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#17 |
Ex-Helpdesk Junkie
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Karma: 85397180
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity
Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)
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Something cool for you to blog about elsewhere and possibly link to?
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#18 |
File format tinkerer
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Karma: 66468
Join Date: Oct 2014
Device: PC
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Last edited by cyanic; 06-25-2015 at 10:12 PM. |
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#19 |
File format tinkerer
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Karma: 66468
Join Date: Oct 2014
Device: PC
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Interesting tidbit: why is there a key on the VitalBook icon? It turns out that before Bookshelf 3.7 the program was called "vitalsource KEY", hence the key in the icon. VitalSource used to sell DVDs with entire curriculums for distribution in universities, and they also preloaded what was called the "Portable Personal Library" on IBM computers. vitalsource KEY was what you used to view those books. Even farther back the program was called VitalViewer. What has stuck through all these years, however, is the name VitalBook. Heck, even the format's more or less the same (at least starting version 3; I couldn't find any earlier version for download).
Looking at the titles in the PPL, I can see why they don't offer it anymore. It's basically all public domain content. It's easy enough to get any of that off the Internet; who wants to pay for it? Here is a snapshot of what VST was doing at the beginning of the 21st century. Bonus: apparently VitalSource had a few TV spots. They are sort of weird. https://www.youtube.com/user/wdmvst/videos Last edited by cyanic; 06-25-2015 at 10:12 PM. Reason: Laugh at them ads. |
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#20 |
before sleep, read or TV?
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Karma: 10
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: Australia
Device: Kobo Libra 2
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Thanks cyanic, ill give your extractor a try
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#21 |
File format tinkerer
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Karma: 66468
Join Date: Oct 2014
Device: PC
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Looks like VitalSource added some new features to their Page Fidelity format. They've added document structure metadata for each page, and now each glyph entry also have its corresponding character as an attribute. The structure metadata was probably designed for accessibility, in particular image alt-texts. The new glyph entries would make it slightly easier to convert PictureBooks to PDF, considering the corresponding text file won't need to be read.
Now, on to VitalSource's own documents. Wow, they are horrible in quality. The EPUB guide throws a whole bunch of errors in EPUBCheck. In fact, it's really just a Word document exported to HTML and converted/split with Calibre. The PDF guide is a complete mess, with every item in the TOC going to the wrong page and the highlighting being ludicrous, only highlighting around half of each letter. Some pages you can select the footer text, some pages you can't. If VitalSource can't even get their own documents working properly in their system, what business do they have ingesting others' contents? |
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#22 |
before sleep, read or TV?
![]() Posts: 104
Karma: 10
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: Australia
Device: Kobo Libra 2
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there is a really big mess with vitalsource bookshelf. I finally was able to convert my book to epub, but it is way too big and my epaper/eink reader gets stuck while loading it, and some software even give me lots of erros.
Now, i converted it to HTML and i am editing and removing some unwanted things (i.e. page numbers) so that i can later convert it to PDF. |
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#23 |
File format tinkerer
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Karma: 66468
Join Date: Oct 2014
Device: PC
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It's interesting how many books on VitalSource don't seem to pass EPUBCheck. Apparently VitalSource doesn't do any cleanup on the books, and publishers try their best to make proper EPUBs while still remaining sort of clueless. Fun fact: Extractor.epub, despite all its JavaScript, passes EPUBCheck tests.
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#24 |
Junior Member
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Karma: 10
Join Date: May 2015
Device: ipad
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wrg...
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#25 |
Junior Member
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Karma: 12
Join Date: Jul 2015
Device: none
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I have created a macro on the Mac that will convert VBK to PDF. It uses the program Keyboard Maestro and was developed with version 7. VitalSource Bookshelf version 6.6 was also used to develop the workflow. All this was done on 10.10.4 (Yosemite).
The workflow will loop through a printing cycle and print the maximum number of pages that are allowed by that publication. There are several things that need to be specified manually, and those are in the color red. Those in orange may or may not need to be changed; it's up to you to test and find out. The main thing to customize in addition to the steps in red or orange is the number of repeat cycles to run. The "Repeat Actions" step loops through the actions to print in blocks of X number. Determine how many times to repeat by <Total number of pages that are specified with integers> divided by <Max Number of pages to print in each run>. For example, if there are 180 pages that are numbered (doesn’t include pages that are numbered with Roman numerals), and you can print a maximum of 10 pages at a time, then set the Repeat action to 18 times. Note that if the number of pages isn’t even divisible, then repeat to the highest possible number, then you’ll have to manually print the excess both after this number, and before if the book uses Roman numerals. I have used this to convert about 2,000 pages into PDFs, and I hope it helps someone else in the future. |
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#26 | |
Junior Member
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Karma: 10
Join Date: Jan 2016
Device: Vital
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![]() Quote:
Your dll file doesn't work for any version of Vitalsource. Extractor.epub also do nothing when click Extract Epub button. Anyone successfully? |
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#27 |
Junior Member
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Karma: 10
Join Date: Jun 2013
Device: iPad 2
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The extractor.epub works fine on older versions of vital source. My problem is most of my books are in other formats (pdfbook or picture book) and are incompatible with the epub. No idea yet how to convert properly to a pdf without taking screenshots.
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#28 |
File format tinkerer
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Karma: 66468
Join Date: Oct 2014
Device: PC
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Alright, so I finally got a chance to look at VitalSource stuff again, since I needed some books this semester. All I'll say is they've changed some things, and while it's a nuisance, nothing too difficult.
I'm not going to be updating or releasing any tools for Bookshelf, since I don't want to make it harder for others who may be working on the format, with VitalSource patching holes. I will also not be providing support for the existing tools over the forums aside from "read the instructions", because you know the rules. The tools are quite easy and straightforward to use, as long as you can follow the instructions and have vulnerable versions of Bookshelf. However, do expect that VitalSource will be overhauling everything to make them obsolete. They've been doing a lot recently, completing their merger with CourseSmart and bringing a much nicer looking online reading interface, along with cracking down on insecurities in their programs that they somehow didn't anticipate would cause problems before I came along. I wouldn't be surprised if they completely discontinue the older VBK versions once Vista support comes to an end and they can drop support for the old version of Bookshelf (if they're desperate, they might even go back and update that version). Don't forget, they've been preparing for the updated version of the format with "enhanced security" for a number of months now. |
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#29 |
Junior Member
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Karma: 10
Join Date: Mar 2016
Device: Laptop
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How it know if Extractor will work ?
Thank so much cyanic for your great efforts!
I've been trying with Extractor.epub for some good time now, but still couldn't get it to work. I'm trying it with a vbk file on the following setup: VitalSource Bookshelf 6.2.3 (31) on Windows 10 x64 Should I expect it to work or stop trying ? Thanks |
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#30 |
Junior Member
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Karma: 10
Join Date: Apr 2016
Device: Ipad
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I am currently also trying with windows 10, bookshelf 6.2 (24), and extractor.epub . However it seem to show error and does not extract. Would you be able to help me?
http://prntscr.com/anusdu Thanks Last edited by koollegend1; 04-03-2016 at 11:30 PM. |
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