Just checked out the PDF ebooks vs. the playable ebooks for the Open Sicilians and WOW   is there a huge gap between the updates!!!  I want to reiterate a strong preference for the playable ebooks (save a tree and that . . . .) so hopefully they can be updated more frequently than they have been in the past

Tony, any idea of which kind of ebook will be published in chesspublishing.com for subscribers?

Thanks

Fausto Alava-Moreno wrote on 01/22/09 at 05:53:19:

The playable eBooks are absolutely first-rate and I hope that you are able to provide more of them in the future (new format is ok in CB10 - ctrl+enter does the trick versus "enter" in CB9).  The PDF versions are ok, but nothing beats the simplicity and speed of playing over the games in CB, especially when you can step-into sub-variations (or not) with the clock of a button.  I vote for more playable eBooks in the new format!!

Very strange..... It is interesting what kind of software they use.....

GMTonyKosten wrote on 01/14/09 at 13:06:05:


Right now I've been checking and comparing these two types of playable books for the first time. I think I'm getting a little bit closer now to understanding them. Unless I'm mistaken, the Moscow is the "new style" playable eBook because it makes use of the embedded game (or game quotation) feature. Thus, I can immediately jump from a truncated line to the full game. Of course only where there is this funny icon (grey, light blue and dark blue), BTW, what is it supposed to symbolize?

Speaking about Chessbase 10 which is the product I'm using here: This feature to embed games and to jump to embedded games still seems to be there, but to my embarressment it is completely undocumented. (At least I didn't find anything) I've no idea why this is so.

In contrast to what seems was working in previous versions (when reaching the icon: "If you then press Enter the game reference will automatically appear..."), in Chessbase 10 I now have to hit (the undocumented?) key Cntl+Enter to make the embedded game appear. – BTW, hitting Enter at this point opens the frame for a position search in Chesslive. This is also useful I have to admit, but even funnier that according to the documentation I should instead hit Cntl+Alt+I to get this done.  

So I'm not sure whether Chessbase downgraded anything. But they really made it difficult for me to use and enjoy this feature.

And yet, for me the new style playable eBooks still seem to work fine in Chessbase 10 and I feel inclined to prefer them over the old style ebook. 
Regards! papageno

I would appreciate if we have playable ebooks in CB format together with PDFs and game archives. As my practice shown I think if we keep updated the ebooks then it will be easy to create PDFs (or at least i think this is the way how PDFs are generated now). If Tony needs any help in working on these I can offer my service for free. I am a subscriber to Open Sicilian section so I can show him what I did in order to keep the material in one place for own use. Just send me a PM.
Regards

Miki wrote on 01/14/09 at 02:37:01:

Originally we made the playable eBooks in the same style as ChessBase or Everyman eBooks, that is: one guiding text linking to lots of other texts, which link to the games. Then I learnt of a feature whereby you could link games from other games, so I experimented with having one guiding text linking to the ChessPub Guides (that you can download from the PGN Archive), which you could play through, which then linked to the individual annotated games.
I hope that makes sense? If not download a newish eBook and a much older one and compare the two.
Now, I quite liked the new type and thought everyone else would, too, but not only has there been almost no positive feedback from subscribers, on top of that ChessBase seem to have downgraded the feature in CB10!