Is Windows XP Service Pack 2 Killing The Ebook Business?

 If you've recently upgraded your computer operating system to Windows XP Service Pack 2, you might have noticed that some of your ebooks no longer work.

In fact, the Traffic Virus ebook that I gave away as a bonus for joining my newsletter is one such ebook that no longer works.

The problem began when Windows XP was released. Although a good operating system, it had security holes which left your computer open to hackers.

Service Pack 2 was released and these security holes were fixed. Unfortunately, some functionality was disabled, resulting in some ebooks not opening past the first page.

Which books work or not depend on the compiler used to create the ebook and the file type of the ebook.

PDF files should work ok. These are files that are opened with Adobe's free Acrobat Reader.

Executable ebooks depend on which compiler was used to create it. Also, if the ebook is one long page, like a report, it should also work.

What usually happens if the ebook doesn't work is that the first page loads ok and any other page then produces an error.

If you're in this position and you have a lot of ebooks that won't work anymore, I have a small patch to enable and disable this feature.

If you want this patch, you have two options:

You can pay $15 by credit card for it here: http://www.money-maker.co.uk/xp-sp2-patch/

Or you can get it for free by subscribing to my weekly newsletter and then joining my members site.

Go to: http://www.helping-you-make-money.com/newsletter.html to subscribe to my free internet marketing newsletter.Once you have subscribed, you will receive details on joining my members site. There, you will find the download information for the patch.

I've told you what you can do if you are a reader of ebooks.

But what are your options if you create your own ebooks?

If you want them to be able to be opened by the largest "audience", they must be compatible with Windows XP Service Pack 2.

Your first option is to create all your new ebooks in PDF format.

This type of file is read using Adobe Acrobat Reader. It comes free with most computers and software. If you haven't got it, you can get it free from: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html

If you've decided to go the PDF way, you can then decide whether money is no object or if you'd like to start off creating PDF files free.

If money is no object, you can purchase one of Adobe's PDF creators. When I produced this article, the standard version cost $299 and the professional version $449.

I haven't tried either, so I can't comment on how easy they are to use or learn. All I can say is that they are the market leader in producing software for this industry standard format.

You get what you pay for. You can take a look at their software at: http://www.adobe.com/

I like to use free software if I can, as long as it doesn't restrict what I want to do too much.

If you go to: http://www.openoffice.org/ you can download a completely free package that you can use to create your PDF files.

I don't want to go too much into what you get, but it includes the following programs: Word processor Spreadsheet Drawing and illustration Presentation creator HTML editor

It's Microsoft Office compatible and will produce PDF files, as well as SWF flash files.

If you haven't got, and can't afford Microsoft Office, this software will replace that too.

Just create your document in Microsoft Word, load it into OpenOffice and then select export as PDF. That's it, done.

If you don't have Microsoft Word, create your document with the OpenOffice word processor, select export as PDF, and again it's done.

If you decide that you want to create your ebooks in the exe format, you need to find a program that works with XP Service Pack 2.

You can pay a lot of money for an ebook compiler, you might have already done so, and find the ebooks can't be opened with XP SP 2.

Let me tell you a short story here.

In case you don't know, I created a free HTML Tutorial ebook which you can get at: http://www.helping-you-make-money.com/html/ I decided to add another section to it. The compiler I was currently using couldn't handle the extra content and messed everything up.

I then had to research for another compiler which added another month to the update of my ebook.

The one I chose had more features and was a little over half the price of the original compiler, which was already very cheap.

The new one handled the new content without any problems. As a bonus, when all the problems arose with the XP update, I found my ebook still worked.

It was only by luck, that the compiler I chose worked with XP SP 2. Further investigation found that the original compiler I was using didn't produce working ebooks anymore.

If you create your ebooks in exe format, I recommend that you try Activ E-Book Compiler if you want your ebooks to work Windows XP Service Pack 2. You can take a look at it here: http://www.money-maker.co.uk/ebook-compiler/

About the author:

Gary Lacey is the owner of http://www.money-maker.co.uk/ where you can read more internet marketing and make money articles.

 Gary Lacey

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