Web Features
Updated Book PreviewLocked up this thread, as it’s getting fairly large and out of date. But I did want to keep the conversation going on Book Preview. This afternoon, we released an updated version. Most of the changes are under-the-hood kind of things. But there are a few new things you may notice:
Anyway, as always, we’d love to get your feedback on these changes, as well as the Book Preview feature overall. Thanks, 
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Hello Jack, That is awesome feature. Thanks for the heads up with the latest info on updated book preview. Thanks much for *all* you do, Jack. Sincerely, |
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That is NEAT ! ! ! ! Thanks for leeting us know Jack, your team are great innovators. .......Tony p.s. Book Preview overall? The front of most books is boring. Title, copyright, etc. Then you get to the meat. It would great to be able to set the start page of the 15 page preview at the start of an interesting chapter or section or group of photos. Otherwsie I love it. |
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100% agree with Tony about being able to specify where your 15 pages for preview begin. It may even turn out that it might be, say, pages 45-60 that you want to exhibit. Is such an option possible / feasible? I also agree, though, that your tune-up to the Preview function is excellent! Thanks! Teri |
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As a user of Mozilla Firefox, the books cannot be viewd in this browser. I realise we are a minority, but we are around 20% and growing! ;-) |
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omeyas, there’s a couple of threads on this topic, including some workarounds, hopefully this may help http://forums.blurb.com/forums/6/topics/3439 http://forums.blurb.com/forums/1/topics/3235 ...........Tony |
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Ok, thanks. It’s probably because I use adblock then, there are a lot of sites I could not view without it! I’ll switch browsers when I want to view the books! |
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Can this Book Preview feature be used before the book is actually ordered and printed? In other words, can I use it during the book creation process?
Martin |
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Hi, First, I love Blurb and have 6 books out there in the bookstore. But… I’d like to make a loop of all of the books previews and play them in my gallery. But I can’t find any way to download them or make it happen. Your presentation is great – full screen – and letting me download and present these previews will lead to more sales for all of us. All I need to know is how to do it. Thanks. Frank |
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Hi Frank – I love your Black and White Series book. At this point, there’s no direct way to display Book Preview content on other sites, though that is something we’re currently researching. In the meantime, many authors have been successful in using Blurb Badges on their own sites. Definitely not the same thing, but you can at least link directly to each book’s preview. Thanks, |
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I agree withe Teri. It would be nice to specify which pages are previewed. My children’s book is short and the preview is actually the whole story. Angela |
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I don’t see any previews. All I see is a yellow background with a little white circle in the middle. What’s up / |
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RM: When you see that circle on the table-top it’s to tell you to go and have a nice glass of wine. When you get back you should find your book ready to go. (It takes quite a time to download.) P
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Rivermill – If you’ve just uploaded your book, it may take a few minutes for the preview to render properly. Once that’s happened, though, it should load pretty fast. I successfully previewed both your and peteshep’s books. Loading time took about two seconds from my home connection (Comcast cable). If you’re experiencing really long load times, try clicking on the "Have a slow connection?" link, on the lower right hand corner of your Book Preview page. |
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Jack: The American Dreaming: When are you going to provide that Californian cable all round the internet? I’ve just timed on my broadband connection 100 secs to first display of cover. http://www.blurb.com/books/440309 "Have a slow connection?" shows after about 10secs, displays the cover much quicker, but then delays, appearing to load each change until the book disappears altogether. |
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peteshep – I would love it if everyone around the world had the fastest broadband possible. Until then… We’ve done quite a bit of work to optimize the Book Preview for all connection types. But, the fact remains that most Blurb books are filled with big, beautiful photos that can come with some fairly serious file sizes. We’ve tried to hit that sweet spot between making file sizes as small as possible while not massively degrading image quality. It’s something we will continue to monitor and tweak as time goes on. |
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Sure Jack, I meant to encourage Rivermill to persevere. I first thought mine was stuck, but now I know to wait.. They haven’t come back to this thread, but I just checked their Preview and it’s working normally. Very well presented photos of the Loire. Well worth the wait. P :-)
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Why does book preview not allow to view ALL pages in book? Artemis
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I would love to be able to choose the specific pages for the preview. That would give us better marketing control of our product. A photography book can’t be front-loaded or the book loses steam, but for the purpose of a preview, I wouldn’t mind being able to showcase the most compelling photos no matter their position in the book. |
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