Quote:
Originally Posted by DNSB
MOBI is loosely based on the pre-ePub OEBPS specification but MobiPocket added some proprietary features and removed others which Amazon continued doing after they purchased MobiPocket. Compared to ePub/AZW3, it sucks capability wise.
|
OEBPS specification is 1998 (and indeed a sort of epub1) and was from a US company unrelated to French Mobipocket. Mobi is HTML3 and no CSS files. There were variations for support databases and javascript. Amazon bought Mobipopcket in 2005 and the Lab126 was started in 2004 and bought / renamed by Amazon. First Kindle was in 2007 and used Mobi and then azw (not azw3) which replaces Mobi DRM with Amazon DRM.
OEBPS (Open Book) was open from about 1999 and like epub2 is a ZIP file plus a Manifest file. Inside the package a defined subset of XHTML may be used, along with CSS and Dublin Core metadata. Mobi is simply HTML3 and not a regular zip file.
Mobipocket files originally (2000 when founded) were little more than text. I don't know when they upgraded to HTML3. They always (even the text only versions) had an encryption option. Most implementations of Mobi can't do RTL languages, Cyrillic, Arabic, Asian, Hebrew and only use the pre-installed fonts on the Kindle, which only have a subset of Greek in addition to Latin-Roman
I don't think mobi/azw/KF7 (not azw3/KF8) has any direct connection to OEBPS (Open Book, essentially epub1). It's grossly inferior.
The only thing positive about mobi is that it's better than the earlier Mobipocket formats used on Palm OS, Symbian and Windows CE. The mobi format on Kindle is dreadful compared to AZW3/KF8 which is based on epub2 (HTML5 and CSS).
Only K1, K2, DX and DXG need mobi. The K3, KNT, KT etc all got backported azw3/KF8 in later FW releases. No-one should use mobi for novels and similar as azw3 is far superior. There are a few mobi variations that were never implemented in KF8 or KFX, but ordinary ebooks don't use them. Print Replica on Kindle is either an encapsulated PDF (developed after mobi) or a fixed layout KFX.
Sony (2005 eink) used LRF and changed to epub in 2008, a good while before Kindle had azw3. I don't know what Sony used on their two main ereader / media book / Bookman portable products before eink.
Summary: Mobi is garbage and was obsolete at release and Western European Language-centric. It's not even the original Mobipocket format. I still have a copy of Mobipocket creator which works best with a very limited HTML input, though there is a pre-Word 2007 MS DOC format import. The HTML3 inline styling is limited and basically you can only define sans, sans-serif and monospace (which can't be picked on GUI). The older models with Mobi only have no alternate body font selection, only size.