ADE Download?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Acreo Aeneas

The way the books are stored in most ebookstores, you need ADE installed in order to read the encrypted file which then lets you download the book.

Honestly, I still hate ADE since it locks up on me if it starts scanning my PP and then if I decided to download a new novel. But I'll stick with it since quite a few of my novels are in DRM'd ePUB/PDF format (and they cannot be had without the DRM).

I thought it (ADE) had locked and made my system barely responsive, when in fact it was scanning my PEz (700+ books). Once if finished (~30 minutes) and displayed my "Library", things returned to normal speed.

I Hate Adobe
The hijacked my preferred EPUB reader setting without as much as a "by your leave". They routinely leave trash entries (not valid) in the registry.

[AJ Starr]

Thanks Dave_S, theducks, and Acreo Aeneas. I was pretty sure that was the case, but it good to be confirmed.

I'll just stick with scanning my books, or downloading the one format I can de-drm for now.

Another question, how IS the ADE working these days. Like I said, when it first came out, ~Adobe Reader 7 days, I tried it and had problems. Is it working OK now, except for scanning the PP when you don't want it?

It could have been my Win Me at the time, now I have Vista.

(By the by, I have been trying to get ebooks since the days when Stephen King first put one out, and my downloaded pdf's in Adobe 5 and 6 were such that the current DRMs don't know what to do with them. I had this conversation on this thread several months back and someone found out what old DRM scheme was used.)

Thanks again.

AJ

[cancelx]

--still wondering where the ACE program is supposed to be located so i can install it 8(
--and, so if you download a book that is DRMed, you MUST have your PP connected? I wanted to just drag and drop books through my internal PC card reader ?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by AJ Starr

Thanks Dave_S, theducks, and Acreo Aeneas. I was pretty sure that was the case, but it good to be confirmed.


It could have been my Win Me at the time, now I have Vista.

Thanks again.

AJ

Win ME. AKA the OS from H3ll ME broke many things

[Davimee]

Originally Posted by AJ Starr

I'll just stick with scanning my books, or downloading the one format I can de-drm for now.

Just out of curiosity, how do you go about scanning your books? Do you have a special scanner just for books? Or do you have to cut off the binding to get a flat page? Also, once you scan them, do you save the book as a PDF, and if so, how does that look on your Pocket Pro? I've got a couple books I've considered scanning, but we just have a normal flat bed scanner (I think that's what it's called... it's big and flat, and has a lid that comes down over the paper being scanned), and it doesn't work real well for books. I'm guessing it's going to be more work than it's worth, since there are just a couple of them that I'm wanting scanned.

Thanks!

[Acreo Aeneas]

Originally Posted by AJ Starr

Another question, how IS the ADE working these days. Like I said, when it first came out, ~Adobe Reader 7 days, I tried it and had problems. Is it working OK now, except for scanning the PP when you don't want it?

Besides the ADE scanning my PP when I don't want it to (actually don't want it to ever scan my PP), it works fine. I simply use it for authorizing my reader and decrypting (not the book but the encryption file that leads to the book) and downloading the DRM books. From there I import the downloaded books into Calibre and upload to my PP using my own custom naming scheme.

[AJ Starr]

Originally Posted by Davimee

Just out of curiosity, how do you go about scanning your books? Do you have a special scanner just for books? Or do you have to cut off the binding to get a flat page? Also, once you scan them, do you save the book as a PDF, and if so, how does that look on your Pocket Pro? I've got a couple books I've considered scanning, but we just have a normal flat bed scanner (I think that's what it's called... it's big and flat, and has a lid that comes down over the paper being scanned), and it doesn't work real well for books. I'm guessing it's going to be more work than it's worth, since there are just a couple of them that I'm wanting scanned.

Thanks!

First of all, I've been scanning my books for about 10 years, every since I got my first flat bed scanner with my WinME, which upgraded with WinXP, but did not upgrade to WinVista. (so I bought an all-in-one)

Second, the books I scan are 99.9% paperbacks, though I have done some hard backs and full sized softsided. For the paperbacks, I have just bitten the bullet and folded them all the way flat. (Prior to ereaders, when I just wanted a copy, I tried to not bed the spine, because I still read the book. By my eyesight has gotten so bad I can't focus on the small print, so I flatted the book and crease the spine). After I flatted them, I DO NOT put the lid down, but I do find some moderately heavy item to place on each side of the open book. Currently I'm using a stapler for the thick side, and something like a camera for the other side. This keeps the paper flat to the scanner glass. Hardbacks are the worse as far as laying flat, and the larger softsided would be like paperbacks.

