EPUB Boot Camp
March 30, 2009

A new digital destination for people to discover and
experience their next great read on any mobile device

OUR OFFERING
A new digital destination for peopleall over
the world to discover their next great
read on any mobile device.
 Instant access to Books, Magazines,
Newspapers and Blogs – any content
 Use the web or your existing iPhone,
Blackberry, Android, etc. – any device,
anytime and anyplace
 Sample, Purchase & Read content in seconds
 Share your favorite reads with friends, family
or create your own Shortcover

INSTANT ACCESS TO CONTENT
Shortcovers is the place to find your next great read among the best books,
magazines, newspapers , blogs and more.
BOOKS
Buy ebooks, buy by-the-chapter
•
Read ebooks, ad-supported
•
Buy the physical book from a participating retailer
•
NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES
Coming Soon: Buy the digital edition, a subscription, or
•
articles
BLOGS
Read blogs for free, ad-supported
•

SAMPLE AND PURCHASE
Get “into the content” instantly, read a free sample and decide to make a
purchase.
BUY!
Both web and mobile experiences are territory – aware and present currencies,
and title/rights accordingly

OUR PUBLISHER OFFERING
 A solution that maximizes reach –
distributing content on any device, over any
network, globally
 Drive digital and physical sales
 Experiment with advertising revenues
 Contact content@shortcovers.com
We’ll send you an our startup package

ACCEPTED FILE FORMATS
 ePub – preferred format as we believe it is the right
standard for digital publishing
 LIT, OEB – we also accept the older LIT and OEB format,
and will process it similarly to how we process ePub files
 Plain Text – we load Plain Text files, though these have to
be based on our defined template that includes necessary
meta data.
 Microsoft Word .doc format – will need to work with you to
determine where Chapter boundaries lie for full eBooks.

Why EPUB?
Chapterization
 No information
 Table of Contents linking to chapters
 One file per chapter
Metadata Information
 None
 Spreadsheet/Word of Mouth
 Onix
 Metadata attached within book

EPUB
 International Digital Publishing Forum
 \"EPUB\" allows publishers to produce and send a single
digital publication file representing their content
 Offers consumers interoperability for digital
publications
 Composed of three open standards
 Open Publication Structure (OPS)
 Open Container Format (OCF)
 Open Packaging Format (OPF)

Open Publication Structure
 Defines a standard means of content description
 Content is XHTML
 Styled with CSS

Open Container Format (OCF)
 Container for book content and metadata
 Link to .opf file
 Abstract Container:
META-INF/
container.xml
OEBPS/
Great Expectations.opf
chapters/
chapter01.html
chapter02.html
… other HTML files for the remaining chapters …
<rootfile full-path=\"OEBPS/Great Expectations.opf\"

media-type=\"application/oebps-package+xml\" />

Open Packaging Format (OPF)
 Publication Metadata, based on the Onix format
 Defines how the components of a published work
(metadata, navigational information) are packaged into
an OPS Publication.
OPF Package document

 An XML Document
 Exactly one file included
 Needs .opf extension
NCX (Navigation Center eXtended)

 A declarative table of contents

OPF Package document
metadata

Most important

Provides information about the publication as a whole

manifest

provides a list of all the files that are parts of the publication

<manifest>
<item id=\"intro\" href=\"intro.html\" media-type=\"application/xhtml+xml\" />
<item id=\"c1\" href=\"chap1.html\" media-type=\"application/xhtml+xml\" />
...
</manifest>
spine

Itemref elements

The order organizes the associated OPS Content Documents into the linear reading order

<spine toc=\"ncx\">
<itemref idref=\"intro\" />
<itemref idref=\"c1\" />
…
</spine>
guide (optional, but please include it!)

<guide>
<reference type=“cover\" title=“Book Cover\" href=“cover.jpg\" />
</guide>

Important Metadata Items
<title>Book Title</title>
•
<creator>A primary creator or author</creator>
•
<contributor>Secondary authors</contributor>
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<subject>BISAC</subject>
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<description>Description of the publication's content.</description>
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<publisher></ publisher >
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<date>Publication date</ date >
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<identifier>13 ISBN (please)</ identifier >
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<language></ language >
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<coverage>List of countries where the content is available</ coverage >
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<rights></ rights >
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OPF Metadata Sample
This is what the metadata section might look like.
•
<metadata … >
•
<dc:title>Tale of Two Cities</dc:title>
•
<dc:identifier opf:scheme=\"ISBN\">123456789X</dc:identifier>
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<dc:creator opf:role=\"aut\">Charles Dickens</dc:creator>
•
...
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<meta name=\"price\" content=\"USD 19.99\" /></metadata>
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</metadata>
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Notice the custom pricing element.
•

Navigation Center eXtended (NCX)
In order to enable ease of navigation and provide greater accessibility

Can be very helpful in distinguishing actual content from accompanying sections

Also for figuring out parts/subsections
Example:
<navPoint id=\"navpoint-1\" playOrder=“1\">
<navLabel><text>Foreword</text></navLabel>
<content src=\"TheBook_frw01.html\"/>
</navPoint>
<navPoint id=\"navpoint-2\" playOrder=“2\">
<navLabel><text>PART I </text></navLabel>
<content src=“TheBook_p01.html\"/>
<navPoint id=\"navpoint-3\" playOrder=“3\">
<navLabel><text>1. Journey to Elsewhen</text></navLabel>
<content src=\" TheBook_c01.html \"/>
</navPoint>
</navPoint>

UPLOAD PROCESS
 Secure FTP (SFTP) – preferred method for accepting
files as it guarantees the transport security of your
content, and ensures that it is not intercepted en-route
from your servers to ours.
 Traditional FTPS (FTPS) – we provide this mechanism
for publishers who have not moved to the Secure FTP
standard.

TERRITORIAL RIGHTS
 Territorial rights allow or restrict content from being
viewed or purchased from specific countries.
 Each piece of content may specify a list of countries for
which the content is allowed or a list of countries for
which the content is restricted.
 Each list is composed of the countries’ two character ISO
codes (US, CA, UK, etc). Additionally, EU may be used
to specify all the member countries of the European
Union.

CONTENT SECURITY - DRM
• Content is not downloaded as standalone files to
customer’s computer/mobile device
• Reading on the web is facilitated using Adobe Flash
Reader with copy/cut/print functionality disabled
• Content is delivered to the end user AES128 bit
encrypted
• Content encryption keys are tied up to user and device id

CONTENT SECURITY – DATA CENTER
Access is limited to the minimal set of authorized
•
users
Network facilities are protected by:
•
• Firewall to prevent attacker intrusion
• Encrypted VPN access from Shortcover’s office to
our Data Centre
Physical access is protected by including two-factor
•
authentication
closed circuit video surveillance of the entrance and
•
exit points
Hosts are secured by regular testing, monitoring and
•
patching for security vulnerabilities