MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Sharp looking to push oddball XMDF format on new LCD readers

charleski · 07-20-2010, 08:15 AM

Sharp's just revealed two new prototype readers (5.5" and 10.8" and both apparently LCD) and will be partnering with Verizon for content delivery.

The big news is that both will use an xml-based format called XMDF ("ever-eXtending Mobile Document Format"), which is supposedly widely used in Japan for text/graphics composites. The launch video (see below) shows both in action. From what I can glean from the video, this format allows allowed embedded video and animation, pop-up windows and text-specific zooming (we'll nimbly gloss over the ugly fake page-turns).

The odd thing is that it's pretty hard to get any real info on this XMDF format (I don't think it's the same thing as the library for describing river cross-sections). A bit of digging found that it was developed by Sharp and has been formalised as IEC 62448 ed2.0, which is not much use as I'm not about to pay to read the spec. A table of contents is available here, but isn't very informative, though there is an intriguing reference to Ruby.

Source: http://en.akihabaranews.com/54850/e-...n-e-books-tech The video at the bottom (skip the first 1:20) shows the two ebooks in operation, with 4 different publications in total.

Frankly, I hope this fails. The world doesn't need yet another ebook format, and I don't see the point of re-inventing the wheel, since this offers nothing over html5 and javascript (except, maybe, yet another clunky DRM scheme).

07-20-2010, 08:15 AM	#1
charleski Wizard Posts: 1,196 Karma: 1281258 Join Date: Sep 2009 Device: PRS-505	Sharp looking to push oddball XMDF format on new LCD readers Sharp's just revealed two new prototype readers (5.5" and 10.8" and both apparently LCD) and will be partnering with Verizon for content delivery. The big news is that both will use an xml-based format called XMDF ("ever-eXtending Mobile Document Format"), which is supposedly widely used in Japan for text/graphics composites. The launch video (see below) shows both in action. From what I can glean from the video, this format allows allowed embedded video and animation, pop-up windows and text-specific zooming (we'll nimbly gloss over the ugly fake page-turns). The odd thing is that it's pretty hard to get any real info on this XMDF format (I don't think it's the same thing as the library for describing river cross-sections). A bit of digging found that it was developed by Sharp and has been formalised as IEC 62448 ed2.0, which is not much use as I'm not about to pay to read the spec. A table of contents is available here, but isn't very informative, though there is an intriguing reference to Ruby. Source: http://en.akihabaranews.com/54850/e-...n-e-books-tech The video at the bottom (skip the first 1:20) shows the two ebooks in operation, with 4 different publications in total. Frankly, I hope this fails. The world doesn't need yet another ebook format, and I don't see the point of re-inventing the wheel, since this offers nothing over html5 and javascript (except, maybe, yet another clunky DRM scheme). Last edited by charleski; 07-20-2010 at 08:17 AM.