New CDF digital format on the rise

From my archives of items to post:
According to  an article in the Library Journal earlier this year, there is a new digital format that will challenge the PDF. The CDF, or Computable Document Format, is a new standard that was released on July 21st by Wolfram Research, and it enables users to “interact with online documents, input their own data, and generate results, live.”

Comparatively, CDF allows interactivity and motion in a document, whereas in PDF, documents are static and unchangeable. CDF files behave more like apps than documents, and they allow users to make their own “knowledge apps”, of which more than 7,000 have already been created by researchers, educators, and students using an early version of CDF. CDF documents can currently be created using Mathematica 8 and distributed for free using the Wolfram CDF Player, which is required to view the CDF document. Currently, there is a beta CDF in an e-textbook currently on the market: Briggs/Cochran Calculus, and many other publishers are showing great interest in the technology. The CDF technology is on its way to changing the way that online documents and e-textbooks allow users to access, and interact with, information.

It will be interesting to see if this format can stand up to other developments, such as those around Epub3.

Understanding EPUB 3.0

The International Digital Publishing Forum(IDPF), a global trade and standards organization for the digital publishing industry, has promoted EPUB 3.0 to a final IDPF Recommended Specification for the interchange and delivery format for eBooks and other digital publications. 

Many of the enhancements to the digital standard will have implications for digital course materials or e-textbooks, so folks in this space should be aware of this development.  Supported by HTML5, EPUB 3 adds rich media (audio, video), interactivity (JavaScript), global language support (including vertical writing), styling and layout enhancements, SVG, embedded fonts, expanded metadata facilities, MathML, and synchronization of audio with text and other enhancements for accessibility.

"EPUB has become the industry standard format for digital publications based on Web Standards that are structured, reliable, device-independent, and accessible," said Bill McCoy, Executive Director, IDPF. "As digital publications evolve from digitized text into enhanced eBooks and new forms of expression, EPUB 3 will dramatically expand the ability of authors and publishers to deliver richer experiences to their readers across disparate devices, in browsers and in apps.

You can learn more about the new format in this article published by O’reilly Media. The article is an easy read and very perceptive even for non-techies. It is a free download from O’Reilly’s website but you must register and check-out as if you were purchasing.