Overview  A writer or publisher has many options when it comes to choosing a format for publication  Every format has its proponents & challenges  Not everyone uses the same software, and there's no universal e-book file format that all market players have adopted

Plain text files  Published as.txt  They are in plain text  The size in bytes is simply the number of characters, including spaces  E.g. the Bible, an 800,000-word book, is about 4 MB in this format

Portable Document Format (PDF)  Published as.pdf  The most common ebook format today  It has the advantage that it can be read on any platform  PDF documents can be created by a number of freely available software converters (give examples)  There are also free PDF viewers for Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Unix, handheld computers (PDA)  Familiarity with the PDF is another advantage of this format

Epub  Published as.epub  an e-book specific format engineered by the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF)  It is based on XHTML and XML  intended to replace the Open eBook (OEB) standard  includes optional support for DRM

MobiPocket  Published as.mobi or.pcr  based on the Open eBook standard using XHTML  It can include JavaScript and frames  It also supports native SQL queries to be used with embedded databases

HTML Format  Published as.htm or.html  HTML is the markup language used for most web pages  It can be read by anyone with a web browser  Many softwares can be used to create files in such format, e.g. free software like Nvu & KompoZer or commercial editors like Dreamweaver  If there are multiple pages, there will be need to distribute the ebook in some sort of archive format, like a zip file, and give instructions to readers how they can unpack the file, and which file to click on to start reading  HTML on its own is not a particularly efficient format to store information, since it requires more storage space for a given work than many other formats.

Windows Executable File  Published as.exe  To use this format, one needs an ebook "compiler" that converts the document into a Windows program  When a reader runs the file, a built-in viewer displays the book for him/her to read.  The format has some disadvantages  Firstly, with viruses and adware on the Internet, many visitors are suspicious of running run an executable file just to read a document  Secondly, the audience is restricted to Windows users  This format has advantage of imposing some sort of protection for ebooks, commonly called "DRM“ using serials and passwords

Amazon Kindle  Published as.azw  file format used by the Amazon Kindle e- reader  Is DRM protected  Kindle also supports TXT, PDF, MP3, unprotected MOBI and (through conversion) HTML and DOC

OpenDocument Format  Published as.odf  is an XML-based file format used to represent spreadsheets, presentations, word processing documents, and more

Comparison Table Format Filename extension DRM supportImage supportTable supportSound support Interactivity support Word wrapsupport Open standard Embedded annotation support Book- marking Plain text.txtNo Yes No HTML.htmlNoYes No Yes No PostScript.psNoYes ?No Yes ? ? Portable Document Format.pdfYes NoYes DjVu.djvu ?Yes No Yes EPUBEPUB (IDPF).epubYes FictionBook.fb2Yes ?No Yes ? Mobipocket.prc,.mobiYes No YesYes [citation needed]citation needed Yes Kindle.azwYes Yes [f 1][19] [f 1][19] Yes [f 2][20] [f 2][20] NoYesNoYes eReader.pdbYes ?No YesNoYes TealDoc.pdbYes ?No Yes ? Broadband eBook.lrf,.lrxYes ?No YesNo ? ? WOLF WOLF [disambiguatio n needed]disambiguatio n needed.wolYes ?No ? ? Tome Raider.tr2,.tr3Yes ?No YesNo ? ? ArghosReader.aehYes ?No YesNo ?Yes Microsoft Reader.litYes ?No YesNo ?Yes Multimedia EBook.exeYes ? NoYes Repligo.rgo ?Yes No YesNo