MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Prospects for Academic/Scientific PDF reading in the coming year

physics · 04-20-2011, 11:41 PM

One quick note-
You mention scientifi
c pdfs, most of which (at least in my field, physics) are compiled from latex via pdflatex. (Even journal papers.) There's a bug in the adobe pdf viewers used on on nearly all e-ink devices where the letter beta is written on top of the previous letter. (Even if it appears fine on the adobe viewer on your computer.) I've verified that this happens when viewing pdfs on:
1) Kindles (DX and 3)
2) Sony E-readers
3) Pocketbook 902/903, if using the adobe viewer. It's fine if you use the fbreader, which is how I was able to track the bug to adobe
4) The Entourage Edge

As someone who was trying to read about the QCD beta function, this was rather frustrating. I don't know what sort of scientific papers you're reading, and whether the letter beta will be important, but it's a reason to favor ereaders that you can at least put different pdf viewers on.

04-20-2011, 11:41 PM	#39
physics Enthusiast Posts: 41 Karma: 729 Join Date: Dec 2010 Device: Kindle DX	One quick note- You mention scientifi c pdfs, most of which (at least in my field, physics) are compiled from latex via pdflatex. (Even journal papers.) There's a bug in the adobe pdf viewers used on on nearly all e-ink devices where the letter beta is written on top of the previous letter. (Even if it appears fine on the adobe viewer on your computer.) I've verified that this happens when viewing pdfs on: 1) Kindles (DX and 3) 2) Sony E-readers 3) Pocketbook 902/903, if using the adobe viewer. It's fine if you use the fbreader, which is how I was able to track the bug to adobe 4) The Entourage Edge As someone who was trying to read about the QCD beta function, this was rather frustrating. I don't know what sort of scientific papers you're reading, and whether the letter beta will be important, but it's a reason to favor ereaders that you can at least put different pdf viewers on.