EPub On Mac; A Weird Issue For Apple?

Posted on January 20, 2012 by AppleBitch


Having spent a bit of time being irked by the fact that Apple hasn’t included native support for opening EPub files on the Mac, I was happy to see the launch of the app iBooks Author on the Mac App Store yesterday. The fact that you could create and export EPub files in Pages only to be unable to open them back up again in Pages seemed to be a weird omission so iBooks Author was a happy new piece of software. The fact that I had to rely on third party software like Calibre…well, as you can tell, I was very happy to see iBooks Author.

So imagine that feeling evaporating when I fired up iBooks Author and found that I wasn’t able to open an EPub file on it. So it seems that, once again, you can create those EPub files but aren’t able to open them on your Mac without software like (in which it is rather difficult to see the correct formatting).  Weird, no?

“It must be a mistake” I thought, “there’s no way Apple could do this again”. But, after a trip down the interweb, it seems that they have. To be able to preview an EPub file, you have to tether an iPad to your Mac.

So, this issue got me thinking a little further. There’s a good, but very evasive, reason that Apple haven’t included this functionality in Lion. It’s almost like the ability to open EPub on the Mac is like that weird cousin in the family that nobody talks about. The cousin that sits in the corner at family parties and touches himself when he thinks nobody is looking.

Creating such a straighforward application such as iBooks Author and then omitting that functionality is a very strange paradox. A very, very strange decision by Apple.

So, what’s the deal?

Touch Yourself And…

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  • Dufus Del Dia

    If I tether my iPad, then Preview, my iBook gets loaded into my iPad as a “PROOF” copy.  I can then untether my iPad and carry my PROOF copy around with me.  The only thing that makes it a PROOF is the word PROOF stapled to the cover.  All content and functionality works.  At least, it does for me.

    Once I decide it’s no longer a PROOF, i can save it as an iBook, then open iTunes, and add it into my iBooks library from there, just like any other iBook.

    If I want to give it to someone, I just hand them the iBook file, and they can load it up onto their iPads (using iTunes…) and carry my iBook around with them, too.

    The only restriction I can see is if I want to SELL my iBook, I have to let Apple sell it for me, and give them 30%.  Amazon takes up to 70% to sell on Kindle.

    So…  What’s the beef?  Hah!!!  

    OK, OK, OK, it might be nice to have an iBook reader on my iMac, but that’s pretty minor.   I can’t imagine reading books sitting at my desk would be more fun than curling up on the couch with an iPad…

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QSY3QVPEJ4KDNA6MGVNBYY2LNI gray bahama

    Based on a comment I read elsewhere, I found out that if you;
    create in ibook author without rich media
    export as ibook format
    rename file extension as .epub,
    sift that file through calibre,

     you get a doc that iBook 2 can read on an iPhone

  • Marcelo Sosa

    disappointing indeed. I second your thoughts. the first thing that came to my mind was that this would be perfect tool for any type of documentation.. no just text books. I created a quick paper to just been able to export to … PDF???  there should be at least a reader app; and run both on MAC OS & Windows

  • Bahamagray

    Apple is all about proprietary formats i.e. control. They initially went to epub because they are playing catch-up with Amazon but now they want to fence off the yard a bit.