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This was on HN yesterday, and according to that thread the only ebook option was a DRMed PDF. I'll buy this book in a heartbeat if either of those two acronyms

This was on HN yesterday, and according to that thread the only ebook option was a DRMed PDF. I'll buy this book in a heartbeat if either of those two acronyms goes away. Ideologically the DRM should go, but practically I'd rather the PDF would go.

pizza234 9y ago
PDF and formats like EPUB are different use cases. Definitely without PDF, audiences would not benefit from the very careful editing that has been done, plus other tools associated to fixed-layout renderers, like freehand drawing. No audience benefits from DRM, but definitely a part of it does from the PDF format.
- Tepix 9y ago
  Maybe it's more important to have some readers rather than to have a pixel perfect layout. I and others will not read it as a PDF.
  - bananaboy 9y ago
    I can't help but feel that you're in a minority there.
    - munificent 9y ago
      My book [1] is available in print, Kindle, EPUB, and PDF versions. I sell many more EPUB versions than PDF, and way more Kindle (which is basically EPUB) versions. Most of that likely has to do with visibility — Kindle and Amazon are highly-used storefronts and platforms. But part of it is also I think fewer people actually do want a PDF version. PDF does look much better than EPUB — it has the fonts and layout that I carefully crafted for the print edition. But it's less flexible and responsible to the device you're viewing it on. That quickly takes its toll. A beautiful page layout that you have to keep pinch-zooming and scrolling around on to see everything isn't really "beautiful" when you consider the whole user experience. [1]: http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com/ http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com/
      - reificator 9y ago
        Especially when pinch zooming on an eink screen with approx. 1fps...
      - reificator 9y ago
        Oh also, I skimmed over the link last time I replied. I love your book, found individual sections while researching years and years ago and as soon as I saw there was a book available I grabbed it. Thanks for both providing that resource and for making it available in whichever I bought, Kindle or EPUB. The website is also very pleasant to read, and I like the way you handled asides across breakpoints.
        munificent 9y ago
        Thank you! I put a lot of effort into the design of the site, print, and EPUB editions try to make each as readable as possible within their own unique constraints.
      - pizza234 9y ago
        My judgment is skewed by having a Surface Book, which is 13.5" (3:2), which makes reading PDFs very comfortable in almost all the cases (exception being only the badly edited PDFs with extremely small fonts). I am very surprised though, that there are essentially no large tablets on the market, as I think 12.* is the minimum for comfortable reading, and I assume there is plenty of people using tablets for reading. I understand that cramming a Windows-capable machine in 13.5 inches and 700gr is reserved to high end machines, but I wonder why they don't do that with ARM CPUs (I'm aware of the Chuwi, but it's 1.1 kg, and 700 is barely the limit for reading for hours).
      - Tepix 9y ago
        It depends on the device. On a typical 6inch eink ebook reader, a PDF is pretty much unusable, unreadable or both.
  - pizza234 9y ago
    Even if we ignore what you call "pixel perfection" (which is actually more significant than that, as without fixed layout it's impossible for example, to lay images where intended, or with an expected proportion with the text), it's simply that some tools (any form of annotation essentially) doesn't make sense on a variable layout. Of course, EPUB makes sense for allowing reading on a variety of screen sizes/devices, but expecting PDF to disappear ignores important use cases.
  - wolfgke 9y ago
    > Maybe it's more important to have some readers rather than to have a pixel perfect layout. I and others will not read it as a PDF. What formats would you prefer? Serious question. My own position on PDF is that it has the central problem that it is a very complicated format for which it is error-prone to write a sufficiently compliant implementation. But most alternative ebook formats also have a rather complicated specification, so most common alternative ebook formats arre replacing one evil by another.
  - dkersten 9y ago
    On the other hand, I read a lot of things as PDF. I basically read: paper, kindle and PDF, roughly in equal measure. I typically prefer kindle (which I read on a kindle paperwhite and occasionally on iPad, although I prefer PDF here), but if I'm reading on laptop or desktop, I prefer PDF. When possible, I like to have both Kindle and PDF formatted books, so that I can read whatever I prefer for the device I'm currently using. But, besides all of that, if I can only choose a single of those formats, I would choose PDF.
    - Tepix 9y ago
      I would read PDF if large (13+ inches) eink readers weren't so expensive...
- reificator 9y ago
  Perhaps I worded it poorly, but my intent is not to remove PDF versions from distribution. I understand the benefits of PDF. My Kindle Voyage does not. If I had a 13" eink display with frontlighting, plenty of storage, the ability to read all my books that I've purchased, in slim profile, with low weight, then I'd love PDFs. But based on what's available and what I'm willing to spend, I've settled on the Voyage, which is perfect for my needs in all respects apart from size. Which means PDF is right out.

pizza234 9y ago

PDF and formats like EPUB are different use cases. Definitely without PDF, audiences would not benefit from the very careful editing that has been done, plus other tools associated to fixed-layout renderers, like freehand drawing. No audience benefits from DRM, but definitely a part of it does from the PDF format.

