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Old 10-22-2011, 03:23 PM   #1
tosh
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osx reader for all formats
hi all
i'm looking for something like calibre... a tool that can handle all the different formats...but without having to import it into some bs proprietary library that is of no use to me as I organize my stuff on filesystem level, nowhere else!
thank you
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Old 10-22-2011, 04:44 PM   #2
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Doesn't exist... why not use calibre and treat it's file system as a backup whilst dumping your books into the type of setup you want, there's a drop down menu with options that'll let you save into any organisation you prefer... that's what I do...
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Old 10-22-2011, 05:55 PM   #3
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Dunno about osx but under linux and windows you can install calibre and just use the reader without importing any books into anything.

The ebooks need to be drm free.
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Old 10-22-2011, 06:11 PM   #4
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Dunno about osx but under linux and windows you can install calibre and just use the reader without importing any books into anything.

The ebooks need to be drm free.
Same under OS X but I read the OP to be talking about handling multiple formats for converting rather than reading because he also talked about the way calibre organises everything in its own database...
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Old 10-23-2011, 01:08 AM   #5
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Note: I responded with wrong info to this post. was reading something else at the same time, and mixed up the two. That info is still below, because it is still useful to some people. Just hit the spoiler button.

And I'd just say use Calibre, but set things up to where when you open an ebook, it just opens up in the Viewer, and bypass the library. You may have to configure it via the ebook-viewer command, which you have to do some extra stuff for OSX (mentioned below).

Spoiler:
Calibre can be used to convert without needing to import to the library, from the commandline.

Quote:
On OS X you have to go to Preferences->Advanced->Miscellaneous and click install command line tools to make the command line tools available. On other platforms, just start a terminal and type the command.
Once you've done that, there will be the ebook-convert command.

Now, if you're comfortable with the commandline, you can just use that, OR, use something like DropScript which will let you create a nice app that would let you drag and drop a file onto it, and automatically execute a command from the commandline. That way, you can have a some things on your desktop, or on the dock (remember, the Dock can also have folders that can pop up with a little menu, akin to how the windows start button works), and you just drop the ebooks onto them and get it automatically converted to the format you wanted. Now, the caveat to this is that you have to a separate one for every output. So, if you use epub and rtf, you'll need one for each.
Last edited by Hellmark; 10-23-2011 at 01:15 AM.
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Old 10-23-2011, 12:58 PM   #6
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Dunno about osx but under linux and windows you can install calibre and just use the reader without importing any books into anything.
oh? and how do I do that? when you open a file with calibre, it imports it into its database automatically...no?

regarding using calibre for reading or converting...well I tried converting a bunch of books in calibre (epub, mobi, u name it) into pdf with very disappointing results.
not that I'm a fan of adobe, but I want a format that is editable, ie. allows me to make notes, hightlight/underline text, delete pages, add links, all of that kind of stuff...
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Old 10-23-2011, 01:17 PM   #7
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oh? and how do I do that? when you open a file with calibre, it imports it into its database automatically...no?
If you open an ebook with calibre's E-book viewer, then no... there is no automatic import of any kind. You're just opening/viewing the ebook from wherever the file is in your filesystem.

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Originally Posted by tosh View Post
regarding using calibre for reading or converting...well I tried converting a bunch of books in calibre (epub, mobi, u name it) into pdf with very disappointing results.
not that I'm a fan of adobe, but I want a format that is editable, ie. allows me to make notes, hightlight/underline text, delete pages, add links, all of that kind of stuff...
If you want to get your ebooks into a format that is easily editable, then epub is probably what you're looking for (or HTML) rather than PDF. Even if you get everything edited exactly how you want it in the PDF document, you're going to be frustrated with the results (with whatever program you use) when you try to convert that perfect PDF back into one of the standard (epub, mobi) ebook formats.
Last edited by DiapDealer; 10-23-2011 at 01:22 PM.
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Old 10-23-2011, 02:21 PM   #8
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If you open an ebook with calibre's E-book viewer, then no... there is no automatic import of any kind. You're just opening/viewing the ebook from wherever the file is in your filesystem.

not on my system (osx.7.2), no.
when i dbl-click on, say, an epub, calibre opens showing a progress bar, saying 'adding...'.
it puts an identical copy of the epub-file into calibre's library.


