Why is Kindle not keen on PDF support?

[volwrath]

The Nook Touch handles pdf MUCH better than any of the kindles.

[HarryT]

Pretty much any reader handles PDFs better than the Kindle; it's definitely not one of its strengths.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by cHex

Semantics? Maybe. But people are claiming the Kindle has no "PDF support," when in fact it displays PDF's exactly as they are formatted.

It doesn't support internal links & bookmarks, annotations, and zoom, even to the limited level that other e-ink readers do.

What's really wanted (and not just by the Kindle community) is a way to cleanly convert PDF's to something like DOC or HTML

... etc. Well, yes, but it's never going to happen. "Simple PDF conversion" would mean that PDFs were made the same way, from the same kinds of source material, and they're not. Image-only PDFs are never going to convert; non-image PDFs will convert differently if they're coming from something with markup than if they're coming from a source that loses its formatting (or never had it) before it became a PDF. Starting with Word, I get different results from "Print to PDF" vs "Convert to PDF"--conversion will tag; printing won't.

PDF isn't a doc format as much as it's a displayable package format; how well it converts depends on what went into the package.

However, Kindles *could* have better support for them--allowing the links to work to make them more navigable, allowing annotations, and at least allowing the rotated-view half-page zoom, if not more specific zoom options.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

It doesn't support internal links & bookmarks, annotations, and zoom, even to the limited level that other e-ink readers do.

I was under the impression that the firmware on the new Kindle Touch was capable of all those things. Is that not the case?

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I was under the impression that the firmware on the new Kindle Touch was capable of all those things. Is that not the case?

If so, I stand corrected. My daughter has a K2.

I had heard that the search and annotation functions for PDFs are lot more limited than for mobi files, and had not heard that internal PDF links and bookmarks were now supported.

[DiapDealer]

If so, I stand corrected. My daughter has a K2.

I have the same model and yes, the PDF support is pretty limited (but still better than the K1). They made many PDF improvements with the K3 and apparently even more with the Kindle Touch.

So while PDF functionality may not be great, it seems as if it's been steadily improving. Which means the requests for increased PDF functionality aren't being completely ignored, anyway.

[HarryT]

The key thing it lacks is reflow; it's pretty much the only mainstream reader that lacks it.

[DiapDealer]

Will the average, run-of-the-mill PDF document reflow on a device that supports PDF reflow? Or does the document have to be properly created and "tagged" for this feature to work?

I honestly don't know enough about it, but if a PDF document has to be specially created to be "reflowable," then I feel the ability of most other readers to handle PDF reflow is a bit of a red-herring. After all, how many PDF's are created with reflowing in mind?

Or am I wrong about normal run of the mill PDF's being reflowable on devices that support it?

[Serpentine]

Just remember that Kindle's render/reader management software is all proprietary, while the others are likely using the far more current mupdf or poppler. I guess they might be using the pango pdf backend, which would explain a thing or two.

If they were to attempt to support it better, then there would be even more complaints about it, since it falls into the "fix this problem" rather than "hey, they don't care - let me just avoid it".

If you dont like it, make sure to look at the alternative software, Duokan, Quindle and some other mupdf based — take a look at the development subforum.

[charmian]

They don't seem to sell many PDFs for the Kindle, which is why it's not a priority for them.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Will the average, run-of-the-mill PDF document reflow on a device that supports PDF reflow? Or does the document have to be properly created and "tagged" for this feature to work?

I honestly don't know enough about it, but if a PDF document has to be specially created to be "reflowable," then I feel the ability of most other readers to handle PDF reflow is a bit of a red-herring. After all, how many PDF's are created with reflowing in mind?

Or am I wrong about normal run of the mill PDF's being reflowable on devices that support it?

Plain text PDF generally reflow reasonably well, even without special markup. It's hopeless for documents with a complex layout, but for such things as reading journal articles, it's pretty reasonable.

[jian1]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Forget the converters, they just don't work properly. You can get good results manually, but it really isn't worth the effort just to get the documents on your reader.

What would work is a reader with a 9.7" screen, Mirasol or a new generation of e-ink, that has the same refresh rate as an LCD. My guess is that we are still 1-2 years away from such a device.

The main reason I disliked Mirasol based on the prototype(youtube) is that the contrast rate is deemed off chart. E-ink is still the king of highest contrast ratio and the main reason why us geeky academic loves it. Sadily, no one gives a rat arse about us serious book-worms, every manufacturer goes for some novel, light-reading materials.