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calibre is a one-stop solution to all your e-book needs. It is free, open source and cross-platform in design and works well on Linux, OS X and Windows. calibre is meant to be a complete e-library solution and thus includes library management, format conversion, news feeds to ebook conversion, as well as e-book reader sync features and an integrated e-book viewer.
What's New
Version 0.8.39:
New Features
- Auto-adding: Add an option to check for duplicates when auto adding.
Closes tickets: 926962 - Content server: Export a second record via mDNS that points to the full OPDS feed in addition to the one pointing to the Stanza feed. The new record is of type _calibre._tcp.
Closes tickets: 929304 - Allow specifying a set of categories that are not partitioned even if they contain a large number of items in the Tag Browser. Preference is available under Look & Feel->Tag Browser
- Allow setting a URL prefix for the content server that run embedded in the calibre GUI as well.
Closes tickets: 928905 - Allow output of identifiers data in CSV/XML/BiBTeX catalogs
Closes tickets: 927737 - Driver for Motorola Droid XT910, Nokia E71 and HTC EVO 3D.
Closes tickets: 928202, 927818, 929400 - Cut down the time taken to launch worker processes by 40%
- You can now configure the calibre settings for the currently connected device by right clicking on the device icon in the toolbar, instead of having to go through Preferences->Plugins
- Auto-adding: Do not add incomplete files when files are downloaded directly into the auto add folder.
Closes tickets: 926578 - When running multiple delete from device jobs, fix the device view sometimes marking the wrong books as being deleted, after the first delete job completes.
Closes tickets: 927972 - MOBI Input: Handle files that have spurious closing </body> and/or </html> tags in their markup.
Closes tickets: 925833 - RTF Input: Strip out false color specifications, as they cause artifacts when converted to MOBI
- Vancouver Province and Windsor Star by Nick Redding
- Onda Rock by faber1971
- Il Manifesto by Giacomo Lacava
- Updated Postmedia publications
- Foreign Affairs
- Read It Later
- Microwave Journal
- taggeschau.de
Requirements
Intel, Mac OS X 10.5.2 or later
Intel, Mac OS X 10.5.2 or later
calibre User Discussion (Write a Review)
Overall:
(81)
(81)
| Downloads:218,980 |
| Version Downloads:1,902 |
| Type:Home & Personal : eBooks |
| License:Free |
| Date:10 Feb 2012 |
| Platform:Intel |
| Price:Free |
Overall (Version 0.x):  |
| Features: |
| Ease of Use: |
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calibre is a one-stop solution to all your e-book needs. It is free, open source and cross-platform in design and works well on Linux, OS X and Windows. calibre is meant to be a complete e-library solution and thus includes library management, format conversion, news feeds to ebook conversion, as well as e-book reader sync features and an integrated e-book viewer.
Copyright © 2012 MacUpdate LLC
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Neartheredrocks reviewed on 10 Feb 2012
However, to call it a "one-stop solution for all e-book needs" is - mildly put - an exaggeration. calibre would need at least the option to organize books in categories to qualify as a one-stop solution. Moreover, I wish there were also columns for "Read", "Rating", and "Comments". Are these features possibly in the pipeline?
Four and a half stars, anyway!
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zuluwarrior reviewed on 27 Jan 2012
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Alex reviewed on 20 Jan 2012
Thank you for that. Very grateful.
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Pacmanen reviewed on 19 Jan 2012
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Pkoziski reviewed on 13 Jan 2012
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Baddington, B reviewed on 13 Jan 2012
Calibre isn't for reading. It's for organizing and managing a library of ebooks.
In my case I do my reading on an iPad, and iTunes absolutely sucks when you have more than a dozen ebooks. The library view is fine of course, a list of all your books, but when you go to make your selections on which ones are going to make it to your iPad you're entering a world of pain.
A WORLD OF PAIN.
So while Calibre is not going to win any beauty contests, it's open source and free, and is getting incremental improvement all the time. Additionally, you can use plugins for it that can do any number of things. Converting ebook formats with minimal effort is where I really fell in love with Calibre, and the fact that I could find plugins to convert my Kindle books so that I could read them in iBooks on my iPad was enough to keep me happy.
If I had any expertise in User Interface design I would want to volunteer for this project, but I can't do anything better and I value the time and effort of those who have contributed too much to whine about it here.
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Edac2 reviewed on 09 Jan 2012
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Since Calibre is free and open source, you can make it better if you think it's terrible.
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Schoschie reviewed on 06 Jan 2012
However, the one time I tried it, the experience was so hideous, I am afraid to ever try it again.
The one thing is its user interface is terrible. It's cluttered, it does not guide the user, all kinds of UI paradigms are mixed, not a joy to use at all. Mac users are pretty spoiled in terms of UI, so this might not be your experience, but I had to cringe all the time while using it.
But, while I can live with a bad UI, I just couldn't even get it to work, so it was a complete failure for me.
