A reflowable document is a type of electronic document that can adapt its presentation to the output device. Typical desktop publishing (DTP) output formats like PostScript or PDF are page-oriented, so are not generally reflowable (but see discussion below for PDF), whereas the world wide web standard, HTML is a reflowable format.[1]
The notion of reflow is sometimes used to discuss only more advanced typographic features than HTML offers, which are typically present in typesetting or DTP publications, for example automatically balancing the amount of text in a number of columns.[2]
Examples
Besides HTML, commercially available systems include:
- ePUB is a simple reflowable format that allows a single column with inline images, in many ways similar to a stripped-down HTML.[3]
- Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) introduced XAML-based documents together with a viewer call "SinglePageViewer" that can reflow any WPF objects. However the XPS document standard also introduced by Microsoft with WPF does not support reflow.[2]
- Tagged PDF documents can contain an additional data layer that (among other things) allows content to reflow within the boundaries of one original page.[4][5]
- FictionBook is a free reflowable format by design. It does not specify the appearance of a document; instead, it describes its structure. For example, there are special tags for epigraphs, verses and quotations.
Xerox PARC has developed an experimental systems that allows the reflow of any document using OCR layout analysis at word-level.[1]
References
- ^ a b T.M. Breuel, W.C. Janssen, K. Popat, H.S. Baired (2003). Apostolos Antonacopoulus and Jianying Hu (ed.). Web Document Analysis. World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd. p. 93. ISBN 981-238-582-7.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ a b Sklar, David F.; van Dam, Andy (2005). "An Introduction to Windows Presentation Foundation". MSDN. Microsoft. Retrieved 2 December 2012.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|month=ignored (help) - ^ Burke, Pariah S. (2011). Mastering InDesign CS5 for print design and production. Wiley Publishing, Inc. p. 501. ISBN 978-0-470-65098-1.
- ^ Burks, Michael R. (2006). Web accessibility : web standards and regulatory compliance. p. 379. ISBN 978-1-59059-638-8.
- ^ "Reflow the contents of Adobe PDF documents" (PDF). Adobe. Retrieved 2 December 2012.
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