E-book

Definition

The Wikipedia (11:22, 7 July 2006 (MEST)) entry provides the following definitions: “An e-book (also: eBook, ebook) is an electronic (or digital) version of a book. The term is used ambiguously both to refer to either an individual work in a digital format, or a hardware device used to read books in digital format. Some users deprecate the second meaning in favor of the more precise "e-book device"” ... “The term e-text is often used synonymously with the term e-book, and is also used for the more limited case of data in ASCII text format excluding books in proprietary file formats.”

History

Ardito (2000) describes how Andries Van Dam, a professor of technology at Brown University in the USA, coined the phrase "electronic book" while working on the first hypertext system during 1967 and 1968 on an IBM 360 mainframe, and that in 1968, Alan Kay conceptualised an e-book called Dynabook, a portable, interactive personal computer with a flat panel display and wireless communication. Though e-books are not new, their uptake has been slow, especially when compared to other e-formats such as e-journals and e-newspapers. One reason for this is because e-books have been available in many formats and these formats are often incompatible and non-interoperable.

(Anurada & Usha, 2006:48)

Typology

DSchneider distinguishes the following major forms

• e-books that only can be read on specialized devices.

• e-books that have been desigend for reading on standard computers (including mobile devices). Typical formats are HTML or PDF (but with adapted pagination and line length). Such books also include navigation features such clickable crosslinks, indexes, etc.

• e-books in plain text format. This is how the Gutenberg project started. This format is also frequent for short "how to install something" manuals.

• digital books that are meant to be printed. Typically these are PDF files with a page size that doesn't fit on our current low-resolution screens (even my 1200x1900 monitors). Sometimes, paper

books are scanned and redistributed as huge PDF files

Standards and Software

Formats

Firstly, one has to distinguis between the formats used to write the book (source) and the delivery formats.

Encoding formats for initial authoring:

1. Any sort of word processor format, in particular MS RTF/doc.
2. XML/SGML based encoding
3. TEX/Latex

Formats that are both used for authoring the source and reading

1. HTML
2. Several XML languages,
   • Document standards such as XHTML, DocBook, TEI or TEI-lite, DITA
   • Open ebook, an e-book standard.
   • Fiction book, an other
3. CHI (MS Compressed HTML Help) that allows to distributed a set of HTML files, graphics and metadata as a single zip file
4. IMS Content Packaging, maybe the most popular format for e-learning texts.

There are several delivery formats, most of them proprietry e.g.

1. Adobe reader in PDF format (see www.adobe.com/products/ebookreader);
2. PostScript (PS)
3. Hiebook reader in HI format ([www.hiebook.com home page]);
4. Microsoft reader in LIT format ([www.microsoft.com/reader/downloads/default.asp home page]);
5. Mobipocket in PRC format ([www.mobipocket.com home page]). Works on most PDA types.
6. Open electronic book package format
7. Palm reader in PDB format (see [www.palmdigitalmedia.com/products/palmreader/free home page])
8. Image formats such as JPG, TIFF, GIF, PNG (typically used for either scanned texts or visually rich formats).

References

• Anuradha, K.T., H.S. Usha (2006), Use of e-books in an academic and research environment: A case study from the Indian Institute of Science, 40 (1) 48-62, [www.emeraldinsight.com/0033-0337.htm HTML/PDF ] (Access restricted)