Chapter 3. Using Your NOOK Tablet for the First Time

YOU’VE FIRED UP THE NOOK Tablet, you’ve got it charged and set up, and you’ve registered it. Now the real fun begins. In this chapter, you’ll get down to brass tacks, using the NOOK Tablet for the first time. You’ll find out how to control it using gestures and the keyboard, and learn the ins and outs of the Home screen and all its nooks and crannies, including how to customize it.

Using Gestures to Control the NOOK Tablet

You control the NOOK with nothing more than your fingers, whether you’re reading a book, watching a movie, downloading an app, or navigating around the screen. Here are the gestures you need to master:

• Tap. Tap something on your screen with your fingertip—don’t push, don’t press, just a light tap will do. It performs the most basic of actions, like selecting an app to run, or switching to your Library.

• Double-tap. Tap not once but twice on your screen in quick succession to perform a wide variety of shortcuts. Double-tap the Home screen, and it’ll clean up the screen and arrange all the covers of your books, magazines, and newspapers in a grid. Double-tap in Shop (Browsing and Searching for Books in the NOOK Store) or Library (Using the Library to Manage Your Books and Periodicals) on a book or periodical cover and a new window opens that provides details about it.

  Tip

  With all the tapping, pressing, swiping, and sliding you’ll do on your NOOK, the screen tends to get fingerprints on it. Your best bet for cleaning it is to use a soft cloth, like the kind used to clean eyeglasses.

• Press and hold. Press your finger on something and hold it there for a couple of seconds to perform a variety of functions. Most often, you’ll get a pop-up menu that offers a number of choices about the image you’ve got your finger on. So, for example, press and hold a book cover, and a menu pops up with choices like opening the book to read it, recommending it, deleting it, archiving it, and so on. Press and hold your finger on a word in a book, then lift your finger, and the Text Selection toolbar appears, giving you a variety of choices about what to do with the text.

  
  

• Swipe. Slide your finger across the screen to the left or right, and you’ll accomplish any one of similar tasks—like moving forward or backward in a book or scrolling through a list or collection. For example, swiping is how you scroll through a row of book covers on your Daily Shelf (The Daily Shelf).

• Scroll. Slide your finger up or down on the screen to scroll through any list that displays a scrollbar. Think of it as a vertical swipe.

  Note

  The scroll gesture is useful when browsing web pages—use it to scroll up and down a page.

• Drag. Place your finger on an object and drag it to another location; it’s like using your mouse to drag an object on a computer. Once you’ve dragged the object to its new location, lift your finger to let it go.

• Pinching in and spreading out. Pinch two fingers together—your thumb and forefinger are the best bet—and you’ll get to see more of the image; in other words, you zoom out. Move your two fingers away from each other and you zoom in.

  Note

  Double-tapping on a picture of magazine page often zooms in on it. Double-tap again to zoom back out.

  
  

Power Users’ Clinic: Using the Secret Back Gesture

If you’ve used other Android tablets, you might have gotten used to the Back button—a button you can tap or press that sends you to the last thing you were doing. For example, if you were in the Library and then opened a book, tapping the Back button would bring you back to the Library.

There’s no Back button on the NOOK, and you won’t find a Back gesture documented anywhere. But that doesn’t mean it’s not there. In fact, there is one, even though it doesn’t work in all circumstances. (But that’s better than none.)

To go back to a previous location, swipe your finger from right to left along the Notification bar at the bottom of the screen. If you’re reading a book, and had previously been in the Library, you’ll get sent to the Library. If you’re in the Library and had previously been on the Home screen, you’ll return to the Home screen. Try it whenever you can. It doesn’t work in every circumstance, but when it does, you’ll find it a great shortcut.