5 ms·

> nobody is going to read a complex technical paper in practise on a phone I do, in fact. Or rather, I often would like to but with PDF? No chance. IEEE explor

> nobody is going to read a complex technical paper in practise on a phone I do, in fact. Or rather, I often would like to but with PDF? No chance. IEEE explore online reading sometimes works, but it would work better if they cleaned up their UI to be compatible with phones. I have read thousands of pages of fiction on a phone and quite enjoyed it. Phones are great for reading if the content reflows properly. Now publishers and content creators would need to embrace non-paginated, reflowing output. This would not only facilitate reading on phones, but also on tablets and laptop screens. O‘Reilly‘s online platform does a good job with their app. There is zero reason why paginated output should be the default in 2022.

oplaadpunt 4y ago
Yes, fiction works because the layout is simple, consisting of text, and maybe images? Research papers are far more complex, and have established standards that aid quick reading and parsing. I absolutely don't want to deal with reflowing equations, reflowing figures, or whatever when publishing papers. Precise margins and column widths.
- periheli0n 4y ago
  Yet, by far the vast majority of content produced today, technical or prose, is read on screens. Responsive webdesign has been around for quite a while. I don’t see a reason, other than lack of effort/investment, why we shouldn’t be able to read technical papers on variable-width screens, in a non-paginated form. Dealing with the technical challenges should not be the task of the author, but the publisher. And indeed, most publishers are on it. What‘s missing is a standardised format that can be downloaded, annotated, re-shared like a PDF.
  - bccdee 4y ago
    I wish there were a convention for sharing whole websites. Even a zip file containing an index.html plus images, css, other pages, etc. would be fine if browsers just supported it.
    - warkdarrior 4y ago
      The SingleFile browser extension can export a webpage into one HTML with all images, fonts, etc that are needed embedded in the HTML.
      - bccdee 4y ago
        Yeah but that works through base64 data urls, which are clumsy. Epubs are zips of separate resources and that works great. We should have an equivalent for webpages and other similar documents—a digital-first competitor to pdfs. Or maybe just broader compatibility for epubs, such as first-class browser support.
        gildas 4y ago
        You might prefer SingleFileZ, see https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFileZ https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFileZ
auggierose 4y ago
O'Reilly doesn't publish math books. All math books in epub/mobi format look like garbage. There isn't a single exception. If you know of one, please tell me. It seems currently too hard to get layout, resolution and inline formulas right in a portable format.
- periheli0n 4y ago
  O‘Reilly‘s online offer has not only O‘Reilly books, but ones from other publishers as well. Some of them have equations. However, they are often rendered as images. IEEE explore does a good job rendering equations on phone screens. Therefore, it is possible. There is no technical reason why equations couldn’t be rendered on a screen just as well as on a PDF. Sure, canvas size constraints might interfere, but this problem exists in principle also on paginated output. Plus, horizontal scrolling is a thing. I‘m not saying a phone is the ideal platform to read a paper containing free energy-like math, but it can go a long way. Much longer than with the artificial restriction to paginated output like PDF.
  - auggierose 4y ago
    Of course it is technically possible, but I haven't seen it done properly. I have never seen a book with math rendered as images that was of satisfactory quality or even close to what PDF can offer. I doubt IEEE explore is an exception, but I don't have an account, so cannot check. I would like to be able to read a book also on a phone, but I am not going to compromise on quality for that, given that I can just read it on a large tablet in PDF format.
    - periheli0n 4y ago
      It is possible to find Open Access articles with math on ieeexplore with little effort. Have a look here: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6767058 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6767058 Does this live up to your maths standards?
      - auggierose 4y ago

oplaadpunt 4y ago

Yes, fiction works because the layout is simple, consisting of text, and maybe images? Research papers are far more complex, and have established standards that aid quick reading and parsing. I absolutely don't want to deal with reflowing equations, reflowing figures, or whatever when publishing papers. Precise margins and column widths.

periheli0n 4y ago
Yet, by far the vast majority of content produced today, technical or prose, is read on screens. Responsive webdesign has been around for quite a while. I don’t see a reason, other than lack of effort/investment, why we shouldn’t be able to read technical papers on variable-width screens, in a non-paginated form. Dealing with the technical challenges should not be the task of the author, but the publisher. And indeed, most publishers are on it. What‘s missing is a standardised format that can be downloaded, annotated, re-shared like a PDF.
- bccdee 4y ago
  I wish there were a convention for sharing whole websites. Even a zip file containing an index.html plus images, css, other pages, etc. would be fine if browsers just supported it.
  - warkdarrior 4y ago
    The SingleFile browser extension can export a webpage into one HTML with all images, fonts, etc that are needed embedded in the HTML.
    - bccdee 4y ago
      Yeah but that works through base64 data urls, which are clumsy. Epubs are zips of separate resources and that works great. We should have an equivalent for webpages and other similar documents—a digital-first competitor to pdfs. Or maybe just broader compatibility for epubs, such as first-class browser support.
      - gildas 4y ago
        You might prefer SingleFileZ, see https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFileZ https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFileZ

auggierose 4y ago

O'Reilly doesn't publish math books. All math books in epub/mobi format look like garbage. There isn't a single exception. If you know of one, please tell me. It seems currently too hard to get layout, resolution and inline formulas right in a portable format.

periheli0n 4y ago
O‘Reilly‘s online offer has not only O‘Reilly books, but ones from other publishers as well. Some of them have equations. However, they are often rendered as images. IEEE explore does a good job rendering equations on phone screens. Therefore, it is possible. There is no technical reason why equations couldn’t be rendered on a screen just as well as on a PDF. Sure, canvas size constraints might interfere, but this problem exists in principle also on paginated output. Plus, horizontal scrolling is a thing. I‘m not saying a phone is the ideal platform to read a paper containing free energy-like math, but it can go a long way. Much longer than with the artificial restriction to paginated output like PDF.
- auggierose 4y ago
  Of course it is technically possible, but I haven't seen it done properly. I have never seen a book with math rendered as images that was of satisfactory quality or even close to what PDF can offer. I doubt IEEE explore is an exception, but I don't have an account, so cannot check. I would like to be able to read a book also on a phone, but I am not going to compromise on quality for that, given that I can just read it on a large tablet in PDF format.
  - periheli0n 4y ago
    It is possible to find Open Access articles with math on ieeexplore with little effort. Have a look here: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6767058 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6767058 Does this live up to your maths standards?
    - auggierose 4y ago