- gutvol-d - lists.pglaf.org

Re: huge hole of missing months in the listserve archives
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 01 Apr '10

01 Apr '10

missing one month (april of 2009), but otherwise here are the archives: > http://z-m-l.com/gutvold/ -bowerbird

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the ipad and project gutenberg
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 01 Apr '10

01 Apr '10

oh boy, the ipad is almost here... gonna change the world, you watch. nobody has mentioned here yet how apple scooped up the p.g. corpus... i wonder if they gave p.g. any money? i read apple is using the .epub files. oh yeah, now _that_ is a good idea... to put those crappy files in front of a user-base that cares about quality. yeah, that's a _really_ good idea, yep. -bowerbird

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Pre-release proof of concept
by Greg Newby 01 Apr '10

01 Apr '10

As mentioned a few weeks ago, I encouraged people who were interested to set up a pre-release area for items in the Distributed Proofreaders processing chain. There is now a site that has this proof of concept: http://dp.readingroo.ms/ This was done by Greg Weeks, using entirely (or almost entirely) DP items he is the project manager for. But other folks who are project managers can ask to have their items included. He announced it here, and there is some follow-up discussion. You need a DP username to access this forum: http://www.pgdp.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=43367 The scripts are checked in at: http://dp50.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/pgdpprerelease/ It's uncertain whether this will continue as-is, or there will be other, competing ideas, or we'll not keep up with this, or something else. Feedback & ideas welcome. -- Greg

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Re: here's my collaborative proofing system you can look at
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 31 Mar '10

