In a previous message, David Nett typed vigorously:
>Apart from sheer programming power (which, sadly,
>I fear is beyond my humble ability), what would
>be required to allow a .pdf reader to run on a
>Newton? Is there a licensing issue with Adobe
>that stops us from building this?
The PDF format is open enough (other than the encrypted version of the
format) to allow you to write software to read and render to any device.
However, this is largely dependent on the capability and power of the
device itself. This is complex enough a task to outstrip any capabilities
afforded by NewtonScript and probably any other Newton OS specific
programming environment. There really isn't a licensing issue, since
Adobe offers quite a raft of developer resources to help companies create
compatible products.
>I recently noticed that there is a reader for the
>PalmOS (as well as almost every other OS out
>there). With the impending release of a v1 of
>Paul's ATA driver, we'll all have space enough on
>our babies for pdf docs.
Space isn't the issue either, since many PDFs are extremely compact. The
issue is practical functionality. Case in point, the Palm OS PDF reader
doesn't actually read and render the original PDF documents. It relies on
a desktop-based conduit to convert and transfer PDFs to the Palm OS
device in a stripped-down format compact enough the actually fit into and
be processed by a Palm OS device.
You _can_ read PDFs on a Newton - text only - by running them through
Adobe's online PDF to HTML converter and then viewing them using a
Newton-based web browser such as Newt's Cape.
Adobe PDF Conversion by Simple Form
http://access.adobe.com/simple_form.html
Newt's Cape by Steve Weyer
http://misf67.cern.ch/~steve/newtscape.htm
g.
......................................................................
Grant Hutchinson Interface Considerations & Toys
Live video served fresh since 1996. http://www.splorp.com/
Now fortified with daily ramblings. http://www.splorp.com/blog/
Newton. It's the Palm with a brain. http://www.splorp.com/newton/
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