Why I hate the Epub format
May. 25th, 2010 06:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amalthiaOkay, for those that don't know I really HATE the epub format. Or at least hate how Adobe Digital Editions handles it and in effect the Sony PRS line of ebook devices.
1) I can't just center my images with < P Align="Center" > instead I have to use < div style="text-align:center" >
2) It will not display .gif files
3) On the Sony PRS-300/500/505/600 there are page numbers on the side margins! and no text justification and if they do introduce it they probably won't add hyphens, which will result in huge gaps between words. I can live without text justification but they really need to get rid of the page numbers.
4) Break tags do not work properly to add line spacing. < br > will create a break but even using three < br > in a row epub will not recognize it. Instead you have to use <P> </P> if you need a line. Mobi and LRF will create a blank line anywhere a < br > tag is at but not Epub. Though it will create a break but you have to use DIV after the BODY tag. :(
As a format epub is not forgiving and it's HTML requirements are too specific considering it won't recognize common html elements.
1) I can't just center my images with < P Align="Center" > instead I have to use < div style="text-align:center" >
2) It will not display .gif files
3) On the Sony PRS-300/500/505/600 there are page numbers on the side margins! and no text justification and if they do introduce it they probably won't add hyphens, which will result in huge gaps between words. I can live without text justification but they really need to get rid of the page numbers.
4) Break tags do not work properly to add line spacing. < br > will create a break but even using three < br > in a row epub will not recognize it. Instead you have to use <P> </P> if you need a line. Mobi and LRF will create a blank line anywhere a < br > tag is at but not Epub. Though it will create a break but you have to use DIV after the BODY tag. :(
As a format epub is not forgiving and it's HTML requirements are too specific considering it won't recognize common html elements.
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Date: 2010-05-26 04:35 am (UTC)I mostly c&p stuff into a rtf document to read on mine though (unless they're on the ebook archive!), so the other issues I haven't come across
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Date: 2010-05-26 05:18 am (UTC)the other thing that drives me nuts is how the pages are counted on an epub. On LRF or RTF when I'm on page 20 of 50 I know exactly where I'm at in an ebook. With epub you can have page 20 for three pages? it's whacked!
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Date: 2010-05-26 02:21 pm (UTC)RTF doesn't allow pictures, which drives me bonkers. Also won't allow fonts that I like. And no TOC. I haven't figured out how to get LRF to work the way I want it--indented paragraphs, no line between, small point size, serif font. Preferably not Times; I alternate between Georgia and Fontin.
I turn a lot of things into small-sized PDFs, which works great for me, but means handing them to anyone else involves them putting up with my font & layout choices or dealing with annoying reflow options. (Even properly tagged documents don't always reflow correctly.)
I think ePub is the Format Of The Future but it's got some bugs (and those bugs are never going to be fixed for older devices).
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Date: 2010-05-27 02:20 am (UTC)I do think epub is where things are going. I think the ADE Adobe people have fixed the page numbers on the side margin but the firmware has to be updated for the Sony PRS-505/600/700 models. I've seen epubs on the Nook and the Nook users can pick their own font to view the story in which I kind of liked. :)
I already sent you the link to my formatting guide right? http://amalthia.mediawood.net/tutorials/ebooks/index.html
All my LRFs come out with indented paragraphs, no line inbetween, small font, and Times New Roman (or whatever the default serif font is on the Sony). With LRF you can embed your own fonts but Kovid recommends against it.
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Date: 2010-05-26 07:21 am (UTC)gif files, I have no idea. Maybe it doesn't like transparency or something?
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Date: 2010-05-26 07:34 am (UTC)As for using br as a substitute, that's not exactly how I've been using them. I actually need the P tag because my css says how much to indent every paragraph tag and etc...I've been using them in LRF conversions to just add an extra line after headers and actually as line breaks for the header information.
I'm getting a system that works rather well, the difficult part was finding out what codes work and which ones don't because for a long time I was mostly converting only to LRF which supported the html codes that epub doesn't support. So I actually have to compare both documents and the Sony Library viewer will only show one at a time...
As for the gifs...I'm not sure what's happening there. Kovid said for some reason gifs get messed up on conversion or epub doesn't support them well? I'm finding some inconsistencies, some gifs work fine and others don't. In the meantime since I can't figure it out I'll just convert the gifs to png. It'll save me headaches later I hope. :)
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