Quote:
Originally Posted by Chrystalline
Is there a way to clarify whether OpenLibrary results are the 14-day epub/pdf option or only the 1-hr webviewer option? I hope I'm not just missing something obvious, but I don't see a way to filter that. I can use the epub/pdf, but the webviewer sends my Win10 laptop into convulsions, so I'm hoping to sort those out, if possible.
|
Open Library has changed several times recently. The help pages on the website are out-of-date.
As far as I can tell the way it currently works is that books available through the Internet Archive can be borrowed in two different ways. If a book is not currently checked out you have the option to check it out for a two-week period and that gives access to DRM protected PDF and EPUB formats when available. If a book is already checked out you can still read it online but that loan will expire after one hour and there are no downloads.
At this point the plugin is working about as well as it can with Open Library. Searches will return books that are capable of being borrowed, whether or not they are available immediately. The "Check current availability of selected books" menu choice will return a zero wait time if a book is currently available for a two-week loan and a two-week wait time if it is checked out. (Two weeks is just an estimate since the plugin cannot determine the actual wait.) You can re-run that check periodically to see which books are now available to borrow.
It used to be possible to get on to a waiting list for a two week loan, but I don't see any way to do that currently. Perhaps I missed something.
-------
Update: I see waitlist options for some books on the Internet Archive. I will look into this further. I may need to switch the plugin so that it uses the Internet Archive instead of Open Library to make this work properly.