LIT to EPUB TOC problem

BlessedPsycho · 02-02-2011, 08:22 PM

Hi there! I've been using Calibre for a few weeks now to convert books to EPUB since my eReader only accepts EPUB. I haven't had too many problems. Today, though, this happened:

I downloaded a copy of "To Kill A Mocking Bird" that was in LIT format since that was all I could find. When I look at the original file in the Calibre e-Book Viewer, it looks LIKE THIS.

However, after converting to EPUB, it looks LIKE THIS. It suddenly goes from no TOC to having the chapters indexed, but they are all listed as "Unnamed".

I tried selecting "Force use of auto-generated Table of Contents" in the "Table of Contents" part of the conversion, bit it produce basically the same thing. This time, though, it had the chapters properly indexed, but also a 2nd set of marks all called "Unnamed". So, double index.

Any help to fix this would be greatly appreciated.

-Myles

ldolse · 02-02-2011, 08:56 PM

Are those un-named TOC items actually chapters?

It would help if we could see the html code from a single chapter heading. The easiest way to grab that is to use the 'Search and Replace' feature. Click the little magic wand button and scroll through the html code until you see the first chapter and just copy a few lines - the heading and a couple lines around it.

You can also try the 'markup chapter headings' in Heuristics, but based on what you're seeing I'm not sure if it would work.

BlessedPsycho · 02-02-2011, 09:30 PM

Yeah. The "Unnamed" chapters each lead to each of the actual chapters and they're in order. It's the same when I do the "Force" option.

BlessedPsycho · 02-02-2011, 09:41 PM

Okay, I went to "Tweak ePub", and uploaded it to my website, <Link deleted by Mods>.

ldolse · 02-02-2011, 11:26 PM

Posting links to copyrighted content on these forums will get you banned, thats why I asked you to use the wizard and just post a few lines of html. Please don't do that again.

Anyway, here is the content I asked you for:

Code:

<div class="chapter" id="calibre_toc_9"></div><div class="calibre1"><h3 class="calibre6"><a name="ch05" class="calibre9" id="ch05">5</a> <br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/></h3></div><p class="fl1">My nagging got the better o

Note that using the 'tweak epub feature' to check out the code is not ideal, because you want to look at the content of the LIT file, not the epub file, that's why I asked you to use the wizard in Search and Replace. It's possible that Calibre may change the html in a way that you can't determine the solution to the problem at hand. Anyway in this case I think you're safe enough.

If you look at your chapter headers, you can see they're just numbers. When you look through the html code you can see these are referenced in '<h3>' heading tags:

Code:

<h3 class="calibre6"><a name="ch05" class="calibre9" id="ch05">5</a> <br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/></h3>

There is a box in the structure detection panel where you can configure an xpath to detect chapters, the default is this:

Code:

//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h2') and re:test(., 'chapter|book|section|part\s+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']

Note that only looks for h1 or h2 tags, but in your case we need h3 tags. It also has a regex that looks for the words chapter, book, section, or part, but we need numbers, which can be represented as \d+

So we can just change that xpath to this:

Code:

//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h3') and re:test(., '\d+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']

And you should be good to go.

If all the chapter tags in the book are h3 tags, you could also click on the little magic wand icon next to the xpath, and just type 'h3' into the first box - even simpler.

BlessedPsycho · 02-03-2011, 12:18 AM

Sorry about that! I'll remember in the future.

Thanks for your help. This fixed the problem!

Fergus44 · 02-04-2011, 04:49 PM

ldolse
Thank you so much for your explanation. I have also been struggling to get the ToC to appear when converting various formats to mobi, even trying Sigil, when what I needed was your advice to click the magic wand in S&R to find the right heading that begins the chapter you want to show in the ToC. Most of mine have been simple h3 in the level 1 but it is good to know various codes in the x-path like the one you offered "//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h3') and re:test(., '\d+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']" can be used for more complex structures. I'm still only a week into learning calibre but have already fallen in love with its versatility and usefulness in conjunction with the Kindle. As well as the helpfulness of the members of this forum.
Thanks again,
Doug

02-02-2011, 08:22 PM	#1
BlessedPsycho Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Los Angeles, CA Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2.0, Nook Color	LIT to EPUB TOC problem Hi there! I've been using Calibre for a few weeks now to convert books to EPUB since my eReader only accepts EPUB. I haven't had too many problems. Today, though, this happened: I downloaded a copy of "To Kill A Mocking Bird" that was in LIT format since that was all I could find. When I look at the original file in the Calibre e-Book Viewer, it looks LIKE THIS. However, after converting to EPUB, it looks LIKE THIS. It suddenly goes from no TOC to having the chapters indexed, but they are all listed as "Unnamed". I tried selecting "Force use of auto-generated Table of Contents" in the "Table of Contents" part of the conversion, bit it produce basically the same thing. This time, though, it had the chapters properly indexed, but also a 2nd set of marks all called "Unnamed". So, double index. Any help to fix this would be greatly appreciated. -Myles

02-02-2011, 09:41 PM	#4
BlessedPsycho Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Los Angeles, CA Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2.0, Nook Color	Okay, I went to "Tweak ePub", and uploaded it to my website, <Link deleted by Mods>. Last edited by ldolse; 02-02-2011 at 11:17 PM.

