Chapter 7. Using NOOKextras and Surfing the Web
The NOOKcolor includes a markedly improved web browser experience over the original NOOK’s browser. Also, B&N added NOOKextras, which include games, the Music Player you learned about in Chapter 6, “Playing Music, Audiobooks, Podcasts, and Videos,” and other items.
Using NOOKextras
NOOKextras are, for lack of a better term, apps. If you have an iPhone, iPad, or Android phone, you are familiar with these downloadable programs you can add to those devices. Well, a NOOKextra is an app created specifically for the NOOKcolor.
Note
Though it is an Android-based device, you cannot download and use apps from the Android marketplace. Don’t fret too much about this though...the Android marketplace apps are geared toward mobile phones (at least for now) and are not optimized for the NOOKcolor’s 7-inch screen.
In the first part of 2011, B&N plans to open a NOOKextras store, where you can download and purchase additional apps. This is a curated store, which means that B&N will review and authorize the apps like Apple does for iPhone and iPad apps and unlike the Android marketplace.
You can get NOOKextras by tapping Extras from the Quick Nav Bar. B&N preloaded several NOOKextras to your NOOKcolor (see Figure 7.1).
Figure 7.1. The NOOKextras on your NOOKcolor.
• Chess:Tap this to play some chess.
• Contacts:Tap this to see the list of your contacts, both B&N and Google (if you linked your Google contacts).
• Crossword:Tap this to play a crossword puzzle from The New York Sun.
• Gallery:Tap this to open up an app to view images on the NOOKcolor.
• LendMe:Tap this to open the LendMe app (see Chapter 4, “Lending and Borrowing Books with LendMe on Your NOOKcolor,” for more details about lending and borrowing NOOKbooks.
• Music:Tap this to open the Music Player (see Chapter 6 for more details about using the Music Player.
• Pandora:Tap this to open the Pandora application and listen to music.
• Sudoku:Tap this to play a game of Soduko.
Playing Chess on Your NOOKcolor
Feel like playing a game of chess? Well, your opponent is just a tap away. When you tap Chess in NOOKextras, the game opens with the board displayed (see Figure 7.2). Tap Settings to set your color (Brown, Black, or Random). Brown moves first. In settings you can also set the difficulty (Easy, Normal, or Hard). Finally, you can also set the amount of time allowed to win. On this latter setting, you can set it so that only you or the NOOKcolor or both have a designated amount of time to win the game.
Figure 7.2. Take on the NOOKcolor in a game of chess.
Note
The time allowed is used up only when it is that player’s turn. In other words, if you give yourself 5 minutes to win the game, your clock counts down only when it’s your turn to move.
The game is straightforward to use. After starting the game, press and hold the piece you want to move, and drag to the spot you want it. The game does not let you make an illegal move. (It say “Wrong move!”) If you mess up, you can tap Undo to go back to the previous positions.
If you tap Pause Game, you pause the game and can resume simply by tapping Resume Game. Also, if you leave the game to go read an ebook or magazine, you can return to the game by going to the Quick Nav Bar, tapping Extras, and tapping Chess.
Tap Resign to, well, you know...admit defeat.
Using Contacts on Your NOOKcolor
If you linked your Google Contacts during the set up phase discussed in the Chapter 2 “Social Menu” section, you see them here (if you haven’t already attempted to share quotes yet). Tap Contacts to open the Contacts app.
Here, you can filter your contacts by All, Barnes & Noble, and Google (see Figure 7.3). By default, all are shown. The Barnes & Noble set are contacts stored only on your NOOKcolor. Google contacts are all your Google contacts (assuming you chose to link your Google account to your NOOKcolor and use Google Contacts).
Figure 7.3. Filter your contacts to narrow your list.
Tip
Until I bought my NOOKcolor, I did not use Google Contacts. But then I realized I didn’t want to add a hundred contacts manually, so I went to where I kept my contacts (in this case, Mac’s Address Book) and exported the contacts. I then imported them into Google Contacts (under Google Contacts’ More Actions menu). I did it one time to get that.
Note
If you linked Google to your NOOKcolor, you cannot edit the Google Contacts’ information on the NOOKcolor.
Use the Search Contacts box to search for a specific person, or you can scroll through your list.
