Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
Well, I did give a solution that would work. But I never said it would be worth the effort. I think it's a terrible idea. I think the index idea should be scrapped. If you are going to fall off your wagon, make sure the horse has stopped first.  |
Just linking every instance of a word into an index would be a bad idea, but a properly constructed index showing places where terms are defined or demonstrated is a useful thing. It requires the author to mark those spots when writing though, like with the latex \index{} command noted previously. I don't think you could create a good index automatically.
A text search would find the same useful places, but you would have to filter out the unhelpful matches yourself. That can be a chore if the term is used extensively in the document. I don't know how many times I've passed right by the stuff I was looking for while hitting "Find Next" repetitively.
So, I think a proper index is good thing, even in a searchable document. Whether it can be implemented well in an EPUB is another question for those more expert than I am.