02-02-2011, 11:26 PM	#5
ldolse Wizard Posts: 1,337 Karma: 123455 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Malaysia Device: PRS-650, iPhone	Posting links to copyrighted content on these forums will get you banned, thats why I asked you to use the wizard and just post a few lines of html. Please don't do that again. Anyway, here is the content I asked you for: Code: <div class="chapter" id="calibre_toc_9"></div><div class="calibre1"><h3 class="calibre6"><a name="ch05" class="calibre9" id="ch05">5</a> <br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/></h3></div><p class="fl1">My nagging got the better o Note that using the 'tweak epub feature' to check out the code is not ideal, because you want to look at the content of the LIT file, not the epub file, that's why I asked you to use the wizard in Search and Replace. It's possible that Calibre may change the html in a way that you can't determine the solution to the problem at hand. Anyway in this case I think you're safe enough. If you look at your chapter headers, you can see they're just numbers. When you look through the html code you can see these are referenced in '<h3>' heading tags: Code: <h3 class="calibre6"><a name="ch05" class="calibre9" id="ch05">5</a> <br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/><br class="calibre3"/></h3> There is a box in the structure detection panel where you can configure an xpath to detect chapters, the default is this: Code: //[((name()='h1' or name()='h2') and re:test(., 'chapter\|book\|section\|part\s+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter'] Note that only looks for h1 or h2 tags, but in your case we need h3 tags. It also has a regex that looks for the words chapter, book, section, or part, but we need numbers, which can be represented as \d+ So we can just change that xpath to this: Code: //[((name()='h1' or name()='h3') and re:test(., '\d+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter'] And you should be good to go. If all the chapter tags in the book are h3 tags, you could also click on the little magic wand icon next to the xpath, and just type 'h3' into the first box - even simpler. Last edited by ldolse; 02-02-2011 at 11:31 PM.

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
ePub TOC to mobi TOC	edmnddntes	Conversion	5	01-24-2011 02:56 AM
Lit to Epub... Problem and can't fix?	jotekman	Calibre	6	09-10-2010 04:12 AM
ePub with eCub -- Import problem of .lit	Rafardeon	ePub	8	04-10-2010 11:47 PM
lit to epub problem	Chris2k	Calibre	5	02-19-2010 06:00 AM
lit to epub - indenting question, & an eject problem	wygit	Calibre	3	11-14-2009 10:49 AM

02-02-2011, 08:56 PM	#2
ldolse Wizard Posts: 1,337 Karma: 123455 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Malaysia Device: PRS-650, iPhone	Are those un-named TOC items actually chapters? It would help if we could see the html code from a single chapter heading. The easiest way to grab that is to use the 'Search and Replace' feature. Click the little magic wand button and scroll through the html code until you see the first chapter and just copy a few lines - the heading and a couple lines around it. You can also try the 'markup chapter headings' in Heuristics, but based on what you're seeing I'm not sure if it would work.

02-02-2011, 09:30 PM	#3
BlessedPsycho Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Los Angeles, CA Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2.0, Nook Color	Yeah. The "Unnamed" chapters each lead to each of the actual chapters and they're in order. It's the same when I do the "Force" option.

02-03-2011, 12:18 AM	#6
BlessedPsycho Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Los Angeles, CA Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2.0, Nook Color	Sorry about that! I'll remember in the future. Thanks for your help. This fixed the problem!

02-04-2011, 04:49 PM	#7
Fergus44 Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Colorado Device: IPad Air	ldolse Thank you so much for your explanation. I have also been struggling to get the ToC to appear when converting various formats to mobi, even trying Sigil, when what I needed was your advice to click the magic wand in S&R to find the right heading that begins the chapter you want to show in the ToC. Most of mine have been simple h3 in the level 1 but it is good to know various codes in the x-path like the one you offered "//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h3') and re:test(., '\d+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']" can be used for more complex structures. I'm still only a week into learning calibre but have already fallen in love with its versatility and usefulness in conjunction with the Kindle. As well as the helpfulness of the members of this forum. Thanks again, Doug