PageBurst by Elsevier

I know there are a lot of student users out there and I have a question perhaps you can answer. My son has some textbooks that included access to the eBook through Pageburst. I was wondering if anyone has used this service? The books can be accessed anywhere using an Internet connection and the company allows one download of the books for offline use. However, the site says it only supports Windows and Mac OS X. I was wondering if anyone has used Pageburst and if you were able to get the eBooks to work on the EE or PE. Also, if I were to download the books to a PC, what is the best way to use them on the EE if they are copyright protected? Thanks in advance.

When you download the books for offline use do they require proprietary software to open? Are they delivered as a SPDF? That's how a lot of course books are delivered and the license is only good for a certain amount of time. Have you tried setting the browser to user agent desktop and accessing the ebook? It may work.

Originally Posted by cheyennedonna

When you download the books for offline use do they require proprietary software to open? Are they delivered as a SPDF? That's how a lot of course books are delivered and the license is only good for a certain amount of time. Have you tried setting the browser to user agent desktop and accessing the ebook? It may work.

Thanks. I haven't actually tried to download any the books yet so I'm not 100% sure in what format they will be delivered. I did find out that Pageburst forwards you to another website called Vital Source Bookshelf. Other Android users have reported accessing their eBooks online using the exact method you describe (by setting User Agent to iPod using Dolphin or iPad using xScope) but, I haven't been able to determine if they were able to access eBooks offline because the Vital Source Bookshelf software is for PC, Mac, iPod, and iPad (boo, hiss). With such a large market it is amazing that these companies have not come up with an App for Android. Fortunately Pageburst books purchased from Elsivier come with permanent access which never expires so at least my son should have web access to the books but it would be nice to be able use them on an e-reader instead.

I vaguely remember using vital source books and I believe it is a proprietary software that opens the books. If printing is allowed you can try printing to pdf, although sometimes that function is not allowed. I did have luck once printing to a networked computer's PDF printer, bit a lot of those books also have page # restrictions, i.e. you can only print 10 pages at a time. Dang book publishers make it so hard to use what we paid for.

Originally Posted by cheyennedonna

I vaguely remember using vital source books and I believe it is a proprietary software that opens the books. If printing is allowed you can try printing to pdf, although sometimes that function is not allowed. I did have luck once printing to a networked computer's PDF printer, bit a lot of those books also have page # restrictions, i.e. you can only print 10 pages at a time. Dang book publishers make it so hard to use what we paid for.

Thanks again. I'll try the PDF printing method. Luckily the books can be viewed using a web browser which works but isn't as convenient as having the offline version. It's not just the publishers making it hard but the schools as well. By requiring students to use eBooks it is almost like they are endorsing a specific product (PC, Mac, iPad) when there are so many other manufacturers (Amazon, Sony, Barnes and Noble, Pandigital etc.) that have e-readers. I'm sure someone, somewhere along the line will question the legality of this. Not that I am saying that eBooks aren't the way of the future but, if a college requires them from a publisher and the publisher does not support basic formats which can be used by all devices it constitutes an endorsement on the part of the school. It's one thing if I decide to buy a book as a private citizen because then I am accepting any device restrictions but, it's a completely different set of circumstances when a school tells me where I have to buy a software product and what platforms I am limited to.