Kindle voice packs & usertts hack

[sstuardo]

Hi.
I recently managed to install your wonderful tts hack. Well... struggled a little actually cause since amazon updated my firmware, no .bin files were working because of the target OTA number (I guess). So I used the KindleTool to fix the files, and it worked.

BUT...
Once I did it, I realized amazon in one of the firmwares has disabled the TTS option for (it seems to me) all non english writen books.
So I did some research, tried to mount --bind the folder /opt/amazon/cant-remember-the-rest containing the jar files with FW ver 3.4 I extracted from the unbrick patch (mine is 3.4.2), but couldnt make it work (not sure if it was because of the mount --bind didnt work, or it did but 3.4 didnt support it, or maybe I guessed wrong and the code disabling the option is somewhere else)

Any ideas?

[knc1]

On a K3? These things are the electronic equivalent of a paperback book, your suppose to throw them away after 6 months.

Ah, is this suppose to work on 3.4.x? (link please to post in this thread).
I only read the first few pages and found only 3.2 and 3.3 mentioned.

And at the voice pack download link, I only see 3r3 as the most recent, no 3r4.

(I am getting too close to #8,000 - somebody put me out of my misery.)

[eschwartz]

Only 8000? Sheesh.

[knc1]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Only 8000? Sheesh.

Single forum user.

[PoP]

Originally Posted by sstuardo

...

BUT...
Once I did it, I realized amazon in one of the firmwares has disabled the TTS option for (it seems to me) all non english writen books.
So I did some research, tried to mount --bind the folder /opt/amazon/cant-remember-the-rest containing the jar files with FW ver 3.4 I extracted from the unbrick patch (mine is 3.4.2), but couldnt make it work (not sure if it was because of the mount --bind didnt work, or it did but 3.4 didnt support it, or maybe I guessed wrong and the code disabling the option is somewhere else)

Any ideas?

Sorry no idea. I wanted to report TTS still works fine on my K3 v3.4.2 I just had it "speak" a french book (per metadata) in the hacked french language.

[knc1]

Originally Posted by sstuardo

- - - -
So I did some research, tried to mount --bind the folder /opt/amazon/cant-remember-the-rest containing the jar files with FW ver 3.4 I extracted from the unbrick patch (mine is 3.4.2), but couldnt make it work (not sure if it was because of the mount --bind didnt work, or it did but 3.4 didnt support it, or maybe I guessed wrong and the code disabling the option is somewhere else)

Any ideas?

Issue the command:
mount
without any options, see if your bind mount is listed.

[sstuardo]

Well, I made some advance
I find some cool hack in the forums called jbpatch here:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=175512

It's a hack that runs before the framework startup and modifies java bytecode on runtime (thus no need to modify the original jar files). Although it's written for K5, arikfunke reports it runs also for k3 (https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho....php?p=2263991). But it's just the "barebone", it has no particular hack enabled.

So all i had to do was to find in the .jar files where does it grays out tts and modify it (and Bingo!). "Shouldn't be so difficult" I thought...
I used jd-gui to explore the code and allthough I finally found a tts class, I simply cannot read the f**king code with all the single letter nested useless functions and stuff like " a = d; return a.a.d;" (I'm actually a newbie programmer but I guess that's ofuscation). Most likely its just a single f**kng boolean to be true, I just cannot find it,

Looking for ideas anyways


****
BTW, hey knc1!
What do you mean by "per metadata"? Maybe there's an easier way than what I'm working on.

Originally Posted by PoP

Sorry no idea. I wanted to report TTS still works fine on my K3 v3.4.2 I just had it "speak" a french book (per metadata) in the hacked french language.

****
Worked so hard on the other way that almost forgot!!! I'll give it a try

Originally Posted by knc1

Issue the command:
mount
without any options, see if your bind mount is listed.

[knc1]

Well, it was PoP that reported this hack working on 3.4.2, not I.

He must mean the metadata of the book (I.E: includes what language it is written in).

So check your book before you try to make a working application work for you.

- - - -

"No hacks enabled" only because you haven't written any of them yet.
(nor has anybody else, IIRC.)

