Adequacy of EPUB?

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

This thread, on the other hand, is a bikeshed.
Suitable only for stopping by for the sheer fun of arguing.

Originally Posted by Hitch

[...]

I really really officially give up on this thread, kids. I think it's reached my head-banging limits.

Hitch

Originally Posted by Hitch

Ah-hah. After reading through this whole thing, again (about colophon, I mean), the light begins to dawn, overall. To answer you, though, Tox:

I knew you wouldn't be able to control yourself.

[...]

This also explains why he's so enamored of such a rigid format. His rigidity is about the OCD-ness of qualifying this and that, so you can sort it, find it, etc. He doesn't really give two hoots about whether or not a chapter is called "chapter" in XML, or not, in XHTML. He's right--for his purposes, XML would, for the categorization of his completed/purchased books, be better. It is, after all, essentially a database for text-based data.

So, to create a database of his books, like in the Calibre Catalogue, he'd likely be better off with an XML list, of those books. (Is this a good point to mention that you can export an XML Catalogue list from Calibre?) XML formatting for his list--not XML formatting for the books themselves.

He's simply wrong about his issue being the format. BUT, you can tell from his posts--and his issue--that he's not the kind of guy that's going to change his mind.

I'm sticking with my penultimate post, however. XML is for machines, and HTML is for humans. Period.

Hitch

Well, yes -- XML would do a lot to solve his problems (I think, because I still can't be positive I know what the root of the complaint is that's what you get for not being straightforward about what's really bothering you). If he would accept reformulating his mental approach.

Now, is this also a good place to point out calibre can store arbitrarily defined custom columns with whatever schema purpose one desires?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I knew you wouldn't be able to control yourself.

I know. It's dreadful, isn't it? but...I can't stand puzzles that I can't solve. It's one thing to see someone here that is adamant that they want X, for example, and think "nope, can't do," or "sure" or whatever. But this was really driving me bats. The why of it. It's most likely a puzzle that wasn't worth the solving of it, but I'm like those damn rats in the maze--gotta get to the end. (You should see me with Chinese Puzzle boxes. Oish.)

Well, yes -- XML would do a lot to solve his problems (I think, because I still can't be positive I know what the root of the complaint is that's what you get for not being straightforward about what's really bothering you). If he would accept reformulating his mental approach.

Now, is this also a good place to point out calibre can store arbitrarily defined custom columns with whatever schema purpose one desires?

I'm now fairly certain that this really IS all about the metadata and semantics. Otherwise, his 3 comments about colophon don't gel. If you view them, however, strictly with an eye to categorization, sorting, etc., THEN, it makes sense. Mind you, he's wrong about the colophon always providing "tagging" (data! The light dawns!), but if you think of it that way, it finally starts to make some sense. If you don't think of it that way, the colophon-tagging comment is utterly crackers, given that they are, 99% of the time, when they exist, in print books.

Our problem, @eschwartz, m'dear, is we actually were thinking about ePUB, itself, silly us. He's not. He says he is, but he isn't. Not the way that you and I and Tox, etc., think about ePUB.

And yes: put the poor lad out of his misery, would you? I know that Calibre CAN do this--and that you can export an XML list from Calibre, of your own catalogue--but I'm not a big Calibre user, as you know. So if you'd kindly take pity on him and alert him to how to do that, or where he can find out best how to do that, we might finally put paid to this.

Hitch
(Not kidding this time....)

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Our problem, @eschwartz, m'dear, is we actually were thinking about ePUB, itself, silly us. He's not. He says he is, but he isn't. Not the way that you and I and Tox, etc., think about ePUB.

And yes: put the poor lad out of his misery, would you? I know that Calibre CAN do this--and that you can export an XML list from Calibre, of your own catalogue--but I'm not a big Calibre user, as you know. So if you'd kindly take pity on him and alert him to how to do that, or where he can find out best how to do that, we might finally put paid to this.

Hitch
(Not kidding this time....)

Well, since Sarmat wants everything to be all programmatic-like, I would probably recommend he take a look at `calibredb export --for-machine` in combination with a custom JSON parser for laying it out however he wants.

But you can also generate an automatic, stock XML catalog.
Convert books ==> Create a catalog of the books in your calibre library.

It can generate XML, CSV, BibTeX catalogs, in addition to EPUB/AZW3/MOBI ebooks.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Well, since Sarmat wants everything to be all programmatic-like, I would probably recommend he take a look at `calibredb export --for-machine` in combination with a custom JSON parser for laying it out however he wants.

But you can also generate an automatic, stock XML catalog.
Convert books ==> Create a catalog of the books in your calibre library.

It can generate XML, CSV, BibTeX catalogs, in addition to EPUB/AZW3/MOBI ebooks.

I meant, tell him about the custom tags/categories, etc. But this is good too!

Hitch

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I meant, tell him about the custom tags/categories, etc. But this is good too!

