Microsoft Reader
Microsoft Reader is a proprietary computer program for displaying electronic books (e-books ) that are present in Microsoft's own DRM-protected Lit format. It only runs on Windows operating systems (Windows 98 and Windows Pocket PC and Windows Tablet PC).
History
Originally, Microsoft Reader was probably planned as part of an overall concept from Microsoft on the subject of e-books. After the presentation of a prototype for a corresponding reader 2000, the product was not put on the market. The spread of the Windows operating system, the reader established relatively quickly. Since he was not offered for the then widespread Palm PDAs, he left an important market segment unprocessed. In August 2011, Microsoft announced the closure of the project. November 8, 2011, there will be no new eBooks. Lit format more. The full write-off for the Microsoft Reader App is to take place on 30 August 2012.
Versions
The first version of Microsoft Reader was published in 2000. The version was not fully mature, in particular, they did not yet possess the important for the commercial marketing of digital rights management, so soon the sophisticated version 2.0 was released with new features in 2001. Besides the versions for Windows PCs and Pocket PCs adaptation to tablet PCs also will be offered.
The 2003 released version 2.1.1 is the most recent of the reader. Since then, the program is no longer being developed from a few bug fixes.
Functions
In addition to the typical e -book reader features such as bookmarks, navigation aid, personal library and user comments from the Microsoft Reader, in addition to interactivity for dictionaries and encyclopedias (words offers can be marked and a translation or explanation can be displayed, if appropriate works are installed), the first time a free pagination. The book pages are automatically adjusted depending on the display screen used when opening. In addition, the Reader offers a ClearType support, which greatly improves the display quality on screens. The important feature for the visually impaired, the reader has a text - to-speech output.
The versions for Pocket and Tablet PCs also offer the possibility to switch between portrait and landscape mode and zoom in on images. The zoom function predestines the reader as viewer for maps.
A software development kit for Microsoft's own Lit format that external developers with the opportunity to develop conversion programs for Lit- e-books and to publish is freely available. End users have the possibility to create conversion programs offered their own e -books from HTML or text files. In addition, there are conversion plug- ins for Microsoft Word word processor and layout program QuarkXPress.