iTunes 9.1 supports “books”

Computers & Mobile Craft & Design
iTunes 9.1 supports “books”

Pt 2753
Hot off the press iTunes 9.1 (not in software updates) but a download on Apple’s site – it now supports “books” since the iPads are making their way around the globe. I have a Kindle and I like it, but I might go iPad if I can’t search text on all the “Kindle” apps (Mac, PC, iPhone) for another week.

Pt 2755
So far the update just added my audio books to “books” and it also added an enhanced podcast I made, but it’s not displaying it properly now, interesting… more later. Might need to do some hacking, it’s unclear what the iBooks format is – a plain ole’ PDF is not in the “books” section, and that bothers me, but it appears using something Calibre and converting it to ePub works…

16 thoughts on “iTunes 9.1 supports “books”

  1. Jearil says:

    The iBook format is supposed to be ePub with some additional DRM provided by Apple.

  2. Phillip Torrone says:

    @Jearil – yah- i’m bummed that a regular PDF just doesn’t show up – you can transfer PDFs via itunes, everyone uses PDFs, the iPad is sort of perfect as a PDF viewer. i suppose there will be the built in PDF reader with mail and perhaps an app, but managing them via itunes would be nice(r).

  3. Xandar says:

    I’m not usually one to complain about off-topic posts… but how is this in any way related to Make? A piece of commercial software got an update and you’re not familiar with the new file format. Wow.

    1. Gilberti says:

      The guys and gals at Make are always interested in products with hacker potential or tools that hackers could really use. The iPad is both.

  4. Phillip Torrone says:

    @Xandar – MAKE was and is one of the only magazine that puts out a PDF each week via itunes, we’ve been one of the only media properties that has made enhanced podcasts (and wrote how-tos about it) we’ve written about hacking ipods, how-tos about hacking ipods, ipod linux, iphone jail breaking – you name it, we’ve been there. if it can be taken apart, we will take it apart – we’re not going to stop now or ever.

  5. Todd says:

    There was a time when one of Apple’s design principles was to have one software program perform one function well. iMovie was for your movies, iPhoto for photos, iTunes for tunes, and iSync for syncing. They have all but dropped iSync and instead are cramming non-music functions into iTunes–probably since iTunes was also designed to run under windows. So, now we have everything under the sun in iTunes–music, video, photos, books, etc. So sad.

    1. Carnes says:

      iTunes is really awesome but i’m with you on this one.. but for different reasons. I’m a desktop control freak and i can’t stand the watchdog and standby programs that applications like iTunes uses. I install those apps under something like sandboxie so that they can be completely turned off.

      I don’t care so much in linux because there are investigative tools and you can easily turn off anything you don’t want. Windows is safer (for me) as a pile of sandboxes that can be turned on and off.

      For example: mDNSResponder.exe, iTunesHelper.exe, and iPodService.exe.

  6. The Daily Spank says:

    google: pdf to epub

    Also… So you know for sure it can’t display PDF files? If not, that would completely suck ass. I doubt that’s the case. Probably some DRM stuff, but it should still be able to do PDFs.

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