Previously, in a kind of reverse thing, any booklike app that didn't have interactivity was refused as a normal app and had to go in the iBook store. But interactivity ie Javascript in iBooks did not seem to be allowed.
The ePub committee spent a lot of time trying to decide if ePub was just a browser and what an eBook was, but maybe Apple have decided.
Not sure they would accept an HTML5 game as an iBook though. A kids book with puzzles in might work though and still sell as a book not an app.
This brings a lot of interesting possibilities to technical books. End-of-chapter review questions that are automatically graded being the most obvious.
Or background/animated images in children' books. Or dynamic content adjusting to what you already know / had already read. I.e. I know what a prototype is, automatically, all the chapters/paragraphs explaining it could be hidden.
As a web developer who specializes in JavaScript, I'm really thrilled -- but as a person who reads books, I'm a little worried. What does the iTunes approval process for iBooks look like? Will any kind of HIG be enforced on the books? Do book publishers have good taste in interactivity? If I wanted interactivity, I would go to the internet.
I find it rather silly to be worried about security given that Apple's one of the largest browser vendors in the world, directly or indirectly via WebKit.
More accurately: all increasing of capabilities in non-immediately-apparent sources IS cause for concern. But that has to be weighted against the exhibited competence of the vendor. I find it unlikely that we-vet-everything our-brand-name-is-safe-computing-experiences Apple wouldn't have considered security in this move.
How is this different than Adobe Reader, where the ability to execute code within a document reading application has resulted in world wide exploits of operating systems?
If my document reader can execute any code in any language, then any document that I read has the potential to execute malicious code on my computer, and I now have an exploit vector that I need to consider when downloading documents & opening e-mail attachments.
I understand that the code can be sandboxed, but before I implicitly trust the sandboxing technology, I'd have to see an example of an unexploitable sandbox. I don't know of any - but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
Right, but "the best" being a very misleading term for anyone not in the know. It too has failed to do the job.. But, of course, no code is perfect. Just keep that in mind.
- what API is available to eBook JavaScript? Can one make Ajax calls? How much of the book's content can one replace? Make permanent changes to book content?
- Depending on e answers, what differences remain between eBook reader and web browser?
I had no idea epub allowed js in the spec. My reactionary opinion on this is negative. Why do we need this? What reason is there to have js in epub when we already have js in html? What distinction will there be between html and epub if they are both just document formats that can also execute js?
JavaScript isn't in the current ePub 2.0 spec. Though it is suggested in the 3.0 draft. Like Apple extended ePub 2.0 with audio/video support, they seem to either support it or not prevent it.
Bingo. Their magazine viewer is bloated. RMSDK is garbage. Start by bringing their expertise in layout and fonts to things that people are actually using. Namely, WebKit and JS.
I was worried about the direction of iBooks and the growing interest in making app-based books instead of using the native iBooks store. This makes me more optimistic about the future of iBooks.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 95.1 ms ] threadThe ePub committee spent a lot of time trying to decide if ePub was just a browser and what an eBook was, but maybe Apple have decided.
Not sure they would accept an HTML5 game as an iBook though. A kids book with puzzles in might work though and still sell as a book not an app.
Cool.
Edit: It's implemented via Mobile Safari, as pointed out by justincormack -- this comment is invalid.
It uses CSS3 columns to make the pages going across.
More accurately: all increasing of capabilities in non-immediately-apparent sources IS cause for concern. But that has to be weighted against the exhibited competence of the vendor. I find it unlikely that we-vet-everything our-brand-name-is-safe-computing-experiences Apple wouldn't have considered security in this move.
If my document reader can execute any code in any language, then any document that I read has the potential to execute malicious code on my computer, and I now have an exploit vector that I need to consider when downloading documents & opening e-mail attachments.
I understand that the code can be sandboxed, but before I implicitly trust the sandboxing technology, I'd have to see an example of an unexploitable sandbox. I don't know of any - but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/security/attacks/2295000...
- is this using the fast JavaScript JIT (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2666763)?
- what API is available to eBook JavaScript? Can one make Ajax calls? How much of the book's content can one replace? Make permanent changes to book content?
- Depending on e answers, what differences remain between eBook reader and web browser?
etc.. :)
What would you like to see from Adobe to change your mind?