Converting PDF to Sony format

[frabjous]

Originally Posted by doreenjoy

Yeah, even in landscape mode. The lines of text in the most problematic books are about 8.5" wide when I trim the margins. I should probably add that I am extremely nearsighted. I need a bigger font than most people in order for it to be legible.

Lines of text 8.5" wide... with no columns?! That's unheard of... whoever typeset that needs their head examined... 6.5" (so the width of 8.5x11 paper with 1" inch margins on both sides) is already significantly too wide by most professional standards; very few published works I've seen go above 4.5" (at least in a single column), and many significantly less.

Yeah, I think if your vision problems are bad enough you're going to have to convert, or use the reflow feature on the reader. You shouldn't end up with no paragraph breaks at all though... what software are you using to convert?

[doreenjoy]

Originally Posted by frabjous

You shouldn't end up with no paragraph breaks at all though... what software are you using to convert?

I've tried converting with Calibre and Acrobat (the "Save As" feature). Also tried opening it in Gmail and copying out the text. No matter what I do, the line breaks are stripped out. Very frustrating.

[elegant]

Originally Posted by sn123py

I usually do these Steps to read PDF on my Sony:
- remove DRM
- open the PDF with newest Acrobat Reader, select all, copy to clipboard
- open Word, copy from clipboard
- with some macros, fix hyphenation, remove page numbers, Chapters and so on.
- save as HTML
- import into calibre
- convert to lrf

all together, it takes me about 10 Minutes each book.

regards,
macfly.

What macros do you use? Is there one which can remove page numbers reliably, as the format will probably vary slightly from book to book?

[JSWolf]

Converting a standard novel length PDF to any format is going to introduce errors and the only way to be 100% sure the conversion is error free is to compare the converted PDF to the original PDF and (IMHO), it's not worth the hassle.

[elegant]

I don't mind too much about minor errors, but I do have author name and page number in the text which I'd like to remove.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by elegant

I don't mind too much about minor errors, but I do have author name and page number in the text which I'd like to remove.

The errors can range from minor to major. You just won't know until you try the conversion. If it's one of those highly formatted PDFs with images and columns, then forget even bothering.

[elegant]

The errors can range from minor to major. You just won't know until you try the conversion. If it's one of those highly formatted PDFs with images and columns, then forget even bothering.

No just text and normal paragraphs.

[BlackVoid]

Originally Posted by frabjous

I've never tried BookDesigner, though. I have, however, tried Acrobat Pro's export as HTML/RTF feature, with mixed results.

Does anyone have a sense of the relative quality of output of BookDesigner for PDF > X conversions vs. opening in Acrobat Pro and exporting to rtf/html? I'm sure either way a lot of cleaning up will be necessary afterwards if you want a professional looking result.

Bookdesigner is superior, because you can easily do the cleanup with the help of these built-in tools in just a few minutes: Book Cleanup and Element Browser.
Another option is to get Abby Finereader, it can convert to LIT, then you can convert to LIT to LRF. Again BD does a good job and this way pictures are preserved. Other tools also may have an easier time with the LIT format than PDF.