Re: [Swftools-common] PDF alternative

[Chris Pugh]

On 22 April 2010 18:21, Yousif Masoud <address@hidden> wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 7:41 AM, Chris Pugh <address@hidden> wrote:
>>
>> On 22 April 2010 03:03, Yousif Masoud <address@hidden> wrote:
>> > On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 10:39 AM, Chris Pugh <address@hidden>
>> > wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Anyone use this?
>> >>
>> >>   http://www.djvu.org/
>> >>
>> >> A lot of people do, and in many ways, it's far more efficient and
>> >> accessible  than Adobe's PDF,   Maybe this should become
>> > integrated into the SWFTools project in some way?
>> >>
>> >> Just one for the ( future ) smelting pot.
>> >>
>> >> Regards,
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Chris.
>> >>
>> >
>> > Hi Chris,
>> > It's possible to convert the djvu to pdf then convert that to swf :)
>>
>> Ahh, so you are a let's go round more corners than we need to
>> just for the fun of it, man, are you?  Now why exactly, would I
>> want to convert a djvu file to a PDF?
>
> You're not permanently converting the document to PDF, it's just an
> intermediate step.  You'll still have a djvu file at the end.

I realise that.  I was merely commenting that the conversion is possibly
an unnecessary step, which adds a level of complication, rather than
simplification.  Mainly because of the differences in intention between
the two file formats ( see Michaels' comments ).

> This was a suggested work around.  This is what I generally do for any
> document type (eg. word, excel, rtf, html and so on).  I convert them to an
> intermediate pdf file, which I then convert to swf using pdf2swf.

I appreciate what you mean.  I often dump to pdf or djvu, depending on the
object file, however, unlike yourself,  I rarely continue with the conversion
through to swf!!   Don't really see the benefit.

> The overhead is negligible, and there's one corner by the way :P

>From *your* point of view!  But, we were specifically talking about djvu
files, which as Michael has pointed out, don't necessarily convert to
PDF  without a large, and unnecessary file size increase - see his
comment about embedding certain graphics in a PDF.

> I have previously agreed with you that djvu is more efficient than pdf,

Indeed.

> but how is it more accessible?  What did you mean by that statement?

I think I meant,  it makes a wider range of documents more accessible,
than they would normally be through the use of PDF, i,e, in respect of
file sizes, content, and legibility, etc.  Not many people, except those
who are 'in the know' use it, which is rather a shame, don't you think?

> Hope all is going well?

Could be better,  but hey, that's life! ;o)  You?

Regards,


Chris.