Mobiperl Mobiperl - Perl tools for handling MobiPocket files

[tompe]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

@tompe: From my experience with libprs500, OSX is a royal pain in the ass. It's far and away the worst of the three to support. By default OS X has no compiler installed, your users would have to download Xcode. If you're serious about supporting OSX, I would recommend looking at some solution that allows you to distribute an embedded Perl interpreter.

Aha. The embedded Perl interpreter approach is the one used for the Windows binaries. I will not do OSX binaries since I do not have an OSX machine easily available but if any OSX user would like to contribute binaries they are welcome to do that.

[tompe]

I put a web page at http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/ describing MobiPerl and I tried to document how to install Perl and required modules.

There is also a version 0.0.21 available (no Windows binaries for this version).

Changes in 0.0.21:

• Added detection of images that are too large in mobi2mobi
  
• Added flag --fiximagesizes to mobi2mobi so it will fix the incorrect image sizes.
  
• --htmlfile flag for lit2mobi placed file in wrong dir, fixed now.
  
• Added flag --coveroffset to mobi2mobi and fixed a bug relating to this. Now it is possible to change which image that is cover image by just specifying another offset.
  
• The distribution is now a packed directory.
  
• Added flags --exthtype and --exthdata to mobi2mobi to be able to set any type. Values can be set for unknown types 204, 205, 206, 207, 401, 403. This can help to figure out what these items mean.

[JeffElkins]

How exactly does this work?

From the console:

lit2mobi --addcoverlink myfile.lit

I get no cover image in the resulting .mobi file. Did I miss something?

[tompe]

Originally Posted by JeffElkins

How exactly does this work?

From the console:

lit2mobi --addcoverlink myfile.lit

I get no cover image in the resulting .mobi file. Did I miss something?

--addcoverlink will add a cover image in the html file but you have to have a cover image that is found in the lit file. If your lit file is missing a coverimage then you can add one by

lit2mobi --coverimage cover.jpg myfile.lit

If the thumbnail then do not work you can use the --addthumbnail flag to mobi2mobi. But for Gen3 it should be enough to add the coverimage. I will test this functionality a bit more and fix any problems I find to the next release.

[tompe]

Found a bug. --coverimage will not work for lit2mobi. But you can use mobi2mobi to add a cover image. Will fix this to the next release.

[JeffElkins]

Originally Posted by tompe

Found a bug. --coverimage will not work for lit2mobi. But you can use mobi2mobi to add a cover image. Will fix this to the next release.

Thanks! I'm new to the ebook world and so far your apps have been extremely helpful.

[tompe]

Version 0.0.22 with Windows binaries are now available via:

http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/

Changes in 0.0.22:

• Fixed so that flags --coverimage, --addthumbnail, --addcoverlink works for html2mobi and lit2mobi.

lit2mobi will try to figure out if there is a cover image available. If none is found or if you want to override the choice use the --coverimage flag. If a cover image is found in some way it will be used as cover image and as thumb nail image (used in MobiPocket desktop version for example). --addcoverlink will add the coverimage first in the document so it is visible in for example FBReader. In Gen3 you will get double cover images with this flag.

[Jiiri]

Tompe, quick question. I purchased a Harvard Classic ebook from Amazon (before I found them on this site, unfortunately), and the title is not what I'd like it to be. With other .azw files I've been able to change the extension to prc, run it through the mobi2mobi script, and then rename the .mobi file that results with .azw, and everything has been working.

The problem I'm having now is that I can't seem to change the title on this file, it still shows up in my Kindle wrong. In the Command Prompt it is showing the title as correct, and the author as correct. The name that I don't want but that is showing is listed in mobi2mobi under

EXTH item: 503-503-80- Harvard Classics, Vol. 23: Two years before the mast and twenty-four years after

and;

LONGTITLE: Harvard Classics, Vol. 23: Two years before the mast and twenty-four years after

Do you have any idea which of these strings is the one I need to change? Also, does mobi2mobi allow me to change it? Thanks!

