Looking for OEB reader and converter

[tleon]

I've got some ebooks in OEB format and want to convert them to epub. But I was unable to find a working converter. The only one I found is the hamster ebook converter and it is crashing right at startup.

Any ideas?

[tleon]

Ok, I found a workable solution. The oeb format is actually just a mulitpart mime format. First I simply tried to just change the file extension to eml and open it with Thunderbird. This nearly works but has the draw back that only the first html file is opened as an email and the pictures are identified as attachments. As the second html file contains the book that didn't help much.

What helped was Total Commander's option to decode files in its File menu. That extracts all files. Than it is a little effort to rename the files and remove the text string that separates the parts in the mime file (a line starting with -- and then some chars). If you now zip the files and add them to Calibre it's possible to convert them to a new format.

[DaleDe]

The OEB format is covered in our wiki. I am glad you found a way to convert it. It is interesting that you were able to use email as a method of separating the parts but the individual pieces are really a defined standard that was later evolved into ePub.

Dale

[tleon]

The problem was not the format as it is described in the wiki. The problem was that it wasn't in a ZIP file, what it usually seams to be. The files contained in the multipart MIME were as described in the wiki.

[mike05]

I have the same problem how tleon, i want to convert an oeb file to an epub file. I have extracted the oeb file with Total Commander and now i have around 100 .bin files and two .txt files. The next step of tleon was to rename the files and remove some text strings but I have no idea which file i have to rename and to remove. Hope someone can help me.
Mfg

[DaleDe]

the bin files can be ignored. The OEB can be referenced directly by Sigil I believe. Open it in Sigil and see what happens. These are Open Ebook files (version 1 ePub). It can also be referenced by MobiCreator to create a mobi file. If Sigil doesn't like it then try making a Mobi and then converting with Calibre.

[mike05]

I think I have nearly solved it. I wasn't successful with Sigil and MobiCreator, both haven't worked with oeb, but i found out that the bin files are pictures the first txt ist like the content.opf in an epub and the second txt is the whole text with html code, now i think the last step is to convert it in calibre to an epub, but i have no idea how i should do this.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by mike05

I think I have nearly solved it. I wasn't successful with Sigil and MobiCreator, both haven't worked with oeb, but i found out that the bin files are pictures the first txt ist like the content.opf in an epub and the second txt is the whole text with html code, now i think the last step is to convert it in calibre to an epub, but i have no idea how i should do this.

Try renaming the files to the correct extensions and then try Sigil again.

The oeb should be .oeb and the second text should be .htm or .html or .xhtml
The images should be whatever extension to match the type.

Dale

[mike05]

Thank you its working with MobiCreator and Sigil now, one last question, the left margin has always a different size, can i set the left margin for all sentences to the same size?

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by mike05

Thank you its working with MobiCreator and Sigil now, one last question, the left margin has always a different size, can i set the left margin for all sentences to the same size?

Since there is no CSS the left margin must be in the file itself as a style entry in the HTML file. You can take a look at the code view in Sigil or use a text editor like Notepad++ and view the html file. You may need a search and replace to find the various left margins and remove them so that a single setting in the body statement can be used to set a uniform margin.

For ePub you can build a CSS to handle this sort of thing but MobiCreator does not support CSS.

Dale

[mike05]

How can i build a css which sets all left margins to the same size if i am not using mobicreator but sigil or calibre instead

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by mike05

How can i build a css which sets all left margins to the same size if i am not using mobicreator but sigil or calibre instead

See the wiki on what you can set in CSS and examples on its use.
A sample might be:

body {margin-left: 5px; margin-right: 3px }

but the current settings on the paragraphs would override this setting since they are more local. You need to remove the current settings before using the CSS.

Dale