Re: hobby electronics

On a sunny day (Fri, 5 Jul 2024 08:46:26 -0500) it happened BillGill
<tonisdad215@gmail.com> wrote in <v68tfj$3abt3$1@dont-email.me>:

I have a large paper library.  I am also getting old.
I may have to go into some sort of assisted living
when I can't go on living by myself.  When I do I will
not be able to take my library with me.  So I have
been building a digital library.  Most books that I have
are available in digital format.  But I realized that many
of the older books are not available.  They are mainly fiction,
mysteries, SF, even a few romances.  And mostly from
the time when books were mostly a one time event.  A
few old time authors, such as Agatha Christie, are still
in print and available as print or digital, but many
are not.  So I decided to digitize those books for myself.
While most of them are in copyright, I have no idea how
to get permission.  I suspect that is why many of them are
not in digital format.  So I have been digitizing them for
my own use.  I will not distribute them in any way.  They
are strictly for my own use.  If any of them show up in
digital format I will buy that edition.
>
So I have been doing non-destructive scanning.  This is a
rather long process, since I am creating epub formatted books
epub is a format based on HTML so that it can be automatically
reformatted to fit on any screen.  But that means extra
work.  It takes anyplace for 3 days to a week, depending on
the size and quality of the book.  First I scan it using
my DIY scanner.  This involves taking a photo of each page,
then converting the photos to text, using Optical Character
Recognition (OCR) software.  After that is the slow part.
I insert the text into a word processor and proof it to
correct all the many errors the OCR makes in the process.
How many errors depends partly on the quality of the source.
Then it is fairly simple to convert it to the epub format,
or into the AZW3 format that can be read by kindle.
>
Bill

I just take pictures of the pages, and then make a pfd that holds the pictures.
Works fast with my canon camera on a tripod.
Takes care of any pictures in the book too.

convert "*.JPG" -quality 100 outfile.pdf
convert' is part of ImageMagic, to allow pdf output:
In /etc/ImageMagick-6/policy.xml
change 'none' to 'read|write" to enable pdf output:
<policy domain="coder" rights="read|write" pattern="PDF" />

There are many readers for pdf format, you can select size too.
I use xpdf in Linux, pdf in firefox browser works too, ctrl + and ctrl- to enlarge or make it smaller.
Especially nice is using it for the microscopic small (one inch or so) 'manuals' like for my watch or other electronic stuff.
All goes to a 4 TB harddisk these days.
Linux 'locate' will find it in a second.

Few month ago did make a pdf from about 500 pages of A4 size circuit diagrams I wrote in the past that way.
All on a Raspberry Pi4 8GB..
Same one I am posting this from.