I couldn't resist giving it a go. It works, and it was trivial.
Here's a simple 1-2-3 of what I did...
1) [Assuming you have not already installed the base version of BookDesigner already]
Download the base install program from here:
http://www.the-ebook.org/e107/e107_f...Designer40.zip
(following
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...94&postcount=1)
Unzip the installer program and run it.
2) To update the program, download and unzip into a folder...
http://www.the-ebook.org/e107/download.php?view.9
(following the link from
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...70&postcount=2)
Then copy it into the folder that was created on the original install, and on top of existing files. For me that folder was:
"C:\Program Files\Book Designer 4.0"
It will replace the old files with new versions (so choose to replace all when there are warnings in the copy process).
3) Follow Harry's instructions from
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...55&postcount=1
It's a Word document to download, and it has full instructions on using BookDesigner to create Sony Reader files from PG HTML sources. But I just took the meat and potato pieces and used defaults and it was amazingly fast and easy! I'll learn the fancy formatting, clean up, illustrations and TOC stuff later.
Caution: I'm a newbie to using BookDesigner myself, so this is only what seems to have worked for me, written out by memory as best I could. Hopefully it helps someone, but it don't make any guarantees!
Conclusion:
WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW! WOW!
Nothing but kudos for VVV for an absolutely amazing program. And to Harry for the amazing quick start guide that makes it trivial to get started. Together with my instructions here on the install (until a newer version comes out, at least), maybe it will be accessible to everyone. I wish I hadn't waited so long!
Honestly, having done nothing and basically not having to learn anything, I've created a nice Sony Reader .lrf file. Almost all with default settings and no trouble. It's like a miracle.
For programmers out there who remember structured programming, have you ever written a program by basically decomposing it until there was nothing really left to do, and by the time you finished you wondered how it could possibly be finished because you don't really feel like you did any work? That's what this felt like - everything was set up just right, and of course the hard stuff is all hidden in the program.
I'm ashamed to say that I'm only discovering this for myself (obviously I suspected something special based on all the other accolades), but I'm blown away. What an amazing job, vvv!!!!!
Warning:
Okay, one more point before I quit -- if you only follow the instructions from this post,
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...94&postcount=1
you won't get the Sony Reader option. Apparently that info is a bit outdated.
Unfortunately, I tried that first, and that false step was basically where all my time went. If I had these instructions I probably could have installed the program and created the book in about 15 mins start to finish.
Hope this helps. BD experts, please correct me where I may have got something wrong.