Looking for Kindle Previewer < 3.49 installer

[slonopotamus]

Hi!

Does anyone still have Kindle Previewer installer older than 3.49 that you could share? The reason I am looking for it is because newer versions no longer open .mobi files.

Thanks in advance.

[jhowell]

The Internet Archive has links to various older Kindle Previewer versions. Here is a link that will give you versions from 2020:

https://web.archive.org/web/2020*/ht...rInstaller.exe

The November 27th snapshot is version 3.48.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by slonopotamus

Hi!

Does anyone still have Kindle Previewer installer older than 3.49 that you could share? The reason I am looking for it is because newer versions no longer open .mobi files.

Thanks in advance.

Eh, what? Oh, do you mean old, MobipocketCreator or Calibre-type MOBIs? MOBI KF7? Because we build MOBI files--the dual mobis with file extension .mobi--all the time and KP opens it just fine, including the latest version.

Hitch

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Eh, what? Oh, do you mean old, MobipocketCreator or Calibre-type MOBIs? MOBI KF7? Because we build MOBI files--the dual mobis with file extension .mobi--all the time and KP opens it just fine, including the latest version.

I was noticing that 3.50 will no longer open mobi files that I downloaded from Tor. Admittedly, I mostly use KP for testing though I admit to getting a chuckle when reading the "We recommend using EPUB format for publishing new titles and updating previously published titles. Please use a valid EPUB file for publishing".

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I was noticing that 3.50 will no longer open mobi files that I downloaded from Tor. Admittedly, I mostly use KP for testing though I admit to getting a chuckle when reading the "We recommend using EPUB format for publishing new titles and updating previously published titles. Please use a valid EPUB file for publishing".

Hi:

I'm confused. We've dl'ed 3.50 and it opens the files fine. It simply pops up a message. ??? No block, not "do not pass go, do not collect $200."

Do you mean that it WON'T open the files or that it nags you and says use ePUB?

Hitch

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Do you mean that it WON'T open the files or that it nags you and says use ePUB.

When for example, I try to open the Tor freebie of The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett by dropping it on Kindle Previewer, I get a Kindle Previewer does not support this file.... message (see attached image). Dropping a mobi file that does open (The Haunting of Tram Car 015 for instance), I get the We recommend using EPUB popup. Seeing as Amazon does not support epub on their ereaders or apps, I find it humourous that they recommend that format for creating/editing ebooks.

So to answer your question, both.

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by DNSB

When for example, I try to open the Tor freebie of The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett by dropping it on Kindle Previewer, I get a Kindle Previewer does not support this file...

That book was a Phoenix Pick in 2016. Are you sure that you got it from TOR?

(All of the TOR freebies I have tried work for me.)

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by jhowell

That book was a Phoenix Pick in 2016. Are you sure that you got it from TOR?

(All of the TOR freebies I have tried work for me.)

You are correct. It was a Arc Manor/Phoenix Pick freebie of the month in Dec. 2020. Weirdly, the title of the email says October for October, November and December.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DNSB

When for example, I try to open the Tor freebie of The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett by dropping it on Kindle Previewer, I get a Kindle Previewer does not support this file.... message (see attached image). Dropping a mobi file that does open (The Haunting of Tram Car 015 for instance), I get the We recommend using EPUB popup. Seeing as Amazon does not support epub on their ereaders or apps, I find it humourous that they recommend that format for creating/editing ebooks.

So to answer your question, both.

That must be either a Calibre, or even older, MBPC book. I don't have this problem at my shop, where we build MOBIs either a) from ePUBs that we've done, or b) by using zipped HTML folders, or c) some combo of that. I mean, I want to be clear, we're building our files effectively using Kindlegen or KP3.x.

The only time I've seen anything like that is when I get customers coming to me to revise (much older) books and when I pop them open, I almost invariably see "Calibre" in the CSS.

I have also see kluged-from-MBPC-PRC files fail, too. I mean, originally were Word, then PRC and then reprocessed to earlier MOBI. Those seem to fail pretty soundly too.

What's inside? When you unpack that sucker, what's it say?

Hitch

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Hitch

That must be either a Calibre, or even older, MBPC book.
The only time I've seen anything like that is when I get customers coming to me to revise (much older) books and when I pop them open, I almost invariably see "Calibre" in the CSS.

What's inside? When you unpack that sucker, what's it say?

Hitch

I unpacked the mobi file and found the following line in the content.opf:

<dc:contributor>calibre (0.7.47) [http://calibre-ebook.com]</dc:contributor>

The GitHub releases list doesn't go back that far but a Google search came up with a release date of Feb. 2011. I suspect that was the current version when the file was first created and it has never been updated. It is newer than the first version of calibre I installed a few months after I joined MobileRead. Time flies when you're reading books...

[JSWolf]

I was using Calibre back when it was called LibPRS500. Because of that, I bought the SOny Reader PRS-500. It meant I was able to easily convert the LIT eBooks I bought (was able to remove the DRM).

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I was using Calibre back when it was called LibPRS500. Because of that, I bought the SOny Reader PRS-500. It meant I was able to easily convert the LIT eBooks I bought (was able to remove the DRM).

Relevance?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I unpacked the mobi file and found the following line in the content.opf:

<dc:contributor>calibre (0.7.47) [http://calibre-ebook.com]</dc:contributor>

The GitHub releases list doesn't go back that far but a Google search came up with a release date of Feb. 2011. I suspect that was the current version when the file was first created and it has never been updated. It is newer than the first version of calibre I installed a few months after I joined MobileRead. Time flies when you're reading books...

AYUP, thar it is. That's what I see every time I get an email with someone saying that a mobi won't open, or they can't do this or that. I mean...Calibre OR MBPC or some of the other third-party doodads we've seen over the last decade.

Man, you're right. How time flies...I just realized that I have...man, at least 500 PRC-cum-MOBI files here that were built "back in the day" using MBPC. OUCH. (Thank GOD that my first "employee" helped me learn how to make ePUBs. Jesus. The thought of that number being worse... )

Hitch

[slonopotamus]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Eh, what? Oh, do you mean old, MobipocketCreator or Calibre-type MOBIs? MOBI KF7? Because we build MOBI files--the dual mobis with file extension .mobi--all the time and KP opens it just fine, including the latest version.

Hitch

I mean this is what Kindle Previewer 3.51 says if I try to open KF8 file with it:


This is the file itself: https://github.com/slonopotamus/dyck...mple-book.mobi

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by slonopotamus

I mean this is what Kindle Previewer 3.51 says if I try to open KF8 file with it:


This is the file itself: https://github.com/slonopotamus/dyck...mple-book.mobi

You don't need any older version of Kindle Previewer. The problem is that the eBook is a Mobi format eBook and not KF8. You can use Calibre to convert it to KF8 if you want.