Digital offerings

[denham2010]

Hi all,

I have submitted the following email to the letters section of the magazine, and I ask all of you to get behind this request by posting here. Let's get a digital version of the magazine available for LINUX devices!

It was with great interest, while reading the August issue, I saw the subscription advert for zinio.com. Great I thought. Now I can read lxf on my linux tablet.

A visit to zinio.com led to major disappointment. The required app is for windows and mac only. So this means I can only read a magazine about linux and for linux users on Apple, Android and Microsoft devices. Sort of defeats the purpose, and completely misses the target market, don't you think?

Surley a digital distribution media supporting linux should have been the major consideration in selecting a digital publishing partner, yes?

I want to read my favourite linux magazine on my linux device. It's in the Ubuntu software centre you say? Well, I don't use Ubuntu either, nor should I have to.

I, and I am sure the majority of your reader base would agree, implore the powers that be at lxf towers, to supply a distro agnostic medium for subscribing, downloading and reading lxf on LINUX devices.

I am certain that those other OS magazines are laughing at lxf behind the school bikeshed, "hehehe, look at lxf, he can't even support the platform he is all about".

Love the mag, but please, address this most annoying and disappointing situation.

Cheers.
Lachlan, Melbourne Australia.

[jonrob]

Hi,

I'll answer here, but it might also appear in the letter's page

First thing to say is, if you buy a print subscription, you get access to our entire archive (starting from around LXF60), with early access to new issues, as DRM free PDFs. You can then download these to your computer/tablet/mobile phone of choice, and so long as you have a PDF reader, you can read them. http://linuxformat.com/archives You can browse without a subscription.

It is a bit disappointing that you have to get a print subscription, but we are working on this and hope to have a solution where you can buy a PDF only subscription very soon!

Second, it looks like Zinio is available for Android, so if your Linux based tablet is in fact an Android one, you can probably use this. Search Google Play and you should find it.

I hope one of these two solutions works for you, and I hope that we can sort out a PDF only subscription soon, too!

[denham2010]

Thanks for the reply jonrob.

Unfortunately I can not afford a print subscription, what with exchange rates and all, it becomes very expensive for Australian readers.

Secondly, my tablet is not Android. It is Linux (running Arch). Dare I say I am one of those that separates Android from Linux.

So, sadly, none of these solutions can work for me. I am sure there are many more in the same boat.

I really hope something can be sorted out soon, not meaning to be rude, as I know the lxf guys may be limited in their sway with the big wigs, but it really is a joke that a Linux magazine can not be read on a Linux device.

Cheers.

[drpetebaker]

Hi Lachlan and others

Being from Oz, for similar reasons, I decided to get the digital only subscription. My 1st surprise was that on my laptop I can read zinio mags only on Windows or old linux distros like mint 11 or fedora 15. Despite my best efforts, no go on a fresh Fedora 17 install because of missing dependencies for Adobe Air which is pretty disappointing. The alternative of reading on my 2 yo android phone while possible is quite a chore.

Zinio.com help have been very responsive but of no use at all

Has anyone had any luck installing zinio reader on 64 bit Fedora 17 or Mint 13?

While I'm sure there are sound commercial reasons, I do find this lack of linux support for the digital version of linuxformat mag totally incomprehensible.

Cheers
Peter
Brisbane, Australia

[nelz]

You could install one of the older distros in a virtual machine. It's hardly elegant, but better than trying to read on a phone screen.

[drpetebaker]

You could install one of the older distros in a virtual machine. It's hardly elegant, but better than trying to read on a phone screen.

Thanks. I have thought about that but being lazy and optimistic I was hoping some else may have solved it

A good reason to check out the latest virt-manager I guess

Cheers
Peter

[Ram]

Have you seen this blog

[denham2010]

Hi LXF team,

Do you have any update at all on a distro agnostic digital version of the mag?

Surely it would just be a matter of a new distribution channel of the version in the Ubuntu Software Centre? The format is there, just need the ability to buy it on distros besides Ubuntu.

Cheers.

[graham]

It should be a simple job. And we are very close to making the digital-only subscription live.

We're also frustrated that it's taken so long; from a technical point of view, this is something the team manages and could have done ages ago.

But the delay has been caused by due processes out of our control - modifications needed to be made to the company that hosts the customer database (this took months) as well as understanding the financial/tax implications for the magazine and company (in the UK, digital copies need to include VAT, for example, while print copies don't).

Something that seemed such a simple idea to us has taken a long longer than estimated, but I'm assured we're very close.

Graham

[denham2010]

Thanks Graham,

Appreciate the hard work you guys are putting into this.

[drpetebaker]

Have you seen this blog

Yes. Thanks. I already used this

It worked fine on Fedora 16 updated from Fedora 14 as some old prerequisite libraries seemed to be floating around. However, on a fresh Fedora 17 install I've had no luck despite copying what I thought were the necessary files etc from older distro.

Cheers
Peter

[drpetebaker]

Thanks Graham,

Appreciate the hard work you guys are putting into this.

Me too!

I'm sure you'll get there eventually

Cheers
Peter

[cinnamongirl]

Hello everybody,
I am interested in purchasing subscription to linux format, but I am unsure where would the programs normally distributed on the disk would be found? Would there just be some kind of cooki-ed link for these? This is because i want to read it on my tablet pc, but play with the software on my play-toy machine..
As you can guess i am very much a newbie, so any advice or comments welcome (please be gentle) thank you.

[Cozzie]

Hi, I've just joined and hope to learn a little from discussions here.

I have downloaded issue 164 from the mags website as a pdf file. I have no problems reading this on my Linux box, Android tablet and Android phone. The cover discs are also available as torrent downloads.

With this facility already available, it pains me that the 'opposition' can produce a digital version of Linux Format when the mag itself does not! An incredible oversight and failure!!

I have ended my subscription to Linux Format with immediate affect until such times as they choose to remedy this ill. As with most enterprises, money talks, and if you seriously want this change, then do likewise.

[drpetebaker]

You could install one of the older distros in a virtual machine. It's hardly elegant, but better than trying to read on a phone screen.

Hi Nelz

Any updates on this?

I want to read linux format on non virtual machine (old lightweight but limited laptop that I need to run recent distro for work). All attempts on linux mint 14 fail miserably so far despite being simple install on older fedora or mint distros

At present, I don't plan to renew digital subscription when it comes up for renewal early next year. This is still a deal breaker for me and I can't seem to find a decent forum to make my voice heard

Cheers
Peter