News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

June 19, 2007

software

Adobe wants you to read eBooks

Posted Jun. 19, ’07, 5:48 PM PT by Thomas Gagnon-van Leeuwen
Category | Software

adobedigitaleditions.jpg

It seems like recent weeks have been sprinkled with mildly uninteresting software releases from Adobe, and this one is no different: Adobe Digital Editions was unleashed today. And what is it, you ask?

Basically, this application offers “an engaging new way to read and manage eBooks and other digital publications”. It’s obvious from the start that this isn’t your typical Cocoa app: it’s installed through Adobe’s website, with the help of Flash, into an obscure folder. But no to worry: you now have a nice alias on your desktop, à la Windows! The un-Macness doesn’t end here, however: since Digital Editions is a “Rich Internet Application”, it has a custom interface and a web-ish feel to it. It’s elegant, but the UI doesn’t feel quite responsive enough.

Those gripes aside, the program actually isn’t bad: it lets you read your PDFs and other eBooks in various views—excluding full-screen, unfortunately. You can add bookmarks in the text for future reference, and the next time you start reading, Digital Editions remembers exactly where you were in the book, so you never lose your spot. One interesting aspect is that it can manage borrowed and purchased eBooks from the libraries or stores that offer them.

Speaking of which, to cope with the lack of content, Adobe has an online library with a reasonable number of samples to give you a taste of eBook reading on your computer. However interesting they may be, I doubt I’ll be sitting at my desk for endless hours reading Dracula off a computer screen. At best, I see this as a good management tool for informative PDFs such as Macworld’s Superguides.


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