The T-Mobile G1 smart phone now has a functional (more-or-less) ebook reader. FBReaderJ has now been re-compiled to work on the device, and it can indeed open and display certain ebook formats. I converted several books from Microsoft’s LIT format to the FB2 format, and they were recognized and opened without a problem.

There are still bugs, to be sure. Find Text doesn’t work yet, and each orientation change causes the book to re-load and start at the beginning (open the keyboard while reading, and lose your place!). And I haven’t discovered a way to set bookmarks yet, which is important. But this is a key application for me, and I’m glad it’s available. Hopefully, active development will continue and improvements will come quickly.

FBReaderJ 0.2.1 is not in the official Android marketplace yet, but the Android package can be downloaded here (you’ll need to enable “Unknown Sources” in the Settings > Application menu on your G1 first).

Thanks to FBReaderJ, I’m now closer to retiring my Treo 650 for good and just carrying the awesome G1.

FROM THE COMMENTS:
“what did you use to convert the LIT books to FB2?”

I use a free Windows program called ABC Amber Lit Converter. It does the job, converting Lit titles to a variety of other ebook and document formats. Very nice.