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Originally Posted by BasilC
But if you produced it with a pda in mind, it would look stupid on a pc or laptop and you'd lose one of the main points of pdf, which is to produce something ready formatted for printing.
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If I use PDF for book-work, it may be a useful benefit to be able to look at it on a PC screen. But using a PDA is not of the slightest importance. It's like trying to drive in a 9in nail with a pocket hammer -- it's something you attempt only where there are no other alternatives, and once you have got rid of the initial frustration, it's something you realize is not going to work anyway.
If I use PDF to design a eBook intended for PDA reading, that's where that text should be read. Looking on it on a PC screen may be useful, but it will won't look good, and it may work almost as awkwardly as trying to read a tabloid page on a 15in screen. Printing it is entirely out of the question: it has not been designed for the resolution of a phototypesetter, it's been designed for the resolution of a PDA screen.
And, of course, if I design a eBook for the PC screen ... it's not going to read well on a PDA, and it's certainly not going to print particularly well either. PDF is not the platform for trying to achieve that kind of portability, unless you are prepared to drop quality -- and accept that it looks 'stupid', as you say.
Me, quality is what I go for. If that means dropping reader platform portability, that's someting I'd cheerfully do. That's why I said "For PDF to work *well* on a PDA...": I meant and mean 'well', not 'acceptably', or even 'at all'.