Need help converting pdf to mobi/epub

[soylent_bob]

I'm trying to convert a pdf to mobi. having some problems with tab spacing? none of the tab spaces i have used are coming out in the final file. so the tab indent used for the beginning of speech for example. its probably a simple fix but im new to this stuff.

[BetterRed]

@soylent_bob - have you read this Read this before Posting PDF Questions

As you'll read in there PDF is the worst format to convert from, sometimes what looks to be a simple looking PDF can be a pain to convert, and sometimes what looks to be fairly complex one can be fairly straightforward.

But in my experience very few PDFs will convert to something reasonable without some additional effort with an editor of some sort. For that reason its better to get the book into EPUB and convert that to MOBI as a final step.

And, you should also read this sticky How to ask a question about conversion problems

FWIW My first choice is convert the PDF using the Mobipocket Creator tool to PRC and then - well it depends on what the PRC looks like. For me some PDF's are just too hard, eg I wouldn't even try to convert a car maintenance manual, that was full of images, drawings, often double column - too much effort.

BR

[dwig]

Originally Posted by soylent_bob

... none of the tab spaces i have used are coming out in the final file. ...

This implies the you created the original file. Since you can't simply type out a PDF the text must exist or have existed in some other format before that format was used to generate the PDF. You should go back to that original format and either convert it to MOBI or use it to create some other word processing or ebook format, other than PDF, to use for convertion to MOBI.

[soylent_bob]

I did create the original file, in Word. Can i use calibre to convert a word doc into a mobi?

Thanks for the help guys!!

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by soylent_bob

I did create the original file, in Word. Can i use calibre to convert a word doc into a mobi?

Thanks for the help guys!!

@soylent_bob - don't use tabs to space horizontal, don't use blank paragraphs to space vertically, use word styles

If you can save it as DOCX (Word 2007/10/13) then do that, calibre does a reasonably good job of converting DOCX

If you have earlier Word save as web page filtered and convert that

If push comes to shove save it as RTF and convert that

Anything but PDF

BR