MobileRead Reorganization - Part II (E-Book Tools Forum)

[Alexander Turcic]

In recent months, we've seen an impressive increase of e-book tools created by talented developers from our community. Many of these tools are not necessarily device-specific; hence the idea to create a brand new forum parent dedicated to them.

I propose: We create a new forum parent labeled "E-Book Tools", which will be positioned between "E-Books" and "E-Book Devices". This new parent will contain subforums dedicated to popular tools, such as calibre, Book Designer, Mobiperl, and so on. We'll decide together which are the "popular" ones. The parent will also contain a catch-all subforum for collecting discussions of less popular or less actively maintained applications.

E-Book Tools
|
-- Book Designer (description)
|
-- calibre (description)
|
...
|
-- Other Tools

Is there anything you would do differently? Something I am missing or forgetting? It's your feedback that will continue to help us improve our community.

Thanks!

Alex

[Patricia]

Seems a good idea to me.

[zelda_pinwheel]

yes, excellent idea. ideally (but this does not really concern the reorganisation of the forums, really it will come afterwards) there could be sticky with a step by step tutorial, for each tool. in the case of the python scripts (by nick and others), it would be great to also have an explanation of how exactly to use them with the batch files or individually.

[Over]

SOunds great!

But instead of "Other tools", I would let the "E-Book Tools" forum contain those topics. Any other topic related with the popular tools would be moved to the respective sub-forum.

Also, would Mobile Read host the latest versions of those tools in a sticky thread in each tool sub-forum?

[TadW]

I like the direction this is going. It sounds like some kind of formal organization could enhance the usefulness of these tool forums. Maybe having the following three sticky topics everywhere:

- latest download link
- tutorial
- mr wiki link

[brewt]

As much as people despise it, may I recommend:

--Word

??

I can't keep house without it........try as I might..........

-bjc

[Elsi]

Originally Posted by Over

Also, would Mobile Read host the latest versions of those tools in a sticky thread in each tool sub-forum?

If not host the files, at least maintain a sticky thread with a link to the place where they can be downloaded.

[kovidgoyal]

I'd certainly appreciate having a separate calibre sub-forum, it would make it easier for me to stay on top of calibre related posts, without resorting to search. It will also give me a place I can point to from the calibre website.

[TadW]

Small suggestion... to me it makes more sense to place the new parent forum between "E-Book Devices" and "E-Book Uploads". It's closer related to the uploads section than to the news section, plus devices should probably remain further on top.

[John H]

I would like to see tools section dedicated to creation, organization and use (reading) of e-books. right now I'm searching for an organizer for my own documents and non-DRM books and it's not easy to find such.

[Alexander Turcic]

John, I was thinking about this too, but I am afraid that your solution would be less flexible. What would we do with tools like calibre that allow to create, organize and read e-books? Also, I don't think we will have that many tools with dedicated forums to justify this kind of ordering.

I think the Wiki would be the ideal place to list links to tools the way you suggested.

[nrapallo]

The Conversion Software wiki is not organized like you would want the subforums to be.

I think a closer match to the way to organize these sub-forums would be the Development Hub layout with the significant Misc. entries being sub-forums on their own; PDFRead could be in it's own sub-forum and everything else eBookwise specific could be in just one sub-forum.

BTW, the IMP wiki lists at the bottom of the page all the software/tools that are useful for eBookwise users and can serve as a guide for what should be in the ebookwise software sub-forum.

[astrodad]

Of course this is a great idea, having suggested one for calibre only minutes before your post. Haha, this forum is great, you all rock!

There should be a sticky in each forum that has the basic details:

- what is the tool supposed to do
- what platforms (computer and readers) does it support
- where to get more info (websites, wiki, etc.)
- posting guidelines (there is a possibility that the authors of the tools may want a different posting guidelines, especially for support)
- author profile
- donate links (if the authors have one)

[Alexander Turcic]

Nick, if I understood you right, you want to categorize tools by device... but this is exactly what we're trying to avoid by creating the new parent forum. Often if not most of the time, tools are format-, but not device-specific. The new forum parent should be the place to discuss the most prominent e-book tools here; the subforums shouldn't be linked to specific devices, or we'll encounter even more difficulties as new e-readers enter the market.

[nrapallo]

Originally Posted by Alexander Turcic

Nick, if I understood you right, you want to categorize tools by device... but this is exactly what we're trying to avoid by creating the new parent forum. Often if not most of the time, tools are format-, but not device-specific. The new forum parent should be the place to discuss the most prominent e-book tools here; the subforums shouldn't be linked to specific devices, or we'll encounter even more difficulties as new e-readers enter the market.

I think what would be appropriate is to organise the sub-forums by popularity first; the more popular software with its own subforum.

And then for the lesser known (popular) software that IS device specific, to be "lumped" together as part of that device specific subforum. Being device specific is tied to being a specific format in the case of .IMP and .LRF; but not for .PRC.

Any lesser known (popular) software that IS NOT device specific could go to a Misc sub-forum.

Now the hard part is defining "popular"; but I guess the user base can voice their opinions here if their software is missing from your sub-forums list.

Your idea of listing these tools in a non-device specific way works primarily for the mobipocket format and not for the Sony or eBookwise formats, so I think a combination of popularity and device specific formats can co-exist as a criteria for the sub-forum list.

We need to flush out the contenders for this sub-forum list, so from my prospective, I nominate:

• PDFRead
• Mobi2IMP
• Using perl scripts to produce .IMP ebooks

Kovidgoyal has already confirmed his affirmation of a Calibre sub-forum and the Mobiperl sub-forum is an obvious choice.

What else belongs there? Anyone care to suggest anything not yet apparent from discussions in this thead?