Quote:
Originally Posted by charleski
I don't think any reader system implements a multi-window environment for epubs. The references to footnotes were just talk. ePub's only linking mechanism is the simple anchor tag and href attribute, so there's nothing built-in to allow it to display certain links in a different way, and there's no support for embedded scripts.
It would certainly be possible to bolt on a set of extensions to allow this, but that basically means a rewrite of the specification.
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There's not need for any sort of extension. A Reading System is perfectly within its right to provide a pop-up preview of the content at the end of a link, or to display a footnote in a separate window etc.
The display of the book is up to the RS. It needs to display the epub according to the standard, but it can add its own display features above and beyond that. Things like being able to change the margin size, the currently used font etc (iPad's iBooks works this way, if the Apple videos are any indication).
Sure, the epub book says what it wants the content to look like, but the RS is free to override that if the user so chooses or the RS is technically limited (or some other reason). The specs talk about this, and that's why you see them use the words "may" and "free to ignore" all the time.
It's the same thing when you use the text zoom features of your browser: some browsers will then enlarge the text and reflow the whole page, and now it looks differently. That doesn't mean the browser is not standards-compliant.
The RS needs to be able to display an epub according to the standard
by default, but allowing the user to change the display semantics is certainly a good idea. Some commercial epub books come with damn stupid margins, and I want my RS to let me change them on the fly.