Kindle Convert: Amazon's Payware Ebook Scanning and Creation Software

conanfan · 02-03-2015, 01:15 PM

Has anyone checked out Kindle Convert? The software claims to allow users to scan personal documents and books to create non-commercial, but fully-compliant kindle ebooks. The software also includes OCR capability.

Several sites have reported on this:

Engadget

Good E-Reader

Liliputing

It retails at $49.00 but is currently on sale for $19.00. Is anyone interested in this? Has anyone tried it out?

UPDATE: Apparently this is only available for US users. Sorry rest of humanity.

eschwartz · 02-03-2015, 04:59 PM

Sounds like Yet Another OCR software chained together with the already free kindlegen and send-to-kindle services... what does this do that ABBYY Finereader doesn't do?

And I wonder how Amazon can sell a good OCR software for about a tenth of the price... unless it doesn't really compare. .

You could always use stuff powered by the open source tesseract OCR engine, of course. If you are spending money on OCR, though, you'd probably want to go straight to the top.

DaleDe · 02-03-2015, 06:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Sounds like Yet Another OCR software chained together with the already free kindlegen and send-to-kindle services... what does this do that ABBYY Finereader doesn't do?

And I wonder how Amazon can sell a good OCR software for about a tenth of the price... unless it doesn't really compare. .

You could always use stuff powered by the open source tesseract OCR engine, of course. If you are spending money on OCR, though, you'd probably want to go straight to the top.

I cannot find any reference to OCR in the description from Amazon. It scans pages and makes a book out of images for your personal use. There is no OCR. This would be an example a AZW4 format.

Dale

eschwartz · 02-03-2015, 06:12 PM

Quote:

Kindle Convert books and documents enjoy many of the same features you love about Kindle books including adjustable text size, worry-free storage in the Amazon cloud, Whispersync of last page read, highlights and notes, and a built-in dictionary to lookup the definition of any word. Kindle Convert preserves all the things that make your books and documents unique, such as hand-written notes, autographs, photos and images. Kindle Convert books maintain the look and feel you love about your print books.

That all implies text, not images...

eschwartz · 02-03-2015, 06:13 PM

It already has some reviews, the top review is protesting that the quality of the OCR is severely lacking and to use Finereader instead.

Why am I not surprised?

DaleDe · 02-03-2015, 06:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

That all implies text, not images...

well handwritten notes implies images and preserving the look of the page. Highlights are also preserved if it were images. The must be an image and and searchable text behind the scene. PDF often does this also. Makes reading ok but searching depends on OCR. If you look at the examples on the page they look like images to me as they include hand written autographs.

Dale

ATDrake · 02-03-2015, 06:48 PM

The format sounds like it could be some kind of revival of Topaz, which IIRC, does all the stuff described.

eschwartz · 02-03-2015, 06:51 PM

Adjustable text size -- can AZW4 actually do that? It does sound like they are claiming the results will be reflowable -- which precludes the use of images.

DaleDe · 02-03-2015, 07:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Adjustable text size -- can AZW4 actually do that? It does sound like they are claiming the results will be reflowable -- which precludes the use of images.

Yea, I looked at the workflow images and the third one talks about topics that OCR would do. It looks, from the workflow, that they have a mix of images and text and assign text to a box within the page or to full page. I am not sure how this reflow would work without ruining the look of the page. It seems they make a lot of claims and all cannot all be right but it does seem OCR is involved on at least some of the pages.

Dale

DaleDe · 02-03-2015, 07:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ATDrake

The format sounds like it could be some kind of revival of Topaz, which IIRC, does all the stuff described.

I think you have hit on it. It does look like a resurrection of Topaz.

Dale

Hitch · 02-05-2015, 07:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DaleDe

I think you have hit on it. It does look like a resurrection of Topaz.

Dale

All I know is, Kill Me Now. It's not bad enough that the vast majority of books coming to professional converters are total messes; (either uber-complex, OR the clients are just hopeless OR utter dicks), but now they'll see THIS, and my life will be an even bigger hell than it is now. {SIGH}

H

02-03-2015, 01:15 PM	#1
conanfan Me Lurk Here Long Time Posts: 79 Karma: 541625 Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Nashville, TN Device: Oasis; PW1+3g; Lenovo Yoga Tab 3 Pro; KF HDX 7;	Kindle Convert: Amazon's Payware Ebook Scanning and Creation Software Has anyone checked out Kindle Convert? The software claims to allow users to scan personal documents and books to create non-commercial, but fully-compliant kindle ebooks. The software also includes OCR capability. Several sites have reported on this: Engadget Good E-Reader Liliputing It retails at $49.00 but is currently on sale for $19.00. Is anyone interested in this? Has anyone tried it out? UPDATE: Apparently this is only available for US users. Sorry rest of humanity. Last edited by conanfan; 02-03-2015 at 01:27 PM. Reason: New Information

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02-03-2015, 04:59 PM	#2
eschwartz Ex-Helpdesk Junkie Posts: 19,422 Karma: 85397180 Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)	Sounds like Yet Another OCR software chained together with the already free kindlegen and send-to-kindle services... what does this do that ABBYY Finereader doesn't do? And I wonder how Amazon can sell a good OCR software for about a tenth of the price... unless it doesn't really compare. . You could always use stuff powered by the open source tesseract OCR engine, of course. If you are spending money on OCR, though, you'd probably want to go straight to the top.

02-03-2015, 06:13 PM	#5
eschwartz Ex-Helpdesk Junkie Posts: 19,422 Karma: 85397180 Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)	It already has some reviews, the top review is protesting that the quality of the OCR is severely lacking and to use Finereader instead. Why am I not surprised?

02-03-2015, 06:48 PM	#7
ATDrake Wizzard Posts: 11,517 Karma: 33048258 Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: Roundworld Device: Kindle 2 International, Sony PRS-T1, BlackBerry PlayBook, Acer Iconia	The format sounds like it could be some kind of revival of Topaz, which IIRC, does all the stuff described.

02-03-2015, 06:51 PM	#8
eschwartz Ex-Helpdesk Junkie Posts: 19,422 Karma: 85397180 Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)	Adjustable text size -- can AZW4 actually do that? It does sound like they are claiming the results will be reflowable -- which precludes the use of images.