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Old 11-20-2012, 08:02 PM   #74
Hitch
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Quote:
Originally Posted by derangedhermit View Post
It's exactly the same. I just took a document with 20 footnotes and a) changed the text size and b) changed the margins. LibreOffice behaved just as I would like a reader to do. I could have also changed the page size as well, and seen the wanted results.

I agree it may be a slow operation when the reflow including footnotes is performed on e-readers (not on iPads or PC e-reader software, etc). But Moore's law will continue to have an impact on e-reader processors, so the issue is temporary. Even if not, I can always pick to use a tablet to read on that does have the horsepower.
I don't think it's the same thing. This isn't to be argumentative, but I don't. It's one thing to reflow a document on a PC or Mac, with all that computing power, and another to reflow a book that can be on any sized device, with any number of fonts, or a limited number of fonts, each set different on each device. When a Mac or PC reflows a document, it has a given number of variables; the document has x or x+y fonts, and a page-size or margin-size. An ebook has a device size, a margin size, number of fonts available and number of font sizes available. And it may or may not rotate 90 degrees. I simply believe that it's a boatload of permutations.

I also don't know what the big damn deal is. I don't see any difference whatsoever in jumping to a footnote at the end of a chapter versus jumping to one at the end of the book. I have never found it to "lack precision in jumping," nor disruptive to the reading experience. I suppose if one has intellectually lazy readers, they might decide to skip the footnotes, but wouldn't they, anyway?

Sorry, just feels like a kerfuffle in a kettle. I love the linked footnotes in books, myself. Footnotes on the printed page are fine, but we've all seen footnotes that are so long that they run to two pages, sometimes 3, lest they take over the text. How would a reflowing e-reader handle that?

{shrug}. Like I said, I don't think that reflowing in ebooks is really the same as reflowing on a virtual sheet of typing paper, given all the permutations, and the (possible) issue with longer footnotes. I agree that javascript pop-up notes, on tap, would be very nice, but the way they are mostly done now works fine, and very "precisely." I also think that our chances of seeing the ePUB spec come into a nice single-file compliance is...nil. ;-)

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