The problem with iBooks storage is that it is essentially unique to iBooks. The ePub files it manages are uncompressed into a container directory under its control, and given weird and wacky names. I have some books from iBooks, its true, but I also have many from other publishers and sources, and even those from iBooks are not all DRM-protected which means they are readable on non-iBooks readers.
Honestly, Apple could have done it right--allowing you to specify the location of the iBooks directory and not tampering with them--and I'd've gone for it. PDFs could be handled just as they were previously in iTunes; when double-clicked, they would be opened in Preview or another application. But they didn't do that, instead preferring to lock you down to their store unless you were willing to lose copies of books you don't have elsewhere. Very annoying. Worst of all, iBooks replaces the book-syncing functionality in iTunes, so books that are moved from iTunes undergo an essentially lossy conversion process, discarding PDFs and making a pig's ear of any organisation. It's just not worth it for me. Now, it happens that I am about to build a NAS for all my stuff, and one possibility there is to put original copies of media on the NAS, only moving them onto my iOS device and/or Mac as and when I need them. In that light, the day may yet come for me to cherish iBooks. It's not today, but it's definitely a thought. This somewhat describes your scenario. I think it'd still be a loss, since now I need to be connected to a network to bring something in, but it would work. The silver lining would then be that I could spend less on Apple hardware. :) -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
