Sick of Kindle inconsistency

[Oxford-eBooks]

Sorry... this is going to be a cathartic rant, and I know there's no answer but here goes.

After trying again to get a nice, consistent way to put full-page images with captions (no, way embedded text on the image.. spit), I dabbled with the wonder of SVGs.
Lovely, works a treat in ePub, looks great on the new Kindle Previewer #3 works. Great, all happy. Read a little more because I was having trouble getting non full-height SVGs to work and say the line in the Kindle guidelines that enhanced formatting and iOS apps don't support SVGs.

{deep breath} Okay then... so WHY? WHY can't the iOS app support something that 's been in the rest of the Kindle range for YEARS?

There's GOT to be a good reason for this... but I just can't see one.

Are they TRYING to mess with us? SVGs would be a GODSEND and can help make lovely looking content, but not supporting on one platform cripples the rest.



... or am I wrong? Someone PLEASE tell me that I'm wrong or today has just been a caffiene induced hallucinaton?

(Oh, and no gradients either????? Really????)

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

Sorry... this is going to be a cathartic rant, and I know there's no answer but here goes.

After trying again to get a nice, consistent way to put full-page images with captions (no, way embedded text on the image.. spit), I dabbled with the wonder of SVGs.
Lovely, works a treat in ePub, looks great on the new Kindle Previewer #3 works. Great, all happy. Read a little more because I was having trouble getting non full-height SVGs to work and say the line in the Kindle guidelines that enhanced formatting and iOS apps don't support SVGs.

{deep breath} Okay then... so WHY? WHY can't the iOS app support something that 's been in the rest of the Kindle range for YEARS?

There's GOT to be a good reason for this... but I just can't see one.

Are they TRYING to mess with us? SVGs would be a GODSEND and can help make lovely looking content, but not supporting on one platform cripples the rest.



... or am I wrong? Someone PLEASE tell me that I'm wrong or today has just been a caffiene induced hallucinaton?

(Oh, and no gradients either????? Really????)

Are you remembering to test the AZK, not the mobi?

Hitch

[Oxford-eBooks]

Okay, I used the Send to Kindle tool to send the MOBI to an iPad an opened it in the Kindle APP there... No SGVs, gradients border radii (radiusses??)
Presumably, that tool pulls the AZK out of the mobi and deliveres it as if it wee coming through the normal consumer channels?

All looks good on the Kindle Previewer3 as prescribed by Amazon.
Yup, using the latest KindleGen as well.

But the big middle-finger from them in the publshing guide talking about SGVs, supported tages ect is the little line that goes:

9.4.12. .... .... .... SVGs are not supported in iOS.
Enhanced Typesetting does not
support SVG images.

I really MUST be getting the wrong end of the stick somewhere becasue I'm not seeing everyone else raging about this and loads of happy articles about using SVGs in their content. Did I turn over two pages somewhere???

[Oxford-eBooks]

... well. After jumping through the assorted hoops of uploading an AZK to the iPad. It all works. Now, this is really what I'd hoped any prayed for.



So what was that note in the documentation about?
And why won't Send to Kindle let me send AZKs?

(getting all my moans out before the new year)

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

I really MUST be getting the wrong end of the stick somewhere becasue I'm not seeing everyone else raging about this and loads of happy articles about using SVGs in their content. Did I turn over two pages somewhere???

A lot of those articles just happily ignore any mention of old MOBI/KF7.

Oh, look how beautiful KF8 and Enhanced Typography is! Works on the newest Kindles and/or latest device X? Nothing else exists!

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

Okay, I used the Send to Kindle tool to send the MOBI to an iPad an opened it in the Kindle APP there... No SGVs, gradients border radii (radiusses??)
Presumably, that tool pulls the AZK out of the mobi and deliveres it as if it wee coming through the normal consumer channels?

NO, it doesn't.

All looks good on the Kindle Previewer3 as prescribed by Amazon.
Yup, using the latest KindleGen as well.

KP3 is worthless, other than for KPF files. The line-heights are UTTERLY effed-up.

But the big middle-finger from them in the publshing guide talking about SGVs, supported tages ect is the little line that goes:

9.4.12. .... .... .... SVGs are not supported in iOS.
Enhanced Typesetting does not
support SVG images.

I really MUST be getting the wrong end of the stick somewhere becasue I'm not seeing everyone else raging about this and loads of happy articles about using SVGs in their content. Did I turn over two pages somewhere???

