Live data from Hacker News

Your ePub Is fine

andreklein.net

101–110 of 322 posts

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#101
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The overwhelming majority of computer users simply DO NOT CARE about things like "install a binary blob" or "free-software hostile vendor" or "non-existent Linux support". They installed the plugin and got a way better experience. > Flash was a constant embarassment of RCEs vulns I wonder if anyone has done an analysis of Flash versus Javascript (or other browser technology) vulns over their respective lifespans.

If Flash hadn’t sucked harder than a neutron star, that would be an argument to have. People install lots of proprietary plugins today. Flash would’ve been just one more on that list. But it did suck, and badly. It crashed the browser all the freaking time, often hard enough to crash the whole OS. (“But the OS shouldn’t let that happen!” True, although even with that said, it was in the short list of common apps capa…

> No mobile OS could have run it solidly and without sucking batteries like no tomorrow.

By the time mobile could run Flash, it was too late. Between Apple & Adobe, it had no shot of making the transition. But before that, Flash was pretty amazing.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#102
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. P…

> 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.

I updated my original comment to include some more personal blogs with first-hand accounts. They're not mine but worth linking to for others!

I haven't bought a PineNote yet, but it's probably going to be my choice for that size of Tablet. I opted for a Xteink instead and have been very happy with it.

> 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.

I agree that there are certainly a lot of sharp edges to less supported platforms. I just think I'd rather get a Boox (and deal with Android/Graphene) or PineNote over the Kobo over the long term. Then again, my usage of very simple -- maybe I just don't read as much/depend as much on the ereader to the extent that others do!

> 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.

Ah yes, AFAICT what you're saying is correct -- sideloading apps is not an issue as far as I could find, it was just the inability to have custom firmware/OS.

I was very disappointed in this, and I generally see it as a step towards locking down that will only continue. Would love to be wrong though as I was very very convinced I wanted a Kobo Libra Color earlier).

People that are happy with the Kobos as they are (and the bundled software/services) I'm sure will be happy to keep buying though, I think the market is certainly big enough for that!

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#103
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Websites are still inferior to Flash of the early 2000s. It's taken decades and they can only mimic a fraction of its power. Is this a troll? What could an application do with Flash in 2005 that we can't do with a modern web application today (excluding the obvious answer of runtime vulnerabilities that allowed apps to escape the sandbox)?

what’s he is referring is the editor and the easy way of drawing things, still agree we can do things today but a easy to draw editor like that is missing. I was a fan of flash and fireworks.

The editor was a scripted timeline, similar to a video or animation timeline. It was fantastic for creatives, but counterintuitive for programmers, so most devs hated it.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#104
post #9

Adobe Digital Editions and RMSDK were recently sold to Wipro Engineering: https://helpx.adobe.com/enterprise/kb/eol-faq-adobe-digital-...

Sold or outsourced?

> Wipro now manages and distributes any new updates, enhancements, bug fixes, and support requests directly

> Create your new ByteBooks ID using the same email address that you used for Adobe ID

Seems sold mostly.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#106
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello, I'm building https://merrilin.ai , could I pick your brain about the problems you faced?

Sure thing. I've actually been working on the spoiler-free resource angle as well. I can book a call to talk. Distribution is the killer problem here though.

I thought about building this too! Love that both of you are pursuing it as I haven't had the time to start. Don't give up.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#107
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Flash hadn’t sucked harder than a neutron star, that would be an argument to have. People install lots of proprietary plugins today. Flash would’ve been just one more on that list. But it did suck, and badly. It crashed the browser all the freaking time, often hard enough to crash the whole OS. (“But the OS shouldn’t let that happen!” True, although even with that said, it was in the short list of common apps capa…

> No mobile OS could have run it solidly and without sucking batteries like no tomorrow. By the time mobile could run Flash, it was too late. Between Apple & Adobe, it had no shot of making the transition. But before that, Flash was pretty amazing.

It was never amazing. It was adequate to give creative people a way to work around its many shortcomings and make something cool anyway. The tech and the implementation was awful, and all credit goes to people who still managed to shine through it.

For all the many reasons people might dislike Apple, they were 100% in the right on this topic. Flash needed to die. It got everyone to collectively push the web standard technologies ahead into something way, way better.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#108
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> You're in the 0.001%. Your asks are arcane and orthogonal to most users of software, who just want their PC to do something neat and useful. Right up until enshittification kicks in and suddenly everyone cares and there are shouts of destroying the evil techbros who are poisoning the minds of our youth to buy a new yacht. Can you imagine the situation if Jobs hadn't killed Flash? Most of the commercial websites req…

> Most of the commercial websites required a Flash blob to deliver full functionality

Being a binary blob is not a strong argument all by itself. chrome.exe, firefox.exe, etc. are also binary blobs. I have no love for Adobe, but that specific criticism is weak.

Re: Your ePub Is fine

#109
The author says that "In a perfect world, RMSDK would just stop living in the CSS stone-ages or at least provide some kind of error handling instead of dropping the whole book, but I’m not holding my breath."

This is blatantly wrong.

In a perfect world, RMSDK wouldn't exist in the first place and Adobe would have gone bankrupt and become history at least 10 years ago.

Post reply on HN