4 ms·

I find for me the most usable experience is to convert to epub, strip all the CSS and fonts, and let my device sort out the typography according to my preferenc

I find for me the most usable experience is to convert to epub, strip all the CSS and fonts, and let my device sort out the typography according to my preference. I never really understand why people think the publisher is best placed to decide the style I choose to read in.

efreak 6y ago
Why bother stripping them? Any decent reader should have settings to either override individual styles or ignore the stylesheet (FBReader has both, iirc it should be available for ios as well as Android) > I never really understand why people think the publisher is best placed to decide the style I choose to read in. Because that's how books have _always_ worked. My problem is more the huge number of images used in section breaks (and worse, occasionally used in chapter titles). Instead of using an image for a flourish or a section break, _please_ either find a character in your currently used font, or add a subset symbol font; using black images on a white background grabs my attention every time I change pages in dark mode, and even in light mode I can clearly see the difference in background color. Then there's the fact that a good number of them are low resolution, which, depending on reader and styling, causes them to be either pixelated, blurry, or too small to be useful in light mode.
- ratherbefuddled 6y ago
  > Why bother stripping them? Any decent reader should have settings to either override individual styles or ignore the stylesheet (FBReader has both, iirc it should be available for ios as well as Android) Fonts are usually the biggest culprit in making epub sizes huge which on typical e-ink devices seems to affect load and page turn times. > Because that's how books have _always_ worked. Not really a reason to perpetuate it now we have digital media. > My problem is more the huge number of images used in section breaks (and worse, occasionally used in chapter titles). Instead of using an image for a flourish or a section break, _please_ either find a character in your currently used font, or add a subset symbol font; using black images on a white background grabs my attention every time I change pages in dark mode, and even in light mode I can clearly see the difference in background color. Then there's the fact that a good number of them are low resolution, which, depending on reader and styling, causes them to be either pixelated, blurry, or too small to be useful in light mode. In my experience stripping the CSS (and the fonts and images that are no longer referenced) fixes all of this.
criddell 6y ago
AFAIK, it's the only format on Kindle that will use the newest layout engine which fixes justification issues (ie ragged right), kerning, hyphenation, drop caps, and some of the weird spacing issues that earlier layout engine produced. What you are describing might be fine for novels, but for works where the typography is part of the creative result, it's not a great solution.
- ratherbefuddled 6y ago
  I'm largely reading novels or technical text as epubs on e-ink devices and the only time I've ever had issues like those you mention is when publishers have included "arty" css. I wouldn't tend to read magazines in that format, probably pdf on a tablet or desktop if I needed to. For some of these things - like ragged right and kerning - I think you have to almost train yourself to notice them, I've been reading a long time and can't recall ever being bothered by either.

efreak 6y ago

Why bother stripping them? Any decent reader should have settings to either override individual styles or ignore the stylesheet (FBReader has both, iirc it should be available for ios as well as Android) > I never really understand why people think the publisher is best placed to decide the style I choose to read in. Because that's how books have _always_ worked. My problem is more the huge number of images used in section breaks (and worse, occasionally used in chapter titles). Instead of using an image for a flourish or a section break, _please_ either find a character in your currently used font, or add a subset symbol font; using black images on a white background grabs my attention every time I change pages in dark mode, and even in light mode I can clearly see the difference in background color. Then there's the fact that a good number of them are low resolution, which, depending on reader and styling, causes them to be either pixelated, blurry, or too small to be useful in light mode.

ratherbefuddled 6y ago
> Why bother stripping them? Any decent reader should have settings to either override individual styles or ignore the stylesheet (FBReader has both, iirc it should be available for ios as well as Android) Fonts are usually the biggest culprit in making epub sizes huge which on typical e-ink devices seems to affect load and page turn times. > Because that's how books have _always_ worked. Not really a reason to perpetuate it now we have digital media. > My problem is more the huge number of images used in section breaks (and worse, occasionally used in chapter titles). Instead of using an image for a flourish or a section break, _please_ either find a character in your currently used font, or add a subset symbol font; using black images on a white background grabs my attention every time I change pages in dark mode, and even in light mode I can clearly see the difference in background color. Then there's the fact that a good number of them are low resolution, which, depending on reader and styling, causes them to be either pixelated, blurry, or too small to be useful in light mode. In my experience stripping the CSS (and the fonts and images that are no longer referenced) fixes all of this.

criddell 6y ago

AFAIK, it's the only format on Kindle that will use the newest layout engine which fixes justification issues (ie ragged right), kerning, hyphenation, drop caps, and some of the weird spacing issues that earlier layout engine produced. What you are describing might be fine for novels, but for works where the typography is part of the creative result, it's not a great solution.

ratherbefuddled 6y ago
I'm largely reading novels or technical text as epubs on e-ink devices and the only time I've ever had issues like those you mention is when publishers have included "arty" css. I wouldn't tend to read magazines in that format, probably pdf on a tablet or desktop if I needed to. For some of these things - like ragged right and kerning - I think you have to almost train yourself to notice them, I've been reading a long time and can't recall ever being bothered by either.