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Old 01-27-2012, 02:00 AM   #121
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Default Re: epub format for e23

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Originally Posted by roguebfl View Post
No there is not. That what we be saying most ePub readers cannot horizontal scroll.
Ah, now I see it.

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Old 01-29-2012, 06:16 PM   #122
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Default Re: epub format for e23

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1. Page references between physical books and reflowed text. Specifically, the fact that they're nonexistent. Let's say you reflow a digital GURPS Martial Arts so that it's now taking up about 800 of your new, smaller pages. Now I hand you a different, physical book that says "For more details on this type of fighting, see GURPS Martial Arts, p. 157." You have no way to find page 157! At most, the reader might be able to tag a range of pages as "having come from what used to be p. 157," but that's not nearly as useful and will certainly require the user to have some sort of "page reference translation window" open.
I think GURPS players are smart enough, that if explained in the introduction, the MA157 is a page reference in the print edition of the book. Tags could also be added to the text, corresponding to the page breaks in the printed books.

What I really want is something like the promised, but never delivered GURPS CD ROM. My books, in electronic format, hyper linked, searchable at my finger tips.
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Old 01-29-2012, 06:29 PM   #123
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Default Re: epub format for e23

As a follow-up to my previous post, ePub may not be the format for the books in question. There may not be an ebook format currently extant which could effectively support RPG books, especially over multiple platforms with different size view ports and aspect ratios.

Unfortunately, there is no 8.5x11 (13.9 diagonal) eReader or tablet. Currently, the "view port" for the PDFs and the books are 13.9".
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Old 01-30-2012, 01:35 AM   #124
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Default Re: epub format for e23

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As a follow-up to my previous post, ePub may not be the format for the books in question. There may not be an ebook format currently extant which could effectively support RPG books, especially over multiple platforms with different size view ports and aspect ratios.
IMHO, the best format for digital GURPS books would be a client side wiki, such as tiddlywiki. You can support tables there, and cross references are easy to manage. You might even be able to keep page references, by tagging each tiddler with the pages it spans. New books can be imported into a tiddlywiki, allowing seamless integration (you import Powers, and the mods for specific advantages appear with the specific advantages). The main issues are that trade dress would be different, that you need some decent horsepower to make it work, once you've got all the books in, meaning that it would probably be hell to navigate on a standard e-reader, and that it would require a lot of reformatting on SJG's side (it would be easier to work from the author drafts than from the finished PDFs).
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Unfortunately, there is no 8.5x11 (13.9 diagonal) eReader or tablet. Currently, the "view port" for the PDFs and the books are 13.9".
Once you remove the margins, it's much closer:
I used Briss to remove the margins from Dungeon Fantasy Adventure 1: Mirror of the Fire Demon. I didn't clop them to the limit, I left a mm or two, and didn't crop the page number and chapter names found on the bottom of the pages. I ended up with a 181x259 mm pdf. That gives me a 316 mm diagonal, aprox (12.44"). However, that's not the right way to look at it, because tablets and pages don't have the same aspect ratios.

My 10.1 tablet (Asus eee Pad Transformer) has a 10.1" 16:10 screen. it has a 1280x800 pixel dimensions (resolution). The screen measures 5.35"x8.56" in portrait mode. In my experience, it's the width, in portrait mode, that constrains it. That cropped PDF has 181mm (7.13") width, meaning that it displays the PDF scaled down by 25% aprox. It's quite readable, and the resolution is just barely sufficient to be able to read the smallest fonts. Tablets aren't going to get much bigger. There's a rumor for a Samsung Galaxy Tab 11.6 that would sport a 2560x1600 resolution, only slightly increasing the physical dimensions, but nearly doubling pixel density. IMHO, bigger than that would make it stop being portable. Now, the resolution is excellent, and would allow clear reading for even the smallest fonts.
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Old 02-04-2012, 07:19 PM   #125
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Apple's iBook format is epup plus. The extensions they've added are what supports the new textbook push they are making. I'm tempted to see what the new textbook authoring program could do by taking one of the smaller PDFs I've bought and cutting and pasting. Need to upgrade to the latest Mac OS first however.
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Old 02-04-2012, 09:05 PM   #126
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Apple's iBook format is epup plus. The extensions they've added are what supports the new textbook push they are making. I'm tempted to see what the new textbook authoring program could do by taking one of the smaller PDFs I've bought and cutting and pasting. Need to upgrade to the latest Mac OS first however.
Their terms and conditions for using the software are beyond abusive, though. They're using a software license to attempt to bypass normal copyright law.
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Old 02-04-2012, 11:35 PM   #127
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Default Re: epub format for e23

The discussion of Apple's license, or really anyone else's, is off-topic. Please don't continue it here.
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Old 02-06-2012, 04:05 AM   #128
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Default Re: epub format for e23

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Originally Posted by Kuroshima View Post
IMHO, the best format for digital GURPS books would be a client side wiki, such as tiddlywiki. You can support tables there, and cross references are easy to manage. You might even be able to keep page references, by tagging each tiddler with the pages it spans. New books can be imported into a tiddlywiki, allowing seamless integration (you import Powers, and the mods for specific advantages appear with the specific advantages). The main issues are that trade dress would be different, that you need some decent horsepower to make it work, once you've got all the books in, meaning that it would probably be hell to navigate on a standard e-reader, and that it would require a lot of reformatting on SJG's side (it would be easier to work from the author drafts than from the finished PDFs).
Let's not forget incompatibility with hardware - I can read PDFs and ePub documents to read on my ebook readers, but I am pretty sure that tiddlywikis wouldn't work.

PDF is a standard that is extremely well-established by now and works on pretty much any platform. ePub documents aren't quite up there yet, but still have a fairly wide spread. But tiddlywikis aren't even close.
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Old 02-06-2012, 04:20 AM   #129
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Default Re: epub format for e23

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Let's not forget incompatibility with hardware - I can read PDFs and ePub documents to read on my ebook readers, but I am pretty sure that tiddlywikis wouldn't work.

PDF is a standard that is extremely well-established by now and works on pretty much any platform. ePub documents aren't quite up there yet, but still have a fairly wide spread. But tiddlywikis aren't even close.
Do they come with a standards compliant browser? because Tiddlywikis are HTML files with inline javascript and CSS. If anything, they're much more platform agnostic than PDF. The main advantage though, is that they are non-linear. They are wikis after all. This means that when you reach Injury Tolerance, Homogeneous, you're one click away from Effects of Injury Tolerance. You don't read them from the beginning to the end, you browse by topic/tag, you wikiwalk them, etc etc.
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Old 02-06-2012, 05:14 AM   #130
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Do they come with a standards compliant browser? because Tiddlywikis are HTML files with inline javascript and CSS. If anything, they're much more platform agnostic than PDF. The main advantage though, is that they are non-linear. They are wikis after all. This means that when you reach Injury Tolerance, Homogeneous, you're one click away from Effects of Injury Tolerance. You don't read them from the beginning to the end, you browse by topic/tag, you wikiwalk them, etc etc.
PDFs can also be hyperlinked, and indeed many RPG publications are (the Pathfinder core rulebooks spring to mind). They can also have detailed tables of contents with live links to each section.

No, a lot of ereaders don't have browsers of any sort. That kind of thing assumes your reader has wifi or 3G. The browsers that are available on eInk readers (the sort that ePub would be ideal for) tend to refresh slowly, which might make navigating a wiki somewhat painful.

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