Re: My opinions about the future of EPUB 3.2

Dear Makoto,

Re. digital mangas, there was no deep discussion on the matter at the TPAC. It was underlined that a CG will very soon be created (I received a draft of a charter from Samuel yesterday), with the objective to work on the model and taxonomy Samuel presented in Tokyo. The technical work will continue at EDRLab until the work of the CG is achieved. 

> Still, I will not be surprised even if features supported by only one implementation  are widely used by publishers.
This would be a showstopper for a W3C standardization of EPUB 3.2. This is why testing the implementation of EPUB 3.2 features among reading systems is required before we go in such direction.  

Laurent 

> Le 24 oct. 2018 à 16:05, MURATA Makoto <eb2m-mrt@asahi-net.or.jp> a écrit :
> 
> Liisa,
> 
> 2018年10月24日(水) 21:59 McCloy-Kelley, Liisa <lmccloy-kelley@penguinrandomhouse.com <mailto:lmccloy-kelley@penguinrandomhouse.com>>:
> Makoto-
> 
>  
> 
> I was heartened last night to have Jeff Jaffe explain that interoperability is by feature, not against the whole spec. Which to me makes it seem more likely that we might find 2 supported instances for each feature somewhere in the world.
> 
> 
> It is nice to hear that interoperability is by feature.  Still, I will not 
> be surprised even if features supported by only one implementation 
> are widely used by publishers.
>  
> 
>  
> 
> From my perspective, we cannot throw out the features that our customers rely on before they are supported more widely on the OWP. We must find a path from where we are with EPUB 3.x to where we want to be.
> 
> 
> Agreed.  I think that we should try to enhance the OWP rather than 
> trying to make EPUB4 in a hurry.  Haste makes waste.
>  
> 
> I think it would be incredibly helpful if you could help us understand the priorities for the marketplace that you represent. Here are a few questions toward that end:
> 
> Is moving 3.2 to ISO approval important for the Japanese market?
> 
> Prof. Ishikawa, a member of the United Nation’s Committee on 
> the Rights of Persons with Disabilities., requested ISO/IEC 
> standardization of EPUB for the promotion of accessible 
> publications.  
> 
> https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/06/15/national/blind-activist-elected-u-n-disability-committee/#.W9BwJUv7SUk <https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/06/15/national/blind-activist-elected-u-n-disability-committee/#.W9BwJUv7SUk>
> 
> This committee published Article 9 on accessibility <https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CRPD/GC/DGCArticle9.doc>.  
> 
> 32. As part of their review of accessibility legislation, States parties must also consider their laws on public procurement to ensure that their public procurement procedures incorporate accessibility requirements. It is unacceptable to use public funds to create or perpetuate the inequality that inevitably results from inaccessible services and facilities.   
> 
> Such public procurement requires internationally-agreed 
> technical standards.
> 
> Prof. Ishikawa spoke with an expert of International Law.  
> According to the expert, there is consensus on the 
> definition of international standards.  But everybody agrees 
> that ISO or IEC standards are international standards.  
> Some people do not think ITU recommendations 
> are international standards.  Few people consider IEEE or 
> W3C specifications as international standards.
> 
>  
> Is AudioPUB an interesting concept for the Japanese market?
> The audio book market in Japan is smaller than in Europe 
> and the United States.  I have not heard publishers mention 
> audio books, but I should ask them.
> 
> But DAISY talking books are used by a library called Sapie. They 
> have more than 70 thousands DAISY talking books.
>  
> What kind of priority and resources would you associate with the Manga work?
> 
> Is this topic discussed in TPAC?   I think that standardization 
> of future digital manga is strongly required.  It should begin 
> with design principles (or grammatology) of the authors, 
> artists, etc., working on sequential art.  Samuel's taxonomy 
> and Rachel Nabor's diagrams in the Tokyo WS are good 
> starting points.  I hope to create a Japanese mailing list 
> under the upcoming community group, and invite 
> manga authors and editors.
> 
> Regards,
> Makoto
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> Would you help us with those questions?
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks much!
> 
>  
> 
> Liisa
> 
>  
> 
> From: MURATA Makoto <eb2m-mrt@asahi-net.or.jp <mailto:eb2m-mrt@asahi-net.or.jp>>
> Date: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 5:49 AM
> To: W3C Publishing Business Group <public-publishingbg@w3.org <mailto:public-publishingbg@w3.org>>
