5 ms·

Yes. I read fiction as ebooks (basically exclusively since days of palm pilot and Treo, then kindle and phone and tablets), but far prefer physical books when

Yes. I read fiction as ebooks (basically exclusively since days of palm pilot and Treo, then kindle and phone and tablets), but far prefer physical books when learning a new topic including tech. Few reasons but I think it's at least partially because: 1. It's easier to mark or hold with my finger e.g. A table or reference or definition page, then return or glance at it as I progress next few pages of that topic. I find it hard to go back and forth in ebook,triply so on e-ink with slow refresh. 2. I cannot explain this but with ebook I don't get a sense of progression or framework relationship. I think with physical book my brain "maps" knowledge to something that's at beginning middle or end of book. And or it's keenly aware that this topot took two pagds thjs topic took 7 pages. Layout of tables and content and lists is firmer. Not sure how to explain it but I find that physical progression through the book solidifies it in my brain. (I don't do much note taking or highlighting but I suppose it's good to have as an easy physical option. While I type all my work notes and my todos are electronic, I don't do really do electronic book annotation for whatever reason.) Overall, it's at the point where existence of really good physical book may influence whether I dig into an optional technical / learning topic or not.

vladvasiliu 4y ago
While I feel the same way towards point 2, I actually find it easier to follow along on a monitor. Sure, it requires a big monitor to display both the doc and the ide/editor, and possibly even the output (say the browser if it's a web framework).
- NikolaNovak 4y ago
  Right, but that's cheating :-). I like everything better on my large monitors. But they have zero portability, so to me they were not part of this comparison. If I am learning about a net new topic that I want to really dive into and engross myself and dedicate and get into the zone, I like to sit down on a comfy chair, lie down on the couch, or bench in a park, or best of all bring the book to shady lounge chair in Cuba lol! Kindle, tablet and physical book can do those things, my monitor setup less so :-)
CWuestefeld 4y ago
I agree completely. I'd like to expand on your #1. I think that physical books make it much easier to have multiple books all open on your desk as you look between all of them, and also to have bookmarks within a single book that you flip between. As you say, I love ebooks for fiction. But the folks building these apps and devices still haven't hit on an interaction model that works well for non-fiction.
- atchoo 4y ago
  This is the reason I love ebooks on a proper workstation with a huge monitor. I can fit eight or more books open at once... but more likely 3 or 4 plus a web-browser and notes. I might have three copies of the same book open at once. One for linear reading, one for search and one for cross referencing. Much better than a physical book. A bookmarks side-bar works well in e-readers if there are specific locations you regularly need access to. Tablets and physical e-readers suck in comparison to a proper computer. You also might need to strip DRM to get out of some walled-garden reader that prevents you opening multiple instances of the same book. Copy paste is a killer feature for note taking (and another reason to ditch ecosystem readers that interfere with copy paste like Apple books).
  - darkteflon 4y ago
    I like this a lot - particularly as there may be a range of reasons that you can’t get hold of a particular book in physical form. I’ve never used or looked into non-ecosystem e-readers. Do you have any recommendations?
    - atchoo 4y ago
      I use the Calibre e-reader with custom style overrides to get my preferred spacing, margins etc. It's ugly out of the box but doesn't require much tweaking to look like Apple Books if you know css. Works great on MacOs/Linux/Windows (I use them all). If a book has hardcoded fonts/styles/spacing I don't like then I use the Calibre editor to remove them. I don't use Calibre as a library tool, I find that pretty annoying. I just use a git repo with folders for genres and markdown file with each book for notes. On Android I use ReadEra.
UnpossibleJim 4y ago
I am a voracious physical note taker when learning, personally. There's something about the physicality of it that helps it stay in my brain. I rarely have to read my notes, once I've written them. That's part if the reason I enjoy hard copies so much, I find scribbling in the margins can have much the same effect, if not as well. Just a small summation of the paragraph in scribble form, to cut through the jargon, of possible and underlining the actionable phraseology keeps it locked in =[
downrightmike 4y ago
Opposite. I need ctrl-F on books. I get in, read and then I am able to revisit things I made need to quickly.
- bergenty 4y ago
  Prefer physical books for everything except when I need to ctrl+f but there is usually a pdf version of the book I can do that on and then just actually go there on the physical.
the_af 4y ago
I agree with everything you said except that for me it also applies to fiction. I read a lot of fiction on my Kindle, and it's never as satisfying as leafing through a paper novel. I don't read start to finish, I tend to go back to favorite passages, or to re-read a character's introduction some chapters before (and if I get lost, some other passage is sure to catch my eye!) and ebooks make this painful. My way of reading is very "physical", for lack of a better word. Ebooks are not good for this at all. I still like my Kindle, because nothing beats having hundreds of novels on a single lightweight device. But to me that's its biggest and almost only advantage. (Secondary: adjusting font size as my eyesight grows less precise with age).
johnchristopher 4y ago
> 2. I cannot explain this but with ebook I don't get a sense of progression or framework relationship. I think with physical book my brain "maps" knowledge to something that's at beginning middle or end of book. And or it's keenly aware that this topot took two pagds thjs topic took 7 pages. Layout of tables and content and lists is firmer. Not sure how to explain it but I find that physical progression through the book solidifies it in my brain. I'll just post my favorite comment again (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30183933 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30183933): >> Also, when I try to remember something I have red on a printed book, - sometimes - I can remember where on the page it was written, what else was on the page, or even what the page looked like. I experience none of that when reading on my smartphone. >This is so obvious to me but more than once I have hit the typical robot HN user on this topic for whom it doesn't matter the medium because he's an eidetic machine. So I'll just post this: >> Beyond treating individual letters as physical objects, the human brain may also perceive a text in its entirety as a kind of physical landscape. When we read, we construct a mental representation of the text in which meaning is anchored to structure. The exact nature of such representations remains unclear, but they are likely similar to the mental maps we create of terrain—such as mountains and trails—and of man-made physical spaces, such as apartments and offices. Both anecdotally and in published studies, people report that when trying to locate a particular piece of written information they often remember where in the text it appeared. We might recall that we passed the red farmhouse near the start of the trail before we started climbing uphill through the forest; in a similar way, we remember that we read about Mr. Darcy rebuffing Elizabeth Bennett on the bottom of the left-hand page in one of the earlier chapters. >https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr... >And repost my comment from one of those times: >>> The value provided by a physical map of a book is knowing how far along you are in the book, yet that's also available in a visual form in an ebook as well. You can even riffle through pages on most e-readers as well, seeing a preview of the page as you move quickly forward or backwards. >>> Aside from weight, what value is the physical map really providing? >> No, it provides more. >> Actually your brain maps physical properties of the book to actual content, creating an overlay map over the story or the content (and our brain is really good at mentally mapping things). This is that map that is being used to know where in the book a particular piece of information is. >> Reading on e-reader is more linear than reading a paper book. See: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr... https://insights.uksg.org/articles/10.1629/uksg.236/ https://insights.uksg.org/articles/10.1629/uksg.236/ and https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/19/readers-absorb https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/19/readers-absorb... >> Besides, no e-reader today can let your riffle through pages as fast as paper book. >> When you are in a novel, or in a manual, you have some kinetic and touch feedback to build memories of where's what. The book becomes an extension (à la proprioception) with much less friction than an e-read for which you have to wait for visual feedback (screen refreshing). >> With paper books things are at the tip of your fingers. >> E-reader have more friction. >> That's a reason why I only read novels on e-reader and jot notes in a notepad for non-fiction books. >> If I had the budget I'd only have physical books.
vl 4y ago
I haven't used Javascript/Typescript for the few years and some needed to refresh it, so I bought a copy of Modern JavaScript for the Impatient. This is great book, can't recommend it highly enough. Few hours reading and I was up to speed. The trick is though that you need to spend some time choosing a book. Random software book is crap. In my case I needed a concise refresher, so I found this specific book after reading reviews for bunch of the books on Amazon. I.e. before getting a book, figure out what you actually expect from it.
wink 4y ago
Mostly this, but I'm also spending enough time in front of a screen, so being able to read my books on the sofa is a huge plus.

