one of the most widely-used e-book formats in the last 20 years has been the .pdf format -- a format which has not, historically, done reflow.

And which is a format that is universally recognized to be a page layout descriptor language, not an ebook file format. PDF is a terrible thing to try to read on an ebook reader, unless the page layout happens to more-or-less match the size of your reader screen, and the size of the PDF font happens to be close to something your eyes like. People tend to print PDF out if its more than a few pages because it is so much more suitable to a laser printer than to an ebook reader. Google Books PDFs *do* happen to more-or-less often to match the size of the display on my DX and then its not too bad - although you are still reading a blurry photocopy with an occasional finger stuck in for good measure.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Document_Format

Hey, when the first eBooks came out, they were all .txt files. Now someone want's to rewrite history and say they are NOT??? Because of easily strippable hard returns??? Reflow didn't even EXIST in those days. Much less WYSIWYG!!! And WYSIWYG doesn't allow reflow. . .unless you consider that as after the fact. . . . In fact this whole discussion is after the fact. eBooks have been around so much longer than these other ideal presentations. . .so let the new presentations use new names, and leave eBooks to the people who have been doing them. Don't let anyone co-opt the name eBook! Maybe they were right, and I should have trademarked "eBook," and then there would be no discussion out using the word. Sheesh! On Tue, 20 Apr 2010, Morasch@aol.com wrote:

jim said:

...

   PG txt file is NOT AN E-BOOK FILE    because it does not meet at least    one criterion that is universally accepted    as being required of ebook file formats:    namely reflow.

jim, jim, jim, jim, jim, jim, jim.

it's bad enough that i call you a bloomin' idiot.

but it's even worse when you come right back with a reply that _proves_ that's what you are.

one of the most widely-used e-book formats in the last 20 years has been the .pdf format -- a format which has not, historically, done reflow.

yet you want to rule it out _by_definition_?

please.

i was _fighting_ against .pdf as an e-book format for many, many years before you even showed up, but even i cannot deny that it _is_ an e-book format.

_any_ file-format which can express a book _is_ -- or can be considered as -- an e-book format.

you seem to think you define terms of engagement, that any discussion must be conducted according to the way that _you_ define words.  that's bullcrap, jim.

***

besides, even if we _accepted_ your stupid definition, it still doesn't compute, jim, because an ascii-file like the p.g. e-text format _can_ be reflowed, quite easily.

you just take out the mid-paragraph hard line-breaks.

_any_ e-book programmer can write code to do that...

voila!  reflow!

-bowerbird