It's the index that doesn't have clickable links, Russell. However there's a
quick reference guide after the contents that you can click on to take you to
that bird group, e.g. Honeyeaters, which is going to get you closer to the
species than the contents. This quick reference looks like it's laid out for a
phone screen, so there's a lot of wasted space on an iPad.
I got around the pagination problem by switching to Scroll mode. When you can
scroll continuously throught the material, the matching of headings and
pictures is more obvious. You enable this mode by clicking on the AA symbol at
the top, then on Themes.
The species maps (which I think are new in the most recent edition of the full
book) would be good, but at least in a regional guide you have a bit of an idea
where they should occur.
It's interesting to compare the concept of an electronic book with a printed
book. I only own a licence for Apple devices, so one day I probably won't have
access to it anymore, whereas with a real book I have it forever. But it's half
the price, adds nothing to the weight of the device it's on, and I get to use
it on my phone and my iPad.
Peter Shute
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
> On Behalf Of Russ
> Sent: Tuesday, 15 October 2013 11:53 PM
> To: Clive Nealon
> Cc: Birding Aus
> Subject: Re: [Birding-Aus] Pizzey Regional Guides (ebook version now)
>
> I'm also hanging out for the app! I hope we see it soon. I
> bought a couple of the regional guides today, but I haven't
> had time to explore them much, except to get a bit of a shock
> when I noticed the pagination issue. At the default font
> size, many of the pages split in the middle of an article,
> leaving the sketch for a species on the top of a page, with
> the Header/Species name for the NEXT species beneath it. e.g.
> Page 397 has a very nicely drawn Malleefowl, and the text
> underneath says:
> AUSTRALIAN BRUSH-TURKEY and goes on with the latter's
> description. It made me do a bit of a double-take!
>
> I haven't found the species maps yet - I hope they are
> included. And the contents pages DO link to sections in the
> text. Hold a title (e.g. Waders) and release it after it
> highlights. The page will flip to the start of the Waders section.
>
> One nice feature is the capability of adding notes and
> bookmarks. Simply highlight a word or phrase, and choose NOTE
> from the popup menu. From what I can tell, the word will stay
> highlighted and have a small sticky note icon next to it,
> which you tap to view / edit the note. It's a more
> user-friendly feature than the annotations available in the
> Morecombe app.
>
> I haven't seen the print version of these books, but I guess
> the intention was to minimize the size for use in the field.
> That meant cutting out about 75% of the text for each species
> - and unfortunately, that was one of the things I felt always
> gave Pizzey's guides the edge over the others - the quality
> and wealth of information in the text. I'm a little
> disappointed that the eBook version didn't restore the full
> text from the whole field guide. Let's hope the full text is
> available in the app - along with maps, and of course calls.
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