Personal recommendations for "Reader" software sought

[Ex Clie User]

Are there any programs, free or otherwise, that are noticeably better than the free eReader?

T (a lot) I :shortcut:

[BaDZeD]

I use PalmFiction and love it. Supports p[lenty of formats and has a built in unzipper for zipped texts.

[vovka1965]

Plucker? That is a good one and free..

[Ex Clie User]

Thanks to both of you. Am already on my way to checking out the aforementioned programs.

[Dick Tracy]

You are aware that eReaderPro is now available free?

[_Em]

I second the PalmFiction/Plucker combination. Use PalmFiction if all you want is the text, Plucker if you want to preserve graphics and some layout. I believe you can even convert PDFs to Plucker format now.

eReaderPro and Isilo are two other options, but they both involve DRM and one-way conversion (although they both read palmdoc and a few other palm-specific ebook formats).

If you want to look to long-term retention of data that will survive across different hardware and software platforms though, avoid them and stick with PalmFiction/Plucker.

[Ex Clie User]

You are aware that eReaderPro is now available free?
Oh, no, I wasn't. Well, thanks for that Mr Tracy :)

[broncot]

I have books for both ereader and mobipocket. Is there one reader that will read both? I'd love to drop one reader and just have one, plus save some memory.
Thanks

[jstrubberg]

PalmFiction.

Because noone else handles multiple formats and has an autoscroll that doesn't take four taps to activate.

[_Em]

...not to mention no other reader has SO MANY options for how to scroll/autoscroll.

As for Mobi/eReader... THIS is why I stay away from such readers, even when they're free: your content is tied to that reader and that reader only. PalmFiction can open documents encoded in formats that people actually use, such as MS Word, RTF, HTML, PalmDoc, plain text, etc. Just dump them on your SD card -- either loose or zipped up in an archive -- and you can browse and read them, convert to/from PalmDoc/ztxt format (for storage in internal memory), etc.

[hgradeca]

I am using Tibr pro for my older Palms and iSilo for new ones, and I am definitively going to try Plucker. :)

[Bliss]

I read all my ebooks on the palm now and I'm too happy about it. Here is what i use regularily: eReader pro (I bought it long ago, ah well), mobipocket, iSilo (bought it long ago as well), Plucker and PalmPDF.

I read most my ebooks in eReader pro and Mobipocket. Bought at fictionwise.com which has better prices so far.

PalmPDF is for reference guides that only come in that format. Texts I get or make myself I convert on linux to Plucker or iSilo depending how I feel and what it is.

[Telemachos]

i am still using the TIBR Pro (on my Clie NX), because its small and easy to handle one-handed..

If the size of the programm is no matter i would use mobipocket (ebooks and news reader)

[araj]

I've tried eReader, Mobipocket and Plucker. Got all three on my Palm TX. Plucker is the best. I got eReader and mobipocket because I thought I had to have one of those if I wanted to read encrypted ebooks. Then I read about ConvertLIT. Now the plan is to buy encrypted books in Microsoft .LIT format, convert to html and read in Plucker.

Mobipocket is so slow; and frequently freezes my hotsync. It's a nice idea, implementation is bad. eReader won't allow me to order the books the way I want to: you're stuck with your books ordered by title. It's also buggy when it displays images -- show an image and it loses lines of text. But Plucker -- now that's well-written software. Books can be categorized and ordered exactly the way you want. Dial the CPU down to 97MHz (extend battery life so's to finish a book on one charge) and there's no reduction in speed. The interface is totally customizable. There are free fonts galore (cheers Dr. Pruss) to make reading comfortable. Getting ebooks is trivial; and with ConvertLIT, even encrypted ebooks are accessible. Plucker rules!

Here's (http://forum.brighthand.com/showpost.php?p=1435648&postcount=16) my review at Brighthand.

[FredPC]

I've tried eReader, Mobipocket and Plucker. Got all three on my Palm TX. Plucker is the best.
Ditto!

eReader is trouble free (well, almost) but as mentioned many times in this thread, the documents are only readable by eReader (DRM).

I never had good luck with Mobipocket, so I deleted it after just a few days. It's been a couple of years, and I've been meaning to try it out again, but I just haven't gotten to it yet.

For several years I used zTxt to compress / convert my documents and Weasel Reader (http://gutenpalm.sourceforge.net/) as the (free) reader, but development of Weasel has been stalled for a while now and it frustrates me because of the untapped potential.

I haven't been overly impressed with PalmFiction (http://palmfiction.sourceforge.net/), but I haven't had any troubles with it either, and it is certainly seems to be compatible with the largest number of document formats. Maybe it's just a carry over from it's less than impressive website.

