Sunday, March 22, 2009

How to download google books

Recently I have found a way to download Google books, which I am sharing here, this is for
educational purpose only(for google too!!)
After extensive searching I found three ways, two of them no longer works or didn't work for
me, first is a software called Google book downloader which is suppose to download books in
PDF format, I tried its recent GBD-0.1.0.alpha8 version but it didn't work for me, second I tried
a website leechvideo which again didn't work.

Idea which worked successfully is this

First of all you need Firefox, IE doesnt work

Then install add on Greasemonkey , search through firefox add on, you should easily find this,
it allows you to run various screepts through your browser, which can modify appearance of
websites, after complete installation icon will appear on lower right of your browser

Now you will need a script called [ Userscript ] Google Book Downloader, after installing this
script whenever you will open the google books site, you will find a download button on upper
right hand corner, click on it, it will list all the availabe pages of the books

Then one last plugin called FlashGot, this will download all the pages you have selected, just
rignt click after selecting the pages and then click FlashGot Selected, or click FlashGot all for all
pages

TRAPS IN this method: there are few points where you might get trapped,

dont try to install userscript before installing greasymonkey

dont search for books from www.google.com, because links generated is not compatible with
this method, rather go direcly to http://books.google.com
In flashGot options select "browser built in", option rather than w-get

Downloaded pages are saved without extension (i.e, *.jpg, *.png), google uses either jpg or png
format randomly for different pages in the same book, so you will have to apply correct
extension by trial and error method(tiring thing) before you will be able to open the page in
windows, If you are using UBUNTU, all pages can be opened without extension because Ubuntu
recongnises format without using extension as windows does

converting to PDF with acrobat pro will require the correct extension behind name of every
picture file generated even if you are using Ubuntu, but this is easier with Ubuntu as file property
will tell you the correct format

and last thing you can download only available pages , so search for only full view books

All the best, dont forget to comment about your experience, your suggestion are welcome
Posted by Sharad at 5:54 PM
Keywords Download Google Books, free ebooks
Reactions: 

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the helpful tips. I've tried Greasemonkey + Flashgot, and I'd like to note that
files are not named according to the names displayed, but rather saved as book, book(1),
book(2) ... etc. Also Google restricts the number of images that can be accessed per book.
So while downloading is possible, it is with difficulty. It is nevertheless very kind of
Google to allow people to view books online.

Sunday, May 10, 2009 9:27:00 AM

Sharad said...

Hi, thanks for sharing, as per my experience pages saved are named by page number, so
creating PDF is easier as they will be organized properly automatically, only we have to
add correct extension
second point, I didnt have any problem regarding google restriction of number of images
that can be accessed per book, however I have tried only full view books

Monday, May 11, 2009 9:50:00 AM

Anonymous said...
 You don't need anything. The images are stored in Firefox cache.

Friday, October 30, 2009 3:22:00 PM

Sharad said...

dear anonymous, to use images from cache you will have to see all pages of the book,
that will take much more time and affort,virutally impossible task

Monday, November 23, 2009 10:55:00 PM

Anonymous said...

hey, thank you for sharing! i'm at linux only since 5 years till now... before reading this i
used opera cache and converted the cached images to .pdf. your tips made downloading
the books quite easier.

best regards

demacus

P.S: until now i own all the books i downloaded, but not in the earliest state

Saturday, January 16, 2010 4:36:00 AM

Anonymous said...

here i am again, its 00:06 am in germany... not to sound crazy...

Saturday, January 16, 2010 4:38:00 AM

Anonymous said...

I can't download all the page! Is there any way to download all the pages in a pdf format?

Thursday, March 04, 2010 12:55:00 AM

Sharad said...

dear friend,
only full view books can be fully downloaded, many books are available as previews
with few pages removed from them. It is impossible to download if it is not there.

Friday, March 12, 2010 11:33:00 PM

till someone write a programme specifically designed to download all pages and convert
them to PDF, I guess this task has to be done manually.

Friday, March 12, 2010 11:36:00 PM

Anonymous said...

Hi guys! Thanks for information posted. I tried to make this working but had no success.
After adding greasymonkey and the script afterwards, I could not open google book site
anymore. The message I get from google is "We're sorry...
... but your computer or network may be sending automated queries. To protect our users,
we can't process your request right now.
See Google Help for more information."
My system is Ubintu and the Firefox is ver.3.5.8.
How do you think what could be the problem

Friday, March 19, 2010 2:45:00 PM

Sharad said...

