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Re: Different topic

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| I have a utility with my ebook authoring software that lets me convert
| CHMs to an ebook.exe. Do you think a LIT is similar enough that by
| renaming its extension it will also convert? (Ebook is just a package
| of web pages and a HTML reader)
|
   I don't think there's much in common. They're the
same in that they're both basically ZIP files, like a
.docx. But if you open a LIT and a CHM in 7-ZIP you'll
see that the file names are all different. A CHM contains
webpages and files in one or more folders, plus specific
files that serve as TOC, index, etc.

  In a LIT I find a file called "manifest" that lists included
JPG files and their file type; a file called "meta" that seems
to be meta-data: file name, date, a few GUIDs thrown in to
make it look official, etc. Then there's a folder named
"data" that contains all the JPGs. A subfolder there
contains a file named "ahc" that seems to be the TOC,
and a file named "content" that seems to be the actual
text, in encrypted form....

  So it's all different. It's as though they got the idea from
CHMs, but beyond that there's nothing in common. (We were
talking about HXS last week. HXS is almost exactly the same
thing as CHM. They just changed some file syntax here and
there. But that's enough to break compatibility so that an
HXS can't be read as a CHM.)

  It looks like a LIT can be retrieved fairly easily if the
decryption of the content file can be done. But AlJones doesn't
want that. I'm guessing what he wants is just the "meta" file.

  I wonder if anyone who's willing to put up with DRM would
even care about being able to decrypt it. If they cared they
wouldn't pay for crippled product in the first place. (Most eBooks
are not even digital files. They're nothing more than streaming
access. A LIT file is a file, but then, if Microsoft can control
how you read it, perhaps even tracking your usage, then the
line between streaming and owning a file blurs.)

   I wonder if it's even legal under the DRM laws in the US to
take apart something like a LIT file. As I understand it, the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act provides criminal penalties for anyone
who exercises their Fair Use rights on any media they buy,
if the seller has done anything (like encryption) to thwart that
Fair Use. By law you have a right to do anything with copyrighted
material that you like: copy it for your own use, lend it, use it in
any manner. The only thing you can't do is to distribute copies to
others. But by law corporations selling eBooks, music, etc. also
have a right to break the law by locking the product they sell to
you. So you have to break the law, reverse-engineering illegal
restrictions, in order to exercise your rights. (I don't know if
that's Kafka-esque or Orwellian. Either way, the only reasonable
and decent course of action, to my mind, is to simply refuse to
use or buy any DRM-tainted media.)

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Different topic AlJones <al@mywebhome.net> - 2011-05-05 15:32 -0500
  Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-06 01:22 -0400
    Re: Different topic AlJones <al@mywebhome.net> - 2011-05-06 11:45 -0500
      Re: Different topic Dee Earley <dee.earley@icode.co.uk> - 2011-05-09 11:45 +0100
        Re: Different topic Al Jones <al@nowhere.invalid> - 2011-05-09 11:07 -0500
          Re: Different topic Dee Earley <dee.earley@icode.co.uk> - 2011-05-09 18:38 +0100
  Re: Different topic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2011-05-06 09:18 -0400
    Re: Different topic AlJones <al@mywebhome.net> - 2011-05-06 11:41 -0500
    Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-06 19:55 -0400
      Re: Different topic AlJones <al@mywebhome.net> - 2011-05-06 19:23 -0500
        Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-06 20:42 -0400
          Re: Different topic AlJones <al@mywebhome.net> - 2011-05-07 11:27 -0500
      Re: Different topic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2011-05-06 23:45 -0400
        Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-07 03:03 -0400
          Re: Different topic Helmut_Meukel <Helmut_Meukel@bn-hof.invalid> - 2011-05-07 11:24 +0200
          Re: Different topic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2011-05-07 10:40 -0400
            Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-07 13:06 -0400
              Re: Different topic GS <gs@somewhere.net> - 2011-05-07 13:14 -0400
              Re: Different topic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2011-05-07 13:34 -0400

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