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2.5 fixed the full justification issue?

4K views 34 replies 13 participants last post by  911jason 
#1 ·
I remember when 2.3.3 came out, VermontCathy had posted about the full justification "at all costs"... well I think that was fixed with 2.5.2 because in the book I'm currently reading there have been several instances where a single line doesn't go all the way to the right margin when the next word is really long or is hyphenated.

Good news, right Cathy?  8)
 
#2 ·
I suspect that this is just a bug in the update. You can't have some lines fully justified and others not - unless the book has been badly formatted that way - and it is only on some lines thankfully.

We all have our personal preferences on this and frankly I wouldn't have bought a Kindle if it didn't have at least the option for full justification. Uneven right hand margins drive me demented - I couldn't read a whole book like that. You wouldn't normally see that in a paper book after all.

I find it irritating enough just to read long posts here on KB. The first thing I did on my first post was look for the full justification button and was very frustrated to see there wasn't one. I'm very OCD about this. I'm happy for there to be a choice on Kindles, but if they take away the option for fj altogether, I'll be selling both of mine.
 
#4 ·
911jason said:
Really? Even when 99% of the lines are fully-justified?

The only ones that I've noticed so far that aren't fully-justified are the ones that would have been spaced out
r e a l l y b a d.
LOL

No - as I say I think this is just a bug - irritating, but livable with. I meant if this is intentional and they're gearing up to change it so that all books are completely left justified as standard (which I think they used to be originally on the K1 maybe?) and with no user option to change it. I can understand people who use the really large fonts not wanting just two or three words stretched out over a line, but to be honest, I don't notice the necessary spacing on the smaller font sizes, even on the K2 - I do notice when the right hand margins aren't justified.

I believe having it as an either/or option is one of the things they should be working on for an update - that way everyone is happy.
 
#5 ·
I believe the K1 had the option to choose, you had to go into the Font Size menu and press ALT+J I think to add the justification option and then you could choose between LEFT or FULL Justification.

The 99% Full Justification that I described in my first post above is the way the K2 originally was until the 2.3 update when it went to Full Justification at all costs. Even when there was an inch between words (well maybe not that much! ;D ).
 
#6 ·
911jason said:
I believe the K1 had the option to choose, you had to go into the Font Size menu and press ALT+J I think to add the justification option and then you could choose between LEFT or FULL Justification.

The 99% Full Justification that I described in my first post above is the way the K2 originally was until the 2.3 update when it went to Full Justification at all costs. Even when there was an inch between words (well maybe not that much! ;D ).
Ah, so it's likely not a bug then but a deliberate return to the pre v2.3 scenario (I got my first K in October last year - I think it came with, or very soon updated to, v2.3). I can't say I've noticed any unnaturally spaced words while I've been reading with what you call the 'at all costs' option. I much prefer it to this 99% version which just looks like someone has made a mistake with the formatting or the Kindle isn't working properly. In fact I'd considered calling Kindle CS and asking them if they could fix it!! Very irritating to find out it's intentional. It's just so untidy. :mad:

As I said earlier, they really need to give readers the option - if they had it in the K1 and now we don't, that's not eaxctly progress, is it?
 
#8 ·
911jason said:
I remember when 2.3.3 came out, VermontCathy had posted about the full justification "at all costs"... well I think that was fixed with 2.5.2 because in the book I'm currently reading there have been several instances where a single line doesn't go all the way to the right margin when the next word is really long or is hyphenated.

Good news, right Cathy? 8)
Yes, this is good news. Although, I am waiting for the font hack to work before I upgrade. But I look forward to it.

Linjeakel, it's not a bug, it's just being reasonable, and they are putting it back to the way it had been before 2.3. I DO like full justification. I just don't want insanely huge spaces in the rare (but not rare enough) situation when large words (particularly hyphenated ones that won't break on the hyphen) cause only a few words to fit on the line. I typically use size 3 so it's not like it only happens with huge font sizes.

