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By David Rothman

imageThe ePub-capable Adobe Digital Editions was demoed with the Sony PRS-505 at the IDPF conference this month. You”ll be able to use the just-released Digital Editions 1.5 update to send ePub files to the Sony Reader with the forthcoming firmware in place on the tablet. But many other questions are still racing through my mind.

Reflowable, kinda

What’s this about reflowable PDF in Digital Editions, for example? You’ll be able to change the font sizes of PDFs, and from what I understand, this won’t just be with especially tagged files—although the size feature should work better on some PDFs than on other. Ideally Adobe will release, as soon as possible, the details for the benefit of publishers and conversion houses. One variable could be the complexity of a book’s layout.

The other catch is that the reflowable PDF won’t necessarily reflow with the ease of, say, HTML or Mobipocket. You may encounter something like "Page 18-19," from what I hear. And—I’ve queried Adobe on this, since I don’t know—you might see less-than-complete pages and have to move on to the next to get a full view. Perhaps a better term than "reflowable" is "resizable." With so many public library e-books in PDF format via the OverDrive service and others at the New York Public Library and other major institutions, I’m really rooting for this feature to work even though it’s clear it won’t turn PDF into something as supple for the reader as ePub.

Still missing: Equivalent of Cybook Gen3′s valuable embolden command

cybookgen3bigFinally, from what I know, Digital Editions so far has no equivalent of the valuable "embolden" command that Bookeen’s Cybook Gen3 uses, the one that turns all the text bold so you can read it more easily on the E Ink screen. Ideally this feature could work on ePub, PDF and any other formats.

The word is that publishers might object to people messing with their precious books. My response is, "Get over it. People who use the bolding feature will know what the publishers’ original intent was. And what about accessibility issues? For many reader, the present E Ink does not sufficiently distinguish between the text and the all-too-dark background." I’m one of them. If Bookeen can offer the embolden feature without thunderbolts coming down from the Random House legal department, shouldn’t Sony-Adobe be able to?

Progress just the same

Still, despite the issues above, Sony and Adobe seem to have made progress. Ideally they’ll give the e-book nuts here at TeleRead and also at MobileRead get a preview of the firmware update, which could be written up as a beta. Good for everyone. Hey, we’re the people who care more than anyone else about the details, and I would not be pestering Sony and Adobe if I didn’t see potential here. Just, please: show me via my first-hand experiences. My late mother was from Missouri.

Another persistent question, beyond the firmware release date issue: Will owners of the original PRS-500 get a firmware update?

 
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