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Originally Posted by DiapDealer View Post
If you want to get your ebooks into a format that is easily editable, then epub is probably what you're looking for (or HTML) rather than PDF.
can you recommend a tool for this?

Quote:
Originally Posted by DiapDealer View Post
Even if you get everything edited exactly how you want it in the PDF document, you're going to be frustrated with the results (with whatever program you use) when you try to convert that perfect PDF back into one of the standard (epub, mobi) ebook formats.
I'm sure you're right about that :/
Last edited by tosh; 10-23-2011 at 02:23 PM.
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Old 10-23-2011, 02:30 PM   #9
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ouh, sorry, I didn't see that Spoiler-thingy by hellmark... i guess i'm slightly annoyed all this is not just as simple and straightforward as i want it to be.
got it now. thank you all.

still, can you recommend an epub editor?
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Old 10-23-2011, 03:07 PM   #10
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still, can you recommend an epub editor?
Sigil
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Old 10-24-2011, 01:24 PM   #11
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i'll check it out.
thank you all, you've been very helpful!
Last edited by tosh; 10-25-2011 at 11:00 AM.
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Old 10-25-2011, 11:04 AM   #12
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dropscript wouldn't work for me on Lion as there is no more support for PowerPC code.

instead, I found platypus, which works great.
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Old 10-26-2011, 02:17 AM   #13
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Originally Posted by tosh View Post
hi all
i'm looking for something like calibre... a tool that can handle all the different formats...but without having to import it into some bs proprietary library that is of no use to me as I organize my stuff on filesystem level, nowhere else!
thank you
If you are working on MAC OSX only then take a look at Nook Study (runs on OSX only, no iOS version).

Nook Study is designed for college students and research (and thus, has a B&N textbook store) and has the best interface for notes, highlights, markup, etc, that you will find on OSX. You can add your own DRM free books too. It also allows a search across your whole library.

Not sure if this is what you are looking for but you might give it a look.
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Old 10-26-2011, 06:17 PM   #14
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Originally Posted by 1611mac View Post
If you are working on MAC OSX only then take a look at Nook Study (runs on OSX only, no iOS version).

Nook Study is designed for college students and research (and thus, has a B&N textbook store) and has the best interface for notes, highlights, markup, etc, that you will find on OSX. You can add your own DRM free books too. It also allows a search across your whole library.

Not sure if this is what you are looking for but you might give it a look.
Thank you for posting this because it prompted me to try it myself. I'm getting an Inspiron Duo that will be part of my mobile tech toolkit, and I was wanting a way to organize my pdf tech manuals and other documentation. I especially wanted something that would be usable in tablet mode. I don't have the Duo yet, but I downloaded Nook Study to this laptop and imported some PDFs, and I think it will fit the bill nicely. Even though I've known about it for quite a while, it never occurred to me to use it for this purpose until your post.
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Old 10-28-2011, 12:36 PM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tosh View Post
ouh, sorry, I didn't see that Spoiler-thingy by hellmark... i guess i'm slightly annoyed all this is not just as simple and straightforward as i want it to be.
got it now. thank you all.

still, can you recommend an epub editor?
Ehh, you're kind of in the minority though. On Windows and Linux, it is easier, but with how OSX packages apps, and that most Mac users want a library, there just hasn't been more effort into doing what you want to do since it would be of zero use to most people (they'd have to compile a special version of the viewer, and it'd have to be packaged separately, and also couldn't be used by calibre unless they did an overhaul of some things with calibre, and that could potentially cause complications for Linux and Windows). Basically, a good amount of work, for no gain, that would only be used by a small subset of users.

As far as the epub editor goes, I'll have to fully endorse Sigil as well.
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