Introduction

eBook Reader Apps

For this post I will confine the discussion to apps that can run on mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets. The following are “free” eBook reader apps listed in the order of best multimedia eBook rendering quality based on my recent experience with them:

Note: Except for Stanza, these readers require that you setup a free account with the parent company. An account for the Nook requires a credit card, but if you are already a Nook user, install the app and you are ready to go.

eBook Formats

Each eBook reader app can open and display documents in a number of formats, so it would be ideal to develop your eBook in the best and most capable of those formats. For example, most of them read .PDF files, but that format does not support multimedia. The best format for multimedia rendering is EPUB supported by all of these readers, or enhanced EPUB supported only by Apple iBooks.

At this writing there are two major EPUB formats in use, v2 and v3.

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Anthologize

Anthologize is a free WordPress plug-in that lets you create an eBook from the posts in your WordPress Blog. Don’t have a WordPress Blog you say? Well you can have one if you join the CUNY Academic Commons, which is open and free for all CUNY faculty. Of course there are other ways to establish a WordPress Blog, but joining the CUNY Academic Commons is a no-brainer.

Once you install and activate the Anthologize plug-in, you simply identify which of your Blog entries you wish to use as chapters or pages in your eBook, and then publish in any of the following formats: EPUB, PDF, ETI, or RTF.

If you already have a WordPress Blog and wish to re-purpose the contents, Anthologize is a great place to start. However, you may want to import the resulting eBook into one of the other programs so that you can edit it before final publication and distribution.

You can read more about Anthologize on their Web site at:

http://anthologize.org/

Access the CUNY Academic Commons site at:

http://cunyac.reclaimhosting.dev/

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Creative Book Builder

Creative Book Builder (CBB) is an iPad app ($3.99) that supports the building of eBooks containing multimedia (text, image, sound, video). Your eBooks can be built only on an Apple iPad 2 or above, but they can be viewed with any EPUB eBook reader on any platform. That said, I have found that the best rendering of multimedia materials in one of CBB’s published eBooks is on an iPad using the free Apple iBooks reader. That may be because the iBooks reader has been updated to render eBooks created using the EPUB 3 format. Most other readers are still at EPUB version 2.

 

I found CBB very easy to use once you get all of your eBook materials onto your iPad. The process goes like this:

1. Gather your text, images, sound and video files
2. Make them accessible or better transfer them to your iPad
3. Place the materials into your CBB eBook
4. Publish and preview your eBook
5. Distribute your eBook

 

Access the CBB at their Blog where you will find FAQs and Tutorials:

http://getcreativebookbuilder.blogspot.com

 

Apps in Your Classroom – read how others are using CBB

http://www.appsinclass.com/creative-book-builder.html

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Apple iBooks Author

 

Other eBook Authoring Programs

There are other programs that allow you to save your documents as eBooks in the EPUB format. Two such programs are:

• Adobe InDesign (MacOS X and Windows)
• Apple Pages (MacOS X) – use export to save in EPUB format

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 Other Useful Information

Reading an eBook in a Browser

There are a number of “add-ons” for the Firefox Browser that allow you to read EPUB formatted eBooks.  I use EPUBReader, a free add-on. If you install it, be sure to completely close Firefox and then reopen it before trying to access your first eBook. Once installed you can drag any EPUB file and drop it into the Firefox Browser window.

 

DRM

Publishers often employ Digital Rights Management (DRM) to prevent redistribution and resale of eBooks. Unfortunately DRM often prevents you from reading your purchased eBook on all of your own devices (phone, tablet, computer, etc.) There are, however, places where you can purchase eBooks that do not contain DRM. EPUBBuy.com is such a Web based eBook Seller: http://www.epubbuy.com/en/

 

 “Buying” eBooks

You can download free and paid-for EPUB eBooks in a growing number of places on the Internet including the Apple Bookstore, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble. For some of the smaller bookstores, begin your search here: http://www.epubbooks.com/buy-epub-books

 

I spent most of my teenage years on stage as a singer. But some of the best times were the rehearsals when we were, as the song says, “singing Doo-Wops to the wall” – or the hall, the bathroom, the stairwell… We were always searching for the best possible sound.

More recently my searching has been restricted to the Internet, and I thought I was doing fine, mostly with Google although I did try Cuil for a while. But Internet search is changing (or about to change) with the introduction of new tools like Microsoft Bing, Google Squared, and Wolfram Alpha.

: On June 3rd Microsoft officially introduced what it calls a “decision engine” which they claim will get you refined results fast. Some reviews are glowing and some not so much. I will be switching to Bing for a while to give it a fair shake.

One thing I like right away is searching for videos. Try selecting videos, and then search for, say, ePortfolios. The result is a matrix of thumbnails that you can mouse over to hear excerpts – Cool!

Read / View information about Bing:

• Microsoft’s Bing Search Engine Goes Live
• A PCMag full review
• Say Hello to BING-411, Bing’s Voice Service (like GOOG-411)
• And not to be missed, the beginning of Microsoft’s video ad campaign
  Bing Rescues World From Google Ruin

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In May, Google offered some new search tools: Google Search Options, Google Squared, Rich Snippets

: Speaking of a matrix, when you search here your results are presented in a table on the screen with related terms down the left-hand column and categories across the top. Google Squared attempts to turn unstructured Web information into a structured database of sorts. How successfully it does this remains to be seen. One thing I noticed is that it seems to work better for multi-term searches than single words.

Squared also lets you add or delete results to produce the most useful “square” of information which you can then save to your Google account and refer back to later. This has possibilities!

Read / View information about Google Squared:

• Article: Google Squared Launched in Labs

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Mathematica founder Stephen Wolfram has launched Wolfram Alpha, a search engine that aims to more thoroughly answer Web users’ questions rather than just serve up existing data. This is a “project to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable by anyone.”

Read / View information about Wolfram Alpha:

• Article: Mathematica Founder Gives Wolfram Alpha Preview
• video: A Sneak Preview of Wolfram|Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine
   

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I may not find any echoes on the Internet, but all this makes the looking fun-again!

What are your favorite Search Tools?