> Subject: Re: My opinions about the future of EPUB 3.2
> Resent-From: <public-publishingbg@w3.org <mailto:public-publishingbg@w3.org>>
> Resent-Date: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 5:49 AM
> 
>  
> 
> Folks, 
> 
>  
> 
> I will not repeat my argument against dropping non-
> 
> interoperable features.  Here I would like to explain 
> 
> my opinions about fundamental problems that cause 
> 
> interoperability problems to EPUB 2.X and 3.X.
> 
>  
> 
> EPUB has deviated from the OWP.  EPUB has its 
> 
> own features (such as the spine element) that affect 
> 
> rendering and user interactions.  Unless we drop 
> 
> all such features and enhance the OWP instead, 
> 
> interoperability of OWP will NOT guarantee 
> 
> interoperability of EPUB. 
> 
>  
> 
> So I conjecture that EPUB 3.X will not provide 
> 
> interoperability no matter what we do.   Certainly, 
> 
> this is unfortunate.  Creating profiles of EPUB 
> 
> might work, though.  (In Japan, it worked.)
> 
>  
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Makoto
> 
>  
> 
> 2018年10月24日(水) 18:22 Laurent Le Meur <laurent.lemeur@edrlab.org <mailto:laurent.lemeur@edrlab.org>>:
> 
> Hi,  
> 
>  
> 
> To use the new WG motto: what is the problem we're trying to solve? 
> 
>  
> 
> I see two problems to solve here:
> 
> 1/ raise the level of interoperability of EPUB 3 reading systems
> 
> 2/ get EPUB 3.2 standardized by ISO, in order to get Asian adhesion to this version of the standard.
> 
>  
> 
> Getting EPUB 3.2 standardized by the W3C is therefore not a solution to the problems; the fact is that resolving the first problem is required to get EPUB 3.2 as a rec, and getting EPUB 3.2 as a rec is a possible step in the resolution of the second one.
> 
>  
> 
> Therefore I propose to first tackle the first problem, the interoperability issue.
> 
>  
> 
> For this purpose we need IMO to 
> 
> a/ define what interoperability really means in our case; this is not so obvious, as there is a large diversity of reading systems (especially those based on browser engines, those with custom rendering engines, those with no visual engine (audio or braille UAs); we may have to defines different classes of reading systems and different interoperability levels.
> 
> b/ list every feature defined in EPUB 3.2, with their testing requirements. Be careful about what we want to test: do we (still) want to replicate the html/css "can I use"? for custom rendering engines, which implement a subset of CSS (and maybe HTML5), this could be necessary ...
> 
> c/ modify the existing (create a new) EPUB test suite, a set of EPUB samples which will help testing each features individually
> 
> d/ update the epubtest.org <http://epubtest.org/> service to handle the new test suite.
> 
>  
> 
> The Publishing CG seems to me the proper place for this work, as it has released EPUB 3.2 (and therefore is now free), can get help from everybody in the industry (BISG ...), and it does not require rechartering the WG. 
> 
>  
> 
> It would be of tremendous help for the industry to get it done. 
> 
>  
> 
> In parallel, we should try to assert the difficulty to get EPUB 3.2 directly prepared for ISO standarization (in men/hours).
> 
>  
> 
> Then and only then, after the main reading systems on the market have been tested against the new test suite, we will be able to assert the difficulty to get EPUB 3.2 standardized by the W3C (in men/hours), i.e. if there are two conforming implementations for each feature of the standard. This work can be made by the WG.
> 
>  
> 
> With this data, we'll be able to decide if direct ISO standarization is harder or simpler than W3C rec + W3C to ISO standardization. 
> 
>  
> 
> During this period, the WG will be able to focus on an urgency for the industry: "WP and EPUB for audiobooks", which could even be released in 2019 maybe (because the spec is simpler that "WP and EPUB for any type of ebook"). And we may find the time to start working on "WP and EPUB for comicbooks" also. Without rechartering...
> 
>  
> 
> Cordialement, 
> 
>  
> 
> Laurent Le Meur
> EDRLab
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Le 24 oct. 2018 à 02:11, MURATA Makoto <eb2m-mrt@asahi-net.or.jp <mailto:eb2m-mrt@asahi-net.or.jp>> a écrit :
> 
>  
> 
> Folks,
> 
>  
> 
> I read the draft minutes of the joint F2F of the publishing working group 
> 
> and the publishing business group with interest.  (Ivan, special thanks 
> 
> to your timely draft minutes! )  Here are my opinions about the future of 3.2.
> 
> ...
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> -- 
> 
> 
> Praying for the victims of the Japan Tohoku earthquake
> 
> Makoto
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> 
> Praying for the victims of the Japan Tohoku earthquake
> 
> Makoto