Scriptures and other Church Publications for Kindle

Does anyone know if the church plans on releasing official versions of the scriptures or other publications (manuals, etc.) in the Kindle format? I have an iPod touch and I just installed Kindle for iPhone, and found it to be a wonderful reader. I guess I could just drop the $15 and get the Scriptures.app for iPhone/iPod touch.

Although I don't have a Kindle, from what I have read the Kindle will support the Mobipocket format. . The same company, Amazon, owns both formats.

bhall7 wrote:Does anyone know if the church plans on releasing official versions of the scriptures or other publications (manuals, etc.) in the Kindle format? I have an iPod touch and I just installed Kindle for iPhone, and found it to be a wonderful reader. I guess I could just drop the $15 and get the Scriptures.app for iPhone/iPod touch.

There is also a iPhone free app of the LDS scriptures at the app store.

And be sure to watch the Church-sponsored, Community-developed iPhone scriptures application, found on the LDS Tech Wiki:

https://tech.lds.org/wiki/index.php/iPh ... pplication

I've been using Mobipocket for years and really don't like it. If Kindle can only offer that as an app then it's iTouch for me. The LDS apps for iTouch/iPhone is superior.
1. I don't like the hassle of not having the links work.
2. It would be nice to have the chapter descriptions available, which are not w/mobi
3. Ensign for the mobi format is usually a month old. By the time it comes out, you've already had to print out a hard copy to follow the lesson given the first week.
4. The HTML converter is so-so.
5. Going from scripture to scripture just seems a chore. Granted my pda is a Zodiac II but all the apps were designed for that era of speed. Mobi was dreadfully slow.
Finally switched to MMS (Mark My Scriptures) They don't do much more, but the ability to go from scripture to scripture is vastly faster.

All these issues have been overcome with iTouch apps, and with the 15 minutes of play time I got on one, I'm a convert.

Kindle looks very, very, attractive. Something in the back of my mind keeps telling me to hold off. I read a lot of books and it is very tempting to have something that portable but someone needs to convince me of it's 'Church-Friendly' qualities.

If you are still thinking about the Kindle and the scriptures, here is a great article on the topic in Mormontimes.com

http://www.mormontimes.com/mormon_voice ... d/?id=7297

Anyone tried the New Barnes and Noble Nook. It looks interesting, and I am particularly interested in the Scriptures for the Nook.

E-Ink readers are great for reading and marking your place but they are to slow for class room use where you need to look up a scripture quickly. I have the free scriptures App for my iPhone and can look up a scripture in the class room as fast or faster then people can with their scriptures.

David_H wrote:Anyone tried the New Barnes and Noble Nook. It looks interesting, and I am particularly interested in the Scriptures for the Nook.

I have one and have been trying to find a way of getting the scriptures onto it. Believe it or not I got the RLDS Book of Mormon on it easier than anything official from the chruch.

Are Community of Christ scriptures available eletronically? It's an interesting (but frustrating) thing to see.

I wrote a blog post on how to get free LDS Scriptures on the Kindle. www.aaronlrobinson.com/blog

I want to comment that although there are public domain versions of the Old and New Testament, all of the scriptures produced by the Church (including version of the Old and New Testament, D&C, Book of Mormon, Perl of Great Price) are covered by the Church's copyright. Those who wish to distribute the Church's version of the scriptures should contact the Church's IP department for permission. This also includes Hymns, Ensign articles, manuals, etc.

Tom

This entire thread was moved to the Community Development Projects/Gospel Library forum, where it better fits.

Mike

I got a Kindle for Christmas, and, of course, the first thing I sought out for it was GospelLibrary. My BYU student daughter also got a Kindle for Christmas, and wanted to put GospelLibrary on it.

So here's our humble request please to include the Kindle. We would love to have GospelLibrary and all other Church publications you see fit to make available.

The Kindle seems to be quite worthy of support. It's big and growing still. The latest sales figures for Kindle are estimated at 8 million sold in 2010. (Figure discussed on various Kindle-related blogs.)

Thanks,

Mark Vos
Victoria Ward
Rancho Cucamonga, CA

Yes, I agree. Desparately awaiting Gospel Library for the Kindle. Ipad, Iphone are nice, and the church applications for them are very nice, but to me they are like toys. What I mean by that is I can't spend a lot of time reading them, it's more like 10-15 minutes or so.

A phone or ipad is not fit to do serious reading for a long amount of time. Don't get me wrong, I use old pda with Yanceyware all the time. But I'd much rather have something that allows me to dig deeply into the scriptures without killing my eyes.

With the Kindle you can do some serious reading (and for me just as importantly, annotating). So one more request for the Kindle please!

Can I third that? Please, Please, Please create the gospel library for Kindle. the Iphone and Android apps are great, but for serious long time reading they will kill your eyes.

Thanks

So too am I, a new Kindle user, and am anxious to be able to utilize this technology in my gospel study. Particularly my interest includes links to cross referencing (is there such a project in the works?)

It is interesting to note that the "LDS Scriptures [kindle edition]" ranking as currently noted at the kindle store are: (from http://www.amazon.com/LDS-Scriptures-eb ... 615&sr=1-1 as accessed 1/3/2011 at 9:55 pm MDT)


Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #226 Paid in Kindle Store
#1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Philosophy > Religious
#1 in Books > Nonfiction > Philosophy > Religious
#2 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Jesus

There is definitely an interest, demand, and most importantly a need:rolleyes:! I look forward to seeing what develops particularly again in respect to improved access to the footnotes and cross references. Thanks for what you do.

Bryan Ditty
Overlake 4th Ward
Tooele North Stake

Does the Kindle support custom third party apps? I know the Nook currently doesn't, but the next firmware update is supposed to add it (I'm guessing it will be a modified Android development kit. If so, I'll be happy to help in the porting process from Android to Nook).

edit: I just looked at it and they have already released a development kit for the nook which is essentially the same as the Android SDK that Google releases.

http://nookdeveloper.barnesandnoble.com/tools#getsdk

It's Android 2.1 but should still work just fine for getting a version of Gospel Library compiled.

edit2: I looked a little more and found that this SDK is just a preview of the one that will be released with the next Nook Color update so developers can start building their apps. It would probably be worth vetting the current Gospel Library build against it, although since it's essentially vanilla Android SDK it should be fine.

This blog post talks about how to get the scriptures and other LDS publications on the Kindle for free:

http://blog.drewwithers.com/2010/11/lds-scriptures-and-other-publications.html

Thanks mrwithers, those files are helpful. However in my opinion the layout and functionality of those free files does not compare to the layout and functionality of the Gospel Library, or for all other eBooks designed for Kindle. This is much better than not having the LDS Scriptures on your Kindle, but I have no doubt that if the Church technical department finds it worth their while to create a Kindle version it will be superior to any other version available. The reasons it will be superiior are the same for all Kindle books; it is like reading a paper copy, it is easy on the eyes and will not interrupt ability to sleep like a backlighted device will, larger screen than a cell phone, easy dictionary reference etc...

Again I plead with the technical team, please make a Kindle version.

I agree with chosen. If the church were to develop its own gospel library for Kindle it would be superior to those files I offer on my blog. But until then, you can't do much better for free.

Although I never would have purchased a Kindle (or any other eBook reader) out of my own pocket, I am about to receive one from my employer for use at work, so now I will join the sea of voices pleading for a Kindle version of Gospel Library.

I've seen it. I even had a copy. Lost when my computer crashed. It was in PDF format. It was aligned verse by verse, paragraph by paragraph. Published by Intellectual Reserve (the Church's publishing agency).

But I can't find it again.

Can anyone help me? Maybe even send a copy to dshurtz4024@gmail.com?

Thanks

dshurtz wrote:I've seen it. I even had a copy. Lost when my computer crashed. It was in PDF format. It was aligned verse by verse, paragraph by paragraph. Published by Intellectual Reserve (the Church's publishing agency).

But I can't find it again.

LDS Scriptures (Resource Edition) has the capability to display several language combinations side by side. Last I checked, it was available for about $5-7 or so from the LDS Distribution on CD.

lajackson wrote:LDS Scriptures (Resource Edition) has the capability to display several language combinations side by side. Last I checked, it was available for about $5-7 or so from the LDS Distribution on CD.

You can get an updated version of the software (and scripture files) for free at http://ldsview.byu.edu/LDSView/Home.htm

For those who are interested I produce, for my own personal use, a Kindle version of the Ensign using Mobipocket Creator. If you want more Info contact me at zippitydoda@gmail.com

Todd

Have you seen that the Book of Mormon is now available for free on Amazon Kindle? It was convereted to Kindle format by a non-profit group that is doing the same with all those free classical books. It does not have footnotes or remotely similar to the Gospel Library. I've got it on my Kindle now. They also have done "Jesus the Christ" and "The Great Apostasy" by Talmage as well. Here is a link to amazon.comto see for yourself.

smithrt wrote:For those who are interested I produce, for my own personal use, a Kindle version of the Ensign using Mobipocket Creator. If you want more Info contact me at zippitydoda@gmail.com

Todd

I also just tried using Calibre (which is free) to convert the .epub version of the November 2011 Ensign to .mobi and it worked just fine (once in .mobi format, I plugged my Kindle Touch into my computer and copied the .mobi to /documents). It takes a few minutes, but the links within the table of contents to the articles (conference talks) works one the ones I tested.

Hopefully the Church is okay if I do this for personal use.

NOTE: The .epub file seems to be only available for the most recent conference