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GutenMark Prettifies Project Gutenberg Ebooks
Posted by Kevin Purdy at 6:00 AM on August 31, 2008
Windows/Mac/Linux: Free ebook converter GutenMark takes plain ebooks from the Project Gutenberg site and converts them into chapter-separated HTML files, italicizes words in foreign languages, removes all-caps instances, and much, much more. One of the main uses of GutenMark is to make ebooks much easier to read on mobile screens, removing hard line breaks and other annoyances that come with some straight-up Gutenberg text downloads. As its own home page describes it, GutenMark is a "prettifier" for Gutenberg texts, and a pretty good one, at that. GutenMark is a free download for WIndows, Linux, and (with more complications) Mac OS X.
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
junkmail
Posted 6:28 AM 31/8/08
Oooh, between this and BookDesigner, looks like I've got some work to do this weekend. :) Thanks for the headsup.
junkmail
garbanzo-bean
Posted 3:07 PM 31/8/08
16.4 MB is too big for a text formatting tool, and something like this should really be portable.
i have been using yBook for quite a while to format text-based ebooks, and am happy with the resutlts. it works great with Gutenberg books, and it even catalogues/downloads them straight from the site. it's meant for reading ebooks on-screen, but saves/prints the nicely formatted texts as well.
yBook can open rtf, html, and pdb/prc in addition to TXT. it's only 3.3 MB, and it can be made portable. and of course, it's free.
garbanzo-bean
Capone
Posted 3:58 AM 1/9/08
[spacejock.com]
Another vote for yBook
"This E-Book reader loads text files and web pages (including direct from an internet address), reformatting them into paperbacks for screen reading. Also includes a printout routine to generate booklets and hard copy for binding, plus a compiler to generate your own ebooks for distribution."
Capone
andrew
Posted 8:36 AM 1/9/08
The conversion section at Mobile Read has a few other options for Gutenberg books, as well as tonnes of general conversion applications. (Its by no means complete, though. There are a couple of applications I've been meaning to add.)
If you prefer your Gutenberg texts pre-prettied for you, check out Many Books. I really love the mobile phone format. Even on my crappy Amoi Skypephone, the texts are quite readable.
andrew
nczuma
Posted 12:36 AM 3/9/08
This is Huge!
I've been looking all over for something like this! Up until now I've been doing a lot of HTML markup by hand.
nczuma
djnrempel
Posted 1:40 AM 3/9/08
@Garbanzobean - yeah, 16.4 MB is just a little too big for all those people stuck with a 16 MB USB drive...
I've used Y-book for a while. However, my favourite solution is to convert to PDF, open it in Foxit reader, turn it 90 degrees and then go full-screen. I can hold my laptop open like a book, with a big reading screen on one side and two big page-turning buttons on the other side. Works great for reading in bed!
Any leads on good TXT to PDF converters? I guess just PDFCreator is good enough but something that could batch convert a whole directory of TXT files would be great.
djnrempel
garbanzo-bean
Posted 3:28 AM 3/9/08
@djnrempel: the sarcasm is appreciated. really, it is. thanks for that.
garbanzo-bean
ralsina
Posted 11:54 PM 3/9/08
Modesty aside, a combination of pandoc and my own rst2pdf makes for much prettier ebooks.
Check a screenshot: [flickr.com]
Or two: [flickr.com]
Pandoc: [johnmacfarlane.net]
Rst2pdf: [rst2pdf.googlecode.com]
ralsina