PDF Zooming Issue on 505 after conversion

[JVIPER88]

I was lucky enough to get a copy of a book I was searching for for free. Unfortunately, each page of this book was in the form of a JPG picture. So, I converted all of the pictures into one PDF file. It looks serviceable on my computer screen, but when I transferred it to the 505, the PDF print is so small I can't see it, and it won't zoom in. Now, I have files that were original PDF's that do reflow like they're supposed to. Why doesn't the converted one do the same thing?

Also, if anyone has a better idea as to what I can do with the JPGS to make them more reader-friendly on the 505, I'd appreciate it!

Thanks!!

[dordale]

There are two types of PDF files--text and image based files. Since your book was created from JPGs, it most certainly is an image based PDF. Unfortunately, since it's image based, the reader can't reflow/zoom the text, as it's not recognized as text. You'll need to find a way to convert the image based file into a text based file in order to zoom/reflow the text.

dordale

[BBRags]

You'll need to find a way to convert the image based file into a text based file in order to zoom/reflow the text.

I had to do this for one book and let me tell you it is tedious work. I downloaded an application called FreeOCR, a free optical character recognition program. It takes an image file with text and outputs a text file. I had to check the output for spelling and format errors (page by page), and there were lots of those. It's worth it only for an ebook you really, really want to keep. By the time you finish the conversion, you will have read the book in microscopic detail.

[Solitaire1]

Originally Posted by JVIPER88

I was lucky enough to get a copy of a book I was searching for for free. Unfortunately, each page of this book was in the form of a JPG picture. So, I converted all of the pictures into one PDF file. It looks serviceable on my computer screen, but when I transferred it to the 505, the PDF print is so small I can't see it, and it won't zoom in. Now, I have files that were original PDF's that do reflow like they're supposed to. Why doesn't the converted one do the same thing?

Also, if anyone has a better idea as to what I can do with the JPGS to make them more reader-friendly on the 505, I'd appreciate it!

Thanks!!

I'm late to the discussion but I will try to help. If you have StarOffice or OpenOffice.org, you can make a PDF ebook fitted to the Sony Reader's screen. It is easy to do, but it does take a little bit of work.

You can do it this way:

- Open up a blank text document.

- Set the page size to the same size as the Sony Reader screen (3.5" x 4.75" for the PRS-500 and PRS-505 screen) with the margins set to 0.2" (the minimum).

- Set the paragraph style to insert a page break after each paragraph.

- Insert the first picture to the paragraph and resize the picture to fit the page.

- Repeat with each picture, attaching each picture to a new paragraph.

- Save the document, then export it as a PDF document.

I hope this helps. As I said, it takes a bit work but when you do a page preview you can see how the ebook will look on your reader.

[graydw57]

Originally Posted by Solitaire1

I'm late to the discussion but I will try to help. If you have StarOffice or OpenOffice.org, you can make a PDF ebook fitted to the Sony Reader's screen. It is easy to do, but it does take a little bit of work.

You can do it this way:

- Open up a blank text document.

- Set the page size to the same size as the Sony Reader screen (3.5" x 4.75" for the PRS-500 and PRS-505 screen) with the margins set to 0.2" (the minimum).

- Set the paragraph style to insert a page break after each paragraph.

- Insert the first picture to the paragraph and resize the picture to fit the page.

- Repeat with each picture, attaching each picture to a new paragraph.

- Save the document, then export it as a PDF document.

I hope this helps. As I said, it takes a bit work but when you do a page preview you can see how the ebook will look on your reader.

I don't think that's going to help. Since the text is in an image, resizing to fit the page will make the image smaller, and the text in the image smaller.

Depending on the margins you have you might try cropping the images to remove the whitespace around the text. There are programs that could automate this (depends on how consistant the margins in your JPGs are.) That will improve the text size on-screen, but I don't know if it'd be enough for you.

OCRing is not a science at this time. Even commercially produced ebooks have tons of typos - and allegedly, someone got paid to go through them.