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View Full Version : New µBook 0.9a No Longer Freeware


jvandervort
11-18-2004, 10:35 PM
Looks like an end of an era.
Still the best reader to use without converting to proprietary
formats.

ironguy
11-19-2004, 01:10 AM
I guess we deserve it. He stated on the website that donations had fallen off. I know that I didn't donate even though I knew that I should. Now I will pay for the use of the best reader around without qualms.

ADBrown
11-19-2004, 10:07 PM
I wish he'd made a bigger deal out of it beforehand. I'm sure we could have whipped up some donations in order to keep it freeware.

Ommadawn
11-22-2004, 07:07 AM
Yeah, I'm one of the guilty party as well. I've seen the request for donations every time I've visited David's site, and thought "I should do that" but never have. Having said that, I paid up promptly when I received the notification email for the new version 8)

Money well spent.

Craig.

Oregon Trail
11-22-2004, 08:55 AM
I am relatively new to reading ebooks. What is the advantage to using µBook 0.9a? Actually, why use any of the other formats than MS reader?

ADBrown
11-22-2004, 11:42 AM
Having said that, I paid up promptly when I received the notification email for the new version 8)

Yeah, but it would have been better to keep it donation-based freeware on behalf of the new users.

As for the benefits of uBook, for one thing it will read practically any format without conversion. Plain text, rich text, HTML, PalmDoc, anything. There's a vast online archive of thousands of books that can be gotten for free, many of them not formatted for MS Reader. uBook also gives you total control over controls, colors, interface, text size, font smoothing, everything.

Ommadawn
11-23-2004, 01:03 AM
I am relatively new to reading ebooks. What is the advantage to using µBook 0.9a? Actually, why use any of the other formats than MS reader?

Hi,

as was said above, µBook will read just about any non-DRM format you need - plain text, html, rtf, palm doc/pdb format, and handles zipped files as well. It's feature rich, very configurable, and up until now, free.

MS Reader users a proprietary format for it's ebook files, and the DRM for lit files is one of the worst there is. It's great when it works, but if you change your email address one too many times, for example, all those books are all of a sudden innaccessable.

µBook can read literally thousands of free ebooks available on the net, from Gutenberg, Blackmask, Memoware and other sites as well. Certain utilities are also available than can deconvert a lit file back to html, which can then be read by µBook (or any other reader you may be using 10 or 20 years from now).

If you prefer MS reader, more power to you, but don't expect to be able to read those books in the future with any reliability....

Oregon Trail
11-23-2004, 02:09 AM
If you prefer MS reader, more power to you, but don't expect to be able to read those books in the future with any reliability....

WOW! Thanks for the information. I thought I was limited to downloading only books done in a particular format. I didn't know which one, if any was better than MS Reader. Like a previous writer, I tend to read most of my books once, but there are signifcant exceptions

Oregon Trail
11-23-2004, 05:02 AM
What is a DRM file?

Squid
11-23-2004, 05:05 PM
Hello Oregon Trail,

DRM is a form of security designed to ensure payment by the reader for a book. Someone mentioned that the DRM management from eReader (Peanut Press/Palm Digital Media) is the easiest. They simply tag the credit card number and owner name that you purchased the book with and opening the book. No credit card number, no book. MS Reader uses their passport system. All your books can never be opened under a different passport. So if you change passports, you loose access to your books. 8O Not a good thing. Hope this helps.

Regards,

Squid

Oregon Trail
11-24-2004, 02:24 AM
Thanks Squid, I am learning a lot about ebooks. I have had a passport account for a few years. This is just about the only thing I've used it for. I don't like the thought of losing something because I change account numbers.