vladvasiliu 4y ago

While I feel the same way towards point 2, I actually find it easier to follow along on a monitor. Sure, it requires a big monitor to display both the doc and the ide/editor, and possibly even the output (say the browser if it's a web framework).

NikolaNovak 4y ago
Right, but that's cheating :-). I like everything better on my large monitors. But they have zero portability, so to me they were not part of this comparison. If I am learning about a net new topic that I want to really dive into and engross myself and dedicate and get into the zone, I like to sit down on a comfy chair, lie down on the couch, or bench in a park, or best of all bring the book to shady lounge chair in Cuba lol! Kindle, tablet and physical book can do those things, my monitor setup less so :-)

CWuestefeld 4y ago

I agree completely. I'd like to expand on your #1. I think that physical books make it much easier to have multiple books all open on your desk as you look between all of them, and also to have bookmarks within a single book that you flip between. As you say, I love ebooks for fiction. But the folks building these apps and devices still haven't hit on an interaction model that works well for non-fiction.

atchoo 4y ago
This is the reason I love ebooks on a proper workstation with a huge monitor. I can fit eight or more books open at once... but more likely 3 or 4 plus a web-browser and notes. I might have three copies of the same book open at once. One for linear reading, one for search and one for cross referencing. Much better than a physical book. A bookmarks side-bar works well in e-readers if there are specific locations you regularly need access to. Tablets and physical e-readers suck in comparison to a proper computer. You also might need to strip DRM to get out of some walled-garden reader that prevents you opening multiple instances of the same book. Copy paste is a killer feature for note taking (and another reason to ditch ecosystem readers that interfere with copy paste like Apple books).
- darkteflon 4y ago
  I like this a lot - particularly as there may be a range of reasons that you can’t get hold of a particular book in physical form. I’ve never used or looked into non-ecosystem e-readers. Do you have any recommendations?
  - atchoo 4y ago
    I use the Calibre e-reader with custom style overrides to get my preferred spacing, margins etc. It's ugly out of the box but doesn't require much tweaking to look like Apple Books if you know css. Works great on MacOs/Linux/Windows (I use them all). If a book has hardcoded fonts/styles/spacing I don't like then I use the Calibre editor to remove them. I don't use Calibre as a library tool, I find that pretty annoying. I just use a git repo with folders for genres and markdown file with each book for notes. On Android I use ReadEra.

