PRS700, EPUB, and LRF

[danegeld]

Being a graphic designer, I naturally want to use my own fonts and formatting on my 700. I'm also a hand-coding type of web developer, so I know my way around code. The problem is that I haven't been able to find a combination of filetype and fonts that really work. The issues:

1. I finally got external fonts working with EPUB files, but the 700 refuses to justify the text and I find the ragged-right margin annoying and hard to read. From the research I've done, there doesn't seem to be a way around this and the fault lies with Sony.

2. LRF mostly works, but if I embed any fonts in the file, the 700 crashes. It does respect font size, but my only typeface choices are the 700's internal serif and sans-serif fonts. I've tried many different fonts, both TTF and OTF, with the same result. I've been using Calibre (both GUI and command-line) to convert the files from my own HTML version. I know the problem is with the 700 because they display perfectly in Calibre's viewer and the HTML versions are correct in any browser.

3. That leaves PDF, which always displays the way I made the file, but I have to make it (in InDesign) the exact size of the reader's screen and the type doesn't resize very well on the 700.

Are there any options I'm missing?

[grooks]

If you want to change the fonts, start here:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28447

Adam

[danegeld]

Thanks, I do know about that. While I may change the reader's default fonts at some point, I'm much more interested in being able to change the fonts for individual books.

[netseeker]

Originally Posted by danegeld

2. LRF mostly works, but if I embed any fonts in the file, the 700 crashes. It does respect font size, but my only typeface choices are the 700's internal serif and sans-serif fonts. I've tried many different fonts, both TTF and OTF, with the same result. I've been using Calibre (both GUI and command-line) to convert the files from my own HTML version. I know the problem is with the 700 because they display perfectly in Calibre's viewer and the HTML versions are correct in any browser.

The PRS-505 does support very few fonts in LRF-files. I guess that the LRF-renderer on the PRS-700 is the same as on the PRS-505. Unfortunately you will have to try many different fonts until you will find one which will work.

Afaik it doesn't matter if Calibres viewer is able to display the fonts because it just does use the font-system of the operation system automatically.

[zelda_pinwheel]

based on what you say, i think your best option is to create epub files. i imagine you have see this thread already, since you've figured out how to use external fonts.

it is true that currently the 700 does not display justified text ; however, this is actually due to a lack of support in Adobe's epub renderer, not Sony's fault. This shortcoming has since been fixed (the latest version of Adobe Digital Editions does display justified text), so i think it's not at all unreasonable to think that a future firmware update from sony will integrate the latest version of DE and correct that. I know a lot of people would like to have justified text in epub (personally, i've got nothing against left-aligned text ; i actually prefer that to a badly implemented automatic justification, as i can't stand to see "holes" and "rivers" in a page of justified text, which happens a lot if you use medium size display, as i do, but i think i'm in the minority).

i know, this is an imperfect solution or compromise, but the epub format is still being developped and improved, and will only continue to improve, as will the rendering engines.

[jbruce]

Seems to work for me - I don't experience any rag-right.

<p style="text-align: justify;">...</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">...</p>
<p style="text-align: right;">...</p>
<p style="text-align: center;">...</p>

Because this was just a quick test with all CSS justify options - I don't know if you can create a universal StyleSheet which Calibre will reference when converting to LRF.

align test - Unknown.lrf

align test - Unknown.zip

Hope that helps.

Cheers,
J

ps. The HTML document can be found in the ZIP file. And, the verification of left/right/center can be seen in the last line of the paragraphs. Increased margins to better demonstrate. The major problem you might run into is that CSS justification get creepy weird sometimes - because you cannot control kerning between individual words/letters; therefore, may have an increased case of widows and rivers. And, will not automatically hyphenate-split words.

pps. Upon closer inscpection - none - of my books appear to be rag-right; they are all justified. Be they downloads from Sony, PDF conversions, HTML conversions, Mobileread DLs, etc. Everyone one of them.

[Andybaby]

use book designer, you can embed fonts just fine in it.

[maggotb0y]

Originally Posted by jbruce

Seems to work for me - I don't experience any rag-right.

pps. Upon closer inscpection - none - of my books appear to be rag-right; they are all justified. Be they downloads from Sony, PDF conversions, HTML conversions, Mobileread DLs, etc. Everyone one of them.

When you set the text larger than small on a PDF or ePub, the rendering engine ignores the "justify" and aligns everything to the left, with the "ragged" right as described above.

[danegeld]

@zelda_pinwheel -- That's a bit of good news about DE. Thanks for the info. I hope Sony releases a firmware update soon.

@jbruce -- LRF files justify fine. It's EPUB files that don't.

@Andybaby -- I've had little success converting books with BD. It's poorly designed and I haven't been able to download the update from the maker's website. It just reloads the same page instead of downloading.

I've also been exporting EPUB files directly from the latest version of InDesign, but they don't work as well as the ones I hand-code and then convert with Calibre. I did finally get one LRF file with embedded fonts to open on the 700, but it was slow and the formatting wasn't quite right. I'm going to keep trying.

[Andybaby]

there is no update beyond what is here for book designer https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=11786

I dont know how much you are editing books, but using BD ussually takes all of 5 minutes to mark all the chapters, and Make a TOC, and then give me a very nice LRF that is not slow at all. though i load books using Sonys Software.

check out this thread about my testing with fonts
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...4&postcount=19

https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Book...505.2C_and_700

[danegeld]

I've done considerably more experimentation and while I have found a few fonts that work when embedded in LRF files, I've encountered something very odd. I've found far more sans serif fonts that will appear in LRF files than serif, but the majority of those serif fonts I've found that do appear, show up bold. Stranger yet, most of those fonts that show up bold are set to normal in the stylesheet. If I set the stylesheet to show them normal, the fonts don't show up at all. These aren't fly-by-night fonts, either, but commercial ones. Any idea why these serif fonts would show up bold?

[Andybaby]

Originally Posted by danegeld

I've done considerably more experimentation and while I have found a few fonts that work when embedded in LRF files, I've encountered something very odd. I've found far more sans serif fonts that will appear in LRF files than serif, but the majority of those serif fonts I've found that do appear, show up bold. Stranger yet, most of those fonts that show up bold are set to normal in the stylesheet. If I set the stylesheet to show them normal, the fonts don't show up at all. These aren't fly-by-night fonts, either, but commercial ones. Any idea why these serif fonts would show up bold?

are you using book designer? if so

Embed and set the font for the body txt and other things you want to use.

then close the sony output window, and reopen it, then make the LRF.

I find all fonts work if you do that.

also be sure to delete the cache on the reader between fonts or it may look funky.

[danegeld]

Thanks, Andybaby! That seems to work. Whoever would have thought?! I'd been deleting the cache, but never thought to close and reopen the Sony Reader window. BD is some seriouly weird software :-)