If you want to add a B&N contact, tap Add Contact (see Figure 7.4). Fill in the First and Last Names, and add an email address. You can add more email addresses for that contact by tapping Add New Email. Tap Done when you have entered in all the information.
Figure 7.4. Adding a contact is easy.
If you need to later edit that contact, find it in your Contacts, tap the name, and then tap Edit. Adjust as necessary and tap Done.
Playing Crossword on Your NOOKcolor
The NOOKcolor features a crossword puzzle game featuring crosswords from The New York Sun. To play, from the Quick Nav Bar, tap Extras and then tap Crossword (see Figure 7.5). Tap Game and tap your difficulty level. A new puzzle appears. You can interact in several ways with the puzzle and enter your answers (or delete your mistakes).
Figure 7.5. Play a crossword game to pass the time.
You can tap any of the white cells in the puzzle. It highlights the word. The darker green cell is where any letter you type appears. Tap the cell again, and it switches to either the across or the down word.
The clues to the puzzles are at the top of the screen. If you tap that area, it expands and you can scroll through either the Across or Down list. Tap the clue to highlight the word in the crossword puzzle.
You can also navigate from word to word by tapping either the Prev Word or Next Word buttons at the bottom of the screen. This particular option cycles through the words depending on your current selection.
Tapping the particular word in the crossword is the easiest to move from word to word.
To enter your answer, tap the letters as appropriate. Tapping one letter enters that letter in the cell and then moves to the next cell for you to enter the letter. Tap DEL to delete the letter. Use the arrow keys to move from letter to letter in the word.
If you get stuck, you can tap Hint and it enters the letter for the currently selected cell.
Using the Gallery on Your NOOKcolor
Gallery is a photo gallery on your NOOKcolor that displays JPG, GIF, PNG, or BMP images.
The Gallery app in its current incarnation is useful for this reason: Gallery collects every JPG, GIF, PNG, or BMP on your NOOKcolor and microSD card and displays them here—every single one. If you have numerous images for covers not from NOOKbooks, when you open Gallery, you can see all of them.
Start Gallery by tapping Extras from the Quick Nav Bar. Then tap Gallery. Your photos appear (see Figure 7.6). You can choose to look at them in either Picture or Grid view. If you are in Picture view, in the top-right corner, you see an option called Grid and vice versa. Tap this to switch to the other view. You can do most of your interaction with images in Picture view. Grid view is useful for quickly navigating your photos.
Figure 7.6. The gallery of images on your NOOKcolor.
When you find a photo you want to see in Picture view, tap it. The image appears all alone on the screen then. You can still move between images in Picture view by swiping right or left. You can also use pinch and zoom techniques to zoom in and out.
Tap the image to display the Photo Tools bar (see Figure 7.7). You have six options here:
Figure 7.7. Use the Photo Tools bar to manipulate your images.
• Slideshow:Tap this option to start a slideshow. The screen shows only the image, and after a pause the next image appears. To see the order of the images, take a look at them in Grid view before starting the slideshow.
To exit the slideshow, tap the Home button.
• Wallpaper:Tap this option to set this images as your Home screen image.
After you tap Wallpaper, a version of the photo appears with an orange outlined box and two buttons: Save and Discard. The orange outlined box is for cropping the image to the size of the wallpaper. Whatever is inside the orange outlined box will be used for the wallpaper. To move that box, press and hold, and then drag it around to wherever you want it. Tap Save to make it the wallpaper, and return to Gallery, or tap Discard to exit back to Gallery.
• Crop:Tap this option crop the image to remove portions of it that you do not want. When you tap Crop, the photo appears with an orange outlined box and two buttons: Save and Discard. Like making wallpaper, whatever is on the inside of the orange box is retained. With crop, however, you can tap the orange outline and drag it smaller or larger. Tap Save to make it the wallpaper and return to Gallery, or tap Discard to exit back to Gallery.
Figure 7.8. Adjust the orange box to crop out what you don’t want in the image.
• Left/Right:These two buttons rotate the image either clockwise or counterclockwise. Use this if an image appears on its side and you want it rightside up.
• Delete:Tap this to delete the image from your NOOKcolor.
