Since this morning I joined - at last - the 505 owners crowd, and I'm delighted ...

Having installed both eBook Library from the Sony CD and libprs500, I have a doubt: it seems that libprs500 is perfectly able to detect my 505, and I used it to transfer files, fetch news (NYTimes again working! Good work!), and convert formats.
So, this program is perfectly able to cover everything eBook Library does? Or there is some reason to keep eBL around?

P.S. I used pdflrf V0.99 to perfectly convert a lot of files: any hope that it can be used from libprs500?

Thank you!

Alessandro

I also, as a new PRS500 owner, would find a sort of comparison sheet between the original software from Sony and the libprs500 very interesting.
I tried libprs500, and find it quite impressive. The only thing I can think of that seemed simpler with the Sonny software was maybe the management of collections.

libprs500 manages collections using tags. Its actually a more flexible system than the original collections system in the sony software. Any tag that you apply to a book becomes a collection when you transfer the book to the device.

There are two things that elibrary does that libprs500 does not do:
1) It does not allow you to buy books from the SONY Connect store
2) It does not do the pre-pagination of books when transferring to the device.

Of course it does a lot of things that elibrary does not do :-)
Its major features are listed here https://libprs500.kovidgoyal.net/wiki/Features

As for pdflrf, in principle, I don't mind adding support, but I prefer to convert PDFs to text, which is what pdf2lrf does, so I lack the motivation. But patches will be accepted :-)

Thanks for your answers ! I'll give this tag system a closer look :)

libprs500 manages collections using tags. Its actually a more flexible system than the original collections system in the sony software. Any tag that you apply to a book becomes a collection when you transfer the book to the device.

There are two things that elibrary does that libprs500 does not do:
1) It does not allow you to buy books from the SONY Connect store
2) It does not do the pre-pagination of books when transferring to the device.

Of course it does a lot of things that elibrary does not do :-)
Its major features are listed here https://libprs500.kovidgoyal.net/wiki/Features

With the 505, can I have ebook Library installed to use with the 505 and also use Libprs500? Do I need to install the device driver?

Yes you can use both in principle. There's no need to have the libprs500 driver installed. However, using both to transfer files may lead to problems. I haven't really tested this. This is because the ebooklib software uses a slightly different XML database format.

With the 505, can I have ebook Library installed to use with the 505 and also use Libprs500? Do I need to install the device driver?

I've got them both installed (didn't install the libprs driver) on a Vista machine & can use libprs500 for my lit2lrf conversions as long as the Reader isn't plugged in if the Reader is plugged in libprs500 freezes. No biggie for me as I can do what I need to do with both programs, but may be for you if you're wanting to use libprs500 to do actual transfers & stuff.

Yes you can use both in principle. There's no need to have the libprs500 driver installed. However, using both to transfer files may lead to problems. I haven't really tested this. This is because the ebooklib software uses a slightly different XML database format.

It appears that I may be suffering from a side-effect of this. I had been doing all my file transfers via eBook Library, so I didn't have to wait for the Reader to process newly loaded files. However, I recently transferred some files via libprs500. Now whenever I plug my Reader in when eBook Library is running, eBook Library freezes so badly that I have to kill the process to quit from the program.

How do I get the eBook Library to not freeze up now? It works perfectly fine UNTIL I plug the Reader in. If I delete the database xml file from the Reader, will that fix the problem or just cause more trouble?

BTW, I have a 505 and WinXP, and the Reader is recognized by Windows when I plug it in.

Thanks.

You can try deleting the XML database file (make a backup first). It's in database/cache/media.xml

Deleting it will only cause you to lose collections and perhaps some metadata, the reader automatically regenerates the file if it is missing when you disconnect.

You can try deleting the XML database file (make a backup first). It's in database/cache/media.xml

Worked perfectly.
Thanks.
:book2: