bfabiszewski / qlmobi

Quick Look plugin for Kindle ebook formats

Quick Look plugin for Kindle ebook formats

QLMobi plugin supports various ebook formats used on kindle readers. It is based on libmobi and works with all the formats supported by the library: prc, mobi, azw, azw3, azw4 and some pdb files. The plugin will generate a thumbnail, based on document embedded cover, and a preview for its content.

Installation

Homebrew

QLMobi can be installed via Homebrew-Cask.

brew cask install qlmobi

Manual

Place the plugin file: QLMobi.qlgenerator into ~/Library/QuickLook/ folder to install it for your account, or into (Macintosh HD)/Library/QuickLook/ folder to install it for all users. If the folder does not exist, create it manually.

Building

Source code is available on github. It is bundled as an Xcode project and depends on the libmobi library.

Screenshots

Troubleshooting

If the plugin doesn't work:

• reload plugins running qlmanage -r from the console;
• try reinstalling the plugin;
• try in the top level Library folder instead of the user's one;
• go to github issues tab, start new issue describing your problem, you may also provide output of the command: qlmanage -d 4 -p -o /tmp /path/to/your/test.mobi.

If you're on Catalina or later, and you get "QLMobi.qlgenerator cannot be opened because the developer cannot be verified", run in a terminal:

$ xattr -d -r com.apple.quarantine ~/Library/QuickLook/QLMobi.qlgenerator
$ qlmanage -r

Changelog

0.6 Rebuilt with libmobi 0.11 and support for arm64 architecture (Apple M1) 0.5
Minor workaround for plugin failing to register handled file types
Include minor fixes from current libmobi
0.4
Hide broken image links in corrupt documents
0.3
Minor changes to use improved libmobi metadata interface
Rebuilt with libmobi 0.3
0.2
Faster thumbnail generation
Thumbnails for encrypted documents
0.1
Initial version

License

Licensed under the GNU Public License (GPL) version 3 or later.

qlmobi's Issues

Doesn't work on macOS Mojave 10.14.6

Doesn't work on macOS Mojave 10.14.6. The QuickLook plugin listen for net.fabiszewski.mobi, but should listen for public.mobi. Maybe similar issue with other supported files.

Does work for azw3 files though.

About iOS

Thank you very much for creating such an excellent library

is It support using this library on iOS?

If possible, could you provide a simple demo?

Thank you!

QLMobi is not available via Homebrew

It would be convenient to be able to automatically install QLMobi via Homebrew rather than something like this:

cd "Downloads"
curl -fsSL -o QLMobi.zip $(curl https://api.github.com/repos/bfabiszewski/QLMobi/releases | grep browser_download_url | head -n 1 | cut -d '"' -f 4)
unzip QLMobi.zip
cp -R QLMobi.qlgenerator ~/Library/QuickLook

Another QL Plugin, QLMarkdown (https://github.com/toland/qlmarkdown) is, so it's technically possible.

Does not seem to work on Big Sur

I've installed the plugin on Big Sur using brew install --cask qlmobi , tried reloading the db with qlmanage -r but it didn't help.

Here's the output of qlmanage -d 4 -p -o /tmp /path/to/your/test.mobi:

~ % qlmanage -d 4 -p -o /tmp /path/to/your/test.mobi
qlmanage: illegal option -- 
Usage: qlmanage [OPTIONS] path...
	-h		Display this help
	-r		Force reloading Generators list
	-r cache	Reset thumbnail disk cache
	-m [name ...]	Display statistics about quicklookd. Stats names:
			* plugins	Show the generators list
			* server	Show quicklookd life information
			* memory	Show quicklookd memory consumption
			* burst		Show statistics about the last burst
			* threads	Show concurrent accesses stats
			* other		Show other information about quicklookd
	-p		Compute previews of the documents
	-t		Compute thumbnails of the documents
	-x		Use quicklookd (remote computation)
	-i		Compute thumbnail in icon mode
	-s size		Size for the thumbnail
	-f factor	Scale factor for the thumbnail
	-F factor	Scale factor for the thumbnail, draw downscaled and compare to 1x
	-z		Display generation performance info (don't display thumbnails)
	-o dir		Output result in dir (don't display thumbnails or previews)
	-c contentType	Force the content type used for the documents
	-g generator	Force the generator to use

Doesn't appear to work in Sierra 10.12.2 (16C67)

I just tried installing this to my home directory ~/Library/QuickLook and did $ killall Finder but not seeing anything when I quicklook a .mobi from O'Reilly books.

Doesn't work on Sonoma 14.2.1

Using a MBPro M1 running Sonoma 14.2.1 _ ran the terminal command you suggested and I got this:

Last login: Fri Feb 2 20:33:18 on console
steveparry@Julay1 ~ % qlmanage -d 4 -p -o /tmp /path/to/your/test.mobi
qlmanage: illegal option --
Usage: qlmanage [OPTIONS] path...
-h Display this help
-r Force reloading Generators list
-r cache Reset thumbnail disk cache
-m [name ...] Display statistics about quicklookd. Stats names:
* plugins Show the generators list
* server Show quicklookd life information
* memory Show quicklookd memory consumption
* burst Show statistics about the last burst
* threads Show concurrent accesses stats
* other Show other information about quicklookd
-p Compute previews of the documents
-t Compute thumbnails of the documents
-x Use quicklookd (remote computation)
-i Compute thumbnail in icon mode
-s size Size for the thumbnail
-f factor Scale factor for the thumbnail
-F factor Scale factor for the thumbnail, draw downscaled and compare to 1x
-z Display generation performance info (don't display thumbnails)
-o dir Output result in dir (don't display thumbnails or previews)
-c contentType Force the content type used for the documents
-g generator Force the generator to use

steveparry@Julay1 ~ %