08-07-2013, 10:42 AM | #1 |
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Static Pagination on different formats
Hi all,
I am in the process of doing my master thesis and I need some help. I need to analyse quickly which different eBook formats allow static paginations. The purpose of this is to offer e-textbooks to students with reflowable content but remaining static pagination for citation and crossreferencing. We dont want to use PDF files because PDF files can easily be copied. I know that ePub allows reflowable content and offers static pagination (if print counterpart is available or used to create the ePub file --> http://www.idpf.org/accessibility/gu...v/pagelist.php ) I need help on these formats. Do these formats provide static pagination? .aeh .djvu .fb2 .html .azw .lit .prc .mobi" .pdb .pdb .rgo .pdb .tr2 .tr3" Thanks a lot. Martin |
08-16-2013, 11:10 PM | #2 |
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1) You have pdb listed 3 times.
2) Some of the formats (pdb) are container formats (think zip file) that can store different formats. 3) https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/E-book_formats should help you in your research. |
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08-17-2013, 01:04 PM | #3 |
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Perhaps if you were to explain what you mean by "Static Pagination" it might help - to me it appears to conflict with the concept of reflowable text which you also want.
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08-27-2013, 12:14 AM | #4 | |
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Quote:
Sure, it's Ye Olden Holy Grail of reflowable ebooks with indices and x-refs that still, somehow, magically work. Naturally, this doesn't really exist. @martinger: As BobC points out, you are stuck in cognitive dissonance. The very nature of reflowable ebooks is that the content moves. This means that there's no such thing as "static pages" or references. The only way around this is to use pseudo-PDF's, like Amazon's "Print Replica" format (which is essentially a PDF, for all intents and purposes). We ran into this when some of our clients, like Al-Anon, wanted to do ebooks, but wanted to be able to use the x-refs and discussion guides that went with their print books. It's just not viable. You can either a) manually create all the links, inside an ebook, so that every topic can be "jumped to," or b) tell your users to use the search features to search for a string of text, or a reference number (like an Outlined number, e.g., I.A.II.b, etc.) That's about all you can do. The whole "pagelist" idea sounds really good--but I'll tell you right now, when someone asks us to do this, it's going to be expensive. It's not fast and easy to track every single page-top (in which version? Hardcover? First Edition, Second, Tenth, Paperback?) and manually mark it. All you can do, if this is what you want, is to do it that way--you search for the first line of each page of text, and you create the list element, and put the links in, one at a time, and x-ref to the PageList. This will only work, BTW, on ePUB3 and/or HTML5 readers. AFAIK, this has to be done by hand. (If not, I'm happy to hear from anyone else who has a better way.) IMHO: I would only consider doing this for books in which searching for a string is simply not possible, due to the labor involved. P.S.: if you think PDF's are easily copied, you really, really ought to read up on DRM and ebooks. I hope this helps. Hitch |
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08-27-2013, 02:02 AM | #5 | |
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Quote:
@OP: You can create fixed layout ebooks, but this somehow defeats the purpose of eBooks with reflowable text. BTW, no matter which format you choose, you can assume that someone has found a way to circumvent whatever copy protection mechanism that you intend to implement. |
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08-27-2013, 05:51 AM | #6 | |
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Quote:
Yes, you can. Crazy people can. (Did I say that aloud?). But it's the same thing; it's a massive,manual process, and each listed item/entry/page has to be referenced back/linked back to the "top of the page." If you have large groups of people all working from differing format books, and using (say), outdated study guides, all of which say something like "beginning at the top of page 54, read the next 5 sections," then I suppose using this makes sense. However, in most cases, by the time you've done all the work to create a Pagelist, (which cannot be read in most ePUB2 devices, IIRC, so now we're really going down the rabbit hole), you could just as easily have created a cross-referenced study guide, by putting the same 5-6 words, or sentence, you were going to have to search for, in order to create the entry link anyway, in some type of reference table. Do you see what I mean? It seems to me that if you have myriad editions, then the simpler plot is to create a table, put the original reference cites ("top of page 54" or what-have-you) in one cell and the text from the relevant sentence/fragment, whatever, in the next, so people with devices can search on it, regardless of which edition of the digital version they have. This would work across PDF's, ePUBs, MOBI, etc. A Pagelist in one edition/version of one digital format wouldn't do that, and I don't see the workload as being one iota different...perhaps even less to create the table. Not to mention--anyone with a word-processor can create the cross-reference table, as opposed to needing skilled bookmakers to create an ePUB Pagelist or MOBI APNX. There's significant cost-savings right there. Plus, the other parts of the OP's post throw me a bit--reflowable versus "static" and the whole "too easy to copy" thing about PDF's. I don't think that the OP has done enough research on the topic in general to understand the issues involved on all fronts--reflowable versus static formats/references, the costs for the latter; the doing of the latter; why PDF and ePUB, etc., are all as easily copyable as the next...lots of ground to cover. And that list of formats--I mean, hell, that list is nearly older than dirt these days. This isn't a criticism of the OP; it's an observation. He needs more background information, and some interaction with ePUBs, etc., in order to get a feel for what's what, (use a real device and the like) so that he has a better grasp on the questions to ask for the issue, to assess solutions that might meet his need--if any exist. Hitch |
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ebook, format, pagination, reflowable, static |
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