[kovidgoyal]

Hi all,

I've reverse engineered the Sony Reader USB protocol, so that I can use my Reader in Linux. I've attached a Python program that implements
the ls, cp, rm, mkdir, touch and df commands. These present a sufficient interface to use the Reader in Linux for non Connect store ebooks.

Requirements:
1) Python >= 2.5
2) libusb >= 0.1.12
2) PyUSB >= 0.3.5

To enable access for non-root users, add the following to /etc/udev/rules.d/90-prs500.rules

BUS=="usb", SYSFS{idProduct}=="029b", SYSFS{idVendor}=="054c", MODE="660", GROUP="plugdev"

and run

udevstart

or

/etc/init.d/udev restart

or whatever technique your distro uses to restart udev. If you dont know, just reboot. OSX users dont need to do this.

You may have to adjust the GROUP and the location of the rules file to suit your distribution.

Installation:
Untar, then as root run

python2.5 setup.py install

Usage:
The script

prs500.py

presents a command-line interface to the reader. Run it for usage instructions. Be careful while copying files to the reader or deleting files from the Reader, you could damage it.

If you're interested in the reader USB protocol it is documented via the api docs in the docs directory. Also giving the --log-packets option to prs500.py will produce a trace of all packets from/to the reader.

Enjoy :-),

Kovid.

EDIT: Edited from the original to give up-to-date information