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User profile for user: wealthychef
wealthychef Author
User level: Level 1
79 points

Apple Books highlighting bug -- no way to inform Apple, what should I do?

Hello

Ever since Books was invented, it has had this bug where you can't continue an existing highlight, sporadically but very frequently. I run across it literally every book I read.


Here is a screen grab. I'm putting it here in the hope that someone at Apple cares.


(note: The Apple feedback website does not accept attachments, or I'd report it directly to them. Imagine trying to describe this with a text-only email. )


iMac

Posted on Nov 30, 2022 5:37 PM

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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 9
51,022 points

Posted on Nov 30, 2022 6:03 PM

wealthychef wrote:

(note: The Apple feedback website does not accept attachments, or I'd report it directly to them. Imagine trying to describe this with a text-only email. )

Here is a link to the real feedback site: https://feedbackassistant.apple.com


This site will definitely accept attachments. In fact, they won't even look at your report until you submit an extensive set of completely irrelevant attachments.


I was able to reproduce the bug you describe pretty easily. I wouldn't worry about it or expect it to get fixed. Apple Books is just an HTML viewer. This kind of highlighting, especially across paragraph tags, is really tricky. Apple has done a good job of hiding the internal mess of how they built the app, but sometimes something like this pokes out. I'm afraid it is as good as it's going to get.

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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 9
51,022 points

Nov 30, 2022 6:03 PM in response to wealthychef

wealthychef wrote:

(note: The Apple feedback website does not accept attachments, or I'd report it directly to them. Imagine trying to describe this with a text-only email. )

Here is a link to the real feedback site: https://feedbackassistant.apple.com


This site will definitely accept attachments. In fact, they won't even look at your report until you submit an extensive set of completely irrelevant attachments.


I was able to reproduce the bug you describe pretty easily. I wouldn't worry about it or expect it to get fixed. Apple Books is just an HTML viewer. This kind of highlighting, especially across paragraph tags, is really tricky. Apple has done a good job of hiding the internal mess of how they built the app, but sometimes something like this pokes out. I'm afraid it is as good as it's going to get.

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User profile for user: wealthychef
wealthychef Author
User level: Level 1
79 points

Nov 30, 2022 8:57 PM in response to etresoft

Haha, it makes sense for it to be "just" an HTML viewer given that epubs are essentially collections of XML I believe. However, there is no reason they can't get their highlights to work correctly. Modern browsers are able to do amazing things with "just" HTML, even without javascript etc. In some areas, Apple really does put forth effort to make things better than others. I'm hoping a bit of prodding will help. Surely I'm not the only one using their app.

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Apple Books highlighting bug -- no way to inform Apple, what should I do?

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