SONY PRS-500 PDF Support

[mdhuang]

Originally Posted by wgrimm

I have created a couple of ebooks from pdf files that seem to display well. Here is how I did it:

1. Open pdf in Acrobat and export to .rtf. For some reason, exports in Gemini and BCL don't work well.

2. Open the .rtf in BookDesigner (the latest) and create an LRF from it, then import to your sony reader. Use the default settings for LRF creation.

I have tried many other methods- re-distilling pdf's with Distiller and Docucom, using Ghostscript, etc. I am in no mood to mess with changing font sizes etc. in a word processor.

The pdf's I used for commercial, non-encrypted. Have no idea why rtf's created from other software don't work well. I used to use Gemini to export to html for the Rocketbook, and it always seemed to work wel....

I wish the expensive Acrobat would do a better job. However, when it converts PDF to RTF or HTML, it doesn't keep all formatting tags even RTF and HTML support them. It doesn't even keep Italic style. That's a major drawback.

I am going PDF->HTML->BD->LRF route, and have not found a satisfatory way to do the first step. pdftohtml kinda works, but it treats each line as a paragraph and also there is no option to remove header/footer (including page number).

Maybe somebody will write a special version of pdftohtml for the Book Designer.

[NatCh]

To throw another dog on the pile: have you tried pdflrf?

[RWood]

Hey, that was a good dog!

[mdhuang]

Originally Posted by NatCh

To throw another dog on the pile: have you tried pdflrf?

Yep. pdflrf is a good tool, especially for very complex PDF files. I have used it for a few documents. However, it has limitations. It basically converts PDF to images and thus results in very big files. You can not resize fonts, and you can not add your own custom TOC either.

Book Designer still the best tool to create good looking and small lrf files. If only we can find a better way to import pdf into Book Designer without losing most styles.

[JSWolf]

Book Designer will import PDF. It will lose the ToC, graphics, and styles. And it won't handle DRM or protected PDF. But if you don't mind going through the PDF and then fixing the BD file to match, it'll work.

[mdhuang]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Book Designer will import PDF. It will lose the ToC, graphics, and styles. And it won't handle DRM or protected PDF. But if you don't mind going through the PDF and then fixing the BD file to match, it'll work.

I know that. That's why I want to convert PDF to HTML first to preserve images and styles.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by mdhuang

I know that. That's why I want to convert PDF to HTML first to preserve images and styles.

The other way to try it is to install libprs500 and use pdftohtml and see how it goes. It does keep styles and images (I think).

[Azayzel]

Originally Posted by lanekko

SPAM!

Hahahah! Finally, someone who has negative karma. Sweet! Teach that 'ol spam monkey!

[Jabberwock]

I am a translator and in my work I sometimes need to convert PDF into more editable format (rtf and doc mostly). I have found out, and my colleagues support that observation, that the best tool to do it is Abby Finereader. It is an OCR program, but with PDF it extracts the text directly from the file.

The big advantage is that you can select exactly what you want to be extracted (for example to skip headers and footers) and how much of the original format is to be maintained.

I realize that it may be expensive for some who do not need to use it often, but I guess Reader users will sooner or later put to use their scanners and digital cameras anyway? An OCR software will be handy, then...

Note: make sure that you draw all the frames manually on the pages (or draw one which suits all the pages, save it and apply to other pages). The automatic recognition is not that great... It make seem to be tedious at first, but it saves a lot of work later.

[mdhuang]

Originally Posted by mdhuang

I wish the expensive Acrobat would do a better job. However, when it converts PDF to RTF or HTML, it doesn't keep all formatting tags even RTF and HTML support them. It doesn't even keep Italic style. That's a major drawback.

I took back my comment regarding Acrobat styles. If you remove all embedded fonts (by PDF Optimizer tool) before converting, it does keep all styles.

[pr28]

I may have missed this somewhere in the threads, but I don;'t see that anyone has figured out how to modify the defaut font so that it starts at 16pt. For my tiured eyes that really is a minimal requirement. If I could do this I wouldn't hve to mess around nearly as much reformaing doc file to single space and 16 pt fonts.
Thanks

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by pr28

I may have missed this somewhere in the threads, but I don;'t see that anyone has figured out how to modify the defaut font so that it starts at 16pt. For my tiured eyes that really is a minimal requirement. If I could do this I wouldn't hve to mess around nearly as much reformaing doc file to single space and 16 pt fonts.
Thanks

There's really no need. You can save the file as RTF and then use rtf2lrf (part of libprs500) to easily and quickly convert it and then you don't need to worry. Besides, you may get the links (not sure) and graphics. Plus you will have a true LRF and it'll be good.

[vstefanyuk]

Try this:

www.pdfcropper.com