Gizmodo article: How To Fix Today's Ebook readers

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Ea

On re-reading this I get you're ironic... Unfortunately, I still don't get the point

My point is that PDF is intended to be "just like a book" with all the typography controls, fonts, etc. etc. but the problem is that it is not flexible. In order to get all that typography control in it becomes constrained to a particular page size and does not work well on smaller screens (or larger/different screens sometimes).

[kovidgoyal]

Originally Posted by tompe

And they fail on rivers and everybody notice that.

But the point is that a text is still harder to read even if an untrained person does not notice any problems. So there is still a need to enhance the text to make it more readable.

Rivers are a function of hyphenation. It's diminishing returns, beyond a point text is easy enough to read that further effort is pointless.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

They correctly handle typefaces, punctuation, paragraphs, text styles.

They fail on: hyphenation, widows and orphans

Some of them fail on important aspects of typefaces, especially in the matter of bold/italics. And I'd put low resolution leading to blurry-ish letters in the typefaces category as well, but that's a hardware issue we all know will get better in time. Not supporting proper bold & italics, and lack of font & character support, are software issues that could be fixed already.

Their orphan problems includes orphaning punctuation marks--my PRS-505 will put quotation marks in a separate line, rather than keeping them with the text they follow, when it reads RTF files.

Current ebook readers are all plenty good enough for reading *lots* of text. What they're not good enough for, is convincing most readers that an ebook is just as "real," just as much a work of craft & art, as a pbook. (Opinions of Mobileread regulars don't count. We're fanatics.) For that, they need hyphenation, justification and better font support. (And, of course, a publishing industry that pays attention to how those work in reflowable formats.)

[tompe]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Rivers are a function of hyphenation. It's diminishing returns, beyond a point text is easy enough to read that further effort is pointless.

I have seen rivers in documents produced with a tool that have hyphenation. like for example Word.

I do not agree. If a paper book is faster to read for me then I will nearly always prefer a paper book.

[SensualPoet]

I know we are already four pages in with this thread ... but relatively little has been said that has much to do directly with Craig Mod's musings about "fixing today's e-readers" over at Gizmodo as referenced in the OP.

For one thing, his entire article is in reference to the iBooks vs Kindle apps that run on an iPad. He doesn't once consider Kindle hardware vs Sony or any other e-ink experience -- he's simply bugged by the limitations of the apps on an iPad.

We're all agreed, to some extent, that typography matters; for some of us, it matters more than for others. Typography, as an art, is plainly absent from non-pdf documents on e-ink devices. Poetry, for example, is pretty much impossible on a Kindle.

There are some basic rules of typography -- like the innate pleasure delivered by the Golden Ratio -- that make reading easier. These things include the right balance of text size to leading to line length; they encompass x-heights on fonts and the merits of serif and sans serif depending on the message intended to be delivered. On ordinary settings, the Kindle 2 accomplishes the bare minimum of this successfully -- which is why some of us say the e-reader "disappears" in our hands. It's also why some other devices -- like the Astak -- appear to render text "crudely" in comparison.

It's my belief that the basic art of typography -- kerning, anyone? -- will improve over time on the standard e-reader in the same way that desk-top publishing came of age after a decade of visual hell and tools like Quark helped raise the entire industry's standards. A lot of Craig Mod's article on these grounds can be dismissed out of hand -- basic typography is already "good enough" for the page to disappear on a properly formatted e-ink document. You can find lots of such examples contributed by our own members here at MobileRead.

The second part of his article is about doing something "more" with the residual meta-data (ie not the author's work but your own reading experience). He goes on to suggest that the highlights of 10,000 readers should be linked together to produce "hot spots" of not-to-be-missed passages; or that we ought to be able to see the highlights of one famous author's private notes reading a second famous author. He, apparently, cares what Salman Rushdie scribbles in the margins whilst reading Joyce Carol Oates; I'm not convinced many of us are, however. And it certainly does NOT improve/fix the broken e-reader.

At the end of the day, what I like about an e-reader is that it brings to my favourite reading place -- that is, curled up in bed -- the author's imagination as created in written words. It's not about hearing the words (which is an entirely different way to consume them); it's not about interactively being clever while consuming them. It's just about reading. Other devices, and other times, are appropriate for social aspects of reading and in those -- outside of the reading itself -- the iPad may add value. But as it stands today, the Kindle 2 is not broken at all; it's a work in progress and already has caught the imagination of millions of regular readers.

