Windows Mobile 6 eBook Reader

[Jaapjan]

I am looking for an open source ebook reader for the Windows Mobile 6 phone I have. I know of only four ebook readers for the pocketpc/smartphone.

Microsoft reader, which, I read somewhere, won't be updated anymore and wont come to Windows Mobile 6.

Vade Mecum, the open source plucker reader. Which hasn't been updated since beginning of -last- year.

Tiny Ebook reader - Commercial but still updated?
UBook - Commerical and still updated?

So perhaps someone can point me to another open ebook reader that works on the mobile 6 platform?

[TadW]

Jaapjan, I was going to say Plucker, but you already mentioned it. It's also the only one I can think of. Do you have a particular reason for going open-source?

[HarryT]

It's not open source, but MobiPocket Reader works on Windows Mobile 6.

[Jaapjan]

I have occasional fetish' to help out on development or improve upon something.

Just hobby things.

I'll look into MobiPocket Reader anyway.

[HarryT]

I would second the recommendation for "uBook", by the way. It's a superb bookreader. Doesn't handle any DRM formats, but it'll read virtually all the "open" formats except LIT.

[Jaapjan]

The uBook site looks a bit fuzzy and I saw nothing about Mobile 6 support.

[HarryT]

All I'd suggest is that you download the demo version and see if it works. It's a compiled C++ application, not a ".NET" one, so it should be reasonably independent of the version of Windows Mobile. It certainly worked OK when I switched from WM4 to WM5.

[HarryT]

I've got a WM6 "smartphone" on order which is due to arrive tomorrow. I'll try out uBook on it and see how well it works.

[Jaapjan]

I look forward to hearing your experiences. What phone did you buy?

uBook, it supports some sort of single-file ebook format very well that is open source and has both the ability to unmake and make books? (In other words, assured of a future readability?)

[HarryT]

It's an HP iPaq 514 - a WM6 "smartphone". Nothing too fancy, but it'll be a vast improvement over my current phone which, believe it or not, will do nothing at all except make phone calls!

uBook supports RTF, DOC, HTML, etc, as well as "eBook" formats such as PalmDoc, and MobiPocket, so there's no problem with future compatibility.

[Jaapjan]

Ah, that one. Yes. I was debating that one. But yesterday I bought the HTC Touch instead. Small, easy in the hand and enough functionality. Also Mobile 6, obviously.

Is there an open source software program to make and break MobiPocket files ?

[HarryT]

Not open source, but several free programs to create MobiPocket files. Eg "Book Designer" which many of us on this forum use to create Sony Reader files, too. There's also free software you can download from Mobipocket's web site.

[Lemurion]

For what it's worth, I use uBook on my old iPaq and it works very well. It reads everything but lits and I can always explode those and then use mobipocket creator to make prcs which it does read-- or read the straight html. I just find the prc seems to work better.

I think it's a great program, well worth the license fee.

[Harpgliss]

Hi,

Tried ubook and liked it but it does not read .doc format which, with all the formats it does read, was a little odd.

From the website:

# Renders .TXT, .RTF, .HTML, .PML, .PDB and .PRC (Non-Secure), files book-like.
# Displays PRC, RTF and HTML images, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, .WMF (in RTF) or .BMP.
# Opens text inside .ZIP, .CHM and .RB files, uncompressing paragraphs on the fly, limiting the amount of memory required (except CHM).

The auto scroll feature was a little bit jarring also.

I like the drag scroll option in Isilo and use it quite a bit.

My reader on the ppc is Isilo and recommend it but not sure of if it works with WM6 bit I do not see why it would not.

David

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Harpgliss

Tried ubook and liked it but it does not read .doc format which, with all the formats it does read, was a little odd.

You mean Microsoft Word documents? No real surprise. The Word document is a complex format, and MS fiddles with it in each release of office, so older versions of Word may not be able to handle documents created in the current version. It's a moving target, and would be a major pain for uBook's developer to support.

If you want to read Word docs with uBook, you're likely better served to bring the document into Word and save it as an RTF file. uBook ought to be able to read that.

David

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Dennis