[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Jellby

It is interesting that it hyphenates "Willi-/am". It indicates it could hyphenate other words, which is good for narrow widths.

yes, i see it hyphenates also "motion" in the first paragraph ; i wonder how good the algorithm is or if it is quite basic ? to be honest i'm not sure i would put hyphens in those names, but for a narrow screen it can certainly help. i wonder also if it can hyphenate other languages or if it relies on some set of rules specifically for english ?

Originally Posted by MacEachaidh

You're absolutely welcome, Zelda.

I find your file an enormously pleasing piece of layout in any context; the fact that it's been done in a technology that very few seem able to employ impressively, and has the added twinkle of being almost completely arcane to me, and that your coding is proving to be so robustly portable ... look, I don't mean to sound fawning, but for me that makes it utterly gobsmacking. I'd previously seen screenshots of your ePub all over the web, whenever people were talking about e.books and their reading devices, obviously holding your coding up as an example of "Just What Can Be Done With The Format", without my knowing where it had come from, and without credit being given to you. (That's the darker side of public domain efforts, to my way of thinking. If people aren't directly required to acknowledge someone's work, they generally don't bother giving the publishing space over to making the gesture freely.) It throws a curious light on commercial e.book products, of which I have several now, and have never seen one that came close to your efforts in layout. Different books need different looks, obviously, but so many instances of commercial electronic publishing seem to take a "near enough is good enough" approach to their products that it disgusts me.

So, my sincere congratulations, Zelda, and thanks for the delight you've provided.

wow, that's a really incredibly nice thing to say ! knowing that this book has provided you (and others) with delight is, i think, the highest compliment you can pay. of course, i have to share the credit with quite a few people. there's this guy named jerome, for instance, who did have a hand in making the whole thing possible. i agree that we see too few examples of really nice epub books but luckily there are a few available. all of jellby's books (available here ! for free !) are definitely worth the detour. our very own pdurrant has also done a magnificent job creating the hand-coded epub version of Desbarollda, The Waltzing Mouse : http://www.durrantpublishing.co.uk/D...lda/index.html. those are just a couple of examples i can think of off the top of my head. I think it's great to talk about them as much as possible ; the more really high quality epub books people are aware of, hopefully the more their standards will be raised and the more they will come to expect a quality book from commercial publishers who, sadly, are often the worst offenders when it comes to really poorly-made books, as you've noticed. i suspect many people are convinced you actually *can't* make a good-looking book in epub, simply because they've never seen one. i didn't know this particular book was "all over the web" ; i know of 3 places it's been used, 2 of which asked my permission first (the third one, i didn't know about until someone sent me a link). but that doesn't really bother me, to be honest ; my role in creating this book is relatively small, after all i didn't write the story nor draw the illustrations. and some of the trickier coding bits were done with the invaluable help of some of our epub gods here (notably jellby). in the end though my original intention was to see "just what can be done with this format" so i'm quite pleased for people to use it as an example ; i hope it will give other people the idea of making some really nice books.

On a happier note, I was beaming (and a little relieved, I admit) to see that it translated beautifully onto the iRiver Story, a device that has proved quite robust and pleases me immensely, but that does have shortcomings in the way it handles some of the formats it purports to support. (I've read enough of these forums now to realise that all e.readers seem to, in their own way.) I don't have the means for creating a screenshot of your book displayed on the Story, but it looks as good as any of the examples I've seen posted here from other devices. Thanks so much!

that is great to hear as well ! in the end, a book can only be as good as the reading system it's displayed on.

Originally Posted by GA Russell

Thanks you for saying so, Zelda! Your efforts are appreciated here!

thank *you* for saying so.