Op Sys: XP-SP3;  Browser: Firefox 3.5; DSL connection (normally 3mb, but not right now, so no comments regarding page transistions) on my home machine.

Overall impression - Very good.  I expecially like the multiple ways to move thru the document.  Each one was very smooth and "easy to use" (i.e. no need for instructions).  I also tried the three (or four if you count full screen or five if you count the click on the screen and move around)) display options.  If I was just browsing I would tend to use the magazine view.  For a general read I would use the default view.  For a serious read I would tend to use the full screen, but the maginifing glass would be very handy for getting a close look at one of the pictures.

What might be handy is if there were some way of storing the user's viewing preference, say in a cookie.  The thought is that different people have their own preference for reading the publication.

Second Test - similar configuration but using a Netbook (10.1inch display).  (My traveling machine).  Here, due to the small screen size only the full screen is somewhat readable.  With the spyglass the text is very readable.  However, this size screen is not typical, so is not a concern. 

My complements to everyone involved.

I commend you for trying out various technologies, but I think I will continue to download as a pdf as I found with the flashback version it was rather slow when switching from page to page, in contrast as a pdf I can download in the background while doing something else and read it later with instantaneous page turning.

using me as a tester for the on line Beta is not a good test as I running a 3.4 Quade Core with 8 gig's of ram. to me it's great and I can use the short cuts to all the sites you have underlined bringing up each site un-interupted. My lap top is a 3.0 duel core wireless and It's a few seconds slower I have it running at the same time but everthing works just as well.

the only thing that seemed strange is the last page showing the preview of the next issue of MRH. When I clicked on it a new page came on and said I needed to be logged in to view it, but I was logged in ??? just part of the beta or the end ?? other than that.

I LIKE IT !!!

Dan

I like this idea. My only problem, and its more of a personal thing, is the size. My screen is set to 1280x800, and the height restriction squashes the magazine so much that its hard to read the letters. The only solution, on your end, would be to move the thumbnail scroll bar, or the zoom buttons. My end, obviously, I can resize my display, but I'm sure there's people out there who would rather not.

I appreciate not needing to download the PDF.  I found it easy to scan and zoom into the parts I was interested in reading.

Viewing this on my wireless Core2 Qosmio Laptop @1680X1050 is great!

It loaded fast and paging through the document is quick.

I like being able to choose views.  When set to magazine view the test is still readable and useful for quickly browsing through but serious reading would be much better in presentation view.

The search tool is very cool.  I like the way it highlights the text in a "tool tip" fashion.

The full screen option would be better if the controls at the top were relocated or re-sized as they hang over the page a bit.

Overall, I thinks it's a great feature.  I might use this format to read the newsletters rather than downloading them but I will always want to download the magazine for archiving and the convenience of offline availability.

Thanks for always striving to make MRH better!

It works fine on Google Chrome.  It seemed a little slow but not a real problem. 

I've had the thing sitting and spinning and claiming to be loading for 3 or so days now... Issuu.com doesn't seem interested in responding to me on their support site.

Glad to hear it generally works for most of you.

There will be improvements before we roll this out as the main way we make the magazine available. And as I said, you'll always have the option to download the PDF version for local reading if you prefer - or for archiving.

There's several little tricks you can use to make viewing easier - for example, you can use F11 to go full screen on the browser. You can also select an option at the top to turn off the thumbnails at the bottom of the screen - that also makes the page resize to be larger.

The initial page loading may be a bit slow, but after you've loaded the page, it gets cached and flipping through the pages becomes much faster - almost as good as a local copy. Once we get the download part perfected, it makes things really simple - just click the download link and voila - down it comes! No more right click, chose save target as, and all that jazz.

In effect, it will be one click to start reading online, and then one click of the download button to download it instead. Very simple with minimal hassle.

We'll continue to make the newsletter available as a beta test link using this technology - and we'll also probably make issue 4 available as a beta test. If all goes well, we'll roll it out with fan-fare on issue 5. If we don't think it's ready, we'll keep doing beta test versions until we get it perfected.

Joe,

Yes, this is a cool feature. It works even on my (Karis) four year old laptop - 1,4 Ghz Intel Celeron M, 504 RAM - XP, Firefox 3,5.

It loads pretty fast, and as  you said, faster when I start to browse the newsletter, but I seems to me that it drains the computers resources in such a degree that it slows down the whole computer.

The full  screen feature is very good, also on my screen with 1024x768 pixels.

I still will prefere to download the issues of the MRH

Thank you for the good work, Joe, I hope this adventure will continue to be a success.