31 Mar '10

lee said: > I would argue that one of the most important lessons > of the internet is that there is practically no such thing > as an "average" user. while i know what you're trying to say, i also know well that only a very small percentage of people use portrait monitors. and about half of the small few who do have _2_ monitors, so they are essentially creating one big landscape screen... > If you ever come across a web site where > you have a right/left scroll bar (and there are many) > you know you have encountered a web designer > who's stuck in the desktop publishing world. most designers today know a horizontal scrollbar is bad... so what do they do? they keep the same old bad design, and they just rip out the scroll bar. so if your viewport is too small to see the whole thing, you're just out of luck... some well-regarded designers think this is acceptable! the whole "reflow" propaganda is, in large part, a big lie. > two monitors, side-by-side, both rotated into portrait mode ... > I can stretch a window across the two monitors i see, so you _were_ just being perverse... and thus my advice to you would be to stretch that window across the two monitors, such that one half of the display is on the left monitor and the other half of the display is on the right, all nice and convenient. but thanks for keeping me on my toes. > Yes, I have similar problems at the FadedPage site, > although it's not quite as bad as they have only > a single frame containing the page image. well, just to be clear, rfrank isn't using "frames" at all... but yes, i could have the user specify some numbers and then i could cram the page-scan into a box of that size, which is what rfrank is doing. (and i believe d.p. as well.) but i'm not sure that's the right thing or the best thing... > I am finding that the problem is really coming down to > the issue of being able to scale the image, > not any of the surrounding controls. bingo. and that's what's frustrating about doing this in a browser, because you want some kind of if/then branching capability so you can _change_ what you do relative to the _situation_. in order to get that kind of functionality, you've gotta go to javascript, and now we're stuck in a whole other ball of wax. and when a user wants to change the scaling -- on the fly -- you've got still more headaches, cured only by a dose of ajax. i'm not saying it's impossible, but it's certainly not _easy_... with my offline apps, though, it's a piece of cake. with frosting. > With a width of 1050 (the maximum resolution of > my particular monitors) to reduce the text to a point > where I get anything like the kind of layout you describe > the text becomes so small as to be illegible; the reason is > while I can reduce the font size I can't reduce the page image size, > which is really about twice as large as it needs to be to be legible. ok, first, my demo uses rfrank's scans from the "sitka" book, and he has adopted the rather irritating practice from d.p. of blowing up the size of the scans. so the scan itself is "too big". for instance, the scan of page 23 measures 1211*1912 pixels. and you can be assured that the book was not _really_ that big. so that's the first fly in the ointment. the second is that i set the image scaling according to its height. if you view the source on my page, you'll find this: height="90%". that scales the image to take up 90% of the height of the viewport, meaning one gets to see the entire page in one's browser-window. that's the good news, anyway. the bad news is that, as you found, on portrait screens, the window's height is so big that the image becomes so large it uses more than half the width of the screen, and thus compromises the basic design, to the point of disaster... the other bad news, as jim found, is that on a widescreen monitor, the image takes up much _less_ than half of the screen. while this is not a "disaster", it's certainly not the preferred thing. i hasten to add that -- on a "regular" 1024*768 landscape monitor that _most_ people use these days -- my image scaling works _nicely_ for them. (although i recommend using full-screen mode for the best effect.) but yes, what needs to be offered is a way for an end-user to plug in the particular scaling which is to be used for that particular situation. or we need a javascript program to determine an acceptable solution. (and maybe an option for user-override to accommodate preferences.) and then, as i have said before, the ability for the user to manipulate the interface at will -- with divider-bars or what have you -- is good. but honestly, given the glacial pace at which web standards evolve, it might be 5 or 10 _years_ before it is _simple_ to do in a web-app the kind of things i can do with my offline apps _right_now,_today_. so for me, this web development is just a nice little distraction that makes it easy for me to show off the general ideas i have in mind. if i ever really have people proofing, they'll do it with offline apps. > If you want any screen shots of the various configurations > I've tried, I'd be happy to e-mail them to you. if you post them, so other people can see 'em too, that'll be best. > These radio buttons don't seem to work at all > with Firefox 3.5.8 on Windows XP. that's weird, as i tested it on windows in firefox (version unknown). the radio-buttons don't change anything when you _click_ 'em; you must summon another page for the change to take effect. try that. (but yes, for that reason, i'll probably change the radio-buttons into a standard button that will toggle between the two states.) > Fair enough. In this case I think you need to include some > sort of access to the easy explanation from the page itself. nah, that would just be more page-clutter to the trained users. the training will take place when new users encounter the site... (and during their early days, as they encounter diff experiences.) > s.m.l. => Spousal Markup Language. So called, > because while there are rules, > one has to figure them out for oneself > ("it's so obvious I shouldn't have to tell you what they are") > and because they're so subtle that > one can't really tell when they've been broken. :-) cute... but entirely inappropriate. as you well know... you always remind me _why_ you're in my spam folder. so, as you know, lee, and as many other people here know, the "rules" of z.m.l. have been posted for many years now... > http://z-m-l.com/go/vl11.zml that file's been up for over 3 years now -- february 2007 -- and other versions were floating around long before that one. indeed, they have been posted for so long that they probably include some small sections that are out-of-date by this time. but for the vast majority of them, i'd say they are well-known. if you really _want_ to know them, that is. on the other hand, you can ignore them if you want, likely with very few ill effects. just don't come around here _broadcasting_ your ignorance... and although the rules might be called "subtle" by some people -- most notably people who can't differentiate it from "zen" -- the fact is that people operating inside my proofing system can indeed "really tell" if/when they're using z.m.l. correctly, because the .html field looks like the p-book page as shown by the scan. and if it looks wrong, it means you've done the z.m.l. incorrectly. so there's an immediate w.y.s.i.w.y.g. feedback mechanism there. > Proprietary simply means "property of." don't come around here and use solely denotative definitions... because we all know you're using that word for its spin value, which is contained in the connotative. but you don't have the huevos to be specific about the negative connotations, so you try to avoid a conscious consideration of their applicability by using a blanket term. spin is used by cowards to sidestep dialog. > You have invented the markup language, and I suspect you > would take umbrage if someone else were to try and alter it. why would you want to "alter" _my_ invention, instead of just creating your _own_ invention that's almost-exact-yet-altered? > Anyone can use it, but you "own" it. right, because i'm not gonna let someone like _you_ come in and "alter" it to the point of _ruining_ it, so no one will use it. > It is thus proprietary. i'm not gonna let you ruin it, no. you can use it, for free. you can modify it, at will, to your liking, just as long as you don't refer to your modified version as "z.m.l." you can build tools, either for my version or for your new mutant. you can use the tools that i've built, for my version, at zero cost... there's no need to reverse-engineer the format, because i have provided explicit documentation on it, and am _right_here_ to answer any questions you might have about it, so that's ducky... but i'm not gonna let you ruin it, no. > This situation is neither good nor bad, > it's simply the way it is. it must be sad to be a man who has no huevos... -bowerbird

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Re: jim replies to his e-mail
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 31 Mar '10