Jiiri

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Jiiri

The problem I'm having now is that I can't seem to change the title on this file, it still shows up in my Kindle wrong. In the Command Prompt it is showing the title as correct, and the author as correct. The name that I don't want but that is showing is listed in mobi2mobi under

EXTH item: 503-503-80- Harvard Classics, Vol. 23: Two years before the mast and twenty-four years after

and;

LONGTITLE: Harvard Classics, Vol. 23: Two years before the mast and twenty-four years after

The LONGTITLE can be changed by mobi2mobi using --title. You can use mobi2mobi without any flag to check the result. It this does not help it must be the 503 that is the problem. With the latest mobi2mobi you might be able to change it with:

mobi2mobi --exthtype 503 --exthdata "New title" --outfile new.awz in.awz

So I wonder what the intended meaning of item 503 is?

[Jiiri]

I downloaded the latest version, and tried the string you suggested, with no luck. It's impossible for me to troubleshoot it since I have no idea what the strings even mean or do, not being a programmer. If the problem is the drm of the .azw file, I'd just as soon not spend a lot of time just to find out that I can't do it anyway. If you care at all, I can send you the azw file and let you look at it.

[tompe]

I got a testfile for this problem and I think I have fixed the problem. The problem occured if item 401 was in the EXTH header and had length 1. I had mistakenly assumed it should have length 4. Things that happens when the format is not documented.

it is probably good to make these assumption. They willl cause bugs but I will get feedback and more data to use to try to figure out what is wrong. So whenever you see something like:

ERROR: generated EXTH does not match original
MISMATCH POS:878:0x9:0xc
MISMATCH POS:883:0x93:0x0
MISMATCH POS:885:0x0:0x1
MISMATCH POS:886:0x0:0x93
MISMATCH POS:887:0x9:0x0
MISMATCH POS:890:0x0:0x9

in the output from mobi2mobi please tell me and if possible send me the file that caused this.

There is a version 0.0.23 available as tar file but the only change is the one described here so no need to update if you do not have this problem.

[JeffElkins]

Treasure_Box - Treasure Box.htm - text/html
RW_~Cover01 - ~Cover01.jpg - image/jpeg
Could not read image file: ~Cover01.jpg
Can't call method "getBounds" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bin/MobiPerl/Util.pm line 25, <OPF> chunk 1.

0.22 fixed my image problem, thanks! I do get the occasional failure as posted above. Not a showstopper for me at all, but thought I'd report it. The ~Cover01.jpg file seems to be fine.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by JeffElkins

Treasure_Box - Treasure Box.htm - text/html
RW_~Cover01 - ~Cover01.jpg - image/jpeg
Could not read image file: ~Cover01.jpg
Can't call method "getBounds" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bin/MobiPerl/Util.pm line 25, <OPF> chunk 1.

0.22 fixed my image problem, thanks! I do get the occasional failure as posted above. Not a showstopper for me at all, but thought I'd report it. The ~Cover01.jpg file seems to be fine.

It is the GD module that fails to read the file. Strange, since it shoud read jpeg without problems. I eliminated the message about undefined value. If i have the ~Cover01.jpg file I can try to see why it fails. But as you say, it is not a show stopper.

[Jiiri]

Downloading the latest version is causing me some issues. The link at http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/ sends me to http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/downloads/, which is the same page. When I click on the link there, it takes me to
http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiper...oads/downloads
Which is broken.

As soon as I can get it v0.23, I'll test the new work you've done and see if it works on the Kindle. Thanks, Tompe.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Jiiri

Downloading the latest version is causing me some issues. The link at http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/ sends me to http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiperl/downloads/, which is the same page. When I click on the link there, it takes me to
http://www.ida.liu.se/~tompe/mobiper...oads/downloads
Which is broken.

As soon as I can get it v0.23, I'll test the new work you've done and see if it works on the Kindle. Thanks, Tompe.

Fixed! I had copied the HTML files to the wrong directory.