Is It Hardware or Software: A Definition of Electronic Books
What is an electronic book? Is an electronic book an HTML file? An Acrobat Portable Data Format file? A Microsoft Word file that can be viewed with Wordviewer? A hardware device used to view a book?
Electronic Book
Barker (1993) originally defined electronic books as “…form of book whose pages were composed not of static printer’s ink but from dynamic electronic information.” Barker (1993) amended that definition to state that electronic books are a “…collection of reactive and dynamic pages of multimedia information.” Thus one definition of electronic books are a collections of pages that are read with a reading device which can be a computer or a dedicated electronic book reader, as defined below.
Electronic Book Reader
Borchers (1999) defined an electronic book as: “…portable hardware and software system that can display large quantities of readable textual information to the user and that lets the user navigate through this information.” Lemken (1999) provided a simpler definition of electronic books as “…a mobile, physical device [used] to display electronic (digital) documents.” Borcher’s and Lemken’s definitions described a reading device that enables a user to view collections of documents or text where the content is represented by a book. The Open eBook Initiative (1999) defined an electronic book reader as: “The physical platform (hardware and software) on which publications are rendered.”
Hypermedia
Often in literature on electronic books, especially studies published in the early 1990’s, electronic books were referred to as hypermedia, hypertext systems, or simply books. Therefore, a definition of hypermedia is in order because although electronic books, hypermedia, and hypertext systems, share similar characteristic such as hypertext links, a definition of hypermedia is needed to distinguish hypermedia from electronic books.
Bieber et al. (1997) provided a definition of hypermedia, which is: “a concept that encourages authors to structure information as an associative network of nodes and interrelating links” and Bieber et al. also stated that the terms hypertext and hypermedia can be used interchangeably. Therefore, it is best to consider hypermedia more as a description of a system than as an actual electronic book. For the purposes of content presented here, the term electronic book, as defined by Barker (1993) is used.
References
Barker, P. (1993, August 16-26). Electronic Books and Their Potential for Interactive Learning, Proceedings of NATO Advanced Study Institute on Basics of Man Machine Communication for the Design of Education Systems, (pp. 151-58), Eindhoven, Netherlands.
Bieber, M., Vitali, F., Ashman, H., Balasubramanian, V., and Onias-Kukkonen, H. (1997), Fourth Generation Hypermedia: Some Missing Links for the World Wide Web, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 47, pp. 31-65.
Borchers, J. O. (1999), Electronic Books: Definition, Genres, and Interaction Design Patterns, ACM CHI 1999, Electronic Book Workshop. Available online: http://www.fxpal.com/chi99deb/ (Verified June 9, 1999)
Lemken, B. (1999), Ebook – the Missing Link Between Paper and Screen, ACM CHI 1999, Electronic Book Workshop. Available online: http://www.fxpal.com/chi99deb/ (Verified June 9, 1999)