Calibre: Modifying Content for eBook Readers
An Elegant Solution to the Wrong eBook File Type
Aug 13, 2009
In the last year or two there has been a recent boom in the popularity of eBook readers. Amazon came out with Kindle (and Kindle 2). Sony came out with the PRS-505 (and subsequently, the PRS-700).
It seems the market is still picking up for eBooks and eBook readers. The demand for electronic reading material has never been greater. With so many choices available, a universal eBook reading and converting utility significantly impacts the eBook choices available to the reader.
eBook Availability
There has also been a boom in online availability and production of eBooks. Some sites, like Fictionwise, charge money for eBooks, while others like Project Gutenberg offer eBooks for free (legally).
While some eBook readers can read multiple types of files and not others, the choices can get quite complicated. There are 12 commonly available file types and it is inconvenient to purchase one only to find it’s one of the types your particular eBook reader can’t read.
Calibre
Calibre, an eBook utility written by Kovid Goyal, is a great program that can change file types at a whim. This is great for those of us who might have inadvertently purchased the wrong file type or for when a person can’t find the book they want in the file type they want.
Aside from being able to change files, Calibre is intuitively easy to use for keeping track of a library of eBooks, including such information as the publisher and date of acquisition.
Changing the File Name
Another problem many eBook reader users face is how to change the title of a PDF. Simply changing the file name as one might for word documents doesn’t change the file name as it appears on eBook readers such as the Sony PRS-505. Calibre will also change the appearing file name.
There are many utilities that can change the file names of PDFs. Unfortunately, most programs that do this seem to have name-changing as their only function, making it a tedious process to change names of many PDFs. Calibre allows an edit with just a double-click on the title and no secondary steps. This means the user can change one title at a time while organizing or importing into their library.
Import the News
Calibre has many available news sources, including the BBC and The Onion and can download the website onto an eBook reader so a patron could read the news daily in electronic format. The program can also be set to automatically update the news every day and to sync with the eBook reader.
The program runs intuitively with many great features and is exactly what many eBook reader users have been looking for.
 |
