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Your ePub Is fine

andreklein.net

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Re: Your ePub Is fine

#91

Post by ameliaquining »

Finnucane wrote: post #88
ameliaquining wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter seems like what the tool's users actually want. That it's a harder problem doesn't change that.

No, the users need to be able to check for conformance. What we also need is for vendors to supply test platforms. Amazon, to its small credit, does this, which is good, because the subset of html/css they support is limited and poorly documented. Heck, I'd be happy if Apple, Kobo, and everyone else just kept good documentation and up to date! Though these days I have to spend more time worrying about EAA and ADA com…

A compatibility linter is a poor substitute for a vendor-supplied test platform, but if the vendor is uncooperative it may be the best that can be done.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#92

Post by chocolatkey »

el_benhameen wrote: post #61
chocolatkey wrote: post #42

Kobo is actually in the process of completely rewriting their e-reader software (you can download the beta in the EU), and I’m pretty sure it’s no longer based on RMSDK. Adobe basically handed the EPUB DRM market to LCP on a silver platter by being a poor maintainer and then selling off to a third party that had botched the migration and further angered end users and platforms, that are switching off Adobe faster tha…

Have you tried the beta? Have you found it to be substantially better?

I’m not in the EU so I have not, this is based on the technical changes mentioned, and what I’ve heard from people. Feel free to try if you are in the EU: kobo.com/update

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#93

Post by dddw »

fnord77 wrote: post #53
acdha wrote: post #20

Adobe has always been like this, too. They squandered an enormous marketshare with Flash because the alternative would've been spending a couple million on QA and they managed to unite all of the browser manufacturers in agreement that the web was better off without such an unreliable partner. I shipped a couple of things on Flash back in the day but it was staggeringly bad software — random crashes, various heisenbu…

> heisenbugs gold

Fnord gold

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#94

Post by dpark »

turpentine wrote: post #45
echelon wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flash is still unsurpassed as the easiest publishing medium. JavaScript build system layer cake and "web standards" are a million times harder than just drawing some stuff, maybe writing a simple function, then building a static file that can be embedded anywhere and even downloaded. You have to spend so much time setting up any flash alternative, and the "standards" are worse. I hate Steve Jobs for killing Flash and…

Magical? Those are some rose tinted glasses. Having to install a binary blob from a free-software hostile vendor that wanted a monopoly to load a website was always ridiculous ask. Flash was a constant embarassment of RCEs vulns and virtually non-existent Linux support.

I remember the time of browser plug-ins (not “extensions”). Everyone happily installed Flash, and the Crescendo midi plugin, and multiple other in-retrospect-ill-advised plugins to enable fun stuff to work in their browser.

The “everyone hates Flash” stuff came later. It served a purpose for quite a while and people loved it. Newgrounds was a place of magic.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#95

Post by ndiddy »

hardwaresofton wrote: post #78
ndiddy wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you tried the PineNote yourself? It $400 and says that it's "aimed at Linux developers with an extensive knowledge of embedded systems and/or experience with mobile Linux." The community provided firmware they link for it hasn't been updated in over a year. The Kobos don't limit what you can do with them either, you can sideload alternative e-reader software like KOReader that improves on the built-in reader fun…

> More expensive and less out-of-the-box software, but straight to the point on device ownership/what kind of software you can run, fewer strings attached. This note was in the original comment, did you read it? The fact that it is $400 (more expensive) and has less out of the box software is literally mentioned to alert people to that. > The Kobos don't limit what you can do with them either, you can sideload altern…

> Could you maybe make your point more concrete?

I hadn't heard of the Pinenote before looking at your comment, so I looked at the site and saw some things that made it seem unfit for purpose as an ereader. I made my comment because I was interested in hearing your impressions if you were using it as a daily driver.

> The point is to buy hardware that is built for you to freely modify and fully own, from the start.

Personally I view stuff like this as a nice-to-have, not a must-have. If it means I can't have an interface where I can buy books and then download them to my ereader, or I can't have an iphone app where I can read books and have my progress synced between my ereader and my phone, or it's unstable, or the battery life isn't good, then I would rather go with the Kobo. I understand that different people have different priorities, but those are mine. Stuff like this is why I'm interested in hearing more detailed information about what exactly the tradeoffs are for going with something like the Pinenote.

> This is patently false, the latest Kobo Libra Color is using secure boot which completely locks out custom development:

I think you can still sideload KOReader on them, but that's a shame that they're making it harder to replace the stock OS entirely. I hadn't heard about that prior to now so thanks for bringing that up. I only have a Sage I bought a few years ago.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#96

Post by dpark »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #68
echelon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I was an average-joe high school student back then. People hated flash. Even non techies.

What’s “back then” to you? Flash grew up in the time of dial up when you could still get AOL install discs with 100 free hours in your typical grocery store PC magazine. I don’t recall people hating Flash a lot until later when it wasn’t a technical necessity anymore.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#98

Post by LooseMarmoset »

echelon wrote: post #24
acdha wrote: post #20

Adobe has always been like this, too. They squandered an enormous marketshare with Flash because the alternative would've been spending a couple million on QA and they managed to unite all of the browser manufacturers in agreement that the web was better off without such an unreliable partner. I shipped a couple of things on Flash back in the day but it was staggeringly bad software — random crashes, various heisenbu…

Flash is still unsurpassed as the easiest publishing medium. JavaScript build system layer cake and "web standards" are a million times harder than just drawing some stuff, maybe writing a simple function, then building a static file that can be embedded anywhere and even downloaded. You have to spend so much time setting up any flash alternative, and the "standards" are worse. I hate Steve Jobs for killing Flash and…

this is unfortunately, the most revisionist take I can imagine. I don’t mean this in a personal way, mind you but while it may have been magical to publish interactive websites, using flash, that magic is utterly outweighed by the mundane vulnerabilities that flash was riddled with.

It’s safe to say we all miss sites like Homestar runner, and I had a co- worker who generated many meme – worthy flash presentations of his coworkers, which were hysterical. however, flash generated security vulnerabilities on the daily, and unfortunately, these vulnerabilities were very conveniently cross platform. These vulnerabilities, which Adobe couldn’t, or wouldn’t, resolve resulted in many many lost hours fixing virus – and Trojan horse – infested PCs, Macs, and cell phones. Adobe never managed to sandbox flash at all.

I miss a lot of old flash content, and I’m sure many people miss the ease with which you could create interactive content for websites. The fault here lies squarely on Adobe, who wouldn’t fix the situation.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#99

Post by radley »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #68
echelon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I was an average-joe high school student back then. People hated flash. Even non techies.

> People hated flash. Even non techies.

Billions of people enjoyed using Flash for games, video, music, and animated entertainment.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#100

Post by Finnucane »

ameliaquining wrote: post #91
Finnucane wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the users need to be able to check for conformance. What we also need is for vendors to supply test platforms. Amazon, to its small credit, does this, which is good, because the subset of html/css they support is limited and poorly documented. Heck, I'd be happy if Apple, Kobo, and everyone else just kept good documentation and up to date! Though these days I have to spend more time worrying about EAA and ADA com…

A compatibility linter is a poor substitute for a vendor-supplied test platform, but if the vendor is uncooperative it may be the best that can be done.

It's not a direct substitute at all. It's not intended to be. And--it's on the vendors for making crap software and not keeping up.
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