Lately, I've been re-examining my document needs on the Palm. I'm not ready to give up editing my documents with Docs-To-Go, but for just about everything else, Plucker (http://www.plkr.org/) certainly seems to be taking the lead. It handles plain text through to complex HTML and it's Free Software (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html) so "you may use it or incorporate it into your own projects or products without charge, you can give it away to others, and that you can even modify the program (or pay others to do it for you) to customize it or add the features you want. Plucker is protected by copyright and as long as you adhere to Plucker's license, you're welcome to use it." There's very little not to like about Plucker!

I'll be curious to see what you decide on and why.

[_Em]

Just so you know, PalmFiction can be set up to be pretty much exactly the same as Weasel Reader, and can read zTxt documents. End result? You can use the PC-side Weasel converter with PalmFiction.

[FredPC]

Just so you know, PalmFiction can be set up to be pretty much exactly the same as Weasel Reader, and can read zTxt documents. End result? You can use the PC-side Weasel converter with PalmFiction.
Thanks _Em. I'll give that a try.

[_Em]

You can also use MassDL to download PG texts (and others) directly to your Palm, and PalmFiction can open the zip files and convert the text/html files inside to zTxt documents if you want. Doesn't do the smart stripping of PG headers that the Weasel converter does however.

[pruss]

I have a couple hundred mb of ebooks in Plucker format, mostly free (but also a couple of commercial items licensed personally to me, carefully converted from Folio Views). The only regular electronic reading on Palm that I do outside Plucker is with PalmBible+, since a specialized Bible reader is better for its purpose (e.g., parallel texts, good Greek and Hebrew support). Occasionally, I read something in eReader or in PalmPDF if I can't avoid the relevant formats.

Note that PG texts are directly available in Plucker format. Unfortunately, Blazer doesn't recognize them, and so I have to save them to card and then copy them to the right place.

The one thing I wish Plucker had was faster and better searching. As far as I know, it's still faster and better than every other general purpose reader except for TomeRaider (which I've found to be a nuisance to convert texts to), but it's not quite good enough for my purposes. (It takes about 45-50 seconds to search a 4.5mb compressed file on my TX.)

[martinloat]

One of the main moans about PalmFiction is its lack of a user guide; I hope this helps :)

PalmFiction – an eBook reader for all Palm O/S

Languages:
Palm Fictions supports many languages, including, English, Bulgarian, French, Spanish, German, Russian, and Ukrainian.
Supported document formats:
PalmDoc, zTXT, RTF, MS Word 2.x, 6.0/95, 2000-2003, simple text, text with HTML tags (for remove tags only), TCR (full unpacking). In all listed formats of documents displays only text (without, hyperlinks, images..)
Features:
Support for ZIP and GZ like folders with docs on memory cards and in main memory. Support for Hi-res displays. Work with documents from memory cards (SD, MS, etc) . Autoscroll "Smooth flow", "Screen rotation", "Smooth rotation". Profiles for document preferences. Customized toolbars. Hardware buttons adjustment. Rotate screen 90, 180, 270 degrees. Work with default fonts. Work with anti-aliased fonts, which can be converted from existing TTF è Type 1 fonts. Support for kerning in fonts, anti-aliasing palette adjustment. Automatic hyphenation (Russian).Doesn't require hyphenation base. Bookmarks, mark and memorize last reading position. Annotation for zTXT (only for documents in main memory). Search in the text. Copying text from screen exchange buffer. Fullscreen mode. Call for RoadLingua & BDicty dictionaries, application & "Desk Accessory". Adjustment for text output parameters. Text colour, background color. Leading and tracking intervals, text margins, text align. Automatic encoding KOI, DOS, UTF-8, UTF-16. Text formatting. Automatic definition for paragraph format. Remove html tags, unnecessary spaces, line breaks. Work with the list of documents, categories, folder in "Explore device", "Catalog of documents", "Favorites", "Recently opened document" modes with delete, rename, copy, add to category, and beam possibility. Document converter to random access zTXT, PalmDoc (without compression). Personalize and localize with skins and language modules.
Downloading
Go to the PalmFiction Main Page and Click on the Download Link.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/palmfiction/
Then pick the package that matches your Device resolution and Language.
Installing
Unzip it and put all the files on the device or SD card in \Palm\Launcher [Might require 3rd party launcher like Zlauncher to load all the libraries.] You can also download Font and color options, but it's not necessary.
Using PalmFiction
The problem is, it doesn't come with a manual, or any instructions.
On the first launch, PalmFiction will scan your device and card. This may take a few moments. Especially if you have a lot of ebooks, text files, html files, etc.
Adding eBooks to the PalmFiction Library
PalmFiction can read any folder on the card, but I suggest you place all of your eBooks in one location. I suggest \Files for obvious reasons!
Reading ebooks
Once you are running PalmFiction and have found your library of books, simply click on the book you wish to read. PalmFiction will load the book and you are on your way.
Scroll through the book by using the down button [up to go back]; or by clicking on the lower part of the screen; or by invoking the autoscroll feature from the "screen" menu.
Getting at the Menus
Until you select a book you will open at the explorer page whose dedicated menu is accessed via tapping the “PalmFiction” dropdown and the tool bar icons. There is no category pull down menu system. You have to scroll to the top of the document list and tap on directory navigation. One can use the category button, but if you are inside a category, it won't move you. A workaround is to put the categories into favorites. Then one has instant access to a category list, though again if you are inside a favorite’s category it doesn't change anything. In which case, one taps the category button.
Oddly, selecting new folder only works when one is in category view.
You can remove docs from favorites... but you have to pick "Delete" and that's unnerving. Fortunately, it does give one the choice whether to actually delete the document, but the menu needs different wording.

