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[sindi keesan <keesan AT SDF.ORG>]

I tried to compile a linux epub reader (it needs GTK 2.4 or later) then 
read in Wikipedia that epub files are zipped xml files.

Having had such good luck with odt format, I tried unzip on epub.

unzip file.epub produces a directory with 6 htm files (chapters of a
Gutenberg novel) and a few .css files and one cover.jpg.  Six htm files 
add to the same size as the single-file htm or text version.

Viewed with Firefox ePub reader (Firefox 3 or later) it displays as two 
side by side pages.  Mouse is needed to 'turn pages'.

The htm files display with lynx faster, space bar to next page.
The text file is similar but is not the full page width (I am using 
framebuffer text at 1024 and the text is 80 columns).

If I first load the right console Cyrillic font, I can read a Bulgarian 
novel downloaded from Gutenberg in console mode (text or htm with lynx set 
to the same font).

Links2 -g can read the html version (with svgalib in console mode on CRT 
monitor, or in X with no added fonts - Cyrillic comes with links2).

Epub format is read by iPad iPhone (iBook) Bookeen Bookworm and there are 
free epub books online at sites besides Gutenberg.

plucker format does NOT unzip.  The format compresses images for handheld 
viewers.  Probably so does kindle (mobipocket) format for handhelds but 
kindle can also just read text and html.  Since basiclinux is not intended 
to use on smartphones or pdas I won't bother with these.



Sindi Keesan