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Nate the great · 11-17-2009, 02:23 PM

As you might know, quite a few ebook readers run Adobe software. While this software is commonly referred to as Adobe DE, ti's actually Adobe Reader Mobile 9. (The PRS-505 might be the exception. It's old enough that it might be running an even earlier generation of software.)

A couple weeks back a contact with one of the device developers said that their reader was running not RM9, but RM9.1.Naturally, I wanted to know about the improvements, so I followed up with Adobe.

Here is some of what I learned:

Improved Dithering

Dithering is a step in the process by which the reader software takes a color image and displays it. RM 9.1 now provides the code to do this, so device developers no longer have to do it. Text rendering was also improved.

dithering (Wikipedia)

Accent-agnostic searches

The search function will ignore accent marks. For example, if you search for facade, the previous search would have missed façade.

New APIs for link enablement

What Adobe actually added was link disablement. Most ebook readers do not have a web connection, so an external link (to a website, for example) is of no use. The new code will give developers the option of having that external link appear as text, not a link.

Support for password-protected PDFs

According to the FAQ, RM9 already supported this. But is listed as an improvement, so I include it here. This support is only for PDFs created with Acrobat 7 or before. Acrobat 9 is explicitly not supported.

11-17-2009, 02:23 PM	#1
Nate the great Sir Penguin of Edinburgh Posts: 12,375 Karma: 23555235 Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: DC Metro area Device: Shake a stick plus 1	Adobe Reader Mobile 9.1 beta As you might know, quite a few ebook readers run Adobe software. While this software is commonly referred to as Adobe DE, ti's actually Adobe Reader Mobile 9. (The PRS-505 might be the exception. It's old enough that it might be running an even earlier generation of software.) A couple weeks back a contact with one of the device developers said that their reader was running not RM9, but RM9.1.Naturally, I wanted to know about the improvements, so I followed up with Adobe. Here is some of what I learned: Improved Dithering Dithering is a step in the process by which the reader software takes a color image and displays it. RM 9.1 now provides the code to do this, so device developers no longer have to do it. Text rendering was also improved. dithering (Wikipedia) Accent-agnostic searches The search function will ignore accent marks. For example, if you search for facade, the previous search would have missed façade. New APIs for link enablement What Adobe actually added was link disablement. Most ebook readers do not have a web connection, so an external link (to a website, for example) is of no use. The new code will give developers the option of having that external link appear as text, not a link. Support for password-protected PDFs According to the FAQ, RM9 already supported this. But is listed as an improvement, so I include it here. This support is only for PDFs created with Acrobat 7 or before. Acrobat 9 is explicitly not supported.