Why the finger? They told you, right? And why WOULD everyone else be "raging?" Most coders still aren't using SVG, because we're making books for commercial production--and given that millions of KF7 devices are still around...well.

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

... well. After jumping through the assorted hoops of uploading an AZK to the iPad. It all works. Now, this is really what I'd hoped any prayed for.



So what was that note in the documentation about?
And why won't Send to Kindle let me send AZKs?

(getting all my moans out before the new year)

What do you mean, what was the note in the documentation about? It means, if you have SVG images in your file, ET isn't supported. Did you mean something else? Your book won't have hyphenation and the other wee goodies that come along with ET, but...{shrug}. That's the trade-off, right? You get to use SVGs--except for the KF7 customers, (presumably, you put in hidden jpegs or whatever for them, right?), and you don't get ET.

NOTHING but sideloading through the hell of iTunes supports AZK, and, honestly, that's been the case for the last two years. Hell, maybe three. Is it three, Tex? Do you remember?

Originally Posted by Tex2002ans

A lot of those articles just happily ignore any mention of old MOBI/KF7.

Oh, look how beautiful KF8 and Enhanced Typography is! Works on the newest Kindles and/or latest device X? Nothing else exists!

Yes. That's one of the things that constantly gets up my nose. How nice for some people, that they can blithely ignore KF7s. (I'm NOT talking about anyone here--had this client, this past week, read on...) Just had a client like this. I must have explained about KF7 at least 5x. He didn't care if the book was crap on those devices--as if the people who use them are TOO STUPID or TOO POOR or TOO THIS to count. Very aggravating. I forced the issue (as that's part of my obligation to Amazon), but...ururururughghghghggggghhhh.

Hitch

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by Hitch

NOTHING but sideloading through the hell of iTunes supports AZK, and, honestly, that's been the case for the last two years. Hell, maybe three. Is it three, Tex? Do you remember?

Speaking of things that might as well not exist to me, itunes and all the Apple stuff.

AZK sideloading has been as long as I can remember, but I don't pay close attention to the Apple side of things. You are the expert one on that front.

Originally Posted by Hitch

Yes. That's one of the things that constantly gets up my nose. How nice for some people, that they can blithely ignore KF7s. (I'm NOT talking about anyone here--had this client, this past week, read on...) Just had a client like this. I must have explained about KF7 at least 5x. He didn't care if the book was crap on those devices--as if the people who use them are TOO STUPID or TOO POOR or TOO THIS to count. Very aggravating. I forced the issue (as that's part of my obligation to Amazon), but...ururururughghghghggggghhhh.

Don't SVGs on Kindle also have the problem where the device forces a page break before AND after each SVG? (?) I forget the specifics you explained last time. I'll have to go hunting down that topic.

I personally haven't gone back to messing with SVGs since I know the old Kindles (+ Android/iOS versions) are a disaster with them. Would cause a hell of a lot more headache at the commercial level—you may be able to finagle a handful of images or your individual book, but all the fallbacks are just a giant pain in the butt at scale.

But when I work on books, I do try to lay the groundwork with vector Formulas/Charts/Graphs, so in the future, I could add it into the book when there is better support.

[Oxford-eBooks]

Originally Posted by Hitch

KP3 is worthless, other than for KPF files. The line-heights are UTTERLY effed-up.

Why the finger? They told you, right?

Yes, we get little but grief from KP3... the previous version at least would happily build you an AZK. Not seeing that in KP3.

No, my real beef was about INCONSISTENCY. Some devices and situations will support SVG and they've been talking about it being available for YEARS.
Yep, there's millions of KF7 devices there and we're still trying to support the widest installed user base possible - but threre's 'billions' (kinda) of iOS devices out there and to not support features that would make a more elegant looking book (yeah, folk want their pretty things) in a readily updatable application just seems daft.

So... the general advice is steer clear of SVGs for mass-market eBooks then?
The main reason for taking a little time to revisit this in the last week before Christmas was to see if it was possible to get a reliable soluton to full-page images cross-platform and also with captons that didn't orphan themselves half the time.
I've been through SO many blimmin 'solutions' but never really satisfied - plus KP3 seems to have this really annoying bug where paging back and forward will land the page renderer between elments that make up your image, so it screws up.

(oh, and who else noticed that the left-hand page button triangle thingy is crooked?! Sigh).

