Kindle Paperwhite for Dummies (36 page)

What if the text you want to highlight spans more than one page? Just tap at the beginning and keep dragging to the next page. The text will continue to be highlighted. If you want to see everything on one page, adjust the font size to get all your desired text on the screen. Or you can adjust the starting point of the displayed text by changing the location. Touch the top of the screen to display the toolbar, and then tap Menu⇒Go To⇒Page or Location. Enter a location slightly different than the current location to shift the starting point of the displayed text, until all your desired text is displayed.

An interesting thing about highlights is that you can view highlights that
other readers
have made. Amazon collects this information and highlights passages in your book that have been highlighted frequently by other readers. Your Kindle Paperwhite displays how many people have highlighted that particular passage.

Although this can be intriguing, some readers find the display of popular highlights distracting. To turn off these popular highlights, follow these steps:

1. Tap Menu
⇒
Settings
⇒
Reading Options.

Popular Highlights is one of the Reading Options listed.

2. Tap the On/Off toggle to deactivate the Popular Highlights option.

If you don’t want to share your highlighted passages with Amazon, turn off the Annotations Backup option in the Reading Options page under Settings. If you do this, your annotations aren’t backed up by Amazon, and they won’t appear on other devices registered to your Amazon account.

Taking notes

Want to make margin notes in your books? Well, you can with your Kindle Paperwhite. Adding notes is similar to making highlights.

With the desired text selected, as we describe in the “Utilizing highlights and notes” section earlier in this chapter, tap the Add Note button. A pop-up window appears with a text entry block and the onscreen keyboard. Type your notes using the keyboard and tap then tap Save.

Note that the text associated with your note is now highlighted in your book and is followed by a superscripted number. Tapping that number displays your note’s text block — where you can edit or delete it.

Viewing annotations

You can view all your notes, highlights, and bookmarks for a particular book. While reading a book, tap the top of the screen to display the toolbar. Then tap Menu⇒View Notes & Marks. All your notes, your highlights, and the popular highlights for that e-book are displayed.

You can also view all your annotations across all your books, magazines, newspapers, and personal documents. Kindle Paperwhite places these in a My Clippings file that’s available as a document from your Home screen. You can read your My Clippings file just as you would any other document on your Kindle Paperwhite.

You can view your annotations from a personal computer by going to
http://kindle.amazon.com
(United States and other countries) or
http://kindle.amazon.co.uk
(United Kingdom). Sign in and click the Your Highlights link.

Sharing on Twitter and Facebook

You probably noticed that when creating or viewing highlights and notes in your book, a Share button is available. This button lets you share a note and a link to the selected passage through social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. You can do all this directly from your Kindle Paperwhite — no computer required! This Share button is a fun way to let others know about books you’re enjoying.

When you use your Kindle Paperwhite to share on Twitter, your Tweet consists of your short note plus a Kindle Store link to the book you’re reading. Figure 9-5 shows sample Tweets created on a Kindle Paperwhite.

From your Kindle Paperwhite, you can also update your Facebook page with a book cover image, an excerpt of highlighted text, and a note. Figure 9-6 shows a Facebook status update created from a Kindle Paperwhite.

Figure 9-5:
You can Tweet about your books right from your Kindle Paperwhite.

Figure 9-6:
A Facebook status update with a link to the book.

To take advantage of these features, you need to link your Kindle Paperwhite with your Twitter and Facebook accounts. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Tap Menu
⇒
Settings
⇒
Reading Options.

2. Tap Social Networks. (If wireless is off, you’re prompted to turn it on.)

A screen similar to Figure 9-7 appears. From here, you can tell your Kindle Paperwhite the usernames and passwords associated with your accounts. Note that if you have previously linked a Kindle to your Twitter and Facebook accounts, you may not have to repeat these steps.

3. To link to your Twitter account:

a. Tap the Link Account button for Twitter.

b. Enter your Twitter e-mail address and your Twitter password on the authorization screen that appears.

4. To link to your Facebook account:

a. Tap the Link Account button for Facebook.

b. Enter your e-mail address and Facebook password on the authorization screen that appears.

Figure 9-7:
Link your Kindle Paperwhite to your social accounts to share information.

After your Kindle Paperwhite is linked, you can share a note about what you’re reading by following these steps:

1. From within a book, select text by sliding your finger across the page.

2. Tap the Share button.

3. Enter your message in the text box that appears.

4. Tap Share.

Your note and a link to the selected book passage posts to the account you’ve linked to your Kindle Paperwhite (Twitter, Facebook, or both).

You can share Twitter and Facebook updates not only for books that you’re reading but also for periodicals and your personal documents. (You can read more about personal documents in Chapters 4 and 7.)

When you finish a book, you can rate it and share it on Facebook and Twitter and leave a short review if you want. The Share page is shown in Figure 9-8.