Now that I have had some time to try out my iPad, it occurred to me that some of the features available in iBooks were good and not so obvious.
First, I really like the dictionary tool. Press and hold down on the word you want to look up.
Hold Down for Menu
You are presented with choices. Choose dictionary.
Definition Floats Above Word
Second, let’s say you find some particular text memorable, important or something you want to come back to. Select the text by holding down and then, using the blue lollipops, drag to select the desired text.
Choose the Bookmark choice and you have highlighted the text you want to remember.
That highlighter is no mere highlight. You can search for it in the bookmarks section in the front. You can also change the color to your choice of Yellow, Green, Blue, Pink or Purple. Just touch the highlighted portion and you will be presented with those choices and the “Unbookmark” choice to unhighlight.
As a bookmark in the beginning of the book. It even records the date of the highlight. Just touch bookmarks instead of chapters.
Searching within a book is a helpful feature. Simply touch the top part of the page and, when presented with the icons at the top, touch the magnifying glass. Type your search term. The search is for that book only.
While you are looking at the tools at the top, notice the brightness icon, the font icon and the Library icon to take you back to your library.
Adjust the brightness by sliding left to right
In order to search for a book in your library, you need to choose the Library File view. Once here, the search pane appears.
Search pane at the top
Overall, I have enjoyed exploring and reading my books with iBooks.
Mar 02, 2011 @ 21:24:26
I’m not sure where you are getting your info, but good topic. I needs to spend some time learning more or understanding more. Thanks for great info I was looking for this info for my mission.
iBooks Tips and Tricks
Jul 12, 2011 @ 22:50:31
Sep 02, 2011 @ 17:36:49
I just cannot figure out how to highlight within a PDF. Is the highlighting only working with books and not with PDFs? Thanks for your help!
Sep 02, 2011 @ 21:42:23
It’s not just you. iBook allows you to read and manipulate a PDF in certain ways. However, it does not appear to allow highlighting and some other features that are typical of epub formatted files. Books that are in iBooks are a different format. You can read more FAQs about iBooks here.
If you want to highlight, I suggest a couple of programs that allow you to annotate and mark up your PDFs. You can try iAnnotate or GoodReader. There are others, however, these are good.
Sep 03, 2011 @ 18:00:02
Thank you very much Justin! iAnnotate looks great, I downloaded it, I hope I will be more happy with that! Thanks again!
Sep 02, 2011 @ 21:30:13
Very helpful. It answered the exact question I needed.
Jun 20, 2012 @ 11:09:01
Good tips. I like iBooks and have not yet discovered all of the ins and outs. have figured out how to group items as if in a folder. and can rename. What i can’t figure out is once an item is opened the library is no longer visible. Can’t figure out how to access library without exiting iBooks and starting over. any tips on that??? thanks.
Or is there a book manager that might is more user friendly. thanks again.
Jun 26, 2012 @ 14:27:40
Try tapping on the topping once on the page and the menu bar should drop down for you to make your selection.