Third, my original flat bed scanner allowed me to save to my word processor with OCR, but I found that drag and dropped into my word processor worked great. However, my new all-in-one will not allow me to cut and paste the text, so I have to save it to a pdf. Fortunately it allows multi-page pdfs, so I usually scan an entire chapter at a time. The all-in-one also allows me to frame different sections, so I scan the open paperback, frame the two pages; making sure the first page is selected, I select the "all" button to scan all the selections, thus my scanner does page 1 then page 2. (If I had left page 2 selected when I selected "all", I think the scanner would have scanned page 2 then page 1) After all the pages of the chapter is scanned I "save" the file (as a pdf).

...I have just recently, like this week, found the setting that allows my scanning to not be as sensitive and not pick up all the little dots on the page as characters. On my scanner options this is called "Threshold". I've moved it from 100 to 80 and I get a cleaner scan.

Fourth, I "open pdf file" in my word processor which OCR's the file. I do the cleanup, save all the chapters together, mark the chapter headings, etc, and save it in my Word Processor. I am still deciding on the best method to get an epub book.

Before Astak gave us the 9 zoom levels in epub, I converted my file to a very specific format pdf so it would have large enough text. Now, the 9 zooms in epub, and the new coolreaderl give me many different options. So I'm still playing with the final output.

I hope this gives you some idea of the procedure.

AJ

PS I use Word Perfect 9 for my word processor, though I think Word will open pdfs also.

PPS For those who have the garbage in their scanned books, I highly recommend this "Threshold" function, it practically emilinated all garbage in my scans.

[Davimee]

Thank you for all the details on scanning books! I just did a quick trial with one of my books, but didn't flatten out the spine, in case it didn't work. I still wanted my book to remain in good shape. It didn't work quite like I was hoping, although probably most of that is due to the user, rather than the scanner. *l* I'll give it some more thought, but right now I'm thinking I might just stick with reading the paperbacks, as it will probably turn out to be more work than I'm willing to do. I'd rather just buy the ebook, but unfortunately it seems to be one of those that is only available for kindle. Oh well... I suppose it won't hurt me to read one or two paper backs, now and then... But thanks again for all the info!

[AJ Starr]

Originally Posted by Davimee

Thank you for all the details on scanning books! I just did a quick trial with one of my books, but didn't flatten out the spine, in case it didn't work. I still wanted my book to remain in good shape. It didn't work quite like I was hoping, although probably most of that is due to the user, rather than the scanner. *l* I'll give it some more thought, but right now I'm thinking I might just stick with reading the paperbacks, as it will probably turn out to be more work than I'm willing to do. I'd rather just buy the ebook, but unfortunately it seems to be one of those that is only available for kindle. Oh well... I suppose it won't hurt me to read one or two paper backs, now and then... But thanks again for all the info!

I would prefer to buy also, but only if I could strip the DRM. Unfortunately, the books I enjoy are in that nebulous area of out of print, but not public domain. So they won't be put into digital form for too many years to wait. So I'll tend to them myself.

AJ

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

You mean there is actually another DRM scheme currently being used with EPUB?

ADEPT is the primary reason that EPUB is my last choice as a format for a DRMed book purchase.

barnes and Noble has their own drm scheme but adobe supports it as well although most portable readers do not.

dale

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

barnes and Noble has their own drm scheme but adobe supports it as well although most portable readers do not.

AFAIK, Adobe just added the B&N name & card number authentication to ADEPT, so that means the device independent social DRM nature of the original B&N scheme has been subverted by Adobe as well?
I hope that I am misunderstanding?

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Davimee

Thank you for all the details on scanning books! I just did a quick trial with one of my books, but didn't flatten out the spine, in case it didn't work. I still wanted my book to remain in good shape. It didn't work quite like I was hoping, although probably most of that is due to the user, rather than the scanner. *l* I'll give it some more thought, but right now I'm thinking I might just stick with reading the paperbacks, as it will probably turn out to be more work than I'm willing to do. I'd rather just buy the ebook, but unfortunately it seems to be one of those that is only available for kindle. Oh well... I suppose it won't hurt me to read one or two paper backs, now and then... But thanks again for all the info!

There is a scanner that lets you only open the book 90 degrees by have it very close to the edge of the device. Another method of scanning is to use a camera to take pictures of the pages and scan those. There is more data on scanning in the wiki.

Dale

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by cancelx

--still wondering where the ACE program is supposed to be located so i can install it 8(
--and, so if you download a book that is DRMed, you MUST have your PP connected? I wanted to just drag and drop books through my internal PC card reader ?

Dear Cancelx:

You can always do a search for "free downlaod af Adobe Digital Editions". Within days we will have a link button to it on www.MyEZread.com

If you are using a PC, you can do everything first... download ADE, find a book, download it, find it under "My Digital Editions" under my documents, then connect the PP, and then drag and drop.

You should find ALL of this on the FAQ sheet: www.theEZreader.com under "support"