Epubmatic ebook converter, someone knows? is good?

[fabio19tdi]

Seeking help
I would like to make a professional ebook, with photos and video texts various links, but do not know how to proceed. I have recommended this service ePubMATIC: professional ebook converter, but I honestly do not know if it's good .... any of you used it? do you recommend? alternatives? thanks to all

[Valkrider]

I have no knowledge of this firm but I use Jutoh and create my own from my source documents.

[fabio19tdi]

thank you, I'm going to try it

[Zetmolm]

Why pay for a service when you can get it for free? If you want conversion, use Calibre. If you want an Epub editor, use Sigil. Both have their own forums here at MobileRead, so do have a look.

[EowynCarter]

Jutoh allow for things Sigl won't do. Jutoh is an e-book publishing tool, while sigil is an ePub editor. They're quite complementary.

Calibre to convert... I usually wonder "what the hell", when looking at calibre generated code. It's OK for personal use if you just want to convert, but not to properly edit e-books.

[HomelessBook]

Originally Posted by fabio19tdi

Seeking help
I would like to make a professional ebook, with photos and video texts various links, but do not know how to proceed. I have recommended this service ePubMATIC: professional ebook converter, but I honestly do not know if it's good .... any of you used it? do you recommend? alternatives? thanks to all

I am an ebook publisher and I regularly use epubmatic.com. Don't believe people that tell you that using Sigil or Calibre is enough. They're great for a personal use, but useless if you want to publish (and sell) an ebook or for professional purposes. Wrongly edited ebooks are rejected by Kindle Store for example, they spot even the smallest errors, I know it from personal experience! And Sygil or Calibre only provide a rough conversion full of errors with respect to publishing standards. epubmatic looks good, they offer from simple text epubs to multi-touch, fixed layout, multimedia, audiobooks etc. Quality is good and they provide free assistance if there are any issues with your ebook after the conversion, I surely suggest trying it!!

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

Jutoh allow for things Sigl won't do. Jutoh is an e-book publishing tool, while sigil is an ePub editor. They're quite complementary.

Calibre to convert... I usually wonder "what the hell", when looking at calibre generated code. It's OK for personal use if you just want to convert, but not to properly edit e-books.

+1

Calibre is OK for personal use, but it's conversions leave a lot to desire and it has no editor to repair any output flaws. Sigil can produce standards compliant EPUB documents, but producing a document fit for it's publication target is still up to the human editor.

[rakulos]

I'd agree that sometimes calibre code can be a bit odd but Sigil? no problems at all and no 'small errors' anywhere - and honestly if you're that concerned just do a modicum of research.
With the tools available there's no need to pay anyone else - the only only possible exception I could see is if your book has a load of images that need inserting at odd places with wrap around text (and even then you can find loads of help about that on the sigil forums) or you are a complete technophobe.

Now proofreading and editing are whole different ballgames but making an epub is pretty easy.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by HomelessBook

I am an ebook publisher and I regularly use epubmatic.com. Don't believe people that tell you that using Sigil or Calibre is enough. They're great for a personal use, but useless if you want to publish (and sell) an ebook or for professional purposes. Wrongly edited ebooks are rejected by Kindle Store for example, they spot even the smallest errors, I know it from personal experience! And Sygil or Calibre only provide a rough conversion full of errors with respect to publishing standards. epubmatic looks good, they offer from simple text epubs to multi-touch, fixed layout, multimedia, audiobooks etc. Quality is good and they provide free assistance if there are any issues with your ebook after the conversion, I surely suggest trying it!!

Gosh, how peculiar!

We've done nearly 2,000 books since 2008-9, using Sigil, and we must have The Luck of the Irish, because not one--not ONE--has ever come back for bad formatting or crappy coding. We've had THREE come back due to bad proofing on the part of the publisher. Let's see...what's 3 out of 2,000, in terms of percentages? Oh, yeah: 0.0015%.

Very simply, we use NoteTabPro for HTML "heavy-lifting" regex, etc.; then use Sigil to make the ePUBS, which somehow, equally magically, work perfectly at iBooks, Nook, and Kobo (without the shameful rejection or "errors" referred to by this new poster). Then we use those self-same ePUBs and put them into Kindlegen, and put the resulting file onto Amazon...again, all without any issues whatsoever.