Anyhoo... big thanks to everyone that's chipped in here with some sage advice.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Tex2002ans

Speaking of things that might as well not exist to me, itunes and all the Apple stuff.

AZK sideloading has been as long as I can remember, but I don't pay close attention to the Apple side of things. You are the expert one on that front.

Yeah, that's what they tell me, but don't bet your own money on that. :-)

Don't SVGs on Kindle also have the problem where the device forces a page break before AND after each SVG? (?) I forget the specifics you explained last time. I'll have to go hunting down that topic.

Our recent tests indicate that it works--kinda--in KF8, if you don't mind that you can't zoom the image. They work like text, not images. And they don't work AT ALL in KF7.

I personally haven't gone back to messing with SVGs since I know the old Kindles (+ Android/iOS versions) are a disaster with them. Would cause a hell of a lot more headache at the commercial level—you may be able to finagle a handful of images or your individual book, but all the fallbacks are just a giant pain in the butt at scale.

But when I work on books, I do try to lay the groundwork with vector Formulas/Charts/Graphs, so in the future, I could add it into the book when there is better support.

Yes, as do we. But...how many clients will ever bring their books back?

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

Yes, we get little but grief from KP3... the previous version at least would happily build you an AZK. Not seeing that in KP3.

Yes, and you can run both, still, if you have a PC. I do.

No, my real beef was about INCONSISTENCY. Some devices and situations will support SVG and they've been talking about it being available for YEARS.
Yep, there's millions of KF7 devices there and we're still trying to support the widest installed user base possible - but threre's 'billions' (kinda) of iOS devices out there and to not support features that would make a more elegant looking book (yeah, folk want their pretty things) in a readily updatable application just seems daft.

But the SVG issue still exists. If you embed a jpg and an SVG, for every image, to cover all bases, what happens to the delivery fee for the client?

More importantly, the millions or billions of iOS devices makes no never mind, as they say in the US South, because by any form of competent measurement, while iOS users buy games, and apps, and even movies--they don't buy BOOKS. If you mean, iOS users have K4iOS, sure--but there's no way, really, (no decent way) to media-query a book for that particular device, which means you're jimmy-rigging it, for ALL KF8 devices.

(Also: I'm not sure that most readers really give two s**ts about how the books appear. We, the bookmakers, do. But the readers seem to not care at all. Otherwise, there is zero explanation as to why some books that are obviously nothing more than uploaded Word files--and barely that--do so well. We may well want to make "pretty" books--but we're wrong, if we think that's a big issue for the end-buyer. It's obviously and demonstrably not.)

So... the general advice is steer clear of SVGs for mass-market eBooks then?
The main reason for taking a little time to revisit this in the last week before Christmas was to see if it was possible to get a reliable soluton to full-page images cross-platform and also with captons that didn't orphan themselves half the time.

Honestly, I don't see that SVG addresses that AT ALL. People think it does, because of Calibre and the cover SVG yabbity-yab, but it has nothing to do with whether or not an image will go edge-to-edge in a MOBI. They are two different issues.

I've been through SO many blimmin 'solutions' but never really satisfied - plus KP3 seems to have this really annoying bug where paging back and forward will land the page renderer between elments that make up your image, so it screws up.

? Sorry? I don't understand what you're talking about. How many "elements" make up your images? Mine have one--the image. Thus my confusion.

(oh, and who else noticed that the left-hand page button triangle thingy is crooked?! Sigh).

Anyhoo... big thanks to everyone that's chipped in here with some sage advice.

Sure. Anytime, but trying to make a Kindle book, specifically to target iOS devices--I think you're investing a lot of time and brain damage chasing the rabbit that disappeared down the hole, if you know what I mean.


Hitch

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

Yes, we get little but grief from KP3... the previous version at least would happily build you an AZK. Not seeing that in KP3.

You can create an AZK using Kindle Previewer 3. From the menu choose "File", "Export" and then change "Save as type" from ".mobi" to ".azk".

[Cinisajoy]

As a reader, I just want a readable book.

[Oxford-eBooks]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

As a reader, I just want a readable book.

lol, yes I know. All but a handful of the titles we publish ourselves in print and eBook (must be about 80-90 in our catalogue at the moment) are just WORDS, maybe a slightly fancy chapter header to pretty things up. But of the HUNDREDS that we get through for our author and publisher clients each year, about 10% need images, some with captions, some are fairly technical books with diagrams and tables, so we have to address that as best we can to put food on the table and keep the lights on.

