Reading PDF files on Windows or Linux

[seuzx]

Hi, first post - have been lurking this excellent forum a while.

On topic: I've used Foxit to read some PDF ebooks on a netbook. A problem is that Foxit (like most PDF readers) can't handle rotated mode well.

My netbook is lightweight enough to be held and read on the side, like a regular book. It is more comfortable than it may sound. And the rotated screen better fits the pdf files format. But Foxit (even in rotated mode) still expects scrolling to occur up/down (which when rotating the laptop means left/right).

What Foxit (or some other PDF software) should do:
1. when user selects rotate mode, ROTATE THE ENTIRE PROGRAM WINDOW.
2. when in rotated mode, add options for trimming white borders or at least some user configurable zoom modes (with hotkeys)

Fixing 1 & 2 would do wonders for netbook pdf ebook reading.

Going a bit off topic:
In general I'm really puzzled by the lack of large screen e-ink readers tailored for PDF reading. There is a gigantic scientific community that read loads of PDF journal articles daily. Yet most ebook readers seems aimed for personal novel reading use or for people with extreme portability requirements.

For academic purposes any ebook reading device has three competitors: printed paper, regular computer screen, physical book.

An A4 sized, wired e-ink reader weighing as much as one kilo would still win over that competition all things considered. So why aren't there a lot of those around? (or are there?) I'm new so you tell me

Edit: I looked into some other PDF viewer mentioned above and found tha Sumatra PDF ( http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/...pdf/index.html ) works slightly better than Foxit for rotated reading. It still has the scrolling problem. Since it is open source I'll post what I wrote above as a request there.

Edit2: I'm also aware that some Nvidia GPU's for example can rotate the entire screen (OS and all). But I don't think the embedded GPU's in standard netbooks can handle that.

[msundman]

Originally Posted by seuzx

What Foxit (or some other PDF software) should do:
1. when user selects rotate mode, ROTATE THE ENTIRE PROGRAM WINDOW.
2. when in rotated mode, add options for trimming white borders or at least some user configurable zoom modes (with hotkeys)

No and no. The most common useage for rotating is when the document you're reading is rotated incorrectly in the first place.
1. If the user wants to rotate everything then she/he should rotate everything. If the OS or graphics card driver doesn't support rotating everything then she/he should choose one that does if this feature is wanted. I've never encountered a mobile GPU that didn't support rotating the screen.
2. Trimming/zooming is completely orthogonal to rotating. That is, whatever trimming/zooming features you have should be completely independent of whatever rotate mode(s) you have.

[seuzx]

Ok, ok. If I specify (not change) what I meant I think we can agree :

1. when user selects [an additional, optional] rotate mode, ROTATE THE ENTIRE PROGRAM WINDOW.
2. when in rotated mode [or any other mode], add options for trimming white borders or at least some user configurable zoom modes (with hotkeys)

Also note that there's a difference between wanting to rotate the entire OS and wanting to rotate the entire window of a single program within the OS. I requested the latter.

The former can be useful too sometimes though. I just found out that Irotate http://www.entechtaiwan.com/util/irotate.shtm actually works for my netbook - great. I only wish I'd found it much earlier.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by seuzx

What Foxit (or some other PDF software) should do:
1. when user selects rotate mode, ROTATE THE ENTIRE PROGRAM WINDOW.
2. when in rotated mode, add options for trimming white borders or at least some user configurable zoom modes (with hotkeys)

Have you tried Digital Editions? It is really designed to consider PDFs ebooks more than Adobe Reader or Foxit may be.

BOb