Pixie E-book reader for PSP (Alpha)

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 1:59 am

This was earlier a GBA/DS project, but it's now also ported to PSP.

http://www.nightmode.org/pixie/

Reads TXT, simple PDB and BOOK (which is converted from HTML with included converter.

This is the first released version so there are bugs. Feel free to comment in this thread on how it works.

emumaniac · Post by **emumaniac** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 3:12 am

Nice release, cant wait to try some of my fave ebooks on it, news posted here --> http://psp-news.dcemu.co.uk/index.shtml ... yEEIvdnjPW and on pspwiki

Pit0711 · Post by **Pit0711** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:35 am

i cant convert.
always get error: msvcr80.dll is missing

emumaniac · Post by **emumaniac** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:50 am

i see pspupdates arent crediting you with a link, for a big site thats disrespectful.

Post by **mrbrown** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:54 am

emumaniac wrote:i see pspupdates arent crediting you with a link, for a big site thats disrespectful.

Cool it.

Clay · Post by **Clay** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 6:52 am

emumaniac wrote:i see pspupdates arent crediting you with a link, for a big site thats disrespectful.

There was no link because the file was submitted to me via email with no link. Now that I have read this and seen the link, it has been added to my news article.

PSPUpdates links to every developer when we know their website. Occasionally, with 40 site articles a day between all our sites, a link will be forgotten. But PSPUpdates never intentionally leaves a link out. Try running 5 console sites 24/7 and see if you do it flawlessly. Sorry for the heated last sentance but this kind of talk is starting to push my buttons.

EDIT: Great work on the release Sasq, we hope to see more from you!

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 8:55 am

Pit0711 wrote:i cant convert.
always get error: msvcr80.dll is missing

Yeah, I compiled it with VC2005 beta with DLL linking which was maybe not too smart. I included the source though so it should be easy to recompile - otherwise just wait a day or two - or try and find the DLL.

Smiths · Post by **Smiths** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 10:54 am

Clay wrote:
emumaniac wrote:i see pspupdates arent crediting you with a link, for a big site thats disrespectful.
There was no link because the file was submitted to me via email with no link. Now that I have read this and seen the link, it has been added to my news article.

PSPUpdates links to every developer when we know their website. Occasionally, with 40 site articles a day between all our sites, a link will be forgotten. But PSPUpdates never intentionally leaves a link out. Try running 5 console sites 24/7 and see if you do it flawlessly. Sorry for the heated last sentance but this kind of talk is starting to push my buttons.

EDIT: Great work on the release Sasq, we hope to see more from you!

It's called verifying first then, just to comment. dcemu.co.uk is 15 sites and there's a pause between submitted news and verification.
"file was submitted to me via email with no link"
Yeah, that makes me happy when the first malicious program is release.. now we know how to spread it to the masses...

But sasq, great work, nice to see ya entering the PSP scene.

joesparano · Post by **joesparano** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 3:22 am

Pixie is my new favorite app! Thanks Sasq.

Possible bugs:
1. some txt files cause an error:
- "**ASSERT: 'book->Ok()' failed in src/main.cpp(171)"
2. hiding the corrupt folder with Sie Tool causes book list to display mysterious titles (that aren't even on my PSP):
- "Cryptonomicon.book"
- "451.book"
- "PHPManual.pdb"
3. When using portrait mode, long titles overlap page numbering

It would be nice to:
1. have a frontend to switch books or change options
2. have the ability to re-map buttons
- (as a start, I'd love for R to page backwards)
3. allow for native html/rtf reading (without conversion)
4. create several bookmarks for one document
5. choose a different "Books" directory (default or on-the-fly)

Thanks again. This is exactly what I've been hoping for!

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 7:01 am

There's a new version (beta 1) that fixes some problems.

- Text files with characters outside font can crash the reader, but that assert means it coudlnt even open the file which is strange.

