Formatting an eBook - Left justify or Justified

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by hobnail

I think it was on the Daisy or epub consortium accessibility site (or are they the same thing) and they recommended ragged right because justified causes uneven spacing between words.

When was this? Do they still recommend left justify?

Thing is, when I see an eBook that's left justified, I think whoever created the eBook is lazy and/or sloppy.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

I'm not sure what you're saying here. Of course kepubs have variable width spaces between words. How else could it do full justification?

What's meant by variable width spacing is when the spaces can be made smaller then a normal space. RMSDK can do variable width spacing. Can KePub do that?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Near as I can tell, the spacing is the same using either kepub or epub in the small sample I checked. The problem is that the only way to justify is to increase the spacing between the words and not the spacing between the characters in a word.

By default, RMSDK does hyphenation (full justify only), kerning, and variable width spaces that include smaller spaces. Access does not do this by default and that means that RMSDK can sometimes get more text per line with the same font at the same font size. More text per line means less larger spaces with RMSDK then Access.

[Uncle Robin]

After reading 7 pages of this thread, I decided to test my vote by changing my current book to justified from left. And immediately confirmed that for me, left is right. So MUCH easier to read , "ragged right" feels much more natural and switching to fully justified had an immediate braking effect on reading speed. I do not, though, feel motivated to post endlessly that my subjective POV on this issue is intrinsically "right" by virtue of being MY subjective opinion.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

After reading 7 pages of this thread...

Five-and-a-half pages of which were posted a decade ago! Why did this 10 yr-old thread get resurrected a couple of days ago anyway?

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

What's meant by variable width spacing is when the spaces can be made smaller then a normal space. RMSDK can do variable width spacing. Can KePub do that?

I still don't understand your question.

Here's a couple of screenshots of the same book page (same font/font-size/line-height/margins). One's an epub (RMSDK), one's a kepub (not RMSDK). I'll let you guess which is which.

Can you tell me which screenshot displays the "variable spacing" you're talking about? They're not identical but both look acceptable to me.

[4691mls]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Five-and-a-half pages of which were posted a decade ago! Why did this 10 yr-old thread get resurrected a couple of days ago anyway?

This!

but as long as I've read -well, skimmed - it, I'm going to agree with this:

Originally Posted by sun surfer

I would generally prefer justified so that's what I voted for, but I really don't like when justification isn't done well. My most comfortable ereader text size is rather large and the worst is when one long word is ridiculously stretched out across a line all by itself.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Five-and-a-half pages of which were posted a decade ago! Why did this 10 yr-old thread get resurrected a couple of days ago anyway?

Because nothing has changed?
And that might be worth considering?

[hobnail]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

When was this? Do they still recommend left justify?

I can't find the original page that I'm remembering where it mentioned uneven spacing but search for "All body text should be left aligned" in the following:


https://www.accessiblebooksconsortiu...ublishers.html

[hobnail]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Thing is, when I see an eBook that's left justified, I think whoever created the eBook is lazy and/or sloppy.

So I guess that would make whoever set up the mobileread web site lazy and/or sloppy? All of our posts are displayed with ragged right.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

I still don't understand your question.

Here's a couple of screenshots of the same book page (same font/font-size/line-height/margins). One's an epub (RMSDK), one's a kepub (not RMSDK). I'll let you guess which is which.

Can you tell me which screenshot displays the "variable spacing" you're talking about? They're not identical but both look acceptable to me.

In your samples, I'm thinking that #1 is ePub and #2 is KePub.

These are two screen grabs showing the variable spacing I was talking about. One is KePub and the other is ePub. The KePub has the paragraph circled in red and the ePub in blue. You will see the one of the lines has smaller then normal spacing in ePub and in KePub, the line end in a hyphen because the spacing cannot be made smaller then normal.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by hobnail

So I guess that would make whoever set up the mobileread web site lazy and/or sloppy? All of our posts are displayed with ragged right.

A forum is completely different then an eBook. That's like comparing Apples to Grapes.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

These are two screen grabs showing the variable spacing I was talking about. One is KePub and the other is ePub. The KePub has the paragraph circled in red and the ePub in blue. You will see the one of the lines has smaller then normal spacing in ePub and in KePub, the line end in a hyphen because the spacing cannot be made smaller then normal.

Where in the line does it change from smaller spacing to normal spacing?

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

In your samples, I'm thinking that #1 is ePub and #2 is KePub.

Actually, no, #1 is the kepub. ... which just goes to show that, although each is slightly different, one is not noticeably "better" at word spacing than the other.

[DiapDealer]

I can read just about anything (so long as it's not entirely right aligned), but I'd rather read ragged right than stare at some of the rivers of white that can happen whenever justified text is done poorly. Plus sometimes, I simply like to break up the hypnotic monotony of identical-looking, perfectly rectangular paragraphs (that justified-text tends to induce after awhile) with some ragged right ones.

I'm not really a fan of having the exact same, totally homogenous typographic reading experience with every single book I read. I like a little variety in that regard.

Heck sometimes (especially with lots of longer paragraphs), the diagonal and vertical whitespace patterns/artifacts that justified text will create start to catch my eye in a distracting manner.