Media for new RPG products

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Isikyus

That said, what I buy is usually PDF, as no-one's selling HTML (and I'm not very confident using ebook formats).

EPUB is (literally) a series of XML documents in a zipfile with the .zip extension replaced by the .epub extension. When DRM is used, the files within are encrypted. EPub includes optional images, as well.

Sony's non-DRM version (I don't recall whether that's .lrf or .lrm) is also the same thing. The DRM one is the same, except that the files inside are encrypted.

Several of Amazon's formats are also encrypted XML.

Low-formatting HTML (<P><B><I><U><Table><TR><TD><H1><H2><H3><H4><H5><H 6><img><strong><em><span> and <a> tags and closing versions of same) converts to epub easily and with no needed tools except a text editor and a zip utility.

[RogerBW]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

Low-formatting HTML (<P><B><I><U><Table><TR><TD><H1><H2><H3><H4><H5><H 6><img><strong><em><span> and <a> tags and closing versions of same) converts to epub easily and with no needed tools except a text editor and a zip utility.

Yeah… but like most things that involve XML, ePub gets vastly more complicated when you try to move beyond the basics. First you optimise for your own reader. Then you try to make it work on other people's readers. If you want to sell it on Apple Books, the stores require it to pass epubcheck. Which is broken, and trying to make it pass that will break it for non-Apple devices. And so on.

There are good specs and bad specs, and ePub is one of the bad ones.