My new Kindle 2 is on the way, having trekked from Indiana to my home state of Pennsylvania. I was hoping it would arrive today, but it looks like tomorrow is delivery day. That’s OK. I gives me time to look at Calibre, a free e-book library management application pointed out to me by one of our readers last week. Lifehacker already gave it the once over but I want to take a closer look.
The software is cross-platform, working on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. It also supports both Kindle devices, the Sony Reader series, Bookeen’s Cybook and the Apple iPhone/iPod Touch when used with Stanza. Using one or more of the supported devices, Calibre helps to manage e-book collections, but it doesn’t stop there. It can be used to read e-books on a computer, which is handy for when you don’t have a mobile e-book device with you or you want to read content on a larger screen.
Calibre doesn’t stop there though. The software also converts e-book content from thirteen formats into EPUB, LRF or MOBI formats as well. I don’t currently have any content that I can convert, but I can see why folks might desire this feature. All of my content is in Fictionwise’s eReader or Amazon’s Kindle formats for now, so I won’t likely make use of the conversion function.
Probably the most intriguing feature to me as a new Kindle owner-to-be is the Calibre’s ability to pull and format content from web sites and RSS feeds. While I could use the Kindle to browse sites or subscribe to an RSS feed, I’m curious about this option. Since RSS feeds cost money thorough the Kindle store, this might be a way to get the same content at no charge. Of course, I’d lose the advantage of getting that content over Amazon’s Whispernet without wires, so I’ll have to weigh the costs and benefits.
Sony Reader owners with Macs or Linux boxes seem to swear by Calibre, but Sony doesn’t officially support either of those platforms, so this doesn’t surprise me. I’ll have to give this a download and see how useful it is or isn’t for e-book management with my Kindle and iPhone. Do we have any Calibre users out there? What do you think of the software?
{"source":"https:\/\/gigaom.com\/2009\/03\/24\/calibre-offers-free-cross-platform-e-book-management\/wijax\/49e8740702c6da9341d50357217fb629","varname":"wijax_1a5fb59c952c53447d884d9e9c070d28","title_element":"header","title_class":"widget-title","title_before":"%3Cheader%20class%3D%22widget-title%22%3E","title_after":"%3C%2Fheader%3E"}