I tried to do two things: convert and reflow a PDF to an ebook format that my 3rd gen Kindle can display better. What happened is I waited for about half an hour with nothing happened, no UI updates until I found out that the app had just frozen. Nothing was converted.
I then tried it with a shorter, simpler PDF to see if it worked at all. It did, but the result was completely useless. They layout was broken beyond recognition; it was unreadable, most images/illustrations had disappeared.
Maybe I used a broken release or I simply failed to use it properly, but the experience was bad enough for me to just delete the whole thing outright and never try it again.
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The interface indeed needs work. I'm a big advocate for Calibre, but I could not disagree on that.
As to PDF, it is not a good format for eBooks in the first place. It is used by companies / publishers trying to 1) save money on layout programs for publishing and/or 2) thinking they gain some extra walls on top of DRM against transcoding an ebook. Now you know why, for PDF sucks as interchangeable data format.
The pdf method for element placement is not governed by CSS as in almost all other formats (which are essentially built on HTML). This is why you are having problems, and Calibre (or any transcoding software) will always have problems converting flat page layout (PDF) to fluid page layout (HTML). One approach still leans back to the idea that page is physical thing and electronic formats should be second to that. The online world, were ebooks took off from, abandoned that paradigm early on.
Don't know much work you want to put in to transcoding PDFs... and hopefully you aren't buying too many ebooks in that format, or your are going to keep facing this problem. What you need is a PDF extraction tool like FileJuicer to pull out the content and then rig it in a format you like. But you really don't want to face that in a large publication. It doesn't sound like you're up to the rest of the work.
Simpler answer, if and when possible, stop buying PDFs. They aren't really epublications... it's just that we have some devices capable of reading this throwback format primary designed to electronically store documents that are then printed only as needed.
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The documents in question aren't commercial eBooks I bought from some publishing company, but free documentation PDFs that I gathered from all around the web.
True that PDF was never meant for interchange (which is never claimed, anyway) but instead to ensure that the visual appearance is identical on any platform. Realizing that, PDF is a good format. It's just not meant for eBook devices where you would need dynamic adaption to the usually smaller screen size. I am aware of that, but I thought that tools like calibre address exactly that problem.
I might have to go and look if those documents are available in other formats; I know this to be true for some of them (they are available as HTML) but definitely not all.
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JCH2 reviewed on 09 Dec 2011
Calibre allows the translation of one ebook format to another. [It can also help in teh creation of an ebook, though that is not its purpose either.] The complication is that both protection of, and construction of, proprietary ebook formats and their subtleties is ever changing. Calibre is the only free software out there that attempts to keep up with such changes and provide support for one primary purpose.
When you buy something that is considered data, such as an ebook, you have the legal right to make backups in any format you desire, and you have the legal right to view that data in any platform and on any device you legally own. Calibre remains legally usable because it supports that legal right. You use not only what device but what access software you wish instead of being subjected to the lock-in paradigms of US corporations that are shunned by almost all other free-world nations.
Is it perfect? No, because not only do certain corps with proprietary formats change details in those formats, they continue to change their proprietary access softwares as well. Then change the format details and modules again... because it is the only way they have to circumvent your legal right to access what you OWN in any way they YOU want to.
No other ereader format translation software does what Calibre does on the broadest range. I know, because I've tried them. (And Stanza stinks as even an reader.) Calibre can also easily manage ebooks and epubs and load them to almost any non-proprietary device that can display such. Of course, you do have to learn how to do so... but that requires breaking out of a slave mentality.
As an working author, of course I fear for what else this software can be used for that could impact my making a living wage. But I support the belief that when you buy a book, you own it; you don't lease it from a corp in some underhanded way that forces you do things their way, using only their services and devices.
Get free... get Calibre.
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Teerexx1952 reviewed on 25 Nov 2011
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I did a net search and all I got was Windows' advice. HELP!!!
Kindle 3/Snow Leopard 10.6.8
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prof. Deja Vue
When your library is big, this software has a very slow startup. Just to make things clear, iTunes is not that slow, which means that the Apple guys are doing a smart job than Claibre developers.
The visual interface is terrible, terrible.
But nevermind. If only they could fix the save to disk stuff I would make a small donation in sign of gratitude.
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No deal! Cmd-Q, Cmd-Delete.
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"calibre has a builtin web server that gives allows you to access your ebook collection using a simple browser from any computer anywhere in the world. It can also email your books and downloaded news to you automatically."
In order to turn server on or off, requires admin rights I believe.
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Badgerone rated on 03 Feb 2012
yyh1002 rated on 02 Feb 2012
richardmannich rated on 30 Jan 2012
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Quiiick rated on 27 Jan 2012
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Junkblocker rated on 17 Jan 2012
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Shooflyshoo rated on 14 Jan 2012
xdefeenx rated on 13 Jan 2012
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Aacuna4560 rated on 06 Jan 2012
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Quiiick rated on 31 Dec 2011
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Exy rated on 30 Dec 2011