- The book folder was hard coded, and when it couldn't find the dir, some test code I had forgotten was run that just showed some dummy books.

- You can now switch books.

- No remapping yet, but ill add it to my TODO.

- Native reading of other formats: Maybe in the future, but it's a lot of work.

- Multiple bookmarks: I'll add it to my TODO - not something I felt the need for myself though.

- Book dir can now be changed in reader.cfg

Lots of other new stuff as well;

www.nightmode.org/pixie/

joesparano · Post by **joesparano** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 8:26 am

A few small issues with Pixie beta 1:
1. If I change the Books directory to another location on the MS, Pixie will crash without a Books directory in the PIXIE folder. Not a big deal, but you know.
2. I'd really, really like the R Trigger to page backwards.
3. Is there any way to remove the "Corrupt Data" folder from the PSP menu? All of the conventional methods render Pixie unusable. (I'm using 1.5)

Notes:
4. Mutiple bookmarks aren't really that important - just something that came to mind.
5. The new features are great. Keep 'em comin!
6. Pixie has made my weekend. Thanks!

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 8:56 am

If you place it in another folder you must change both the FONT and BOOK directory in the config-file. That should work allthough I havent tried it myself.

Also remember to remove the old reader.cfg so it can be updated with the new options.

joesparano · Post by **joesparano** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 3:45 pm

I like to keep book files in a neutral location (with my emulator roms) to simplify application upgrades. It doesn't make as much sense to move the Fonts folder to that same location.

I've found that it's OK to relocate the Books folder without relocating the Fonts folder. Pixie can be fooled by placing an empty Books folder in the original location, even if the working Books folder is somewhere else entirely. Not all that clean, but certainly functional.

ghandi1987 · Post by **ghandi1987** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 6:13 am

i got the assert thing everytime i tried to use one of my own txt files. you can make it stop giving you the assert by just capitalizing the first letter of the filename. although it does freeze once it loads some of my files.

edit: i figured out that it was freezing b/c the person used some ascii art in the file, once i deleted the ascii art it loaded fine.

almazlamaz · Post by **almazlamaz** » Tue Jul 05, 2005 7:24 am

good job ! :)

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Wed Jul 06, 2005 8:40 am

Have mostly been working on the tools and porting now - the conversion tools for windows and a GBA version are now available.

(Fonts are converted from normal TTF fonts).

Will try and get the TXT-reader more stable, key remapping, better suspend/resume and then release a new psp-version.

ghandi1987 · Post by **ghandi1987** » Wed Jul 06, 2005 12:44 pm

the ttf2pfont program works great, keep up the good work.

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 6:56 am

A new beta (PSP version, Windows tools) can be downloaded from:

http://82.182.81.80/pixie/files/Pixie_psp_beta2.zip

This version has better font support (like runtime settings of fonts and sizes) and keys can be completely configured.
Also includes TXT2HTML for converting text-files (especially Project Gutenberg books - http:/www.gutenberg.org).

Also notice that you need to run MAKEFONTS.BAT and MAKEBOOKS.BAT to convert fonts and books - take a look at them to see how you can convert your own.

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 1:16 pm

Both PSP and GBA-versions up at:

http://82.182.81.80/pixie/

(Hope my domain comes back soon! :)

joesparano · Post by **joesparano** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 1:52 pm

Impressions of beta 2b:
1. All of the new options and tools are really great.
2. I think L/R trigger page-turning is essential - especially for reading in portrait mode. Perhaps all the Trigger+ options in the current build could be devoted to a menu screen in the future?
3. It would be nice to select a default font for plain text files. Right now, Pixie automatically uses the fixed-width selection for these? Maybe an additional option of Plain Text = "Fixed" or "Normal".
4. Behavior of increase/decrease font size is strange. Sometimes the switch happens after two button presses, sometimes more - but never on the first.

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Mon Jul 11, 2005 2:19 pm

> 2.