Dear friend, when I read your comment I thought that google has done something to
prevent books download by above described method, so I tried this myself. There is no
problem in this method. It appears that there is some problem with your system. Can you
surf books site again after removing the script?

Thursday, March 25, 2010 10:38:00 PM

tharinduill said...

Not working any more...

Monday, May 17, 2010 3:27:00 PM

Anonymous said...

really thax man.....may be tedious job to download page by page......something is better

Tuesday, May 18, 2010 5:25:00 PM

Anonymous said...
 10x man

Wednesday, June 30, 2010 12:04:00 PM

Anonymous said...

@anonymous re: "It is nevertheless very kind of Google to allow people to view books
online." i guess you mean to thank the authors for writing the book. that's where the work
is. in most cases, google simply stole the books from the writers and publishers - don't
thank google for stealing. they have enough capital to pay authors for their work, but they
don't. google just dropped them in a machine for automated digitisation. i am still waiting
for a better download solution straight to PDF (working on linux).

Tuesday, July 06, 2010 5:03:00 PM

Krizia said...

Hi! i've downloaded everything:

Monday, August 02, 2010 8:53:00 PM

Abhinav said...

I have downloaded grease monkey. No problems there. however, when i try downloading
google book downloader, a page full of computer lingo (Script) comes up. Any
suggestions? and Can i only download books with full preview and not books with
limited preview. Could please mail me the full solution to my id
[email protected]?, Thanks a lot.

regards
Abhinav

Wednesday, August 11, 2010 12:47:00 AM

Abhinav said...

Also, is it possible for me to use Orbit downloader instead of the FlashGot downloader?

Wednesday, August 11, 2010 12:50:00 AM

Thank you very much. This post it's absolutely amazing! I was looking for it. Currently I
was exploring the possibilities of Google Books© and found a way to search for the
downloadable books, those in the public domain (in my blog http://fernartal.blogspot.com
[in spanish] I explain how), but your post take it a hundred steps beyond. Thank you very
much.

P.D. The script you mentioned doesn't work in Chrome, only in Firefox.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010 12:20:00 AM

Sharad said...

You're welcome Fernartal, I am glad you like it. BTW I cant read spanish, though I tried.

Friday, September 24, 2010 11:09:00 AM

Anonymous said...

where it is saved?

Tuesday, September 28, 2010 2:47:00 PM

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the post! As you said "as per my experience pages saved are named by page
number", I was wondering how you setup the options of flashgot, and/or something else?
After the download links are generated, the texts shown on the links are page numbers,
but after downloaded by flashgot, the image files are not numbered as books(1),
books(2), books(3), books(4), etc. Anyone knows how to automatically name the files as
their actual page numbers? Thanks!

Tuesday, September 28, 2010 7:35:00 PM

Anonymous said...

Sorry, by "after downloaded by flashgot, the image files are not numbered as books(1),
books(2), books(3), books(4), etc. ", I mean to say "after downloaded by flashgot, the
image files are numbered as books(1), books(2), books(3), books(4), etc. "

Tuesday, September 28, 2010 7:37:00 PM

Anonymous said...
 Actually, with a little freeware program called Extension Renamer, you can select all the
files you want and change the extensions all at once to whatever you want such as .png,
.jpg etc.

Thursday, November 25, 2010 4:49:00 PM

Jodi said...

I have downloaded everything, however, i still don't get the download button on
books.google. I don't get it. HELP! Thanks in advance

Saturday, December 04, 2010 9:54:00 AM

Sharad said...

Hi Jodi, download button should appear when you have installed, the userscript with
greasy monkey. One of this two is probably not installed properly. I hopefully assume
that you are using firefox.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010 6:05:00 PM

Anonymous said...

I got the same result here: after downloaded by flashgot, the image files are numbered as
books, books(1), books(2), books(3), books(4), etc.

Saturday, December 18, 2010 3:47:00 AM

Anonymous said...

i can't open files downloaded by FlashGot from google books .please answer me.how can
i understand which file extention it belongs?
[email protected]

Tuesday, December 28, 2010 1:32:00 PM

Anonymous said...

thanks so much - i have been looking for a way to download from google books for
weeks! this is the only method that worked for me. sweet :)

Monday, January 03, 2011 8:40:00 PM