface on a purely digital touch sensitive device.
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Because the old physical analog interface is amazingly efficient and it has served our civilization extraordinarily well over the last centuries. People are used to it and like it. Well, at least those who are older than the MTV, YouTube and Facebook generations...
 
trainwrecka said:
What's wrong with scroll bars per chapter in a book or article in a magazine? Do you enjoy articles on the web that are stretched over 5 pages?

It makes more sense for a device like the iPad to scroll, since users change font sizes which changes the page numbers. If I'm on page 35 in a book, an iPad user might be on page 20 or 50. But I can easily search for the sentence they are referencing with a few touches.
Click to expand...

Nothing wrong with a scroll bar as long the scope is not too big. If the scrollbar covers a chapter with an equivalent of few pages I'm fine with. I dont say that all slider are bad. As you mentioned in news pages they are better compared to pages if the article is not toooo long. But in ebooks like kindle a paged design is what I preferr. With some nice effects as shown ...
 
Presumably this could be implemented without private APIs as well. Just more work.
 
Unimpressed to say the least.

The claims at the beginning of the video are bogus as well. Books are cumbersome to hold open, and physically tiring. People with arthritis cannot read paper novels at all.

Ebooks, especially with iBooks, are perfect. No holding of the device at all if you wish, since you don't have to hold the ages apart. When reading, people flip one age at a time. If you're doing research and need to go through multiple pages....please allow me to introduce you to....SEARCH

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PeterQVenkman said:
That's slick. Now imagine if DVDs imitated a VCR tape rewinding for 5 minutes at the end of a movie! ;)
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Thats an excellent analogy!
 
pmz said:
Unimpressed to say the least.

The claims at the beginning of the video are bogus as well. Books are cumbersome to hold open, and physically tiring. People with arthritis cannot read paper novels at all.

Ebooks, especially with iBooks, are perfect. No holding of the device at all if you wish, since you don't have to hold the ages apart. When reading, people flip one age at a time. If you're doing research and need to go through multiple pages....please allow me to introduce you to....SEARCH
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The search feature only helps if you're looking for a specific bit of text. If you don't know exactly what you're looking for, or if you're looking for an image, then flipping though pages may be your only option.
 
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mk2012 said:
This will never take up, Apple likes simplicity. The experience they provide has to be for 8 Year olds as well as 80 year olds.

Sorry, nice video though.
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Not all of the features in the video would have to be implemented. Also, with the addition of multitouch gestures in the iPad with iOS5, I think people could get the hang of it.
 
sennekuyl said:
<sheepish />I used to waste hours flipping pages just because their motion so intrigued me. :eek: (At the time I was young and though I might understand some wonderful overlooked principle in things like that. I still splash water just to watch the motion.)
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Well I like your appreciation of the visual, no reason not to have a special page tuning app or even a splash simulation one .. ;)
 
It's a neat tech demo, nothing more. Of course, many see issues as no UI designed applied (Apple's strength) yet. Don't knock the concept because it's like dismissing GUI by Xerox; once handed to a proper capable design team, it could do wonders like what happened with the original Mac.
 
Winni said:
Because the old physical analog interface is amazingly efficient and it has served our civilization extraordinarily well over the last centuries. People are used to it and like it. Well, at least those who are older than the MTV, YouTube and Facebook generations...
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By that logic we should still have dials on our home phones because thats how it used to be done. Lets takes two steps forward with the invention of the iPad and touch interface technologies and one quick step backwards so we can cling to an antiquated notion of how handle printed pages.
 
Winni said:
Because the old physical analog interface is amazingly efficient and it has served our civilization extraordinarily well over the last centuries. People are used to it and like it. Well, at least those who are older than the MTV, YouTube and Facebook generations...
Click to expand...

Analog interfaces are used in some situations to great advantage e.g. knobs and sliders on effect modules in Garage Band but page turning isn't like that. Those analog features actually alter things, page turning is a visual cue only and nothing else. I suppose it could be an optional on or off thing but I bet over time more would have it off that on.

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Navdakilla said:
I like this.. so since it's patented by that company, apple will either have to buy them or pay them for usage?
wow
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Heck the iPhone and its many features were patented so we were told at launch, didn't stop Google ripping it off though ... sadly ... not that I think Apple would want any of this particular IP, patented or not.
 
What's wrong with the current method of flipping through pages and searching pages with the new textbooks in the ibooks store? Even, Adobe and some other platforms had implemented ways to flip through many pages quite easily in a similar manner.

I think its easier and more efficient to search a desired page the way ibooks does with textbooks (I really like adobe's method with some of the magazines in the app store as well)

The amount of time getting used to the new gestures with the concept seems to be a bit more than learning to tap on a specific space on the screen to bring up a scrollable list (instantly recognizable as scrollable) of thumbnails of pages.
 
The problem with gestures and interaction like this is that if a user doesn't understand ALL of them, they will be constantly annoyed... "sometimes when I go to flip a page it slides out a bunch but then doesn't flip any!"
 
Sure hope these guys have a patent pending on this capability. Apple will try to take it before they ever consider buying the rights for it.
 
Meh...

The only thing there that seems difficult to do in some better fashion is flipping back and forth between two sections of a book. I do that with technical manuals and documentation all the time. I think they've made these gestures more complex than required though, specifically they've created several different gestures to access the core functionality of block page flipping.

I'd keep the existing gestures for page changes:
  • tap left or drag right -> go to previous page
  • tap right or drag left -> go to next page
  • maybe add the multi-finger gestures for multi-page flipping (I wouldn't since it conflicts with app navigation, but I guess some people like them so whatever)
In only the center region (maybe the center fifth) add one new gesture:
  • touch and hold to bring up page index (vertical column of page thumbnails) with finger at the (highlighted) starting page.
I'd like there to be a way to navigate in the page index by thumbnail view (look of page) or semantic view (content of page, like the table of contents). I'd love some method that showed both types of information simultaneously. Once you are navigating in the page index column:
  • Release from center leaves index showing (so you can rest your hand at any time).
  • Drag up/down (along column) to navigate through index.
  • Tap outside index to return to current page.
  • Tap on thumbnail to goto page.
  • Touch on destination page thumbnail and Drag left/right to create a temporary flip set. Just like when flipping through a book, if the destination page is before source page, destination shows on the left, source on the right. If destination page is after source, source is left, destination is right. Once you've dragged out of the center the index disappears.
  • return to center and hover to bring back the index.
  • Release from left/right means to go showing page (either destination or source depending on page ordering)
  • additional touch (above or below existing touch) to handoff flip set from one hand to another (started with my right index finger but handoff to left thumb so I can take notes/answer my phone with my right hand)
  • additional touch and swipe to or from center anchor to add/remove pages from the flip set (analog to the action you'd use with a physical book)

If implemented correctly this would be a very fast, very intuitive interface that would allow quick navigation to a desired page, quick flipping back and forth between two pages, and wouldn't conflict with any existing gestures. It also adds only a single new 'gesture' to the basic navigation functions, and collects all of the fast navigation functions (navigate to page, navigate to section, flip between pages) into one common function.
 
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absoloodle37 said:
Sure hope these guys have a patent pending on this capability. Apple will try to take it before they ever consider buying the rights for it.
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You missed it, I suppose...

The KAIST Institute of Information Technology Convergence has posted this video demonstrating their patented eBook interface prototype.​
 
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