Well you could just change the config, "LTRIGGER" and "RTRIGGER" are still valid keys, but if you use one you cant use it as a modifier.

> 3.

It always uses Normal and not fixed IIRC, but yes, I can add a config option for that.

> 4.

Font size is increased one unit at a time, so it all depends on what fonts you have in the fonts dir. If you generate one font for each size it will change with each keypress...

Arwin · Post by **Arwin** » Tue Jul 12, 2005 9:23 pm

Brilliant!

Just one comment:

- changing font size / line spacing

If you change the font size or line spacing, you are reset to page one. It would be nice if you'd stay at the first word of the page you are at. Especially since the font is different for some of the books, even in the examples, on the first few pages, you can't see the effect of your adjustments directly.

Perhaps you can use the already present bookmark function for this? Set a bookmark to the first word, and then move to that bookmark again after resizing/changing font size.

sasq · Post by **sasq** » Tue Jul 12, 2005 10:15 pm

I could add this as an option, but it would mean freezing the program until the indexer has reached the place you are at, which might take a minute if you are at the end of a long book.

LastCaress · Post by **LastCaress** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 9:17 am

Great tools! Could you please fix/add the following:

-Support for large number of files. (I have a huge amount of small files, that include short stories, jokes, etc...) - When I put a large amount of files in a directory, the program just freezes (I'm using the gba port)

-Support for serveral directories at once (I have the different files catagorized according to subject)

Thanks!

milksop · Post by **milksop** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 3:26 pm

Nice!

Rotated viewing is some snazzy stuff! Love it.

Looking forward to a version that saves settings when I change them in the app.

scott

Arwin · Post by **Arwin** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 8:54 pm

sasq wrote:I could add this as an option, but it would mean freezing the program until the indexer has reached the place you are at, which might take a minute if you are at the end of a long book.

Shouldn't be too much of a problem, as you're generally already comfortable with what you selected by that time. It's usually near the beginning of a book that you'll be experimenting with an optimal display.

Alternatively, to speed things up, you could use a snapshot of the current position in the book, say the 1000 characters from the first character of the page, to show the effect of your changes, and only reindex after you've confirmed the new settings.

Amakusa42 · Post by **Amakusa42** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 4:00 am

This happened when I transfered the files over to my psp. Once I tried to boot it up in the Game directory, it said Corrupted data. I have version 1.50. Also, i am missing some of the fonts when I run the font convertor. Can these two be related? Do you need a windows service pack to run this?

BTW, great idea for a program, I cant wait to try it out.

Arwin · Post by **Arwin** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 5:44 am

Amakusa42 wrote:This happened when I transfered the files over to my psp. Once I tried to boot it up in the Game directory, it said Corrupted data. I have version 1.50. Also, i am missing some of the fonts when I run the font convertor. Can these two be related? Do you need a windows service pack to run this?

BTW, great idea for a program, I cant wait to try it out.

You should have one corrupted data, and one which says Pixie with a nice logo. You don't need all the fonts, I didn't have all of them either. Finally, like I posted above, you need to copy the layout.txt file to the root of your PSP. That means that if you hook it up to the PC, and it becomes visible as, say, a D: drive, you need to copy the file to D:\layout.txt, and NOT to, say, D:\PSP\Game\Pixie\layout.txt.

Finally, make sure that when you disconnect your PSP, you first stop the device properly through the USB Device option (click on Tray Icon, select 'Stop this Device ... etc.' If it says "You can now safely remove ... " you can leave the USB menu on your PSP and test out Pixie.

Amakusa42 · Post by **Amakusa42** » Thu Jul 14, 2005 6:18 pm

Works! Thank you. I cant find the layout file though in the zip file. IS it a seperate download?

forums.ps2dev.org

Pixie E-book reader for PSP (Alpha)

Pixie E-book reader for PSP (Alpha)

assert

ttf2pfont

Mine keeps saying corrupted data

Re: Mine keeps saying corrupted data

Thank you!