31 Mar '10

jim said: > I told you your latest efforts were broken, > with one display scrunched on the left side, > and one display scrunched on the right side, > and instead of fixing your software > you suggested a work-around. oh, jim. you are completely hopeless, aren't you? :+) i would love to string you along, and let you continue to make a monkey of yourself, but let us cut to the chase, ok? that quadrant design is for regular laptop-sized screens; for large screens like yours, one will use a triptych design. here's a screenshot: > http://z-m-l.com/go/triple2010.jpg i named that with "2010" in the filename because i have another file named "triple.jpg" in the very same directory: > http://z-m-l.com/go/triple.jpg "triple.jpg" was posted back on july 7th, 2007, and shows the same exact basic layout as we see in "triple2010.jpg", so i probably discussed it on this listserve way back then. in other words, i'm about 3 years ahead of you, jim... but, you know, thanks for your "error report", and all that. -bowerbird

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here's my collaborative proofing system you can look at
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 30 Mar '10

30 Mar '10

here's the first appearance of my collaborative proofing system: > http://z-m-l.com/go/sitka/editr.pl you are hereby invited to kick the tires on it and give feedback... i especially invite criticism. constructive criticism is preferred, of course, but if you need to be destructive, do please feel free. i have thick skin. and am fully capable of biting back, if i want. the interface is displayed in 4 quadrants, 2 on top, 2 on bottom; the top 2 will fill the window initially; scroll down for the others; the top quadrants are for smooth-reading, the bottom editing... i expect my text to be very clean after aggressive preprocessing, so the emphasis in my system is geared toward smooth-reading. more instructions to follow, if i get the impression anyone cares. -bowerbird

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Re: jim replies to his e-mail
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 29 Mar '10

29 Mar '10

jim said: > Sorry, I do not keep track of what you have done in the past well, gee, but then you say "it didn't work." how about saying something at the time? especially if you're not gonna "keep track"? > if it fails I delete it and move on. that doesn't help you _or_ the programmer. > In the future if your stuff does not work, I will tell you, but > I notice that when I tell you that something does not work, > you are not receptive to that information i don't see how asking for details is being "not receptive". nor do i see how an offer to troubleshoot the problem can be seen as being anything _except_ "receptive"... but you didn't tell me which program you looked at, or how it didn't work, or say _anything_ specific at all. so exactly how _should_ a programmer react to that? > but rather blame the user nobody blamed any user, for anything. > or suggest a workaround where was a workaround suggested? > without acknowledging that > what you are suggesting > is a workaround. again, where was a workaround suggested? for what? you keep saying things that _imply_ some shortcoming, but you never actually describe any actual shortcoming. so, again, how specifically do you think i should react? -bowerbird

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Re: jim replies to his e-mail
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 27 Mar '10

27 Mar '10

jim said: > OK, the typical pattern of experience I've had > with the programs you have asked us to try in the past > is that they appear to install "correctly" and then > when I try to get them to work they literally hang forever, > or take minutes to update the display. huh? which program(s) would you be talking about? i'm quite sure the programs i release do not "hang", not under normal circumstances or ordinary usage. but if they _ever_ don't work as intended, i'd like to hear about it, so i can troubleshoot the cause. so if you can point me to any such program, _do_... otherwise, i'd say you must have my stuff confused. -bowerbird

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[SPAM] daniel reetz and the d.i.y. book scanner community
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 27 Mar '10

27 Mar '10

here's a video of daniel reetz doing a talk at harvard about the home-made $300 scanning station he built, the design and plans for which he continually refined: > http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/mediaberkman/2010/03/23/daniel-reetz-on-the-wh… here are the plans, now released under the g.p.l.: > http://diybookscanner.org/PDF/DIY-High-Speed-Book-Scanner-from-Trash-and-Ch… daniel also started the d.i.y. book scanner community at: > http://www.diybookscanner.org among other people, this community has some cool members; francesco scanned 6 italian dictionaries to put 'em online, and "postscangrinder" did 36,000 pages of high-school yearbooks. -bowerbird

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Re: here's my collaborative proofing system you can look at
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 27 Mar '10

27 Mar '10

jim said: > Well, my first feedback would be that > on my display, which is 1280, > the text to be edited is scrunched down > the left hand margin of the display, and > the digitized page is scrunched down > the right hand margin of the display, with a big > empty no-mans-land on the display in between, > such that one cannot compare one to the other > without constantly swiveling one's head > like a scene out of the Exorcist. well, yes. that happens because the image is right-aligned and the text is left-aligned. but you can bring them together easily, simply by making your window less wide. another solution is to size the text bigger; you'll find this can make it easier to proof, and thus make good use of your big monitor. but whatever you do, don't do head-swiveling... :+) -bowerbird

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