Arabic and zooming PDF's

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by paola

that is even worse, as not only letters are disjoint, but they go backwards (should go right to left)

I didn't mention it, because I didn't want to confuse the poster any further.

BTW, if you've read the whole thread and still don't understand what is meant by "disjointed" and RTL, check out this older post by me.
It contains a very simple Arabic test ePub (without diacritics), and you can see in the post exactly what it should look like.
Unfortunately, most ADE based readers cannot display this ePub correctly, even though I embedded a free SIL Arabic font.

[Hedaya]

I'll play around with sigil some then and see if it helps. Of course, I remember when pessimists said ereaders would never be able to read Arabic epubs at all, so I think this will eventually be solved too. And while work arounds like rooting and so forth "work", this has got to reach a level of ease of use that everyone can work with. Besides, other than diacritics, Pocketbook does work. And the menu can be switched to Arabic as well.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Hedaya

And while work arounds like rooting and so forth "work", this has got to reach a level of ease of use that everyone can work with.

I totally agree with you on that, but, IMHO, the problem is simply that there doesn't seem to be much demand for foreign language support besides the usual FIGS implementations.
For example, I can read Russian books on my Kindle, but it doesn't support dictionary lookup for Russian ebooks, even though the (much older) Mobipocket software it's based on does. And Russian is certainly not an exotic language.
As for Arabic, the problem is that pretty much all Arabic ePubs that you can find on the Internet are non-fiction books about topics related to Islam, which is great for Muslims and Islam scholars but bad news for everyone else.
There's no real Arabic equivalent of Project Gutenberg and the Arabic version of Wikisource has only a handful of non-fiction books in it. Since the ebook market is content driven, it's no wonder that there isn't much interest in offering ebook readers with full Arabic support, because there simply isn't any interesting content (free or otherwise) with mass appeal.

As for rooting the Nook, have you looked on Craigslist? Unless you live in the middle of nowhere (or outside the US), you should be able to find someone who'll root your Nook for a small fee, which is still cheaper than investing in yet another reader or app.

[Hedaya]

Well, you are right, sort of, but not right as well, b/c there are in fact a billion Muslims in the world, so that's actually not a small market, since while Arabs only make up about 15% of that, many non-Arab Muslims are studying and reading it, making that number go up. There are 8 million Muslims in the US alone, and Arabic programs all over the country and internet b/c of it. I'd say the market is under-targeted more than under-sized. 2 conferences a year alone each attract 30,000+ attendees.

Plus, I think, personally that literacy is something that does need to be pushed in the Arab world - for everyone - not just Arabs b/c of how their problems seem to bleed over into our world. Imagine, just like a laptop effort I saw a couple years back, there was an e-reader effort to give impoverished countries access. I know that's on the philanthropic side, but literacy really is an issue. I was shocked when I visited Jordan once and found that most homes don't have any books, magazines, newspapers in them, nothing. Now, that *is* changing for sure, but I still meet a lot of people illiterate, and not surprisingly the majority are women. Educate women, change the world.

I'll get off my soapbox now, but I'm just saying, this needs to move forward. For many reasons, all of them ultimately impact us all.

As for the Craigslist idea, that's interesting. Now, here's the $64 dollar question: if I root my nook, do I know for sure that will solve the problem? everyone says it will, but I have yet to see a screen shot of a voweled text on any device. The 1 rooted nook screen shot I saw wasn't voweled.

Of course, the one reason I prefer to work it out with Pocketbook, by one fashion or other is b/c they have at least tried. Nook and Kindle could care less, and maybe the last ones to make an effort, since they already make enough money. I like to support the one e-reader that has made any effort to work "natively" at all.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Hedaya

Well, you are right, sort of, but not right as well, b/c there are in fact a billion Muslims in the world, so that's actually not a small market...

I certainly didn't want to downplay the importance of ebooks for Muslims all around the world and I agree with you that the market is simply under-targeted. Hopefully this will change in the future. It has already started with Islam-centric software for smartphones and it's only a matter of time before the ebook publishers will catch on.

Originally Posted by Hedaya

Now, here's the $64 dollar question: if I root my nook, do I know for sure that will solve the problem?.

Just post the ePub of the first Sura that I attached to this post in the Nook forum and ask people with a rooted Nook to test it with a couple of readers from the Android app store.

[Hedaya]

No for sure. I'm just passionate about it, as you can tell. :-) I didn't mean any offense. :-)

[paola]

Originally Posted by Doitsu

I didn't mention it, because I didn't want to confuse the poster any further.

BTW, if you've read the whole thread and still don't understand what is meant by "disjointed" and RTL, check out this older post by me.
It contains a very simple Arabic test ePub (without diacritics), and you can see in the post exactly what it should look like.
Unfortunately, most ADE based readers cannot display this ePub correctly, even though I embedded a free SIL Arabic font.

many thanks for this - I am on a dodgy connection at the moment, but look forward to checking this out.

[Hedaya]

At least your "test epub" does look right in pocketbook. =) For grins and giggles, I decided to check it out.