Playing Music with Pandora on Your NOOKcolor
On the original NOOK, one of the earliest hacks to it was to add a Pandora music player. Pandora is a web-delivered streaming music service, for free (Pandora.com). You create stations based on artists or types of music, and Pandora plays music from that artist or type of music and similar types of music—think of stations as playlists. You can create multiple stations. As you’re listening to music, you can give it a thumbs up or down to indicate how well the selection matches your expectations to that station. Pandora uses this to refine the music it picks.
If you listen to Pandora on your NOOKcolor, you can leave the app to read, surf the Internet, or do other things while Pandora continues to play.
A couple of things to note about Pandora: Because it is free and the licenses it has signed with music distribution companies, you can skip a song that you don’t like (by tapping the Next Song button or tapping thumbs down while the song is playing). However, you are limited to 6 skips per station per hour and a total of 12 skips per day across all stations.
The first time you start Pandora on your NOOKcolor, you can either enter existing account information and tap Login or register for a new account by tapping Register for Free (see Figure 7.9). If the latter, fill out the Create New Account information, and tap Register for Free.
Figure 7.9. Setting up Pandora for the first time.
If you have an existing account, when you log in, the NOOKcolor Pandora app grabs all your stations.
After the Pandora app starts, to add a station follow these steps:
- Tap Add Station. The Add Station screen appears.
- In the Artist, Song, or Composer field, type in what you are looking for. Tap Done.
- Depending on your search, you may see many results or just a few. Tap the one that best meets your needs. Pandora switches to play mode and adds the station so that you can access it any time by tapping My Stations.
Tap My Stations to see a list of your stations (see Figure 7.10). Tap the station you want to listen to. Tap Edit and then the hyphen in a Circle icon at the left to delete that station.
Figure 7.10. Your Pandora stations.
While listening to music, you can use the thumbs up or down icons, bookmark a song or artist, pause playing, or tap skip to next song (see Figure 7.11).
Figure 7.11. The Pandora music player.
If you are not viewing the Pandora application (that is, you’re reading a book while Pandora is playing songs), you can always tap the Pandora Notification icon to see what is playing. If you tap the Notification icon, the Pandora app opens.
Playing Sudoku on Your NOOKcolor
Sudoku is a wildly popular puzzle game, and the original NOOK had a Sudoku game (with release 1.3). You can continue to enjoy the pleasures of Sudoku on your NOOKcolor. To play Sudoku, from the Quick Nav Bar, tap Extras, and then tap Sudoku.
When you first start Sudoku, tap New Game (see Figure 7.12). Then tap which game difficulty you want. (If you have previously started a game and left it, you can either resume the existing game or tap New Game to start a new game).
Figure 7.12. Play Sudoku to keep your mind sharp.
A puzzle appears and you can begin play. You have two primary options for entering numbers: Pen and Notes. Notes enables you enter the possible numbers you think might fill that cell without committing to that number (see Figure 7.13). Pen enters that number as your choice. (You can easily overwrite it by choosing another or tapping Undo or Clear Cell.)
Figure 7.13. Use notes to help solve the puzzle as if you were writing it on paper.
Tip
If the number appears in red in the cell, that number is already used in that row and cannot be used again.
Use the number pad to enter the numbers in either Pen or Notes mode. Undo cancels out your last action and redo reverts that back. For example, if you enter 3 in a cell and then enter 4, tapping Undo takes that cell back to 3. Tapping Redo returns it to 4. Tap Clear Cell to remove any numbers from the cell.
Tap Pause Game to stop the timer. You can then resume playing by tapping Resume Game or the arrow button in the center of the puzzle screen.
Tapping Quit Game quits that particular game, so you can play a new one.
If you leave the game to go read or surf the Internet, the game automatically pauses.
Browsing the Web with Your NOOKcolor
The NOOKcolor comes with a full-featured web browser (see Figure 7.14). Right now, it does not support Flash, though it is widely expected that a future update will provide Flash support. Flash is a platform created by Adobe that allows for animation and interactivity and is used frequently on websites.
To start the browser, from the Quick Nav Bar, tap Web.
Figure 7.14. The NOOKcolor’s web browser.
