03-15-2010, 02:16 PM | #1 |
Nameless Being
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EPUB Headers & Footers?
Is there a way to add a header and/or footer to EPUB files that will display on each page of document displayed? Note I searched this forum topic and I read the discussion in this forum about the merits of having headers or footers in ebooks. It is not my intention to revive that debate. As was stated in the aforementioned discussion it is a matter of preference at the discretion of the EPUB file author. I know that according to the standards the CSS display element values oeb-page-head and oeb-page-foot should do this, but in practice not.
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03-15-2010, 02:26 PM | #2 |
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No, there isn't a way. As you note, the standard permits such a thing, but no current ePub reading software actually support it.
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03-15-2010, 02:31 PM | #3 |
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I'm actually glad it doesn't work. It would be yet another thing to have to fix in an ePub.
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03-16-2010, 04:25 AM | #4 |
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Adobe added an extension based on XSL:FO very early on in order to allow headers and footers. It's very poorly documented (one page of notes is all you get) and only implements a tiny subset of XSL:FO. Naturally, styling produced using this only works on ADE Reading Systems (though those represent the majority of portable devices). A large number of ebooks incorporate this file, though in almost every case it's simply a stock template that's been pasted in to allow two-column flows on wide devices. I suspect that very few who use it professionally actually understand how to make it do more than that.
I've attached an example which shows how to use it to create headers and footers IF YOU ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO USE THEM. Don't ask me why the footer keeps bouncing around - I think this extension is little more than a legacy now. Note that you need to keep repeating the head and foot in your text - I couldn't find a way to get around that. The styling uses Jellby's trick to stop them showing up on non-ADE readers. |
03-16-2010, 04:37 AM | #5 |
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The funny thing is, the old Ebookwise reader supported page headers and footers via oeb-page-head and oeb-page-foot. So there really is no excuse for modern readers not to support it.
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03-16-2010, 06:55 AM | #6 |
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Headers (Title) appear on every page of a ePub file on the nook.
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03-16-2010, 07:29 AM | #7 | |
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Quote:
As the OP and myself mentioned, the markup to do this is in the epub spec (and the even older OEB spec). It's just that none of the current epub readers support these statements. Personally, I would like to see these supported, with the added ability to disable their display as a user setting. |
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03-16-2010, 12:28 PM | #8 |
Nameless Being
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Thank you to all for confirming what I suspected and the additional information. I guess it comes as no surprise to the old web site designer that the standards say one thing and the actual implementation is a hodge-podge dependent on software and device.
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04-21-2010, 01:46 PM | #9 | |
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Quote:
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04-21-2010, 09:23 PM | #10 |
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Yeah, that's the problem with the implementation I used there, it's not really workable. There might be a better way of doing it, but in the absence of any real documentation from Adobe I haven't bothered playing around with this mechanism further.
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04-22-2010, 01:08 AM | #11 | |
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Quote:
Dale |
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04-23-2010, 08:41 PM | #12 | |
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Quote:
I get the strong feeling that Adobe introduced the page template idea as a preliminary model back when the epub spec was still in flux and decided not to develop it any further when certain people made a big fuss about not wanting any sort of proprietary extensions (and, of course, this was a part of the whole css vs XSL-FO thing). While the idea of keeping the standard completely open is laudable, the standard has languished from neglect, partially as a result. |
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