Once a book is selected then menus are accessed using the hotspots. Just hold your stylus at either side screen edge clear of other menus or info bars for a second or so then the floating reading screen menu appears. (This is important to know since it is possible to hide all tool and status bars).
Tuning and Customizing PalmFiction
There are 4 toolbars available on the reading screen. You can enable or disable them at the Toolbar Tab of the Tune profile window. To actually configure the toolbars, you choose.

Menu > Tune toolbar (in the reading screen)

A floating window appears and you can drag any function you want to the toolbars (or drag them away from the toolbars to get rid of them. For bookmarks choose "Bookmark list". There are buttons at the bottom for: Close, Bookmark, Find in text, Find next, select font, Rotate Screen, Toggle full screentoggle 'copy mode', select profile, Tune profile, Brightness, contrast, and battery power. These buttons are selectable in the tune profile as to what shows up... there are hundreds of possible preferences. Go wild, or just read! It's up to you

At the Top are Title, % read, Time and Battery meter.

How to "Autoscroll" and "Bookmark"
To make it work you have to assign the autoscroll function to one of the hard buttons (like so many other possible functions). Actually almost everything else is done basically in a similar way.

Menu > Tune profile

The Tune profile window opens. Then choose a tab with a function in mind. There are 12 different tabs (from choosing a font, colors, alignment, spacing, choosing a dictionary, to html preferences, etc.) In this case choose Control (where you customize the buttons), and assign the autoscroll function to one of the buttons. You can control the speed afterward with the Nav buttons (while it's autoscrolling). Also choose the Autoscroll Tab to configure the type of scrolling you want (normally it would be "Smooth").

:D
I would be interested if anyone can add to this with brief "How To's"

Of interest also is the PalmFiction forum at http://palmfiction.sourceforge.net/forum/forum2.html

:( Sadly the authors of this program have the following remarks when asked about adding LIT to its repetoire: "Support lit is time-consuming. Palm near death. I do not want to spend time in vain". :(

Ciao

[alominator]

After reading this post i started re-organizing all my ebook collection: at the beginning i started using ereader (i found it in TX bundled cd), converting my doc files in pdb using ebook studio, but it's a long process and the result can be read only by ereader. Altought it' interesting that some images can still be opened..
After reading this post i found myself in front of a crossroad: palmfiction or plucker? Yes, palmfiction doesn't need conversion, but plucker can open for example images. The results? I choose palmfiction, re-creating all my library, and i'm happier with it! I choose the same color scheme i'm using with ereader (nostalgia :p ), deleted some toolbar and using anti-aliased fonts. I like it!

Does anybody have any suggestion regarding the "right" reader? I'd like to know your opinion...
Thanks, Alo

[_Em]

I use PalmFiction, and if one of the documents I have just doesn't look right and needs formatting/photos, I can pluck a copy of it and use Plucker to view it. Palmfiction can still read the original :)

I'm still pining for the day when Plucker can pluck its own documents so I don't need to involve a PC in the conversion process....

[alominator]

Yes Em, i agree with you! But for pluckering you have to convert your doc file in html and after process it with sunrise...so it's a two step conversion, isn't it? But you know, if you want also the images I think it's a good compromise... :)

[Another Michael]

If you need a good reader for big PDF files with bookmarking capability there is nothing better than RepliGo:

http://www.cerience.com/downloads/downloads.php

The docs need to be converted over the included RepliGo printer driver. Every doc that can be print out on a windows system can be converted. Only for Windows users.