If you are familiar with the web browser on the original NOOK, forget what you knew. The NOOKcolor browser is by far a better browser experience. The original NOOK’s browser displayed the page on the E Ink and you navigated with the small touchscreen. This was tedious at best. The browser on the NOOKcolor displays the whole page in color, allows you to tap links to navigate, and lets you pinch and zoom to specific locations on the web page.
An Overview of Browsing on Your NOOKcolor
Browsing the web on your NOOKcolor is easy. From the Quick Nav Bar, tap Web to open the browser. The browser opens to the home page or last page you were on.
At the top, you see a typical looking web browser interface:
• Back Button:Tap to go back to the previous web page.
• Address Bar:Tap to enter a new web address or search the web. Tapping gives you the keyboard, and you can either enter a specific web address, or you can type a search term. As you type, a series of tappable links appears below the bar. This displays previously searched terms and websites. You can continue typing and tap Go, which performs a Google search.
• Stop Button:Tap to stop the current page loading.
• Bookmarks:Tap to access bookmarks, most visited sites, and your history. For more information about the Bookmarks options, see “Using the Bookmarks Screen.”
• Options:Tap to access additional options, settings, and so on. For more information about the Options, see “Using the Browser Options.”
When you are at a web page, press and hold, and then drag to maneuver the page. You can zoom into an area of the page by either tapping twice quickly on that area of the screen or tapping once and then using the plus button at the bottom of the screen.
To zoom back out, tap twice on an area of the screen, or tap once and then use the minus button at the bottom of the screen.
Note
To do a lot of the functions in the web browser, you have to wait for the page to load completely.
Tap a link to go to that link if it is a regular hyperlink (for example, going to another web page). Some links download items to your NOOKcolor. For example, if you press and hold on an image, you can get a menu to save or view the image (see Figure 7.15). However, if you are at Project Gutenberg go to the download section for a specific book and tap the EPUB link, the file downloads to your NOOKcolor (see Figure 7.16). These downloads go to the My FilesMy Downloads folder.
Figure 7.15. Some links offer you an opportunity to save or view the file.
Figure 7.16. Some links download the file to your NOOKcolor.
If you press and hold a hyperlink (see Figure 7.17), a menu appears with these options:
Figure 7.17. Your options after you press and hold a hyperlink.
• Open:Opens the link. This is the same at tapping the link.
• Open in New Window:Opens the link in a new window, thus leaving your existing window in place.
• Bookmark Link:Adds a bookmark to the link you are pressing.
• Copy Link URL:Copies the link to the Clipboard.
Note
In the browser, copying text or links is allowed in a couple of places. However, I have yet to find a place where I can paste the said text.
If you press and hold in a nonlink area of the web page, a menu appears with these options (see Figure 7.18):
Figure 7.18. Your options after you press and hold a nonhyperlink area on a web page.
• Find on Page:Tap this to search for specific text on this page. The keyboard appears. Type in what you want to search for. Tap Search. The keyboard drops away and the number of occurrences found on the page is shown. If more than one appearance is on the page, use the back and forward buttons to highlight the word.
• Select Text:Tap this to select text on the page. After you tap Select Text, press at the starting point of the text you want to select, and drag to the ending of the text. Lift your finger, and you receive a note that the text has been copied to the Clipboard.
Note
Because it is a web page, sometimes when selecting text, you grab a couple of columns, and so on. It’s imperfect and, given that I have yet to find the place to paste the text, I’m not sure of the point as yet.
• Page Info:Tap this to see some information related to the page.
• Settings:Tap this to access the browser settings. For more information about the Options, see “Using the Browser Options.”
• Downloads:Tap this to see any downloads you have made from the NOOKcolor to the My Downloads folder.
• Bookmark This Page:Tap this to add this page to your bookmarks.
Using the Bookmarks Screen
The Bookmarks screen, shown in Figure 7.19, enables you to add bookmarks, modify existing ones, and other options. The screen opens with three tabs: Bookmarks, Most Visited, and History.
Figure 7.19. The Bookmarks screen.
To get to the Bookmarks screen, tap the Bookmarks button. The Bookmarks screen opens at the Bookmarks tab. The bookmarks are thumbnails of the web pages. The top-left thumbnail, with Add overlayed on it, is actually not yet a bookmark. You can make this a bookmark by tapping it. The Add Bookmark window appears. You can adjust the name of the bookmark and location. (I recommend leaving this as is.) Tap OK to make it a bookmark.
