Over the past few days I have been shocked to discover that nearly everyone I've talked to does not know what CBR files are. They are very useful for furries, so please read the following for your benefit.
What is CBR? A .cbr file is opened by a comicbook reader program and contains several image files in sequential order to be viewed as a comic book with multiple format settings selectable by the comicbook reader.
Why not use a PDF? PDFs are designed to be viewed in a specific fashion, usually lock out page extraction, and are comparatively difficult to create. CBRs can be viewed in a format set up by the user, can save any or all of the images to a location outside of the file, and are easy to create (see below)
Why not use an image viewer? Image viewers are geared for viewing one image at a time, where as, some comics are designed to be two images side by side. Doubling pages for left to right or right to left reading is a simple option for comicbook readers. Where as changing the settings of an image viewer for optimum view from a single picture to comic books and back again becomes frustrating.
How to make a CBR A CBR files are Zip files! Add any images to a .zip/.rar/.7z/etc archive file and rename the extension from "comic.rar" to "comic.cbr". The readers will read the files in standard ascending order except that the files have to have starting zeros in the numbering scheme. For example, if you have 999 images in your cbr, the first one should be numbered "001" instead of "1".
What programs use CBR? For Windows CDisplayEX for simple viewing. (Free) ComicRack for iTunes like viewing and cataloging. (Free) For Mac Simple Comic one of many (Free) viewers For Linux Evince document viewer or Okular. (Search your repositories, and of course: Free)
