If you are using other systems to download ebooks then you will probably need to extract the encryption keys for them. If you meet this list of requirements then it’s likely the Calibre plugin has access to the encryption keys used by Adobe Digital Editions and or Kindle for PC. If you are only using Adobe Digital Editions and or Kindle for PC and they are installed on your machine and they run under the same account as Calibre then you are ready to start importing your ebooks. You’ll then get a dialog telling you that the plugin has been installed, restart Calibre to be on the safe side. Calibre gives you a generic warning about untrusted plugins being a virus risk, select yes if you feel it’s safe to do so. Point Calibre at the zip file containing the plugin and select Ok. Select Plug-Ins under the advanced section and then click “Load Plug-In From File”. Click the downward pointing arrow to the right of the Preference button on the tool bar and select “Change Calibre Behaviour” Installing this plugin into Calibre is a little more convoluted than regular plugins but it’s done like this. Unzip Apprentice Alfs toolkit and open the root folder in there you should find a Calibre plugin folder and inside that a zip file that contains the actual plugin. Next get Apprentice Alf’s DRM removal tools, as the software on that site probably breaks numerous ridiculous laws (DMCA I’m looking at you) I suppose it could vanish at any moment so best save a copy of whatever you download. Kindle for PC: C:\Users\\Documents\My Kindle Content.Adobe Digital Editions: C:\Users\\Documents\My Digital Editions.You need to know where the various readers store your books so here are the default locations: Note: Digital Editions comes complete with it’s own bloatware in that it tries to install Norton Security, you have to uncheck the box in order to stop it being installed (slimy bastards). Books bought though Google Play can be downloaded using Adobe Digital Editions see here for more information. If you’ve bought any books through Amazon you’ll need the Kindle for PC software. The first piece of software you want to install is Calibre, this is an ebook manager and while I find it a little unusual in it’s design it’s easily the best piece of software out there for the job. I’m going to assume that you are working on a Windows PC, as far as I’m aware the decryption can also be carried out under Linux but you probably can’t install some of the downloading software for book providers so you’ll have to play about with encryption keys. Before we get started though you need to get some software. Fortunately things have got simpler and most of the heavy lifting is now done by a Calibre plugin. In the past it was quite a game to remove the DRM from ebooks, you had to install Python with some fancy crypto libraries and dance around an enchanted pentagram while chanting a magic incantation. This nearly happened to me but fortunately I had a DRM free version I could use. The other problem with DRM encumbered ebooks is what happens if the company you bought them from goes bust? You can no longer download them to your new device, effectively they are lost. The problem is you can’t read DRM encumbered books in Moon (or any other third party software reader that I can think of). There’s nothing wrong with my previous choice of Moon for epub but ReadEra has better PDF support. My e-reader of choice (as of 2020) is ReadEra Premium previously it was Moon . Most e-readers have an inverse option which is an improvement but can still be difficult. I personally find the default option of black text on a white background a little difficult to read especially if there isn’t a lot of ambient light. I wouldn’t normally stick my head above the parapet and write a post like this but DRM on ebooks really annoys me as it impacts my enjoyment of the books I’ve bought.
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