The other thumbnails are your bookmarks. Tap the thumbnail to open that web page. If you press and hold the thumbnail, a pop-up menu provides these options (see Figure 7.20):
Figure 7.20. Additional options on the Bookmarks screen.
• Open:Opens the link. This is the same at tapping the link.
• Open in New Window:Opens the link in a new window, thus leaving your existing window in place.
• Edit Bookmark:Opens the Edit Bookmark window. Here you can adjust the name and location (that is, the hyperlink address) of the bookmark.
• Copy Link URL:Copies the link to the clipboard.
• Delete Bookmark:Deletes the bookmark. You will be asked to confirm that you want to delete it.
• Set as Homepage:Sets this bookmark as your home page.
The Most Visited tab lists the web pages you have visited the, well, most often. A star appears to the right of the link. Gold means that it is a bookmark. Gray means that it is not a bookmark.
You can tap a link to go to that web page. If you press and hold the link, you see a set of options similar to the preceding list of options with one exception: Delete Bookmark is replaced by Remove from History. Tapping this removes the web page from your history.
Note
You might think that tapping Remove from History would remove the link from the History tab on the Bookmarks screen. Although logical, you would be incorrect to think this. On the Most Visited tab, the Remove from History option is better labeled Remove from Most Visited.
The History tab lists the web pages you have visited. A star appears to the right of the link. Gold means that it is a bookmark. Gray means that it is not a bookmark. Scrolling down to the bottom of the list provides options for sites visited Yesterday, 5 Days Ago, and 1 Month Ago. Tapping one of those reveals more sites.
You can tap a link to go to that web page. If you press and hold the link, you see a set of options similar to the previous list of options. Tapping Remove from History removes the web page from the history.
On the screen, you can also tap Clear History to wipe out the entire history at once.
Using the Browser Options
As mentioned previously, tap the Options button to access browser settings and other options (see Figure 7.21). The following appears in the drop-down menu:
Figure 7.21. The browser’s Options screen.
• New Window:Tap this to open a new window and leave the current window in place.
• Bookmarks:Tap this to open the Bookmarks screen. For more information about the Bookmarks options, see “Using the Bookmarks Screen.”
• Windows:Tap this to see all the windows currently open. Tap the window you want to go to. Tap the X button to close that window.
• Refresh:Tap this to refresh the page, which is particularly useful if the page receives periodic updates.
• Forward:If you have tapped the Back button, tap Forward to go back to the previous page.
• More Options:Provides many items already covered, except for Settings.
Many settings about the web browser are available. Most of them are self-explanatory, but a few are covered in detail here.
Tap Text Size to adjust how large the text appears on web pages. Consider this the same as adjusting the text size in ebooks. You have several options: Tiny, Small, Normal, Large, and Huge.
Tap Default Zoom to set how the browser opens pages initially. You have three options: Far, Medium, and Close. Far shows more of the web page than the other two, which means that you have to zoom in more to get close. Close starts in very close, usually requiring more pressing and dragging to maneuver around the page.
Tip
I think Medium is the best setting. If you use Far, when you double-tap quickly a part of the page, the page zooms in quickly equivalent to the Close setting size. Medium seems to strike the right balance between easy visibility without being too close.
The Open Pages in Overview setting determines how newly opened pages first appear. If this setting is turned on, the web page appears in the browser showing the page in a zoomed out view (though not equivalent to the Far setting in Default Zoom).
With the Open in Background setting off, when you choose to open a link in a new window, that new window is what you see. With this setting on, that new window is hidden until you choose it by tapping Options and then tapping Windows.
You can use the Set Homepage option here to set the current web page as the home page.
The NOOKcolor’s web browser is, as you have learned, feature rich. As an anecdote about how you can make use of this browser, I share a recent experience. I was about to attend a meeting (via a phone conference). The agenda was in my email, but just as I needed it, my computer decided that it needed to shut down suddenly. Rather than waiting for the slow rebooting and start up, I opened my NOOKcolor’s web browser, signed onto my email, tapped the attachment, and downloaded the file (a Word document) to My Downloads. I then opened the file with Quickoffice. I was using the agenda as the meeting was starting while my computer was still booting up.