Here's a few examples of what I don't like (again, I don't have 2.5.2 yet):

In the above image, it's the 3rd line from the bottom that bugs me.


In the above image, it's the 4th from the top and 7th from the bottom.


The line that starts with "clicking" obviously is not good.
 
#9 ·
*shrugs* I guess it's just a case of personal preference then - I much prefer it to be like your examples than to have odd sentences where the right hand margin comes up short.

Examples like the third one where a long web address (as opposed to a single word) is not able to fit on the previous line are very rare - especially if like me you read 99% fiction. In the second example the fault is with the editing - those aren't hyphenated words, there should be a space between the dash or hyphen and the words (like there is earlier in this sentence) and then it wouldn't have to force it so much so that 'crops' would be on the line before. From my POV there isn't anything wrong with the first example.

I think it bears repeating, what I've said earlier in this thread (and in others) that you can't please everybody unless you give your customers as much choice as possible wherever possible. This isn't something they can't do, it's something they've apparently chosen not to do - or at least they've taken the 'easy' way out and adopted the middle ground. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's frustrated by this attitude. I can only hope that this and all the other little niggles that we have will be addressed by the Kindle Apps store - if it ever comes to fruition.
 
#10 ·
Linjeakel said:
...
I think it bears repeating, what I've said earlier in this thread (and in others) that you can't please everybody unless you give your customers as much choice as possible wherever possible. This isn't something they can't do, it's something they've apparently chosen not to do - or at least they've taken the 'easy' way out and adopted the middle ground. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's frustrated by this attitude. I can only hope that this and all the other little niggles that we have will be addressed by the Kindle Apps store - if it ever comes to fruition.
I agree choice is the best, but what I think some people (including myself) were annoyed about is that they changed it - and no one (including you) complained about how it was prior to 2.3 (the same as how it is now with 2.5). No one noticed it or thought anything about it, and that's how it should be. You say you think it would be annoying, but apparently it wasn't because you didn't even notice that it changed. (unless, of course, you didn't buy your kindle until after 2.5).
 
#11 ·
vermontcathy said:
I agree choice is the best, but what I think some people (including myself) were annoyed about is that they changed it - and no one (including you) complained about how it was prior to 2.3 (the same as how it is now with 2.5). No one noticed it or thought anything about it, and that's how it should be. You say you think it would be annoying, but apparently it wasn't because you didn't even notice that it changed. (unless, of course, you didn't buy your kindle until after 2.5).
I bought my Kindle with v2.3 and the full justif. 'at all costs' as the OP calls it and was very happy with it, so I had no need to complain. I didn't know it had ever been any different on the K2. It's only since v2.5 came out that it's changed back again and I had anything to notice - and as I said, I did notice it and thought it was one of the bugs they were sorting out before releasing 2.5.2/3. Apparently this is not the case, so now I'm complaining. ;D
 
#12 ·
I can't remember what it looked like before, but now it seems Kindle is only prepared to add a fixed, maximum amount of space in between the words in a given line. Depending on the words, that is not always enough space to fully justify it. So the right margin will have a sort of random raggedness, particularly if there are fewer words per line.

So I'm not sure this changed with 2.5, but if so, it's kind of a fix of sorts. With the largest text sizes, it can almost take the appearance of left-justification, which is what everyone wishes they could have.

Of course it is not really clear what a true fix would be, if you wanted a book-like full justification. Hyphenation is how that's achieved in print, but it probably doesn't make sense for an ebook reader, since you'd need to do a lot more of it and it would probably slow down reading somewhat. Automatic hyphenation requires language-specific hyphenation dictionaries, more complex algorithms, and even then, is not as good as when humans are able to make the final adjustments (well, or the algorithms need to be even more complex than they typically are).

