Obtaining books readable in iBooks

[Bingoldsby]

I'm still having a problem understanding how to obtain books that I can read in my iPads book reader... titles I can find from other sources when they are not available from the Apple Book Store.

I have downloaded and installed Calibre on my Windows laptop, but have no idea how to use it or what to use it on. Or perhaps I should rephrase that last to read that I don't know how to obtain an electronic book copy that I can run through Calibre for converstion to a file that will read in iBooks reader.

I have visited several stores and find books I want, but they seem to have to be downloaded into other propriatary app/readers... such as Amazon's Kindle or their Kindle App.

In another thread, I mentioned that I had purchased a book from eBooks.com, and that I was stuck fetching that book into their own reader. I couldn't do anything but open that eBooks reader to see the book. There has to be more to this than ONLY being able to view and read books in the iPad's reader that are obtained from the Apple book store.

Can I please have some coaching on how this all works. I know that Calibre can transform lots of file types, but I need to know how to obtain the files that can be run through Calibre.

Hope my inquiry is clear enough. Thanks.

Brian - Sent from my iPad using iPF

 

[USBill]

Not at home to confirm this but I thought Calibre came with an ebook manual.

You probably have to use iTunes to synch the output from Calibre (which means knowing where the output files go) to iBooks.

For Kindle books, I use the Kindle
Reader. I think it's much better than the iBooks reader, so I don't see any reason to convert.


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- Posted with TapaTalk for iPhone

 

[Bingoldsby]

Bill,

Thanks for the suggestion about Kindle Reader. The reader from eBooks.com was FAR more plain and uninteresting than the iBooks reader. I guess I just figured Kindle Reader would be dull too. After the expense of the iPad (including its reader - which I like), I was dissappointed I couldn't use it for a book I bought elsewhere.

I just got through scanning a very long series of FAQs for Calibre. I'm more befuddled than ever having done that.

Thanks for the reply.

Brian - Sent from my iPad using iPF

 

[thewitt]

The iBook reader reads ePub format books. There are sources for these online

There unfortunate thing you have discovered is there is no one standard for ebooks, so you sill end up with multiple readers. Even with Calibre you will not be able to convert all of the books you find because of copy protection schemes used by several different companies.

Here are some links that might be interesting.

FREE ebooks that are already in ePub format

http://www.mobileread.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=130
ePub Books - MobileRead Forums

http://www.manybooks.net/
ManyBooks.net - Free eBooks for your iPad, smartphone, or eBook reader

http://www.epubbooks.com/
epubBooks.com - Free EPUB eBooks for your mobile eReader

http://www.feedbooks.com/
Feedbooks | Food for the mind

http://www.baen.com/library/ Baen Free Books

http://www.snee.com/epubkidsbooks/

The link below is a site that converts documents to ePub online.... Nothing to download....

http://www.2epub.com/
2EPUB - Free tool to convert documents and e-books to EPUB format.
100% free online converter.

t

 

[Bingoldsby]

Thanks "T" (if that's your signature at the bottom of your reply).

I appreciate all the links, and I'll investigate them all. I did download the Kindle reader onto the iPad. It's not quite as "special" and the iBooks reader - in that there are no fancy page-turning frills when the book is read landscape. I also downloaded the Kindle app for the PC, and downloaded a free book from Amazon to work with in it. Then... (pretty much completely by accident) I managed to find that book file, run it through Calibre, deposit the ePub copy in a place I could find it, manipulate it in iTunes, then get it transfered to the iPad in iBooks. That didn't happen because I know anything about what I was doing, but I now get the flow and order of the whole proceedure. That's great!

So I think this all going to work out just fine.

Brian - Sent from my iPad using iPF