Barnes & Noble Launches Nook for Web

[TnTexas]

bklvr896: Anyone get it to work on a tablet. It doesn't seem to work with either safari or chrome on the iPad.

Alex said in this thread (http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/Community-Room/Introducing-NOOK-for-WEB/m-p/1362544/message-u... Today, we’re excited to introduce NOOK for Web, an innovative and free new browser experience that offers readers the ability to explore the hottest digital titles and bestselling books right from their computer – no sign-in, software download or NOOK account required to begin reading. With fast and easy access from any PC or Mac® browser, NOOK for Web seamlessly combines NOOK’s award-winning digital reading experience with access to Barnes & Noble’s expansive NOOK Store™. Now, anyone who loves to read can browse, sample and become instantly immersed in a NOOK-like reading environment from any browser, with support coming this fall for Internet-enabled tablets, smartphones and other mobile devices.

[petesnook]

bklvr896: Anyone get it to work on a tablet. It doesn't seem to work with either safari or chrome on the iPad.

In addition to Alex's psot, Melissa said in the first post in this thread:

Support for tablets and mobile devices will arrive in the fall.

So I wouldn't expect it to work on tablets just yet. Maybe it should be working with IE8, but I'm glad they got it up and running on something. The things they learn from the PC version should help them launch a better mobile version.

[frantastk]

I gave it a try. I like it. Not sure when, if ever, I'd read on my computer instead of my nook, but it's a nice option to have. I like it a whole lot better than Nook for PC. I have only ever used that for downloading my books, never reading.

[Sun_Cat]

---

keriflur wrote:

---

MacMcK1957 wrote:
A web app that doesn't work on an iPad or the most commonly used versions of MSIE has already seriously shown itself lacking.

---

YES.  That's the part that makes me wonder.  An app should ALWAYS be designed to work on the most common versions of the most common browsers, not just on the newest versions.

As a web developer, I'll just mention that this ideal is much easier stated than realized. This web reader app is very JavaScript-intensive, and browsers notoriously implement the JavaScript language in different ways. If developers always waited for the world to catch up with the latest specifications, it might be years before we got to see some of the more advanced browser-based apps.

That said, though, I took a peek under the hood and I'm a little surprised that it wouldn't run on IE8. The app uses two well known, well tested libraries -- jquery and Closure Library -- that generally provide seamless cross-browser compatibility with reasonably graceful degradation on browsers that don't implement all the required capabilities. It's possible that the developers deliberately decided to use some features that just don't exist in IE8, or it's possible that it's unintended. Maybe this would be a good question for "Ask B&N." Oh, wait...

[TnTexas]

Me (earlier): Why did I think they'd already done this?

fantastk: I like it a whole lot better than Nook for PC.

Nook for PC! That's what I was thinking about earlier! I'll have to see what the difference is between the two.

[kamas716]

---

keriflur wrote:

So I did some checking and over the last 3 months IE9 has had more users than IE8, but IE 8 has still had more users than any single version of Firefox or Chrome.

The latest version of Chrome is NOT the most popular version of Chrome.  Same for Firefox.

http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-US-monthly-201204-201206-bar

---

It took me months to get Firefox greater than 7.01 to work on my laptop.  I finally got it up and running, but FB games are pretty sucky still.  IE9 works better right now.  I tried Chrome, but it seemed to have the same problems running FB stuff as Firefox, so I kicked it to the curb.

I'm currently running Firefox 13.0 at home on my laptop, and 13.0.1 at work.  They both have some problems, but they are different ones.

[HumbleCorrespo…]

The thing about IE8 is that a lot of people are still running XP. IE9 is not available on XP. XP may not be supported for long (if it's not already - I forget when the cut off is), but a lot of people use it, especially businesses. I think it's silly to ignore all of those users / customers.

[keriflur]

---

Sun_Cat wrote:

It's possible that the developers deliberately decided to use some features that just don't exist in IE8, or it's possible that it's unintended. Maybe this would be a good question for "Ask B&N." Oh, wait...

---

Or it's possible that they didn't test it on anything but the current browsers.  It's not that it's not working, it's that you can't even get far enough to see if it would work.  It does the browser check and tells you to upgrade.

---

Sun_Cat wrote:

If developers always waited for the world to catch up with the latest specifications, it might be years before we got to see some of the more advanced browser-based apps.

---

Yes, when I said "always" I was thinking of the apps focused to the general public, not techies, animators, designers, etc.  Apps for Julie.  Sorry, I should have been more clear.

[Doug_Pardee Distinguished Bibliophile]

---

HumbleCorrespondent wrote:

The thing about IE8 is that a lot of people are still running XP. IE9 is not available on XP. XP may not be supported for long (if it's not already - I forget when the cut off is), but a lot of people use it, especially businesses.

---

Exactly so. And one of the big reasons that businesses are still on XP is that it's not possible to upgrade from XP via a "remote push". Major corporations might have tens of thousands of computers, normally managed from a single "control center". But the upgrade from XP to Vista/Win7/Win8 requires that a tech go to each computer and do the install. Furthermore, the upgrade from XP wipes out all installed software, which then requires that the software be re-installed on each machine — some of which might not work on Vista/Win7/Win8, at least not without some tweaking. The upgrade also wipes out all user data, requiring that all data be backed up and restored.

Upgrading from XP is a huge headache for large organizations, and they're putting it off as long as they can.

[flyingtoastr Scribe]

XP support ends in just over two years for enterprise customers. I'm willing to bet most companies still running XP on their computers (like BN, heh) are prepping right now to switch to 7 or 8, given how long a companywide rollout can take.

But does your employer really want you reading on the job anyway?

But for personal users there is pretty much no excuse not to have a current browser. Browsers are free, and two of the three major ones (Chrome and Firefox) even update themselves automatically in the background. Staying current with web browsing is an easy way to keep yourself safer from online attacks, as well as letting you play with the shiny new stuff like HTML5 applets. 

I actually wish more websites would take this sort of tactic (of course giving easy links to follow to update browsers). It would really cut down on the headaches for web programers and make everyone safer and have a better time.