Wake up the dog, Clear off a 2x2 section of wall, and dig out your horsewhips, I'm back. Couldn't leave well enough alone.
Attached is a new revision of the css for making drop caps work from Word into an epub. After struggling with the first release, I've rebuilt it.
I decided that, given the size of the devices we all are reading on, a 48pt space for the drop cap is just too big. So this is toned down to 36 points.
When you attach this css into your word document, there are some noticeible changes (improvements?).
<Initial> and <InitialWithSpace> styles are gone. Use <Normal> or <Body Copy> instead, depending on what you want the space after the initial paragraph to be like - an extra 6pts (body copy) or 0pts extra space (normal). Both are defaulted in Word.
Select the 1st letter of the paragraph your want to have the drop cap appear in as <drop>. It the 1st letter is the whole word, like "A" or "I", yer done. If it is the 1st letter of a word, select the rest of the word (NOT the space after the word) in one of the following styles, depending on what the initial letter was:
<afterdroppeda> if it is an "A"
<afterdroppedbcdefopqrtvw> if it is a "B C D E F O P Q R T V or W"
<afterdroppedghijkmnsuxyz> if it is a "G H I J K M N S U X Y or Z"
<afterdroppedl< if it is an "L"
This is tuned (ha!) for the default font in Normal to be, well, normal, i.e., 12 pt Times New Roman.
A couple messages up I described a problem with the space afterr the <afterdropped---> style getting re-expressed. This is solved by not making the space after the word in the <afterdropped---> style. Word would re-express the style if the first word was a Proper Name that Word Recognizes. Can't figure out why, might have to do with word attempting to be helpful with preparations for data field, might not, I might really not care.
There is still an occasional instance of style re-expression if punctuation is involved with the first word. Still haven't figured out how to solve that from within Word.
If the first bit of your paragraph is a quote, like
"Ask Me Again," said Jane...
Most "real" books would take the initial double-quote off, and bigger up the first letter.
If the bit of your chapter you're applying the drop cap to has a bunch or really short sentences like:
Night.
A Dark a Stormy Night.
Raining to Boot.
you are on your own for making an intelligent decision to make it look right. Let me know what you think. Typical typographic techniques may not work because we can't tell where the soft line breaks will come in on the target device.
And it still doesn't look like a drop cap in Word itself. Oh Boo Frickety Hoo.
-bjc