Future Recommendations for NSTG- A Interface Perspective [ Edited ]

[rfodish]

Disclaimer:  If any of the ideas below have already been discussed or are in progress please note I did not do much research into these matters.  If so I apologize for the redundancy in advance.

I recently purchased the Nook Simple Touch (NST) with GlowLight. It performs all the functions I require as a first-time purchaser of an eink device. However, I quickly found substantial areas where improvement is desperately needed. I have itemized some key areas where I feel the NST needs further development.

1. The shelf feature is nice but not good enough. What would make more sense is NST automatically organizing all books according to their genre and having those genres accessible from a drop-down menu.  Besides - who wants to scroll through hundreds if not thousands of book to shelf?  That would be unreasonable, a simple solution would to do that through a software solution discussed below.
2. Where is the software interfacing tool? Calibre is indeed a powerful freeware tool however it is not customizable or designed toward the NST like itunes is designed for ipod/ipad/mp3 player. If B&N wants to stay ahead of the curve, a Nook software interface tool that streamlines the transfer of books in the way itunes streamlines the transfer of music is mandatory.  Shelves should also be treated like playlists as a comparison to itunes.
3. The last issues I find is how the internal storage memory of the device is partitioned from the microSD memory. In other words, I cannot access the internal 2g using the typical microUSB port. This wouldn't be a large caveat only the accessible internal storage is only a mere 239 MB without a microSD supplement.

Overall - implementing the above ideas would skyrocket NST over its competition. I only hope (foolishly) that my inquiry will be answered in time.

[roustabout]

I wrote a very simple hack, which I've been using for a couple of weeks now to no obvious ill effect, that lets your glowworm use the SD card as the storage location for all of your files - both the BN ones and any you may sideload, for example via Calibre:

http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/NOOK-Simple-Touch-General/Would-you-like-a-fat-Glowworm-sdcar...

There are caveats, but reversing the hack is trivial (either simply reset your glowworm or ask me, and I'll write the 'undo' script to go with - so far, no one's asked.) 

This lets you manage your whole library via Calibre, including your BN-purchased content, and keeps it all in a single storage pool accessible from your computer. 

A more advanced hack is to "root" your glowworm so that you can install other software, and install a different epub reader on it.  Fbreader, my epub reader of choice, lets you view your titles by tag, by author, or by alphabetical 'bins' - that is, if you view by title, your library is in 36 bins (a-z plus 0-9) without your needing to create shelves.

You can use calibre to add tags, and then use those to sort as well. 

I posted a very minimal root (root access plus the Amazon market, basically) on XDA, based on the tools available for the simple touch:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1650593

That one turns out to also work on the Simple Touch - I had a chance to test it last night. 

and there is now a fuller root available which adds the Google market and I think also google location services, which many folks like quite a lot (me included, but not on the ST or glowworm - the battery drain from the various google services isn't worth running them, to me.) 

That root is outlined here:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1675706

The request for better shelf capability, and off-device shelf management, backup and restore, is longstanding and so far, no one's seen motion on it. 

[AaronFMD]

Not trying to hijack this thread, but I have one suggestion that I think is a glaring problem.  When the NSTG is off but asleep (screensaver is showing) if you push the N button for 2 seconds the light comes on.  Guess what happens if you put your nook in your bag with it in this state?  That's right, dead battery.  A great change would be to make the light unable to come on until after the finger swipe.  I have been resorting to turing the nook completely off before putting it in my bag to avoid this, and having to reboot the whole thing each time I want to use it.  Def. not user friendly.  Will post this under it's own heading as well.  Please fix B&N!

a

[SusanaSZ]

I´m really angry with side loaded content. I´m a spanish speaker so I read spanish... As if there were no spanish speakers in the US there´s no dictionary and no way to make a google search. I bought it because of the glowlight, but really, I´ll go back to the Sony reader the minute they release a front lit reader. I do buy books, but mostly in spanish. The Nook Color didn´t have these issues and the browser made it easy to search on Wiki or Google. I really hope they realize that the second most spoken language in the US is Spanish!!!

[Byteguy]

If you bought it for a Google search... you didn't pay attention to what you were buying.  B&N makes NO claims that you can do that.  eInk displays are VERY different than the one you had on the Color.  It's painfully slow to update webpages.  You would probably be even more upset if you actually DID a bunch of googling.

As for the dictionary, yes, it needs help.  They don't even mention the dictionary on the specs on the webpage anymore.

But, they do give you time to return the unit if you don't like it.

[roustabout]

My girlfriend's mom is a Spanish speaker and reader, and we like the Nook devices but the Amazon Spanish language selection is very much better than the BN selection.  BN's treatment of Spanish language literature and by extension of its Spanish speaking customers is - politely - an embarrassment.  

It is hard to find real Spanish literature (translations of english titles by Danielle Steele and bodice rippers do not count.)   According to BN, for instance, Garcia Marquez has only 4 books available in Spanish.  

If I were advising a Spanish reader today, knowing what I know now, I'd say buy an Amazon device.  The amazon devices are tied to a much better store for Spanish language content.  If you can, register your Amazon device to a street address in Mexico or Spain - the content gets much better if you're able to do so.  Even without doing that, though, the amazon website makes finding spanish language titles easier and has far more of them.  

That said, since you have a couple of Nook devices already, you can take a look at this thread on XDA for a discussion (requires rooting) of how to swap out the stock dictionary for others:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1477918

I do not know if the method works on the glow, though.