Personally, I'm all in favour of trying to make the best work possible and that's the reason why a number of our clients use us rather than (and I'm saying this as a gross generalisation so don't read too much into it) "cheap overseas eBook sweatshops".
Their print book designers have put a lot of effort into the design of the original book and we try to reflect that as best we can in the digital edition using the tools available to us. Yes, we can't make an eBook look identical, and often we need to reimagine the design to suit the media - as one ALWAYS should. And sometimes, we make beautiful things.

We ARE the bookmakers and we are the artists and dreamers that make books to delight young and old. Yes, only we as bookmakers notice the little touches that we put into our work, but what if we stopped TRYING but wash our hands and say "oh well, that's the way it is". This is our ART, this is the lifeblood of those that choose to make a living from it.



Anyhoo... I think I'm going to reboot this thread in a bit because I did have a proper technical question to ask before I went off on a moan

[Shad Plante]

Personally, efforts by professional bookmakers such as yourself, do really improve the reading experience. I'll put up with an inferior setup ebook if I really want to read the book, but it is not as enjoyable as an experience.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

lol, yes I know. All but a handful of the titles we publish ourselves in print and eBook (must be about 80-90 in our catalogue at the moment) are just WORDS, maybe a slightly fancy chapter header to pretty things up. But of the HUNDREDS that we get through for our author and publisher clients each year, about 10% need images, some with captions, some are fairly technical books with diagrams and tables, so we have to address that as best we can to put food on the table and keep the lights on.

Personally, I'm all in favour of trying to make the best work possible and that's the reason why a number of our clients use us rather than (and I'm saying this as a gross generalisation so don't read too much into it) "cheap overseas eBook sweatshops".
Their print book designers have put a lot of effort into the design of the original book and we try to reflect that as best we can in the digital edition using the tools available to us. Yes, we can't make an eBook look identical, and often we need to reimagine the design to suit the media - as one ALWAYS should. And sometimes, we make beautiful things.

We ARE the bookmakers and we are the artists and dreamers that make books to delight young and old. Yes, only we as bookmakers notice the little touches that we put into our work, but what if we stopped TRYING but wash our hands and say "oh well, that's the way it is". This is our ART, this is the lifeblood of those that choose to make a living from it.



Anyhoo... I think I'm going to reboot this thread in a bit because I did have a proper technical question to ask before I went off on a moan

Oh yes. I can spot a $5 proofread within 3 paragraphs.

I have run across some very good image ebooks. Now I will tell you for image heavy books like "Letters from Alcatraz" I read it on my kindle touch and fire but used Kindle for PC for the images. All the images were photos of the letters.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Oxford-eBooks

lol, yes I know. All but a handful of the titles we publish ourselves in print and eBook (must be about 80-90 in our catalogue at the moment) are just WORDS, maybe a slightly fancy chapter header to pretty things up. But of the HUNDREDS that we get through for our author and publisher clients each year, about 10% need images, some with captions, some are fairly technical books with diagrams and tables, so we have to address that as best we can to put food on the table and keep the lights on.

Personally, I'm all in favour of trying to make the best work possible and that's the reason why a number of our clients use us rather than (and I'm saying this as a gross generalisation so don't read too much into it) "cheap overseas eBook sweatshops".
Their print book designers have put a lot of effort into the design of the original book and we try to reflect that as best we can in the digital edition using the tools available to us. Yes, we can't make an eBook look identical, and often we need to reimagine the design to suit the media - as one ALWAYS should. And sometimes, we make beautiful things.

We ARE the bookmakers and we are the artists and dreamers that make books to delight young and old. Yes, only we as bookmakers notice the little touches that we put into our work, but what if we stopped TRYING but wash our hands and say "oh well, that's the way it is". This is our ART, this is the lifeblood of those that choose to make a living from it.



Anyhoo... I think I'm going to reboot this thread in a bit because I did have a proper technical question to ask before I went off on a moan

You sound as though you work/own our shop--that's how we view it, too. Nonetheless, when it comes to things like SVG, having already experimented with that, we are not using it now, EXCEPT for very heavy-text-tables, and of course, we MQ it so that the KF7 readers get a high-ish Rez jpg/gif and the KF8's get the SVG. Other than that, given the troubles with them, we're not yet using it.

Offered solely FWIW.

Hitch