> Without a need for software as complex and resource-hungry as a web browser engine ePub would require.
I know that technology purists love that, but any electronic reading device handles HTML easily (especially the simple HTML in ePubs).
The point becomes moot when your book contains images/illustrations and you (like a normal reader) want to view them within the content. You will use some Markdown formatter/viewer which is again based on browser.
> Word/LibreOffice documents others would send me often are real pain to modify as WYSIWYG word processors bundle tons of redundant invisible formatting details for every bit of text even when not asked for.
Markdown is just insufficient for any non-trivial document. There isn't any standard way to set image size for example. There's no standard way to create even rudimentary tables.
> “Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.”
Then go for plain text. All those headings and asterisks are a distraction anyway. Years ago, many e-books used to be distributed in plain text in fact.
> Then go for plain text. All those headings and asterisks are a distraction anyway. Years ago, many e-books used to be distributed in plain text in fact.
Markdown is more semantic. E.g. it gives you a ToC (a very important feature of a good book, and it has to be semantic markup-based when you decouple the text from the view by omitting explicit pagination) for free.
Isn't Markdown meant to be lightweight HTML with shortcuts to declutter it visually? Afaik it even is considered officially correct to use HTML tags in it when necessary.
I know that technology purists love that, but any electronic reading device handles HTML easily (especially the simple HTML in ePubs).
The point becomes moot when your book contains images/illustrations and you (like a normal reader) want to view them within the content. You will use some Markdown formatter/viewer which is again based on browser.
> Word/LibreOffice documents others would send me often are real pain to modify as WYSIWYG word processors bundle tons of redundant invisible formatting details for every bit of text even when not asked for.
Markdown is just insufficient for any non-trivial document. There isn't any standard way to set image size for example. There's no standard way to create even rudimentary tables.
> “Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.”
Then go for plain text. All those headings and asterisks are a distraction anyway. Years ago, many e-books used to be distributed in plain text in fact.