iBooks 1.2 update – added illustrations, collections and AirPrint

iBooks, Apple’s own e-book reading program, has just received an update. Version 1.2 now includes fully illustrated children’s books, and added AirPrint compatibility. The app also now has the ‘collections’ feature which lets you organize certain books in to categories. So, for instance, you can have all your kids’ books in one section, PDFs in another and classic novels in yet another.

Until now, in order to view and read illustrated kids’ books you had to download an individual app for each story. Now, it should make for a less cluttered iDevice screen, with all your books in one place. Early opinions are that the illustrated books look stunning on iPad. The App Store description states:

Experience fully illustrated books, from children’s picture books to beautifully designed art books, available for download in the iBookstore.
Organize your books and PDFs into personal Collections. Swipe left or right to jump between Collections.
Print PDF documents and notes you’ve written in iBooks using AirPrint.
iBooks now fits more words per page by automatically hyphenating text, available only on iOS 4.2 or later.