Tepix 9y ago
Maybe it's more important to have some readers rather than to have a pixel perfect layout. I and others will not read it as a PDF.
- bananaboy 9y ago
  I can't help but feel that you're in a minority there.
  - munificent 9y ago
    My book [1] is available in print, Kindle, EPUB, and PDF versions. I sell many more EPUB versions than PDF, and way more Kindle (which is basically EPUB) versions. Most of that likely has to do with visibility — Kindle and Amazon are highly-used storefronts and platforms. But part of it is also I think fewer people actually do want a PDF version. PDF does look much better than EPUB — it has the fonts and layout that I carefully crafted for the print edition. But it's less flexible and responsible to the device you're viewing it on. That quickly takes its toll. A beautiful page layout that you have to keep pinch-zooming and scrolling around on to see everything isn't really "beautiful" when you consider the whole user experience. [1]: http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com/ http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com/
    - reificator 9y ago
      Especially when pinch zooming on an eink screen with approx. 1fps...
    - reificator 9y ago
      Oh also, I skimmed over the link last time I replied. I love your book, found individual sections while researching years and years ago and as soon as I saw there was a book available I grabbed it. Thanks for both providing that resource and for making it available in whichever I bought, Kindle or EPUB. The website is also very pleasant to read, and I like the way you handled asides across breakpoints.
      - munificent 9y ago
        Thank you! I put a lot of effort into the design of the site, print, and EPUB editions try to make each as readable as possible within their own unique constraints.
    - pizza234 9y ago
      My judgment is skewed by having a Surface Book, which is 13.5" (3:2), which makes reading PDFs very comfortable in almost all the cases (exception being only the badly edited PDFs with extremely small fonts). I am very surprised though, that there are essentially no large tablets on the market, as I think 12.* is the minimum for comfortable reading, and I assume there is plenty of people using tablets for reading. I understand that cramming a Windows-capable machine in 13.5 inches and 700gr is reserved to high end machines, but I wonder why they don't do that with ARM CPUs (I'm aware of the Chuwi, but it's 1.1 kg, and 700 is barely the limit for reading for hours).
    - Tepix 9y ago
      It depends on the device. On a typical 6inch eink ebook reader, a PDF is pretty much unusable, unreadable or both.
- pizza234 9y ago
  Even if we ignore what you call "pixel perfection" (which is actually more significant than that, as without fixed layout it's impossible for example, to lay images where intended, or with an expected proportion with the text), it's simply that some tools (any form of annotation essentially) doesn't make sense on a variable layout. Of course, EPUB makes sense for allowing reading on a variety of screen sizes/devices, but expecting PDF to disappear ignores important use cases.
- wolfgke 9y ago
  > Maybe it's more important to have some readers rather than to have a pixel perfect layout. I and others will not read it as a PDF. What formats would you prefer? Serious question. My own position on PDF is that it has the central problem that it is a very complicated format for which it is error-prone to write a sufficiently compliant implementation. But most alternative ebook formats also have a rather complicated specification, so most common alternative ebook formats arre replacing one evil by another.
- dkersten 9y ago
  On the other hand, I read a lot of things as PDF. I basically read: paper, kindle and PDF, roughly in equal measure. I typically prefer kindle (which I read on a kindle paperwhite and occasionally on iPad, although I prefer PDF here), but if I'm reading on laptop or desktop, I prefer PDF. When possible, I like to have both Kindle and PDF formatted books, so that I can read whatever I prefer for the device I'm currently using. But, besides all of that, if I can only choose a single of those formats, I would choose PDF.
  - Tepix 9y ago
    I would read PDF if large (13+ inches) eink readers weren't so expensive...
reificator 9y ago
Perhaps I worded it poorly, but my intent is not to remove PDF versions from distribution. I understand the benefits of PDF. My Kindle Voyage does not. If I had a 13" eink display with frontlighting, plenty of storage, the ability to read all my books that I've purchased, in slim profile, with low weight, then I'd love PDFs. But based on what's available and what I'm willing to spend, I've settled on the Voyage, which is perfect for my needs in all respects apart from size. Which means PDF is right out.