Hitch

Well, there isn't much I can say about that beyond, "read the forking manual".
Why doesn’t calibre have a column for foo?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Well, there isn't much I can say about that beyond, "read the forking manual".
Why doesn’t calibre have a column for foo?

Awwright, awright, awright. I was just trying to be kind. Poor laddie's distressed, after all.

Hitch

[doubleshuffle]

As a keen cyclist, I seriously resent the disrespect shown to bikesheds in this thread.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

As a keen cyclist, I seriously resent the disrespect shown to bikesheds in this thread.

Well, y'know, brah, those bikes are really badly made. You can't instantly sort them all by maker, color, or type of seat--real man seat versus sissy padded seat. That means that none of them are worth using. Ergo, we need a new bike maker. And what that means is, until we have a new manufacturer of bikes, those bikesheds are worthless, too.

Hitch

[Jellby]

Maybe we need something like this

<chapter head>
<name><noun num="singular">Chapter</noun></chapter name>
<number>1</number>
</chapter>

<1st paragraph>
<sentence>
<adverb><drop cap>O</drop cap>nce</adverb>
<preposition>upon</preposition>
<article>a</article>
<noun num="singular">time</noun><punctuation>,</punctuation>
<adverb>there</adverb>
<verb tense="simple past" pers="3rd" num="singular">was</verb>
<article>a</article>
<adjective>little</adjective>
...

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Well, y'know, brah, those bikes are really badly made. You can't instantly sort them all by maker, color, or type of seat--real man seat versus sissy padded seat. That means that none of them are worth using. Ergo, we need a new bike maker. And what that means is, until we have a new manufacturer of bikes, those bikesheds are worthless, too.

Hitch

Horribly convincing. I'll trash my bike and bikeshed at once and just get fat until the real bike comes along.

[Toxaris]

Thanks Hitch and Jellby, I needed a laugh. Now I have to clean my screen...

BTW Jellby, I think you made an error. Of course it cannot be <number>1</number>, it must be <number digits="1">1</number>. It must be clear of course.

[dickloraine]

This is great. Now we can write a grammar check too! Or let the user decide. The author uses too many adjectives for your liking? Just ignore all adjectives past the first!

[Sarmat89]

Originally Posted by Hitch

What colophon in a "physical" ebook? For that matter, what the hell is a physical eBook?

The second page of the book which bears contributor names and copyrights. There you can find names of artists, translators, and like, which cannot be included in the EPUB format.

DocBook

It was you who was talking about DocBook, not me.

none of us are discussing "automatic" conversions, like those browser-based "convert your book to...!" websites

Then why are you talking about book creators who won't "tag things properly" (out of spite?)

We all work in HTML/XHTML/CSS.

Then there is no difference for you what to work with, HTML or XML.

We're doing 3 books right now, that are ALL about the FONTS.

We are talking about e-books not tied to a specific device. That means we can expect any resolutions and used fonts.

Our average book has 3-4 revision rounds, and often, at least one of them is surrounding layout.

What kind of layout tweaks can there be for a reflowable format intended for a random resolution, font size and face? With a proper XML format those are cared of automatically for you, there are no widows/orphans in <p>, pages broken properly before <chapter> <title>s, all due to the semantic nature of the format.

semantic tagging.

Semantic tagging does away with all the fuss and tweaking around HTML used for emulating the printed text (instead of its original intention for man pages).

He claims that an XML e-reader

What of Earth is an 'XML e-reader'? You are trying to reduce my point ad absurdum with strawman claims about 'reading XML' (?!)
For example, there is a VitalBooks company which makes coursebooks in their proprietary XML-based format. So the XML as a book representation technology is viable, and an open and comprehensive format can be developed for both fiction and nonfiction work.
In MOBI format, there are proprietary HTML extensions for semantic markup of dictionaries, are you against it, too?

I don't know how he plans to force authors to write in XML, or word-processing/writing software companies to export

First you are talking about working 'directly in HTML/CSS', and now about 'word-processing exporting'?

ePUB IS the new XML format

EPUB is HTML5 in a ZIP archive. Nothing more, nothing less.

XML is meant to be read by machines. HTML is meant to be read by humans.

"EPUB is a new XML format", ergo EPUB is not for humans? I'm speechless. Is XML-compliant HTML a format 'not for humans' too?

[Arios]

Good one Jellby.

And speaking of bike and bikeshed, a few guidelines from Parkinson's Law could be useful here: "it is better to have a virtually impossible format to use, rather than one that could be improved."

[phillipgessert]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

With a proper XML format those are cared of automatically for you, there are no widows/orphans in <p>, pages broken properly before <chapter> <title>s, all due to the semantic nature of the format.

Good layout usually takes both content and semantics into consideration, not just semantics alone. "This part is a chapter title" is not near granular enough for a thoughtful design.

You had an earlier post that mentioned viewing five different books and noting that they all presented information five different ways. This really doesn't strike me as a problem at all.