For all I know, epubmatic is the cat's meow, but I won't listen to anyone say that Sigil "only provide [sic] a rough conversion full of errors with respect to publishing standards," because that is flat-out crap. Sigil, like ANY program, is GIGO. If you put crap in, you'll get crap out. It's not a magic conversion machine, as if those really exist in any event; it's an ePUB editor. Sigil's code is as clean as anything produced--cleaner, in fact, than anything else I've seen, and trust me, I've seen pretty much everything. I've seen Atlantis' efforts; I've seen OO's epub-add-in's efforts, Jutoh, etc. Sigil's code is, hands-down, clean. To be clear: Sigil, unlike programs like Calibre, isn't "making" the code--it makes the ePUB from your code. it will endeavor to compensate for people who are attempting to use it as a WYSIWYG "word processor," but even then--its code is clean.

@Eowyn: Honestly, I see no reason why anyone would use both Sigil and Jutoh; with Kindlegen and/or Previewer available, why? Particularly now that Sigil has an HTML TOC-add-in. I have both (Juoth and Sigil), but I consider Jutoh to be basically Word with an ebook-making add-in; if someone knows how to use Word and Word's Styles, really, I can't see why they'd use Jutoh, unless they are using OO or LO, and even then, it's much the same. This isn't to knock Julian's product, but it, too, is not magical. I tried Jutoh, but I don't really see that a professional book-maker would find a good use for it, in lieu of html and ePUB tools. Everyone has their own work process, of course, but if one has a good mastery of html and Sigil, I truly don't know why you'd then use Jutoh in addition.

I would concur--as does Kovid, BTW, although no one listens to him--that Calibre should not be used for commercial ebook production.

Hitch

[editor]

I have always worked as an editor of books on paper, until one of the publishers for whom I work asked me to make e-book in ePub format. At first I thought, “What will it take? With InDesign and some freeware software it will be a no-brainer”.
I tried dozens of times to make a decent product, surfed the web in search of some tutorial or help, until I realized that without the support I couldn’t go anywhere: every e-book I was making had something wrong. I’ve never managed to make an e-book aesthetically acceptable with the notes and the images in place, the tables paginated correctly. Ok, I did not know how to do the job but I have studied for weeks (and have years of experience on paper).
Having to make many e-books in a short time I tried to find someone who knew the technology, and some friends advised me to use Calibre or Sigil, and then to fix errors with the html language. But I, like all the editors who worked on paper, have no idea of what html language is.
As long as I have found epubmatic: I sent an e-book to test (the worst I had: full of pictures, diagrams, notes, tables, captions, references and all) and within a very short time (and for a really good price) they returned it to me they returned it to me perfect, not only better than I could do myself, but better than I've seen in general.
Yes, Calibre and Sigil could be fine for plain text books, no notes and a few pictures, and if the editor has much time to make, fix, redo, rechack etc, but on more complicated texts is not even thinkable, in my opinion.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Hitch

We've done nearly 2,000 books since 2008-9, using Sigil, and we must have The Luck of the Irish, because not one--not ONE--has ever come back for bad formatting or crappy coding. We've had THREE come back due to bad proofing on the part of the publisher. Let's see...what's 3 out of 2,000, in terms of percentages? Oh, yeah: 0.0015%.

I hope your eBooks are better than your maths, Hitch . 3 out of 2000 is actually 0.15%.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Dave_S

Calibre is OK for personal use, but it's conversions leave a lot to desire and it has no editor to repair any output flaws.

It doesn't have a built-in editor, that's true, but it does allow you to correct your eBook via its (not "it's"!) "Tweak ePub" facility.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It doesn't have a built-in editor, that's true, but it does allow you to correct your eBook via its (not "it's"!) "Tweak ePub" facility.

Mea culpa.
Like I said, even with a good editor program the final result is up to the human editor.

I still do not think Calibre is suitable for any publication work.

[rakulos]

Hehe, and gosh - another new poster waxing lyrical about this new wonder service! Good job I'm not cynical else I'd think this was some flimsy transparent advertising.

Dear epubmatic people - please check out the forums and read the posts - have you seen the work done by Kovid and usernone? Honestly, pick a more gullible target audience next time.

[Dave_S]

Originally Posted by rakulos

have you seen the work done by Kovid and usernone?

I would just like to point out that while usernone is currently maintaining Sigil, it was Valloric that was the original creator of Sigil.