And bravo! to that accomplishment!

[HansTWN]

If typography is the very important for you, get a device 8" or larger and read PDF files in their original layout. An 8" screen is exactly the size of a paperback, and the PDF books I have really look great. As good as any pbook. But newer Epub renditions have also greatly improved -- as I can see when I compare the same book on both devices I have.

[kovidgoyal]

Originally Posted by tompe

I do not agree. If a paper book is faster to read for me then I will nearly always prefer a paper book.

It wont be. Try it and see. The less efficient page turns alone will compensate for any advantage that typography could possibly confer.

[Drseltsam]

The reason I would never buy a Kindle, is that there are these scary social features.
I'm aware of that most people give a shit if some company (that only aim is it to maximize their profit) knows what kind of book they are reading and how.
Privacy seems to be a concept of the 20th century since people are not well educated enough to realize what they are doing and can't see the consequences.
I'm very happy with my Pocketbook 360. It has good typesetting and is very customizable and finally I have my privacy.

[richman]

For just straight linear reading, like novels in paperback bookstores, my 505 is fine for me. The advantages of the 505 over paperback for me is adjusting font size so I can read it. Can't do that in paper.

Now if I read poetry, or tech stuff, or art type stuff , 505 sucks for me, I read on 42 inch computer screen. So I would think I need a 12 inch tablet that can capture the same experience as I get on computer screen.

If the IPAD was 12 inchs and could capture the reading of TEXT books in same way as pdf on computer with pinch zoom, it would take these ereaders to next level. The 9 inch version is too small for pdf experience for me on IPAD.

[Ea]

Originally Posted by kennyc

My point is that PDF is intended to be "just like a book" with all the typography controls, fonts, etc. etc. but the problem is that it is not flexible. In order to get all that typography control in it becomes constrained to a particular page size and does not work well on smaller screens (or larger/different screens sometimes).

What I'm hpoing for is better typography control in a re-flowable format. As it is, it's 'okay' - doesn't mean we can't wish for, and strive for, better. Perhaps a computer will never be able to completely emulate 'the human touch', but making it better than it is now, should be possible.

[WillAdams]

The problem is, achieving anything better than we have now would be expensive in terms of:

- human effort up-front --- requires better mark-up, esp. coding discretionary hyphens for words which are hyphenated different depending on which form of speech they are (present (to give) vice present (a gift))

- processor effort on the machine, increased requirements of testing for Q&A --- while a multi-gigahertz machine can typeset a TeX document all but instantly, back in the day of 28MHz 68040s my NeXT Cube could take _minutes_ to typeset a complex document --- a more complex algorithm will be more likely to have odd effects in edge cases

- there aren't any good h&j algorithms which will eliminate stacks (multiple instances of a word appearing at the beginning or end of a line) --- every effort to code one which I've seen has been unable to avoid getting stuck in an endless loop

Devices w/ larger screens are available --- the problem is they're _expensive_ (and are starting to go away --- Fujitsu seems to've discontinued their Stylistic ST-6012 slate computer)

William

[JSWolf]

The main problem with eBook on current readers is the lack of hyphenation. Without, you can easily get rather large spaces between words where you might not had there been hyphenation. So really, add hyphenation to the readers and things will be better with full justification.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by Ea

I don't think you should dismiss "typography enthusiasts" wholesale - or at all - most, by far, would agree at least mostly with you, I think.

Well, I did use "enthusiast" instead of "nut" or "nazi"

I do hope the state of the art continues to improve. I just know that I already read quite well with what we have on the iPhone and iPad.

Lee

[leebase]

Originally Posted by kennyc

My point is that PDF is intended to be "just like a book" with all the typography controls, fonts, etc. etc. but the problem is that it is not flexible. In order to get all that typography control in it becomes constrained to a particular page size and does not work well on smaller screens (or larger/different screens sometimes).

Exactly. I doubt we'll ever achieve the nirvanna of automatically resizing page, font size, etc. -- in such a way as to get the results of a human optimizing type for a particular "page size".

I like being able to change the font or the size to what suits ME

Lee

[leebase]

Am I the only person not in love with hyphenation? I'd rather have rivers or a ragged edge than have to start a word, keep it in mind, and finish it on the next line.

Lee