Digital Publishing: Are You Getting the Most Out of EPUB 3?
You’re Not In This Alone
Fortunately, as support for EPUB 3 has gained momentum, lots of resources have emerged. EPUBCheck tells you if your EPUB 3 file has coding mistakes. The free Readium plug-in for Chrome lets you view your EPUB 3 files; it has implemented all EPUB 3.0 features. The Readium software is open-source, which will make it easier for reading systems to implement EPUB 3; there will soon be an open-source Readium SDK as well. IDPF, the organization that governs EPUB, has provided a wealth of EPUB 3 samples so you can see how other publishers have done things, and is developing a Compliance Test Suite that will test how well reading systems implement each feature of EPUB 3. The BISG publishes an EPUB 3 Support Grid that monitors which features of EPUB 3 are currently supported by each reading system. And O’Reilly recently published (in cooperation with the IDPF) EPUB 3 Best Practices, a clear and comprehensive guide to the spec, with helpful advice on what to do and what not to do to ensure that your EPUBs work well. (This article is largely based on that book, to which I contributed.)