Sync of Ibooks

[moparherb]

i have quite a few PDF's on my iPad air, in a couple of different collections. I can't seem to get them to sync ( be on) my iPhone. Any help is appreciated. FWIW the titles of the collections are on the iPhone but no contents of the collections.

 

[twerppoet]

Only iBook Store books will sync.

The books themselves aren't actually synced/copied between devices. What happens is that each device looks in the iBook Store and sees what books you have purchased. Those books are available on all your iOS (and OS X) devices, as long as they are signed in with the same Apple ID.

If you have sync Collections turned on, then the collection as an organization is synced. So you get all the collections, and the collections know what books belong in them, but they don't automatically download those books. Even iBooks Store books don't automatically download; though if you have Online Content turned on you will see all of your books. Those not stored on the device will have a cloud/download symbol next to them.

If you have it enabled in the iTunes & App Store settings, books purchased on one device will automatically get downloaded to your other devices. Still, the download comes from the iBook Store, not from your other device. And it only happens at the time of purchase. Older books won't be downloaded when you turned the feature on.


Suggestions:

If you already use iTunes on the computer to sync, you can add all your non-iBook Store books to the computer first, in iTunes on Windows or the iBooks app in OS X. Those books will be synced when you sync with iTunes, as per your Book sync settings.

Use a third party app for your PDF books. Most of the good ones will sync through cloud services like DropBox or Box; or even iCloud. I like PDF Express for it's friendly markup tools, but there are lots of these apps.

If it's only a few books, you can email them to the other device. If a book can be emailed you will see a share/action icon (box with an up arrow) at the top left corner of the open book. It's next to the library button and contents icon. To the best of my knowledge only PDF files can be emailed. You won't see this option for ePubs, even if they aren't from the iBook Store.

 

[moparherb]

Thank you very much for your explanation. I have been an iPad user for years but just recently got my iPhone 5S, so I guess I have a lot to learn. You are a wealth of knowledge. Thanks again.

 

[Pjttx2]

Only iBook Store books will sync.

The books themselves aren't actually synced/copied between devices. What happens is that each device looks in the iBook Store and sees what books you have purchased. Those books are available on all your iOS (and OS X) devices, as long as they are signed in with the same Apple ID.

If you have sync Collections turned on, then the collection as an organization is synced. So you get all the collections, and the collections know what books belong in them, but they don't automatically download those books. Even iBooks Store books don't automatically download; though if you have Online Content turned on you will see all of your books. Those not stored on the device will have a cloud/download symbol next to them.

If you have it enabled in the iTunes & App Store settings, books purchased on one device will automatically get downloaded to your other devices. Still, the download comes from the iBook Store, not from your other device. And it only happens at the time of purchase. Older books won't be downloaded when you turned the feature on.


Suggestions:

If you already use iTunes on the computer to sync, you can add all your non-iBook Store books to the computer first, in iTunes on Windows or the iBooks app in OS X. Those books will be synced when you sync with iTunes, as per your Book sync settings.

Use a third party app for your PDF books. Most of the good ones will sync through cloud services like DropBox or Box; or even iCloud. I like PDF Express for it's friendly markup tools, but there are lots of these apps.

If it's only a few books, you can email them to the other device. If a book can be emailed you will see a share/action icon (box with an up arrow) at the top left corner of the open book. It's next to the library button and contents icon. To the best of my knowledge only PDF files can be emailed. You won't see this option for ePubs, even if they aren't from the iBook Store.

 

[Pjttx2]

So, I am unable to retrieve my pdf's after the upgrade. Are they gone for good?

 

[moparherb]

My PDF's were still there ( on my iPad ) after the update. What I was trying to get done was to sync them to my iPhone. Which the explanation above straightened me out on. You don't loose your PDF's.

 

[twerppoet]

Thank you very much for your explanation. I have been an iPad user for years but just recently got my iPhone 5S, so I guess I have a lot to learn. You are a wealth of knowledge. Thanks again.

You're welcome.

 

[twerppoet]

So, I am unable to retrieve my pdf's after the upgrade. Are they gone for good?

Unless you were forced to do a restore through iTunes on the computer, your PDF files should not have been deleted. But, because we got a new iBooks app, it's not impossible that something went wrong and the library was reset.

But the bottom line is, if your PDF files disappeared from iBooks on the iPad then the only way to recover them will be to download them again. Hopefully you have copies elsewhere or remember where you got them from.


Mild Ranting Below:

I've said this before, but it's worth repeating. Never rely on your iPad as the only place you keep important photos or documents. This is true of any device or even online services, but it goes double for portable devices. They are far more likely to be damaged than a computer.

Even backups are not 100% reliable. One, they don't include everything. Apple's media apps assume everything you put in them is from an iStore, and retrievable from there. Unless you add the content to iTunes on a computer first, and sync from there, you have no backup of those files.

You only have one backup, the most recent. This means that if you happen to do a backup after something is lost, then it is no longer in the backup to be restored.

Also, backups are all or nothing. You can't restore just one or two files, which means you risk losing recent work. It becomes a question of what is more important, those files or the work you've done since the last backup.

 

[thewitt]

Just one clarification. Books you purchase thru the iBook Store will sync between devices. Books you include from other sources will not.

 

[twerppoet]

Just one clarification. Books you purchase thru the iBook Store will sync between devices. Books you include from other sources will not.

Pedantry warning:

The result is similar, but technically, no.

If you have Online Content turned on in iBooks' settings on both devices, then you can see all your purchased content on both devices. That has the appearance of being synced, but you still have to tap and download what you want on the device.

If you have Automatic Downloads turned on for Book in the iTunes & App Store settings, then books you purchase on other devices will be downloaded on that device. If you've been using this from the beginning on both devices, it looks a lot like syncing. However, it only works for purchases after the settings has been turned on. Older books will not be downloaded unless you do it manually.

It all works through the iTunes/iBooks store, not between the devices. One feature simply shows you what you have. The other notes a new purchase and downloads it.

The only things that actually sync between the devices, through iCloud, are you collection organization, bookmarks, notes, highlights, current place in the book, and other stuff that helps you keep on the same page (pun intended) between devices.

The iCloud syncing stuff works with all books (as far as I know). The store based stuff does not.

 

[twerppoet]

More stuff:

I just realized that I'm the one that used the words sync to begin with, though I went on to explain it; perhaps not as clearly as I could have.

Also, the more I think about it the less sure I am about the iCloud syncing of notes and stuff between non-iBook books. I'll have to do some testing, because now it's bothering me.