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Old 02-19-2019, 12:01 PM   #58
jackie_w
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Posts: 6,257
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Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: UK
Device: ClaraHD, Forma, Libra2, Clara2E, LibraCol, PBTouchHD3
Quote:
Originally Posted by ZodWallop View Post
Why is that, anyway? Is there a reason kepub doesn't support ligatures?
Kepubs do support both ligatures and kerning if you add the right line of CSS - body {text-rendering: optimizeLegibility;} - either by hand, via calibre driver or via patch. Ligatures/kerning will only be as good as the font you're using.

The drawback is that if you read your books full-justified then occasionally word- and letter-spacing can be weirdly uneven. I've convinced myself that this unevenness arises (at least partly) from the KoboTouchExtended (KTE) algorithm which adds the koboSpan tags necessary for turning an epub into a kepub. KTE tries to replicate exactly the algorithm used in Kobo-bought kepubs so I don't suppose it's likely to change.

FWIW I did hack my own version of KTE to change the koboSpan algorithm. I've been happy with the results for my own reading purposes, with the caveat that I can't be 100% sure that I haven't degraded the bookmarking/notes/highlighting features in some way because I rarely use them.

Also I've never compared side-by-side a full-justified epub with an equivalent 'hacked' kepub. All I know is that, for over 2 years, my hacked kepubs have been good enough for me and they have both ligatures and kerning.
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