One file per chapter vs. many chapters per file?

[doubleshuffle]

Prompted by a bug in the current Kobo firmware, in which the TOC only works properly when each chapter has its own file, I have been forced to rethink my approach to this problem.

After experiences with a few bought books with hundreds of individual files that were very slow and worked much better after I had merged a lot of those files, I had come to the conclusion that it was better to have fewer files with several chapters in them.

However, in the books I recently made I used an individual file for each chapter, ending up with many hundreds of files (poetry collections!) and the books work just fine, perhaps even a bit snappier than with fewer, larger files.

So what slows a book down? Is it many links inside files? Between files? What's your experience?

(Obviously, even if many small files should turn out to be the better solution, Kobo still must fix that bug. Sometimes you just need the option to have a chapter break without a page break, and that's just not possible if you have each chapter in its own file.)

[dgatwood]

I would expect that a larger number of smaller files would perform much better. The amount of memory and CPU power needed to keep track of the metadata for a few hundred files is negligible. The amount of RAM and CPU overhead involved in rendering a large DOM tree is huge. So the smaller the HTML files are, the better I would expect the book to perform, assuming all else is equal.

If that isn't the case with some particular reader, I'd be curious why. It probably involves somebody accidentally implementing bubble sort or something equally atrocious. :-)

[Turtle91]

^^ +1

Plus, it's just easier to organize/edit your book if you have different files for different purposes... Cover, title, dedication, epigraphs, chapters, glossary, etc.

[theducks]

many files also leaves memory for big images (and multi media)

Both Calibre and Sigil editors (those are just the ones I use) have search options that work over many files
Small files under the knife, the less chance of a BIG

[doubleshuffle]

Thanks for your replies.

So it really seems small files are better. I wonder what was wrong with those books that put me off the idea. Perhaps Sigil silently fixed something when I merged their files and that's why they were better after. I'll see if I can remember what those books were...

[Jellby]

Small files also make it easier to have a consistent chapter break formatting. If you have several chapters in the same file, breaks within the file may end up being rendered differently from breaks from file to file. If you can keep full "groups" within each file (like parts of a book, or books of a trilogy), it may not matter but then you are also more likely to hit some memory limit in some reader, and be forced to break the file at unnatural places anyway.

[crankypants]

One file per chapter is better because on the older ereaders each chapter can only be 300kb long. Plus on the Moon Reader, at the beginning of a file/chapter, the text begins on a new "screen/page".

[Toxaris]

Originally Posted by crankypants

Plus on the Moon Reader, at the beginning of a file/chapter, the text begins on a new "screen/page".

That is true on most readers.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by crankypants

One file per chapter is better because on the older ereaders each chapter can only be 300kb long. Plus on the Moon Reader, at the beginning of a file/chapter, the text begins on a new "screen/page".

Well, I wasn't thinking of monster files, but particularly about poetry, where you end up with very small files. But as I said before, my belief that fewer files were better was engendered by books which must have had other faults which I mistakenly attributed to their consisting of many small files.

Regarding the new file starting on a new page: Sometimes there are chapters you don't want to start on a new page. That is why more than one chapter per file must always remain an option.

[JSWolf]

It's not a chapter if it doesn't start on a new page. What you are talking abut are sections.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It's not a chapter if it doesn't start on a new page. What you are talking abut are sections.

Well, we can start splitting hairs, of course. For me, if it gets an entry in the TOC, it's a chapter.

[stumped]

Originally Posted by crankypants

One file per chapter is better because on the older ereaders each chapter can only be 300kb long. Plus on the Moon Reader, at the beginning of a file/chapter, the text begins on a new "screen/page".

I had one book where moon reader could not handle a long chapter and confusingly split it in two. It was one file in the source. To be fair this was a short stories collection so each chapter was actually a story. But some authors do write very long chapters, which break reader app ram limitations.
I have seen bookari get muddled also when there is not one file/chapter per toc entry. I think it was robin Hobbs ship of fools where she had nested headers , for chapters within sections, and bookari toc assigned page numbers that were off by one chapter. An edit to flatten the toc fixed it.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

Well, we can start splitting hairs, of course. For me, if it gets an entry in the TOC, it's a chapter.

The cover most often gets a ToC entry. The copyright gets a ToC entry, sometimes the dedication gets a ToC entry. Sometimes maps get a ToC entry.

NONE of those are chapters. But by your incorrect assertion, they are chapters.

I have seen plenty of books where subsections get a ToC entry but are not chapters. A chapter starts it's own page and if size permits, should be all in one file.