Comments on: Large-print font hacks for the Kindle 2 and DX—plus other tips for the visually impaired http://www.teleread.com/drm/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/ News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics Wed, 15 Feb 2012 18:02:38 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Jan Kortis http://www.teleread.com/drm/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/comment-page-1/#comment-1167062 Jan Kortis Wed, 26 May 2010 01:07:30 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/10/02/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/#comment-1167062 The Kindle DX seems to display pretty well using the larger font options. It doesn't replace the feel and look of physical <a>large print books</a>. What do people think of the Kindle for Ipad for large-print purposes? The Kindle DX seems to display pretty well using the larger font options. It doesn’t replace the feel and look of physical large print books. What do people think of the Kindle for Ipad for large-print purposes?

]]> By: Alan Wallcraft http://www.teleread.com/drm/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/comment-page-1/#comment-1146135 Alan Wallcraft Fri, 02 Oct 2009 17:24:45 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/10/02/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/#comment-1146135 Amazon's problem is that they have hard-wired 6 particular font sizes into TOPAZ ebooks. So in order to maintain a consistent look and feel across AZW and TPZ ebooks they use the same font sizes for AZW too. There is even a 7th size for AZW that Amazon does not want you to know about. The six sizes were not terrible for the 6" Kindle and Kindle 2, but the 9.7" Kindle DX could handle much larger fonts if Amazon was not wedded to TOPAZ ebooks. I think Amazon should break the false constraint of compatibility with TOPAZ and allow AZW ebooks to use larger fonts, perhaps by providing 2-3 ranges of 6 font sizes to choose from. They could also easily add a bold option (perhaps even for TOPAZ), using synthetic bold fonts. Amazon’s problem is that they have hard-wired 6 particular font sizes into TOPAZ ebooks. So in order to maintain a consistent look and feel across AZW and TPZ ebooks they use the same font sizes for AZW too. There is even a 7th size for AZW that Amazon does not want you to know about.

The six sizes were not terrible for the 6″ Kindle and Kindle 2, but the 9.7″ Kindle DX could handle much larger fonts if Amazon was not wedded to TOPAZ ebooks.

I think Amazon should break the false constraint of compatibility with TOPAZ and allow AZW ebooks to use larger fonts, perhaps by providing 2-3 ranges of 6 font sizes to choose from. They could also easily add a bold option (perhaps even for TOPAZ), using synthetic bold fonts.

]]> By: Felix Torres http://www.teleread.com/drm/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/comment-page-1/#comment-1146133 Felix Torres Fri, 02 Oct 2009 17:02:19 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/10/02/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/#comment-1146133 No, OpenInkpot doesn't support DRM'ed books. But, the original Hanlin V3 firmware that used to support DRM'ed Mobipocket was replaced by the worst mobile ADE implementation so far and the Adobe supporters have been urging folks to "simply de-DRM" their mobi collections. Of course, if you can de-DRM mobi you can do the same to ePub and avoid ADE and move to OpenInkpot which is both more stable and more flexible. And, btw, OI just released a new "official" pre-release snapshot built around a whole new front-end gui. http://openinkpot.org/wiki/0.2/UsersGuide Still a work in progress but its a work in progress that puts to shame every OEM reader firmware out there. No, OpenInkpot doesn’t support DRM’ed books.
But, the original Hanlin V3 firmware that used to support DRM’ed Mobipocket was replaced by the worst mobile ADE implementation so far and the Adobe supporters have been urging folks to “simply de-DRM” their mobi collections.
Of course, if you can de-DRM mobi you can do the same to ePub and avoid ADE and move to OpenInkpot which is both more stable and more flexible.
And, btw, OI just released a new “official” pre-release snapshot built around a whole new front-end gui.
http://openinkpot.org/wiki/0.2/UsersGuide

Still a work in progress but its a work in progress that puts to shame every OEM reader firmware out there.

]]> By: asphalt http://www.teleread.com/drm/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/comment-page-1/#comment-1146132 asphalt Fri, 02 Oct 2009 16:45:49 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/10/02/large-print-font-hacks-for-the-kindle-2-and-dx-plus-other-tips-for-the-visually-impaired/#comment-1146132 This confuses me. What am I missing? Font-size is changeable on my Kindle 2; and the font gets very large indeed -- I'm not visually impaired, but my font gets large enough that barely a sentence even fits on the display of my K2. There's a dedicated button on the keypad that pops open a window with the range of font-size choices. Ironically, that button is very hard to find, if one is visually impaired, but once one knows where it is, no problem. Or -- is the largest font on Kindle not big enough? Has Random House quietly demanded that that feature be disabled, too? ?? I doubt Amazon 'hates' the visually impaired, anymore than Zappo's 'hates' people who require orthopedic shoes. Amazon is not in the business of creating accomodation equipment for the differently able, and I would suggest that they don't even have developers with that particular expertise. But I agree that it is extremely frustrating that Amazon has gotten so close to the device being useful to this extra segment of the population and stopped just short. How about putting a single, raised dot on the font-adjustment key to set it apart from the rest of the keypad? But then, I'm the one who also thinks that there should be an affordable Braille device for the totally blind, too. Recoding symbols exercises the brain very differently than listening to audio; Amazon has a big list of available titles acquirable in an 'instant-gratification' manner; and why the heck shouldn't the blind be able to underline and annotate like the rest of us? And why shouldn't they be able to read with their fingers while listening to music? Plus, the physical size of Braille books on paper makes them challenging to store, if one has a significant personal library. I believe that a manufacturer may have taken on a Braille e-reader project; it's just a question of whether Amazon will allow such a device to read its titles. How hard can it be to engineer a pinboard behind a silicone membrane that will form the Braille characters on the fly from .azw files? From there it would be another short step to some kind of underlining/line-marking convention and interface to show annotations. This does need to happen; because it is possible, not hugely difficult, and it would be good. This confuses me. What am I missing? Font-size is changeable on my Kindle 2; and the font gets very large indeed — I’m not visually impaired, but my font gets large enough that barely a sentence even fits on the display of my K2. There’s a dedicated button on the keypad that pops open a window with the range of font-size choices. Ironically, that button is very hard to find, if one is visually impaired, but once one knows where it is, no problem. Or — is the largest font on Kindle not big enough? Has Random House quietly demanded that that feature be disabled, too? ??

I doubt Amazon ‘hates’ the visually impaired, anymore than Zappo’s ‘hates’ people who require orthopedic shoes. Amazon is not in the business of creating accomodation equipment for the differently able, and I would suggest that they don’t even have developers with that particular expertise. But I agree that it is extremely frustrating that Amazon has gotten so close to the device being useful to this extra segment of the population and stopped just short. How about putting a single, raised dot on the font-adjustment key to set it apart from the rest of the keypad?

But then, I’m the one who also thinks that there should be an affordable Braille device for the totally blind, too. Recoding symbols exercises the brain very differently than listening to audio; Amazon has a big list of available titles acquirable in an ‘instant-gratification’ manner; and why the heck shouldn’t the blind be able to underline and annotate like the rest of us? And why shouldn’t they be able to read with their fingers while listening to music? Plus, the physical size of Braille books on paper makes them challenging to store, if one has a significant personal library. I believe that a manufacturer may have taken on a Braille e-reader project; it’s just a question of whether Amazon will allow such a device to read its titles. How hard can it be to engineer a pinboard behind a silicone membrane that will form the Braille characters on the fly from .azw files? From there it would be another short step to some kind of underlining/line-marking convention and interface to show annotations. This does need to happen; because it is possible, not hugely difficult, and it would be good.

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