So yes, the best fix would be a left-justify toggle like K1 had.  ;)
 
#13 ·
tsemple said:
....... I'm not sure this changed with 2.5, but if so, it's kind of a fix of sorts. With the largest text sizes, it can almost take the appearance of left-justification, which is what everyone wishes they could have....... (my emphasis)
No, not all of us! As you will see from my comments earlier in the thread, I for one can't think of anything worse than being forced to have left-justification. They need to give us the choice.
 
#14 ·
This '99% justification' where the odd line or two per page is not full justified is much more annoying to me than the 'at all costs justification' where some lines get stretched a bit. I'd much rather have the stretched lines....or else no full justification at all [which I hate]. The couple of lines per page not being justified is quite off-putting from a design standpoint and, yes, is even enough to throw me out of the story a bit.

As Lin says, choice is good.
 
#16 ·
Steph H said:
This '99% justification' where the odd line or two per page is not full justified is much more annoying to me than the 'at all costs justification' where some lines get stretched a bit. I'd much rather have the stretched lines....or else no full justification at all [which I hate]. The couple of lines per page not being justified is quite off-putting from a design standpoint and, yes, is even enough to throw me out of the story a bit.

As Lin says, choice is good.
I'm just curious - actually reading on your kindle this bugs you, or just the idea when it's described makes you think it would annoy you? On font size , this only happened (either tons of space, on version 2.3, or a little extra space at the end, pre-2.3 and 2.5) maybe once every 5 or 10 pages.
 
#17 ·
No, actually reading on my Kindle, it bugs me.  I noticed it in a book a day or two ago, before I ever read this thread, and have since noticed it in several books.
 
#18 ·
You suggest having an option. But what should the choices be? I tried out left-justify option on my Kindle I and decided it made most reading unpleasant. What I do find distracting is excessive spacing between words. I'm willing to accept slightly raggedy right margins to avoid this. So, should the choices be between 2.3 and 2.5 justification rather than between left and full?
It would be interesting to know why Amazon can't make up its mind how to do justification.
 
#19 ·
DavidSherwood said:
You suggest having an option. But what should the choices be? I tried out left-justify option on my Kindle I and decided it made most reading unpleasant. What I do find distracting is excessive spacing between words. I'm willing to accept slightly raggedy right margins to avoid this. So, should the choices be between 2.3 and 2.5 justification rather than between left and full?
It would be interesting to know why Amazon can't make up its mind how to do justification.
I don't think it's always Amazon - I think the publishers have something to do with it too. Full- or left-justification was an option on K1, but it didn't work with every book, so apparently some publishers decided we all "need" to have everything fully justified. I happen to be one who'd rather have a raggedy right edge than funky spacing in my text (probably because typing was my profession for so many years). So it always bothered me when a publisher killed that option on a book on the K1. It bugs me that I NEVER have the option on my K2 - why not at least give me the option? (That one is a question for Amazon.)

In the end, you can't please all of the people all of the time, but you can come closer by giving them as many options as possible to please themselves.
 
#20 ·
*raises hand sheepishly*

I'm a bit confused, got to admit.  I have books that are right justified, books that are full justified and one where there NO paragraph indentations.  So, it doesn't look to me like it's my kindle or amazon doing anything, but the publishers or in the case of indies, the author.  Am I tripping?
 
#21 ·
Linjeakel said:
No, not all of us! As you will see from my comments earlier in the thread, I for one can't think of anything worse than being forced to have left-justification. They need to give us the choice.
Sorry if you think that's what I meant (or if that's what I actually said!). I agree: choice.

But if the ebook specifies a specific paragraph style (as it can) - I think one has to live with it.
 
#22 ·
DavidSherwood said:
You suggest having an option. But what should the choices be? I tried out left-justify option on my Kindle I and decided it made most reading unpleasant. What I do find distracting is excessive spacing between words. I'm willing to accept slightly raggedy right margins to avoid this. So, should the choices be between 2.3 and 2.5 justification rather than between left and full?
It would be interesting to know why Amazon can't make up its mind how to do justification.
If it were up to me, then it would be full 100% justification, because that is my preference. However, there are others who prefer full left justification and still others who are happier with the 99% justification that we appear to have now. Amazon don't need to make up their mind - they need to let us each make up our own mind and let each of us have whichever of the three choices we prefer. Apparently there used to be a way to change the justification on the K1, so it can't be that difficult to implement.

