font sizes ?

[charleski]

One thing that's interesting about all this is that it shows the BeBook must be doing part of its scaling by redefining the size of a point. On ADE the 'bad scaling' example using font-sizes specified in points doesn't scale at all, whereas it looks like when switching from M to larger sizes the BeBook changes the number of pixels making up a point. So not a bug as such, just slightly strange behaviour.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by charleski

it looks like when switching from M to larger sizes the BeBook changes the number of pixels making up a point. So not a bug as such, just slightly strange behaviour.

If that's the case, it is a bug. A point is a point is a point, no matter the number of pixels, it is supposed to be an absolute unit, equal to 1/72 of an inch. Changing the definition of absolute units can only be valid as a shortcut for zooming/magnifying, but not for changing font size.

What happens with margins or image sizes defined in terms of points (or inches or millimetres)?

[Dellaster]

Originally Posted by Jellby

But I don't think there's anything capable of cleaning up useless <span>s, or the proliferation of almost identical classes (one with 9pt indent, one with 10pt indent, etc.)

Not if you want to preserve that information, no. The method I described homogenizes the markup and such variations are lost. Most paragraphs are nothing but <p>text</p>. The retained variations include centering, bolds, italics, and headers. A centered paragraph with two font sizes changes like so:

From this -

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;text-autospace:none'><span
style='font-size:9.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:18.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia'>All
rights reserved including the right of </span><span style='mso-bidi-font-size:
18.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia'>reproduction in whole</span><span
style='font-size:9.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:18.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia'> 
or in part in any form.</span></p>

To this -

<p class="c1">All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.</p>

With the CSS being merely -

 p.c1 {text-align: center}

Which works fine for me with works of fiction but perhaps not for someone who wants to keep that formatting information.

Ted

Originally Posted by Jellby

A point is a point is a point, no matter the number of pixels, it is supposed to be an absolute unit, equal to 1/72 of an inch.

If it is a Postscript point maybe but sometimes a point is not always a point: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_(typography)

Of course a millimeter has not always been a millimeter either.

[GeoffC]

sometimes a millimeter is a millimetre ......

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by shall1028

If it is a Postscript point maybe but sometimes a point is not always a point: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_(typography)

But in the context of ePUB, a point is a CSS point, and the CSS specification defines a point as:

pt: points — the points used by CSS 2.1 are equal to 1/72nd of an inch.

Originally Posted by GeoffC

sometimes a millimeter is a millimetre ......

it is also milímetro, milimetër, milimetar, milimetras and my favo(u)rite milliméadar