Getting concerned about Marvin and upcoming iOS 15 update

[Turtle91]

I personally don't use the sync functionality - I use Calibre for management/download and only read on one device - so I haven't noticed anything. If all your devices went down at the same time, and Marvin hasn't changed, then I would suspect Apple playing their games again.

Please let us know if you figure it out!

[rraven]

I spent some more time trying to get sync in Marvin 3 to work under iOS 15.1. It turns out that it does sometimes work, but it's only perhaps 10% of the time. When it fails it seems to time out and then get rate limited.

This feels a bit like an iOS bug. I haven't come up with a reliable workaround. I think at this point I'm probably better off waiting for the next iOS update before trying again.

[skillachie]

Originally Posted by maxyn83

Tried your app and deleted it again when I encountered a login when I opened it. I don't understand why I would need to register an account just to read books.

Missed this response.

We answered this in our thread under reading management previously. As we mentioned we designed the app to allow seamless syncing of eBooks, highlights, notes and reading progress across all devices and to share eBooks seamlessly with friends and family(currently in beta). To do this we need an account to connect and sync between devices. It was much easier to build our own sync mechanisms than relying on integrating with Google Drive or other services.

We would need to refactor the app to not require an account but at the current phase, the time is better spent improving it and adding new features for our current readers. We plan to do the refactoring to not require an account for those that might not need syncing and other functionality.

[skillachie]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Here is a tutorial on how to set this up. I'd check to make sure you have your dropbox linked... I know there were issues with apple and 3rd party data transactions a long while ago...not sure if/how they were resolved.

Also, you are one of several (one-and-only post) people who have come here bringing up this topic. If you are NOT a bot for the OTHER ebook software trying to get free advertising (welcome to MR!! ) then I would recommend using the search function on this forum, or scroll down the list of thread topics.

Cheers!

Haha, hope you are not referring to me responding to the messages. Doubt the users are bots, I think they just discover the same issues over and over between Kybooks and Marvin not being updated and before searching the forums they decide to post. The mods would definitely be able to tell if they were bots.

I do search for the relevant topics or responses every other month and respond if I think we can add value though.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by rraven

I spent some more time trying to get sync in Marvin 3 to work under iOS 15.1. It turns out that it does sometimes work, but it's only perhaps 10% of the time. When it fails it seems to time out and then get rate limited.

This feels a bit like an iOS bug. I haven't come up with a reliable workaround. I think at this point I'm probably better off waiting for the next iOS update before trying again.

For what it's worth, Marvin 3 syncing has been working OK for me across multiple devices running iOS 14.8.1, 15.1 and 15.2 Beta.

Maybe Marvin's iCloud data on your account is corrupted? You can delete it by going to Settings - <Your Apple ID> - iCloud - Manage Storage.

Also, it might be worth installing Marvin SxS to see if sync works with that. Alas, it's $4-5, I think.

[rraven]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

For what it's worth, Marvin 3 syncing has been working OK for me across multiple devices running iOS 14.8.1, 15.1 and 15.2 Beta.

Maybe Marvin's iCloud data on your account is corrupted? You can delete it by going to Settings - <Your Apple ID> - iCloud - Manage Storage.

Also, it might be worth installing Marvin SxS to see if sync works with that. Alas, it's $4-5, I think.

Thanks for the suggestion. I did try erasing that data as part of my earlier debugging. Marvin still failed with the same error. Sigh.

It's very odd that syncing is working for you and fails on all of my devices. I have a slow network connection but it's not <i>that</i> slow and Marvin 3 sync was rock solid until I moved everything to iOS 15.

I will give Marvin SxS a try this weekend. I've been using Apple Books as a fallback and it's... annoying.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by rraven

I will give Marvin SxS a try this weekend. I've been using Apple Books as a fallback and it's... annoying.

Highly recommend starting over with a clean slate when you do (don't restore from Marvin 3 backup).

If you have Dropbox, maybe create a folder with just a handful ebooks and use the "Download everything" option to load the test folder into Marvin SxS on your various devices. This would ensure ebooks are 100% identical and have the same MD5 hash. I believe Marvin uses the MD5 hash as the unique identifier for books.

Alas, Calibre's OPDS/HTTP server updates metadata on the ebooks it sends to devices. Hence, it's possible downloading via Calibre might break proper identification of the book. Marvin does try to do fuzzy searches based on title but who knows if iOS 15 broke that feature.

Mind, if you're interested in investigating, the Marvin backup is a simple ZIP file and the Marvin database is just SQLite. Exported Marvin format bookmarks/annotations are simply zipped JSON files.

[rraven]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

For what it's worth, Marvin 3 syncing has been working OK for me across multiple devices running iOS 14.8.1, 15.1 and 15.2 Beta...

Sync in Marvin 3 started working for me again after I updated to iOS 15.2 final. Was it the iOS update? Was it something that got fixed on the iCloud side? Was it the phase of the moon? I don't know. I wish that I did.

Thanks for the additional debugging suggestions. I didn't get to use them this time around but I'll save them for if/when this happens again.

[Turtle91]

Glad you got it working! As others have pointed out, since Marvin hasn’t been changed in awhile the problem MUST be one of the other culprits you mentioned. Phase of the moon seems pretty close !!