- - - -

If any of the jbpatch stuff seems intimidating, keep in mind that ixtab was working towards his PhD. in Computer Science when he wrote this stuff.

[PoP]

Originally Posted by knc1

Well, it was PoP that reported this hack working on 3.4.2, not I.

He must mean the metadata of the book (I.E: includes what language it is written in).

...

Exactly what I meant, and wrote.

[knc1]

Originally Posted by PoP

Exactly what I meant, and wrote.

yes, sorry about that, but the post I read seemed to imply that the poster did not know that books have language metadata.

(oh, boy, just wait until they learn what stuff images carry around with them other than what you can see. )

[PoP]

Originally Posted by knc1

yes, sorry about that, but the post I read seemed to imply that the poster did not know that books have language metadata.

(oh, boy, just wait until they learn what stuff images carry around with them other than what you can see. )

No need to be sorry -- I never meant to sound snarky, just wanted to reply directly.

BTW I am sending you some meta-Karma You gave me ideas to possibly enhance my Avatar...

[EDIT 14:37] Done. Thanks Phil Harvey!

 

[sstuardo]

Finally managed to do it. Here is what I did:

Target file is /opt/amazon/ebook/lib/booklet.jar
Class: com.amazon.ebook.common.gui.overlay.l
method ZrB

That method gathers the text-to-speech strings when you press the Aa button and returns them, so it says "Text-to-speech Turn On Turn Off" or "Texto-to-speech Turn off Pause" etc, depending on the situation . When tts is off, It also sets wether the menu is enabled or disabled (visible but gray)
If you explore (I used JD-gui) the file I mentioned, you'll find the last line of the method contains an "if (...) then a.setEnabled(false)". That's the line to avoid.

So I tried to fix it the "elegant" way: make a jbpatch, so needed to install eclipse and jadclipse and jbpatch and make a project and compile it and after 2 days of hard work... I failed miserably (and realized I'm no programmer)

So unzipped the jar, searched for the class file, grabbed JBE and edited the method. Replaced the bytecode instruction iconst_0 to iconst_m1 (equivalent to changing a.setEnabled(false) to a.setEnabled(true)), saved the file, zipped the jar, copied to my kindle the standard way (to user root directory), mount --bind the modified jar to cover-instead-of-replacing the original file and Bingo!

Well... I know... ugliest solution, but it works for me. Now I can tts any book. If any newbie as me is going to try this my way, I strongly recommend disabling kindle's automatic OTA updates, as I guess the file may get corrupted.

Also, dsmid, could you add a little note on this on your first post?

For the record, I own a Kindle Keyboard wifi (B008), firmware version 3.4.2 (2687240004)

(Cannot post the modified file because it's amazons copyrighted.)

[knc1]

Originally Posted by sstuardo

- - - -
If you explore (I used JD-gui) the file I mentioned, you'll find the last line of the method contains an "if (...) then a.setEnabled(false)". That's the line to avoid.
- - - -
Now I can tts any book.
- - - -
For the record, I own a Kindle Keyboard wifi (B008), firmware version 3.4.2 (2687240004)
- - - -

Hmm...

I have to read between the lines here to figure out why PoP reported it working and you had to 'fix' it.

From what I see now - Yours **did not work on all books** before, and evidently PoP tested the unmodified version on a book that would have worked for you.

I.E: The inside of the IF (...) that you eluded is checking the metadata of the book.
The book you where working with and the book PoP was working with returned different results of the test.

- - - -

That is a copyrighted .jar file - you can't post it here.
Please read the site Guidelines about I.P.

[eschwartz]

Moderator Notice

Sorry, no posting of Amazon's actual content. See our Posting Guidelines.
Instructions to help other people recreate your results are completely acceptable though.

Attachment removed.

[PoP]

Documenting, If it can help.

My firmware version:


The specific (public domain) book I tested:
Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert.azw3

Its metadata:


Its metadata language:


TTS enabled in my Aa options on this book:


BTW, I can TTS all of my books with the unmodified hack and I have removed DRM in all of them.