TOC Creation & Calibre vs. MobiPocket

[Themus]

Thanks in advance for your help.

Wondering why Calibre is not creating a TOC when Mobipocket will take the same html file and will create one.

My chapter is set as <h1>Chapter</h1>

And I run the wizard in Calibre where it put it as //h:h1

But it never generates a Table of Contents.

If I use Mobipocket it does. But since I am doing this for my Ipod Touch, I am using Calibre as it supports the file transfer wirelessly.

Any help would be appreciated.

[kovidgoyal]

calibre creates a metadata toc not a toc inside the document.

[Themus]

I am not sure what "calibre creates a metadata toc not a toc inside the document" means. When I look at this tutorial link, I get the impression it can create a table of contents similar to the output in mobipocket.

It even shows the output.

Pardon my ignorance then, but Calibre then doesn't create a table of contents one can see after the title page? and which when you tap on the chapter, it takes you to it.

http://amalthia.mediawood.net/tutorials/ebooks/toc.html

Thank you for taking the time to respond.

[kovidgoyal]

what that means is that calibre will create a toc that is accessible via the menu on your reader, not necessarily a part of the normal flow of the book.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

what that means is that calibre will create a toc that is accessible via the menu on your reader, not necessarily a part of the normal flow of the book.

You can see the TOC that Calibre creates for ePubs in the Calibre viewer by clicking on the TOC icon half way down the left side. If you use Adobe Digital Editions or Firefox's Epubreader extension the TOC will be displayed in the left sidebar. I can see it on my Sony 505 by selecting Table on Contents in the book menu.

Check the viewer in the Ipod Touch and see if there is a button, icon or menu item for the TOC that you can click.

The first time I realized that the TOC for epub wasn't required to be inline was when I used the create catalog feature in Calibre. I thought it was a mess until I stumbled through my own limitation and found the TOC menu item.

Good Luck.

[Amalthia]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

what that means is that calibre will create a toc that is accessible via the menu on your reader, not necessarily a part of the normal flow of the book.

I should probably add furthur clarification on that page. I thought I'd said something similar. But I think until people start to use the built in TOC it's not immediately obvious what it's there for or what it looks like?

[Amalthia]

Originally Posted by Themus

I am not sure what "calibre creates a metadata toc not a toc inside the document" means. When I look at this tutorial link, I get the impression it can create a table of contents similar to the output in mobipocket.

There are two types of TOC, one is the one that embeds the TOC withing the document itself like mobipocket, the other only shows up on the device in the menu of the ebook under TOC.

However, when you open the ebook in Calibre or some other ebook viewing program you can see the TOC for the ebook with either method used. For some ebooks I do insert an inline TOC as well as make sure it's accessible via the menu of the portable device.

[Themus]

That clears up a great deal. Great responses! I'll look for that TOC option in Stanza on my ITouch in just a few minutes.

I appreciate everyone's time!

[Themus]

I am sure this isn't a surprise to the experts, but I can access the TOC through my ITouch and if I bring the Word 2003 file into MobiPocket first before converting it in Calibre it also creates the inline TOC. And that works!

I've got to figure out where I can set the inline TOC type to a larger font as its a bit small for selecting with the touch of my finger. But I am making great progress thanks to all your great feedback.

I hope I can return the favor to others someday as my knowledge increases.