Days Of Dragging Around Heavy Textbooks Could Be Coming To An End

Going to college or university no longer means lugging around heavy textbooks, thanks the new Textbooks for iPad app by Kno. The free app, from the makers of the now-abandoned Kno digital textbook, includes a library of 70,000 titles at prices 30 to 50 percent cheaper than the list price. Most importantly, each book uses the same page numbering and chapter conventions as their physical counterparts. Finally, the Course Manager allows students to organize their textbooks and PDFs by class and term. It also includes social and learning features. Features also include:

• One-touch highlighting with multi-color support
• Paging- the same page and chapter numbers clearly marked as a physical textbook
• High-fidelity pages with crystal clear text and pinch zoom capabilities
• Annotate using sticky notes
• Portrait and landscape reading modes
• Ask questions, post comments, or share your location with study buddies
• Preview the entire chapter and jump directly to any page

We've test the app and overall were impressed with it. Not only was the download process smooth and the library of available resources huge, but book prices appeared reasonable. On the downside, moving from page-to-page seemed slow at times, when compared to performing similar tasks using both the Kindle and iBooks app. Still, Textbooks for iPad has the potential of changing an industry and saving students money as well. Thoughts?

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