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Originally Posted by ATDrake
But the point remains that I can create and edit an ePub using nothing more than a plain text editor and a zip utility and I expect to be able to keep doing that in the future, and DRM considerations aside, be able to easily extract the textual innards to convert into the next-generation format using only a zip utility and a plain text editor.
And that puts it a step above Mobi, on which you're dependent upon whatever tools and docs Amazon provides, and whatever tools and docs anyone else can reverse-engineer, which I'm quite grateful for and use on a weekly basis, but it would be nice to be able to do without.
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Very good point... actually tried my hand at a short text yesterday and submitted to HarryT for some comments. They were positive, with only a few suggestions that I could incorporate easily. I have used only Sigil. It's an amazing piece of work (Sigil, not the eBook
), but basically is comes down to being a text editor that can edit stuff inside a ZIP-file without first unpacking it. As the EPUB-format is basically HTML + CSS with some extra rules tacked on, it is exceedingly easy to work with; at least for me.
Basically, if you are a webdesigner (someone who can do front-end web development), then you can very easily create an eBook, even without using specialized tools, and I think that's very good.
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One might as well argue that Mobi is an equally if not more-so moving target in this area, as Amazon keeps messing with the DRM and changing the way the PID/kinfo works in conjunction with the device/software apps to decrypt the files. Not to mention KF8 and Topaz.
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The problem with any multi-vendor standard is that it may splinter, but you still have a choice to go one way or another, or maybe make the different versions of the standard work together. (See Linux, for example. If a distribution does something you don't like, you move to another one, keeping the same programs.)
The problem with any one-vendor standard is that you have to "eat" what that vendor gives you. (see Windows, for example. If you *need* Windows, because of some programs you use, then you'll have to use what MS serves you at a given point.)
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Originally Posted by ATDrake
Provided you can get at it, it's what's underneath that counts, and the amount of work it takes to keep the unofficial Mobi helper tools up to date can be seen in the efforts to understand the changes made to the wrapper of the new default KF8+ output of the new version of KindleGen, so that the mobiunpack and kindlestrip tools can be used with it, which currently run to +5 pages combined. |
Hm. I've read those threads for a bit, but even being a programmer, I'd be much more inclined to use EPUB if I wanted to create (or change) an eBook... at least at this point in time. Nothwithstanding, I hope that the people working on that stuff can get it done, so people can still convert to and from the Kindle format in the future.
I think I've made my decision. While I like the Kindle best with regard to hardware at this time (when going by the many reviews on the 'net), for now I will stick with EPUB eBooks as the source file as much as possible.