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A user decides to annotate a textual section of an EPUB publication. They select the section, trigger the annotation affordance, optionally enter a note, select a highlight mode and color. They then save the annotation. The selected section appears on the page with the chosen highlight.
A user annotates an image included in an EPUB publication. They select the image and trigger the annotation affordance. The annotation feature is then identical to the one associated with a textual selection.
A user consults an EPUB publication that includes detailed diagrams (e.g., in SVG) and images (e.g., in JPG or PNG) visualizing a research data set. They analyse the data by annotating parts of the diagrams and/or images by selecting rectangular areas of the data visualization and share these annotations with their colleagues.
A user consults an EPUB publication that includes an audio clip (e.g., in mp3 format). Thanks to the audio player offering the proper API, they select a time segment in the audio clip. The annotation feature is then identical to the one associated with a textual selection.
A user decides to bookmark a location in a reflowable EPUB publication. The cursor is located where the user clicks on the screen, or at a default location (often the top-left corner of the screen, for left-to-right content). The user triggers the bookmark affordance, optionally labels the bookmark, and saves it. A bookmark icon appears on the screen, which helps localize the bookmarked area.
A user stops reading and closes the EPUB publication. They export the EPUB publication with their notes, bookmarks, and last reading position. They then import the EPUB publication into another reading system that supports this specification. The reading system opens the EPUB publication at the last reading position, allowing them to continue reading from where they left off.
A user adds an annotation to an EPUB publication after selecting an audio segment in an audio clip. They add a textual note with rich text formatting: emphasize, italic, underline, and subtitles.
A user adds an annotation to an EPUB publication after selecting an image. They add an audio note by recording their voice; the audio clip is attached to the annotation.
A user adds an annotation to an EPUB publication after highlighting some text. They add an image note by drawing a sketch on their screen with their digital pen and attaching it to the annotation.
A user adds an annotation to an EPUB publication after highlighting some text. They select a color for the highlight and a type (e.g. solid background,underline, strikethrough, outline).
A user adds an annotation to an EPUB publication. They enter one or more keywords that will help categorizing the annotation.
A user responds to an annotation by creating a new annotation that points to the first one, creating a thread of annotations.
A famous author annotates a book they have just written, and deals with their publisher a specific edition of the EPUB version of the book which includes these annotations. Readers buy this highly marketed edition, open it with a reading system that supports this specification, and benefit from the author's notes.
A user exports from a reading system an EPUB publication they have previously annotated. They decide to save their notes and bookmarks in the EPUB package. If they import the ebook into another reading system that supports this specification, notes and bookmarks automatically appear.
A copy-editor verifies an EPUB publication before release. They open the EPUB publication in a reading system that supports this specification, annotate text containing typos and images with missing descriptions. They export their set of annotations to a destination folder with a specific file name and provide the file to the EPUB creator. The EPUB creator associates the annotation set with the EPUB file in an editing tool that supports this specification, reviews the annotations, and corrects the EPUB accordingly.
A teacher reads an ebook and prepares some annotations. They add a keyword to each annotation so that students can group them easily; examples of keywords include “clarification”, “question”. They export an annotation file and share this file with their students. Their name (or nickname) is attached to each annotation. The students import the same ebook and the teacher's annotation file into their reading system. Annotations prepared by the teacher appear in the ebook. Students add their own annotations to the ebook and send them back to the teacher, with keywords like “interpretation”. Their name or nickname is also attached to their annotations.
A student had temporary access to an EPUB publication via an academic subscription bundle. They have annotated the ebook while they had access to it and exported their set of annotations. They no longer have access to the ebook. These annotations are nevertheless useful to them, as they include ebook metadata (title, author, year of publication), and each annotation is associated with an indication of the progression in the publication (print pagination if present, % of progression in the publication, timestamp in the case of an audiobook), and contextual information like the chapter or section in which the annotation was created. They can therefore import the annotations in a specialized tool to generate citations in a standardized format, like APA or MLA. Once generated, these citations can be copied and pasted in a word processor, in a bibliography or in a note-taking application, to prepare a report or an essay.
A user annotates an EPUB publication. They synchronize their notes and bookmarks with their other personal devices via a standardized Cloud mechanism supported by each of these systems.
Participants in a book club read the same EPUB publication ebook during a period of time, in a reading system that supports this specification. Each participant adds notes to the ebook, and these annotations are shared via a standardized Cloud mechanism supported by their reading system. The name of each participant appears, so that each participant can see who made which annotation.
A user has annotated a textual section of an EPUB publication and closed the ebook. Today, they load a new version of the EPUB publication in their reading system. The spine item in which the annotations were created has been modified, and some words have been added to the leaf HTML element in which an annotation was created, before the start of the annotation and in the annotated text itself. Nevertheless, the user gets the annotation at the proper location.
The same user loads a new edition of the EPUB publication in their reading system. A new resource - a foreword - has been added to the spine, and the page list has been modified. Still, the user gets the annotation at the proper location.
In this section, we will list all requirements the EPUB Annotations specification must respect to fulfill the use cases listed in the previous sections. Not all requirements will be adopted during the implementation phase, and some aspects may be postponed to future versions of the specification.
Cross-device synchronization of annotations and bookmarks via cloud services, with a clear author attribution and the possibility of real-time updates, is considered out of scope for this specification.
The EPUB Annotation specification will provide the following features: