MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Convert eBookwise 1150 annotations to iLiad?

scotty1024 · 12-19-2006, 04:42 PM

I've written software to format .imp files and understand the file format/history of it. I still have my Softbook Reader, REB-1200 and a stack of .imp files.

The .imp file is actually a packed up Macintosh file, the original Softbook Reader device was to have run a version of the Mac OS. They got a license from Apple back went Apple went "crazy" and licensed 3rd parties to use Mac OS.

Then "sanity" returned to Apple and the Softbook Reader, which had yet to ship, decided to get a new OS. They didn't want to re-write their book reader software so they simulated the original Mac OS multi-resource fork file structure via the .imp file. The little files are named by the resource code letters they held as resources in the Macintosh HFS file.

Someone could write a .imp file viewer for the iLiad. But without permission to implement the DRM... what real use would it be as an upgrade path?

The annotations can certainly be extracted, I've done it myself. But the resolution of the touch screen on the 1150 is, putting it gently, very low. One of the features of the iLiad is that the Wacom has a resolution high enough to yield usefully accurate HWR. You could get high lighting though, that's character level.

12-19-2006, 04:42 PM	#5
scotty1024 Banned Posts: 1,300 Karma: 1479 Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Peoples Republic of Washington Device: Reader / iPhone / Librie / Kindle	I've written software to format .imp files and understand the file format/history of it. I still have my Softbook Reader, REB-1200 and a stack of .imp files. The .imp file is actually a packed up Macintosh file, the original Softbook Reader device was to have run a version of the Mac OS. They got a license from Apple back went Apple went "crazy" and licensed 3rd parties to use Mac OS. Then "sanity" returned to Apple and the Softbook Reader, which had yet to ship, decided to get a new OS. They didn't want to re-write their book reader software so they simulated the original Mac OS multi-resource fork file structure via the .imp file. The little files are named by the resource code letters they held as resources in the Macintosh HFS file. Someone could write a .imp file viewer for the iLiad. But without permission to implement the DRM... what real use would it be as an upgrade path? The annotations can certainly be extracted, I've done it myself. But the resolution of the touch screen on the 1150 is, putting it gently, very low. One of the features of the iLiad is that the Wacom has a resolution high enough to yield usefully accurate HWR. You could get high lighting though, that's character level.