Amazon are spending too much time and energy on trying to emulate other devices by adding facebook and twitter and all that other unnecessary rubbish when what they should be concentrating on is the basics like this and making the Kindle the best e-reader out there.
 
#23 ·
Just wanted to point out this post from another thread, as I'm pretty sure it will also work on the K2. You can edit the same file that is talked about in this post to change justification from full to left.

Sweet!

w5jck said:
On the MobileRead forum (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=94129) isotherm and others pointed out that the K2 trick to decrease margins works on the K3. I can confirm that it works on my K3. To decrease the margins on the K3 follow these steps:

Step (1): If using Windows be sure to set Folder Options to Show hidden files, folders, and drives and uncheck the Hide unprotected system files option.

Step (2): Close all books and go to the K3 Home screen.

Step (3): Connect your K3 to your PC via the USB cable.

Step (4): Using windows Explorer locate the following file KINDLE:\system\com.amazon.ebook.booklet.reader\reader.pref. Where KINDLE equals the drive Windows assigned to your K3.

Step (5): Using Notepad edit KINDLE:\system\com.amazon.ebook.booklet.reader\reader.pref and change the setting HORIZONTAL_MARGIN=40 to a smaller number like HORIZONTAL_MARGIN=20.

HORIZONTAL_MARGIN=40 equals 20 pixel margins on left and right for a total of 40 pixels. So decide how many pixels you want your margin left to be and multiply it times two. Using 20 works well. Using 10 it gets a little small. Using 0 (zero) gets rid of margins but makes it difficult to read.

Step (6): Save the file KINDLE:\system\com.amazon.ebook.booklet.reader\reader.pref.

Step (7): Eject and unplug your K3.

Step (8 ): From the K3 Home screen press Menu and select Settings to go to the Settings page.

Step (9): From the K3 Settings screen press Menu and select Restart to restart the K3.

NOTE: Once the K3 restarts your margins are reset and will remain reset unless you change the Words per Line setting which will return to margins to factory settings.
 
#24 ·
I would note that, in effect, this means making changes to the basic operating code of the Kindle. I would not suggest attempting it unless you are Very VERY comfortable with making such changes. No, it's not difficult. But if you accidentally delete something or a finger flub enters another letter where it shouldn't be, you can royally mess things up. . . .and I'm not convinced Amazon would be obliged to help you out as you're obviously messing with basic code.

Not saying don't do it: just saying have a healthy understanding of the risks from your perspective and proceed, or not, accordingly.
 
#25 ·
I'm glad this thread came up because I hadn't seen it before.

I thought the "99% justification" thing was some kind of bug, rather than intentional.

I transferred some of my own books onto my Kindle with the intention of using the annotation feature to make notes of edits/changes.  Each time I see one of the ragged non-justified lines, I think it's an error I made in the formatting and that I put in too many spaces.

Now I see that it's a "feature" of the Kindle, rather than a bug.  I wish I'd known sooner because I've been racking my brains thinking it was an error I'd done in formatting.

Is there an option on the K3 or the current software that allows for full 100% justification?  Ideally there should be options for multiple or customisable justification so that each individual user can pick what best suits their preference.
 
#26 ·
JSRinUK said:
...... Is there an option on the K3 or the current software that allows for full 100% justification? Ideally there should be options for multiple or customisable justification so that each individual user can pick what best suits their preference.
Unfortunately not. The situation remains the same as it did after the K2 was updated to the 99% justification and there is no official user option to change it. There is, as noted by 911jason above, a way to change it to left justification by amending one of the system files. I looked at the file and it says in there 'justification=full'. I don't know what you could change it to, to make it 100% full, rather than 99% full.
 
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