... or the RepliGo PDF mobilizer:

http://www.cerience.com/downloads/index.htm

Also only for Windows users. Bulk converting capability. Expensive (99$).

Screenshot: Skinned with PalmRevolt / BeOS Theme.

[_Em]

Of course, you could also just read them in native format using PalmPDF; it does bookmarks and can read pretty much any pdf you throw at it without conversion.

[Another Michael]

Of course, you could also just read them in native format using PalmPDF; it does bookmarks and can read pretty much any pdf you throw at it without conversion.

But it is much too slow. And there are many memory problems. And it resets itself often. So it's no fun for me.

Another hint is Picsel Proviewer 1.0.29 (not available any more). Very fast but no reflow mode.

Link to dead website:

http://www.picselpowered.com/

Link to unregistered version (14 days of usage):

http://www.wegzumselbst.de/dat/picsel-proviewer-1-0-29.zip

[Another Michael]

The one thing I wish Plucker had was faster and better searching. As far as I know, it's still faster and better than every other general purpose reader except for TomeRaider (which I've found to be a nuisance to convert texts to), but it's not quite good enough for my purposes. (It takes about 45-50 seconds to search a 4.5mb compressed file on my TX.)

I have never use the search function in plucker but i'm not the only one who think that you can do everything in palmos programming only if you want to.

Plucker "developer" cvs version:

http://www.plkr.org/developers/snapshots

[Another Michael]

Yes Em, i agree with you! But for pluckering you have to convert your doc file in html and after process it with sunrise...so it's a two step conversion, isn't it? But you know, if you want also the images I think it's a good compromise... :)

Do you know this ?

pdaConverter simplifies the creation of documents for Palm OS based handhelds and works only under MS Windows. The daily synchronisation of webpages/channels can be done, too. pdaConverter is freeware.

http://www.jakewalk.de/meine-software/pdaconverter/langswitch_lang/en/

pdaConverter supports the following filetypes:

* PDF
* HTML
* Rich Text
* Windows Help Format
* Word Perfect
* Text
* MS Word, Excel, Power Point (Windows 2000/XP only)
* Aportis Doc
* JPEG
* GIF
* PNG

…and can write the following palm filetypes:

* Plucker
* Aportis Doc
* zTXT

[alominator]

This seems very interesting! Tomorrow i'll give it a change...it seems a full period of software testing, isn't it? :D
Thank also for this hint Another Michael!

[Another Michael]

This seems very interesting! Tomorrow i'll give it a change...it seems a full period of software testing, isn't it? :D
Thank also for this hint Another Michael!

But ... this converter can't convert directly to plucker from your Webbrowser like sunrise does. (I use SeaMonkey as my favorite Webbrowser, but i think this feature don't work with the actual firefox/ie ?)

BTW: Sunrise for java is open source.

Because i like to do screenshots here is one which shows the "Send to sunrise" feature in my Browser.

http://www.wegzumselbst.de/pic/2008-05-22_004240.jpg

[alominator]

Ok, so it seems you need at least two programs, Sunrise (or similar) for html pages, and pdaConverter for the other document. Later when I'm at home I'm going to try pdaConverter and see how it works!

[araj]

Re: format shifting encrypted Microsoft Reader books: avoid titles published by Penguin. I bought and tried shifting the Microsoft Reader edition of Alastair Reynolds' Galactic North (http://www.fictionwise.com/eBooks/eBook68171.htm?cache) (published by Penguin, available at Fictionwise). convertLIT removed the DRM, but it couldn't generate an html file. Penguin's using bad html. This thread (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?p=192848#post192848) at MobileRead has a discussion of the problem from post #318 onwards.

HarperCollins and Random House books, though, work fine. Bought, shifted, Plucked and am reading the second (http://www.fictionwise.com/ebooks/eBook20081.htm) Foundation (http://www.fictionwise.com/ebooks/eBook20078.htm) trilogy (http://www.fictionwise.com/eBooks/eBook20082.htm?cache) and Neil Shubin's Your Inner Fish (http://www.fictionwise.com/eBooks/eBook64469.htm?cache) on my Palm TX :->

Edited to add: The fix posted on the mobileread thread worked :-) Penguin need not be avoided.

[vainruny]

Clevertester - Software Quality Assurance News and Information Resourcehttp://www.clevertester.com/