UnpossibleJim 4y ago

I am a voracious physical note taker when learning, personally. There's something about the physicality of it that helps it stay in my brain. I rarely have to read my notes, once I've written them. That's part if the reason I enjoy hard copies so much, I find scribbling in the margins can have much the same effect, if not as well. Just a small summation of the paragraph in scribble form, to cut through the jargon, of possible and underlining the actionable phraseology keeps it locked in =[

downrightmike 4y ago

Opposite. I need ctrl-F on books. I get in, read and then I am able to revisit things I made need to quickly.

bergenty 4y ago
Prefer physical books for everything except when I need to ctrl+f but there is usually a pdf version of the book I can do that on and then just actually go there on the physical.

the_af 4y ago

I agree with everything you said except that for me it also applies to fiction. I read a lot of fiction on my Kindle, and it's never as satisfying as leafing through a paper novel. I don't read start to finish, I tend to go back to favorite passages, or to re-read a character's introduction some chapters before (and if I get lost, some other passage is sure to catch my eye!) and ebooks make this painful. My way of reading is very "physical", for lack of a better word. Ebooks are not good for this at all. I still like my Kindle, because nothing beats having hundreds of novels on a single lightweight device. But to me that's its biggest and almost only advantage. (Secondary: adjusting font size as my eyesight grows less precise with age).

johnchristopher 4y ago

> 2. I cannot explain this but with ebook I don't get a sense of progression or framework relationship. I think with physical book my brain "maps" knowledge to something that's at beginning middle or end of book. And or it's keenly aware that this topot took two pagds thjs topic took 7 pages. Layout of tables and content and lists is firmer. Not sure how to explain it but I find that physical progression through the book solidifies it in my brain. I'll just post my favorite comment again (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30183933 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30183933): >> Also, when I try to remember something I have red on a printed book, - sometimes - I can remember where on the page it was written, what else was on the page, or even what the page looked like. I experience none of that when reading on my smartphone. >This is so obvious to me but more than once I have hit the typical robot HN user on this topic for whom it doesn't matter the medium because he's an eidetic machine. So I'll just post this: >> Beyond treating individual letters as physical objects, the human brain may also perceive a text in its entirety as a kind of physical landscape. When we read, we construct a mental representation of the text in which meaning is anchored to structure. The exact nature of such representations remains unclear, but they are likely similar to the mental maps we create of terrain—such as mountains and trails—and of man-made physical spaces, such as apartments and offices. Both anecdotally and in published studies, people report that when trying to locate a particular piece of written information they often remember where in the text it appeared. We might recall that we passed the red farmhouse near the start of the trail before we started climbing uphill through the forest; in a similar way, we remember that we read about Mr. Darcy rebuffing Elizabeth Bennett on the bottom of the left-hand page in one of the earlier chapters. >https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr... >And repost my comment from one of those times: >>> The value provided by a physical map of a book is knowing how far along you are in the book, yet that's also available in a visual form in an ebook as well. You can even riffle through pages on most e-readers as well, seeing a preview of the page as you move quickly forward or backwards. >>> Aside from weight, what value is the physical map really providing? >> No, it provides more. >> Actually your brain maps physical properties of the book to actual content, creating an overlay map over the story or the content (and our brain is really good at mentally mapping things). This is that map that is being used to know where in the book a particular piece of information is. >> Reading on e-reader is more linear than reading a paper book. See: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-scr... https://insights.uksg.org/articles/10.1629/uksg.236/ https://insights.uksg.org/articles/10.1629/uksg.236/ and https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/19/readers-absorb https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/19/readers-absorb... >> Besides, no e-reader today can let your riffle through pages as fast as paper book. >> When you are in a novel, or in a manual, you have some kinetic and touch feedback to build memories of where's what. The book becomes an extension (à la proprioception) with much less friction than an e-read for which you have to wait for visual feedback (screen refreshing). >> With paper books things are at the tip of your fingers. >> E-reader have more friction. >> That's a reason why I only read novels on e-reader and jot notes in a notepad for non-fiction books. >> If I had the budget I'd only have physical books.

vl 4y ago

I haven't used Javascript/Typescript for the few years and some needed to refresh it, so I bought a copy of Modern JavaScript for the Impatient. This is great book, can't recommend it highly enough. Few hours reading and I was up to speed. The trick is though that you need to spend some time choosing a book. Random software book is crap. In my case I needed a concise refresher, so I found this specific book after reading reviews for bunch of the books on Amazon. I.e. before getting a book, figure out what you actually expect from it.

wink 4y ago

Mostly this, but I'm also spending enough time in front of a screen, so being able to read my books on the sofa is a huge plus.