B&N removed download option on all books in "My Nook" library

[shalym]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Unless you DO own a hardware Kindle.

Exactly. The difference is that even if you own an actual Nook you can't download unless you have Nook for PC. With Amazon, if you have a registered device you can download the book directly from your account, without having to install any extra software.

The biggest thing that B&N has done is to cut out the people who don't have WiFi available in their house. About a year ago, my aunt finally started e-reading. She was given a used Nook Simple Touch. She lives in a very rural area, and there is no high speed internet available anywhere around her, so she uses dial-up to access the internet. Obviously, she doesn't have WiFi at her house, so she used to download the books to her computer and sideload them to her Nook. She can no longer do that--if she wants to get books onto her computer, she has to drive over 30 miles to get to the closest place that has public WiFi, or to her daughter's house, which is about the same distance.

She's getting a Kindle for Christmas.

Shari

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by shalym

Exactly. The difference is that even if you own an actual Nook you can't download unless you have Nook for PC. With Amazon, if you have a registered device you can download the book directly from your account, without having to install any extra software.

The biggest thing that B&N has done is to cut out the people who don't have WiFi available in their house. About a year ago, my aunt finally started e-reading. She was given a used Nook Simple Touch. She lives in a very rural area, and there is no high speed internet available anywhere around her, so she uses dial-up to access the internet. Obviously, she doesn't have WiFi at her house, so she used to download the books to her computer and sideload them to her Nook. She can no longer do that--if she wants to get books onto her computer, she has to drive over 30 miles to get to the closest place that has public WiFi, or to her daughter's house, which is about the same distance.

She's getting a Kindle for Christmas.

Shari

I don't have a Nook, only "Nook for PC" and I Download to my PC run them through calibre and sideload them to my Kobo AuraHD. I have "Nook for PC" set to sync and download any new purchases. I just open "Nook for PC" and look in the Library and watch the new purchases being added. Once they are in the Library, they are also available at "Documents" > "My Barns & Noble eBooks". Most often all I need do is click on the calibre "Add books" icon/tab and it will open in the proper folder. It will probably take longer to download the new purchases, but it should still be doable using dialup. Wifi is not needed to sideload using the USB cable.

B&N's server knows nothing about my Kobo ereader device. They can do nothing to it, not like for Kindles and the amazon server.

Luck;
Ken

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

I don't have a Nook, only "Nook for PC" and I Download to my PC run them through calibre and sideload them to my Kobo AuraHD. I have "Nook for PC" set to sync and download any new purchases. I just open "Nook for PC" and look in the Library and watch the new purchases being added. Once they are in the Library, they are also available at "Documents" > "My Barns & Noble eBooks". Most often all I need do is click on the calibre "Add books" icon/tab and it will open in the proper folder. It will probably take longer to download the new purchases, but it should still be doable using dialup. Wifi is not needed to sideload using the USB cable.

B&N's server knows nothing about my Kobo ereader device. They can do nothing to it, not like for Kindles and the amazon server.

Luck;
Ken

Her aunt owns a Nook - why should she have to install a program on her pc to get books onto her Nook? B&N is making things more difficult for their paying customers.

[loloofaz]

I too miss the download on my nook. I don't have wi-fi and being able to get a book in the middle of the night without going out made it easy to get the download on my PC

[Ripplinger]

Originally Posted by loloofaz

I too miss the download on my nook. I don't have wi-fi and being able to get a book in the middle of the night without going out made it easy to get the download on my PC

You can still download to your PC. Open up either Nook for PC or Nook Study on your computer. That will show all your books purchased from B&N, freebies included. Click on the book, it gets sent to where it stores all your B&N books in your Documents directory, such as C:\Users\Username\Documents\My Barnes & Noble eBooks\YourEmail for Windows 7, under C:\Documents and Settings for WinXP. Then just sideload to your reader using your USB cable.

So you can still download, you just have to open up one of B&N's programs on your computer. Same as you would have to do on a Kindle without wi-fi.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

I don't have a Nook, only "Nook for PC" ...

I think that was Shari's point -- that you shouldn't have to have extra software just to download your books. I -- personally -- don't have Nook for PC. I don't even know if it would work with Linux (though I think I read somewhere that it could be set up under Wine). I used to be able to download Nook books directly from B&N's site but can no longer do it. So, even if I can get Nook for PC to work in Linux it's an unwanted and unneeded extra step for me. With the Kindle I can directly download my books into Calibre from the device. Guess who's going to get my business.

[lkmiller]

Nook for PC/Mac and Nook Study are old, buggy, and unsupported. It wouldn't surprise me if they were cut off from B&N's servers any day since B&N obviously would prefer that no one had direct access to the epub files.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by lkmiller

Nook for PC/Mac and Nook Study are old, buggy, and unsupported. It wouldn't surprise me if they were cut off from B&N's servers any day since B&N obviously would prefer that no one had direct access to the epub files.

They would have to not allow the Nook Android app to download either. Although at the rate B&N is going it wouldn't surprise me if they did that too.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

They would have to not allow the Nook Android app to download either. Although at the rate B&N is going it wouldn't surprise me if they did that too.

Or update the app with a new URL.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Or update the app with a new URL.

Huh? Where does the app have a url and how do you read within the app if you don't download?

[shalym]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

Huh? Where does the app have a url and how do you read within the app if you don't download?

They could do it like Amazon does with the Kindle for Windows 8 app. It's not actually stored as a book...it's stored as a database object (or is it a series of database objects??) Either way, it's not a normal epub, and can't be simply lifted out of the file system.

Shari

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

Huh? Where does the app have a url and how do you read within the app if you don't download?

The app downloads books from B&N's servers, just like the desktop programs.

That was your reason for doubting they would cut off the desktop applications, since it would disable the app too.

I simply pointed out, if they cut off hosting the books from the old location (same as the greasemonkey script?), the app could be updated to still work -- by downloading from the new location -- and they'd simply not update the desktop programs.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by shalym

They could do it like Amazon does with the Kindle for Windows 8 app. It's not actually stored as a book...it's stored as a database object (or is it a series of database objects??) Either way, it's not a normal epub, and can't be simply lifted out of the file system.

Shari

Kind of like Kobo. And there is a plugin to extract books from the Kobo db. Maybe someone will do one for Windows 8 - especially for non drm books, and for when the Win 7 version no longer works.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

The app downloads books from B&N's servers, just like the desktop programs.

That was your reason for doubting they would cut off the desktop applications, since it would disable the app too.

I simply pointed out, if they cut off hosting the books from the old location (same as the greasemonkey script?), the app could be updated to still work -- by downloading from the new location -- and they'd simply not update the desktop programs.

Doh!

You probably wanted to use instead of didn't you?

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

Doh!

You probably wanted to use instead of didn't you?

If it makes you feel better, sure.