Anybody here dealt with "Redshelf" vis: ePUB?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by MarjaE

I'd expect the educational sector to have high standards for accessibility.

Because standard epub is a lot more accessible than whatever they're doing with the flashing dots, flashing when using the built-in screen reader, no keyboard navigation, small text, faint text, hard-to-read fonts, etc.

MarjaE:

But..the size of a "page" in an eBook has nothing to do with accessiblity. And vis: page numbers--how many ePUBs have you seen, with hard-coded page numbers? We can, as I previously explained, add RPNs--Real Page numbers, which are encoded (invisibly to all), but which can be accessed and displayed (or heard).

What's peculiar is that I told this client to upload a PDF and they were told that they could--but that RedShelf's "preference" is for ePUB. Couldn't tell it from what I've seen,that's fersure.

A note on accessibility--what would be really nice would be if every college, university, institute and Tom, Dick and Harriet didn't have their own damn made-up accessibility standards. I just went through a brain-damaging process with a college-professor client, whose university insisted that our ePDF only met 49% of their accessibility standards and when we finally--finally--figured out WTH they wanted, was it in WCAG2? Was it even close? Did it even MAKE SENSE? Hell, no.

Hitch

[JSWolf]

Hitch, they should tell you exactly what they want up front so when you are making the eBooks, you can make them with whatever it is they need instead of having to go back and redo things because they didn't say first.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Hitch, they should tell you exactly what they want up front so when you are making the eBooks, you can make them with whatever it is they need instead of having to go back and redo things because they didn't say first.

I agree, but overall, Jon, this is a good and considerate customer; thus, I don't mind the request.

Hitch

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I agree, but overall, Jon, this is a good and considerate customer; thus, I don't mind the request.

Hitch

Have you figured out how to code this eBook for Redshell?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Have you figured out how to code this eBook for Redshell?

Nope. They haven't (the customer) been able to come up with any usable specs. It's bizarre.

Hitch

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Nope. They haven't (the customer) been able to come up with any usable specs. It's bizarre.

Hitch

And they won't say how to convert an ePub to work on their lousy system?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

And they won't say how to convert an ePub to work on their lousy system?

There are no specs at all, apparently. We're supposed to Kreskin our way through it.

Hitch

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Hitch

There are no specs at all, apparently. We're supposed to Kreskin our way through it.

Hitch

You didn't find their BestPracticesDigitalPub pdf file useful? All 2 pages and 10MB? I think it ranks up there with their accessibility guidelines for using the most electrons to supply the least information.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DNSB

You didn't find their BestPracticesDigitalPub pdf file useful? All 2 pages and 10MB? I think it ranks up there with their accessibility guidelines for using the most electrons to supply the least information.

Mwahaha.

Indeed.

Hitch

[PeterT]

I fell into the rabbit hole of looking for info on their offering. Tons of reviews saying how bad it is from both students and professors but nada on content creation.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by PeterT

I fell into the rabbit hole of looking for info on their offering. Tons of reviews saying how bad it is from both students and professors but nada on content creation.

Oh, hey, was that you I saw down there waving at me? I thought that dude looked familiar. :-)

Me, too. UNfreakingBELIEVABLE how obscure the info is.

Hitch

[MarjaE]

Originally Posted by Hitch

MarjaE:

But..the size of a "page" in an eBook has nothing to do with accessiblity.

Except that people may need to enlarge text to read it. It's harder to do that if we can't reflow text. Yes, some people can use zoom and pan, but not everyone.

A note on accessibility--what would be really nice would be if every college, university, institute and Tom, Dick and Harriet didn't have their own damn made-up accessibility standards. I just went through a brain-damaging process with a college-professor client, whose university insisted that our ePDF only met 49% of their accessibility standards and when we finally--finally--figured out WTH they wanted, was it in WCAG2? Was it even close? Did it even MAKE SENSE? Hell, no.

Hitch

WCAG standards are better than the web as it is, but they aren't enough.

For example, they permit flashing and scrolling text under certain circumstances. For example, for very important alerts, or if it flashes less than 3 times per second, for less than 5 seconds. Such important alerts that it's alright to make people sick and leave people unable to read the actual alert.

https://www.w3.org/WAI/test-evaluate...minary/#moving

For another, they don't address smooth scrolling. A lot of sites override browser settings, and impose smooth scrolling regardless of user preferences and accessibility needs.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by MarjaE

Except that people may need to enlarge text to read it. It's harder to do that if we can't reflow text. Yes, some people can use zoom and pan, but not everyone.

Yes, but that was precisely my POINT. They're saying that our "pages" (in an ePUB, mind you) don't "fit" their page size. What the holy hell does that mean? It's ridiculous. If we were discussing a PDF, yes, I'd agree; pan-scan, tap-zoom, etc., is onerous, but we're not.

WCAG standards are better than the web as it is, but they aren't enough.

For example, they permit flashing and scrolling text under certain circumstances. For example, for very important alerts, or if it flashes less than 3 times per second, for less than 5 seconds. Such important alerts that it's alright to make people sick and leave people unable to read the actual alert.

https://www.w3.org/WAI/test-evaluate...minary/#moving

For another, they don't address smooth scrolling. A lot of sites override browser settings, and impose smooth scrolling regardless of user preferences and accessibility needs.

We recently had to remake a huge file--over 1200 pages when laid for ePDF--3 times, because the "university" that insisted that it had to meet their accessibility standards just slapped some items on there that aren't included in anyone else's. Suffice to say that I was livid, as the things that they wanted don't come easily, when you're exporting an ePUB, to text/Word, thence to PDF. (For example, if you export a Word file to HTML, the alt-text doesn't go with!).

It's one thing to be asked to meet accessibility standards. It's another to be required to meet someone's arbitrary, undocumented accessibility standards.

In this instance, Redshelf has NO documented standards, for accessibility or anything else. At least they are EEObnoxious.

Hitch

[najgori]

Originally Posted by Hitch

(For example, if you export a Word file to HTML, the alt-text doesn't go with!).

Hitch

This is very interesting. Is there a topic on Mobileread that goes into more detail about that, esp. about differences between alt and title attributes and their implementation in Kobo epubs and Kindle mobi/azw/... ebooks?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by najgori

This is very interesting. Is there a topic on Mobileread that goes into more detail about that, esp. about differences between alt and title attributes and their implementation in Kobo epubs and Kindle mobi/azw/... ebooks?

I don't think so. Hmmmm...where is my buddy Tex? Tex2002ans? He's very good at documenting that sort of anomalous crap.

I have to say, I find that exceedingly annoying, too. it's one thing to export a Word file to HTML, get the title attributes and all that, but then, when you export it to PDF, get nuttin'. THAT was not fun.

Hitch