I'm converting a public-domain book that has a fairly extensive index, and trying to decide whether to bother including it. I'm done with proofing the auto-OCR and have done basic formatting but haven't decided on any details. Converted the Notes sections to endnotes but left them in the main text too because I haven't figured out how best to deal with them.
For the index:
On the "don't bother" side: many ebook readers have a search function, which is faster & more efficient than an index.
On the "yes, do this" side: search function doesn't give you a list of relevant terms or tell you how common they are.
On the "PITA" side: I'd have to (1) do extensive number proofreading (ick) and (2) create HTML anchors manually for each spot mentioned in the index (ick ick), possibly twice (once for epub, once for mobi?), and do separate page-number calculations if I wanted to make (6" reader sized) PDFs. Ick ick ick.
The book, if it matters, is James Conant's "
The Child The Parent And The State," about the future of public education (in 1960).
Anyone have a nice script that creates a linked index for ePubs?