How do I reformat my pdf books and magazines so that they can be readable on a 9 by 12 cms, 6-inch e-ink screen?

July 14, 2008 10:17 AM

How can I read TNR, Commentary, The Weekly Standard and other emags and ebooks on a Hanlin reader?

I've just bought a Bebook - a Dutch rebrand of the Chinese Hanlin V3 - and I am naturally eager to get all my ebooks and emags on it. I'm on a Mac/Leopard and use Stanza or ColorSync Utility for converting to rtf or (open) PDF files. The problem is the digital magazines I subscribe to (for example, The New Republic, The Weekly Standard & Commentary) come out all weird and line-broken. They're just about readable but incredibly annoying, specially the magazines with their graphical arrangements. The same happens with ebooks I've bought or *cough* have been lent.

Is there any program I can use for reformatting pdfs, like Photoshop or some Book Design software I can buy or borrow? What do I do? How much trouble will it be to clean up rtf files, for example? How do I sharpen the grayish and blurred text? Or are there some basic common-sense procedures I can follow?

Basically, what are the provisional rules for Mac-based eBook readers? What can I do to automatize my reformatting for a 6 inch gray screen? I am a member of the obligatory forums and boards, but this is still a very PC-centred activity, I'm afraid. (Unless this is beside the point, that is!)

Many thanks!

posted by MiguelCardoso to computers & internet (2 comments total)

PDFs are pretty crappy on all ebook devices. If you can, convert them to HTML or even text.
posted by wongcorgi at 11:05 AM on July 14

PDFs are pretty crappy on all ebook devices. If you can, convert them to HTML or even text.

That's not true - PDFs work fine on my iLiad. That's how I read journals, books and reference manuals. And I didn't have to transform or reformat them or anything.

However the 2 inch screen difference between the iLiad and Bebook may be the killer difference. MiguelCardoso, does the Bebook resize PDFs to the screen? Depending on your eyesight, the originals should be fine then. Otherwise, conversion to a more flowable format may work (there are PDF-to-DJVU converters I think). But you may be out of luck. Magazines tend to be fairly strongly formatted and any conversion process may break that.
posted by outlier at 11:52 AM on July 14