Reading text files

[evwool]

Sorry if this has been covered before but although I've read through the User Manual of the Kindle, I still can't figure out if you can simply drag a .txt document to your Kindle from your PC using the USB port and then read it on the Kindle. Does this work? Or do you have to do something to the text file first?

The guide talks about emailing things to Amazon for conversion.

[BrowseTheStacks]

Yes you can use .txt "as is". But i would use the free conversion service as raw text has poor formating vs the .azw file amazon will mail you back.

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by evwool

Sorry if this has been covered before but although I've read through the User Manual of the Kindle, I still can't figure out if you can simply drag a .txt document to your Kindle from your PC using the USB port and then read it on the Kindle. Does this work? Or do you have to do something to the text file first?

The guide talks about emailing things to Amazon for conversion.

it ultimately depends on the file that you drag and drop there. i just tested it out with a txt short story i had on my computer and it is just as pleasant to read as any azw file i've seen. it's best to have text that only has had the enter key pressed at the end of each paragraph (the one i used had this plus each paragraph had 4 leading spaces, so all the paragraphs were indented), so the text can re-flow properly. however ultimately, readability is in 'the eye of the beholder'.

[evwool]

Thanks both of you, that's the best of both worlds. I've lots of text docs from Project Gutenberg and I'm looking forward to reading them on a tailor-made device rather than my 2.5" Palm VX or my 'fade-in-the-sun' netbook. It means that I can have some of them converted by Amazon and some of them just dragged onto my Kindle-To-Be for instant reading.

[dwig]

Originally Posted by evwool

Thanks both of you, that's the best of both worlds. I've lots of text docs from Project Gutenberg and I'm looking forward to reading them on a tailor-made device rather than my 2.5" Palm VX or my 'fade-in-the-sun' netbook. It means that I can have some of them converted by Amazon and some of them just dragged onto my Kindle-To-Be for instant reading.

... and you'll find that you can download new copies from PG already formatted for Kindle.

Also, many of the same titles, built from the same PG source, are available from ManyBooks.net in formats for the Kindle (I find their MOBI generally better formatted than their AZW versions). While the list of available titles is shorter, there is a good library here at MR which is generally formatted better than the versions at PG or MB.

I've converted some of my old PG TXT files, many having been converted to PalmDOC PDB long ago for my earlier devices, but have found that replacing the old files with newer copies is just as easy and yields better results. One big flaw with the older PG files is that being TXT they lack typographic niceties (e.g. bold, italic, varying font sizes, ...). Italic is usually represented by all-caps. Most of those old PG files have been replaced with newer releases in formats that support these attributes (HTML, ePub, MOBI, ...).

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by evwool

Thanks both of you, that's the best of both worlds. I've lots of text docs from Project Gutenberg and I'm looking forward to reading them on a tailor-made device rather than my 2.5" Palm VX or my 'fade-in-the-sun' netbook. It means that I can have some of them converted by Amazon and some of them just dragged onto my Kindle-To-Be for instant reading.

Originally Posted by dwig

... and you'll find that you can download new copies from PG already formatted for Kindle.

ah....you didn't say they were from gutenberg in the original post....dwig is quite correct, re-downloading them in the proper format (mobi in your case) is probably your best option.

[evwool]

That's really good to know, Alan. I'm used to seeing them unformatted but how nice to have them properly formatted.