World Famous Comics: Amazon Kindle The Definitive Guide - Includes all Kindle tricks and hidden features, Kindle user keyboard shortcuts, how to use Kindle for internet and email, also where to obtain free Kindle books
Amazon Kindle The Definitive Guide - Includes all Kindle tricks and hidden features, Kindle user keyboard shortcuts, how to use Kindle for internet and email, also where to obtain free Kindle books
By: Errol R. Williams Average Rating: Binding: Kindle Edition Format: Kindle Book Label: Ailax Merchandise (UK) Publication Date: March 28, 2008 Release Date: March 28, 2008
The Author - Errol R. Williams, has specifically written a 12,991-word article - "Amazon Kindle The Definitive Guide" for Kindle owners who want to get the most out of this revolutionary wireless reading device.
The article contains 15 comprehensive and informative chapters dedicated to the Amazon Kindle. The article includes tricks and hidden features you never knew the Kindle could do, including accessing Google GPS Maps to search for near by restaurants or find the nearest gas station, setting up an email account to send and receive emails, play a game, activate Kindle clock, make Kindle screenshot images and save as a file, get Kindle to spell out time, how to use the Kindle audio player - with keyboard shortcut keys, browsing the web using Kindle, sending and receiving email on Kindle, show/hide text justification options, show Kindle diagnostics data, how to convert and email attachment files free of charge and avoid the $.10 fee, plus many more Kindle user tricks. This book also includes a complete list of Kindle user keyboard shortcuts (which are not included in the Kindle User Manual), Kindle coverage Map areas, Kindle device technical specifications and an accurate estimate of how many Kindles sold since its November 2007 launch date.
Bonus Content Included
Step-by-step self-publishing author Kindle book formatting - which covers best practices for converting different file types to Kindle-readable format, how to use popular programs such as Microsoft Word to edit, create accurate text paragraph spacing, add navigation bookmarks which are hyperlinked enabling your Kindle book readers to skip to any chapter within your book, font / text size to use, Microsoft Word keyboard shortcuts to help you quickly edit your books content and saving your finished book as an HTML file, self-publishing author sales strategy tips and where to obtain thousands of free .prc, .mobi, .azw and .txt file books, to read on your Kindle.
Free Content Updates
This book will be updated frequently as new information becomes available regarding the Amazon Kindle.
Amazon Kindle customers could receive the updated content free. In your Amazon account, go to "Your Media Library" and click the "Downloads" tab, located at the top. Select the purchased title you want to refresh, followed by "Send wirelessly to Kindle". If there is an updated version available of that particular title, it will now be available on your kindle to read.
Mobipocket customers could receive the updated content free by logging into your mobipocket.com purchased book account, and re-downloading this book.
He Needs to Hire an Editor I read the reviews here and then bought it anyway. At least my expectations were adjusted before I started reading it.
I found about 2/3 of the chapters to be pretty interesting. The other third (word formatting, self publishing, etc.) seemed outside the scope of this document.
My two biggest complaints, though, were the formatting (or lack of formatting) of the tables and the atrocious spelling.
The typos and grammatical errors were the worst I've seen in any publication (even worse than my town's local paper). The misspelled words jumped off the page! They were so bad that I wonder whether the author even proofread his own document or if he just wrote it in one pass and clicked "send." He could have paid a high school kid fifty bucks to read through the draft and mark up the errors. Very shameful for any document, let alone one that I had to pay for.
The formatting of the tables made them nearly useless. If he saved his Word doc as HTML then the tables still should have been preserved. If that didn't work, then he could have taken a screen shot of the tables and pasted them in as images. There has to be a better solution than one column of jumbled terms and values.
Outside that, I actually enjoyed the background of the Kindle device. I was looking forward to the keyboard shortcuts, but I'm either too thick to figure some of them out or they've been discontinued (or maybe they were just incorrect). For example: alt-Aa?!?! Does that mean I hold down alt, shift, a for the first capital "a" and then press a second lowercase "a"? Do I hold down the "a" to make it two As? I tried many different combinations and never had any success.
As others have said, you get what you pay for. It was worth a buck, but no more than that. He mentioned that we should check for upcoming releases. Maybe he'll spell-check it and post another version.
UPDATE: Reading through the Kindle User's Guide (which, I'll admit, I should have read first), I discovered that the keyboard shortcut for sleep mode is alt-aA (the font size button). Again, it's a point of confusion that an editor and/or a little clarification by the author could have prevented.
Almost terrible If you want to know the history of the Kindle and all about its innards, get this ebook. There are a handful of good shortcuts that I am assuming are probably found for free on the web (I haven't perused the other reviews.) Editing is just awful. Entire book is almost terrible.
Kindle Definitive Guide - Errol Williams Not impressed. Grammar, spelling, wording -- definitely needed an editing job! As for "does" -- does he mean women? Also not much of use here for the average Kindle owner - info for publishers may be interesting to the wannabees but I have no desire to go that route. Tables or lists were tough to decipher - tables WERE nothing but lists and rather lame or incomprehensible. Most of the "places to get free books" I have already visited. Minesweeper? Tried a game -- bad news. Yeah, I lost, but it was because the game was, well, not at all like the minesweeper I knew and loved long ago. Tricks? All useful ones are listed in the guide that comes with the Kindle. Check your email - or ano other online usefulness? I was a "blocked client" each time. Author said nothing about how to get unblocked! GPS?? yeah, right! But the lack of decent editing -- that bothered me the most. Ouch! -- So I blew 99 cents on it -- glad it didn't cost any more! Sorry, Mr Errol R. Williams! Maybe another time after paying a few dollars for a competent editor or even a competent friend or relative - accent on the 'competent'. "Bonne chance", as they used to say at Mobipocket.
Worth 99 cents--no more Much of this book describes the background leading to the development of the Kindle and the technology behind it. The "tricks and hidden features" are limited--but that's because the Kindle doesn't have a lot of tricks and hidden features.
I did learn that pressing Alt+T would display the time, but not much else. However, I only paid 99 cents, and this is one instance where you get only what you pay for--which is a little for a low price.
Worthy Information As a newbie author for the Kindle Catalog, I was understandably anxious to expose myself to as much 'technological' information as I could get my hands on. This guide, more a 'manual than a book', does provide many useful and interesting techniques, but assumes a great deal of skill and ability with PC/software usage on the part of the reader. For the price, I was expecting more detailed instructions. It was certainly not a waste of my time to purchase, but wish it had not cost as much. Finished reading it in 45 mintues. (Since my review, the author has adjusted the price to a somewhat more modest scale, I would change my 'star setting' to a four, if the system allowed. This manual is helpful)