InDesign epub code cleanup

[paperwhite13]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

When you do your testing can you please also test the following code? It does work in calibre. I created a second CSS with just that code and it's the second stylesheet listed in the HTML. So if it fails, it won't cause a problem. It does not work in Thorium Reader (2.3.0) for Windows.

@supports (font-variant: small-caps) {
small {
  font-size: 1em;
  font-variant: small-caps;
  text-transform: lowercase;
}

Thank you! I've tried it and it works on some, I didn't have time to do a full testing. One thing of note, the TTS wasn't tripped by the mixed tagging regular+small caps, it only read the ARIA labels (like page breaks labeled as such etc.).

Also, the fixed font height for the fake small caps worked better in some cases than others -- ideally, small caps are always x-height, but the x-height varies from font to font.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by paperwhite13

Thank you! I've tried it and it works on some, I didn't have time to do a full testing. One thing of note, the TTS wasn't tripped by the mixed tagging regular+small caps, it only read the ARIA labels (like page breaks labeled as such etc.).

Also, the fixed font height for the fake small caps worked better in some cases than others -- ideally, small caps are always x-height, but the x-height varies from font to font.

I would rather have used a media query, but I don't know if it can be done.

[Quoth]

Same publisher and same author and same series. A 1990s edition
Seems to later change how Death speaks. From Reaper Man.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by paperwhite13

TOne thing of note, the TTS wasn't tripped by the mixed tagging regular+small caps, it only read the ARIA labels (like page breaks labeled as such etc.).

I'd have assumed that. I was nearly totally sure.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Same publisher and same author and same series. A 1990s edition
Seems to later change how Death speaks. From Reaper Man.
Attachment 206372

Death speaks the same way in the eBooks.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Death speaks the same way in the eBooks.

Makes sense as all the ebooks are about two decades later than the style change in paper printed series.

[nabsltd]

Originally Posted by paperwhite13

ideally, small caps are always x-height, but the x-height varies from font to font.

The small cap height tends to be a fixed ratio compared to the cap height, which means small caps can be smaller than the x-height for some of the more extreme "designed to be easy to read" fonts, and larger than the x-height for older, more elegant fonts.

[nabsltd]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Makes sense as all the ebooks are about two decades later than the style change in paper printed series.

The homogenization of eBooks is one of the things I dislike the most. I like when different books by the same author use different styles. Often, that style is related to the story, theme, genre, etc.

OTOH, there's James Patterson, who long ago picked a style for his physical books, and every hardcover with his name on the cover (even those where he likely did not write a single word) has the same style. The style is designed to hide how short the book really is...with short chapters, new chapters always starting on the right-hand page, and large vertical margins around the chapter number, you get a lot more physical pages with a word count less than 90K. This style has not carried over to the eBooks.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by nabsltd

The homogenization of eBooks is one of the things I dislike the most. I like when different books by the same author use different styles. Often, that style is related to the story, theme, genre, etc.

OTOH, there's James Patterson, who long ago picked a style for his physical books, and every hardcover with his name on the cover (even those where he likely did not write a single word) has the same style. The style is designed to hide how short the book really is...with short chapters, new chapters always starting on the right-hand page, and large vertical margins around the chapter number, you get a lot more physical pages with a word count less than 90K. This style has not carried over to the eBooks.

For James Patterson eBooks, you have a large space around the chapter header and a large line height for the body text.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by nabsltd

The homogenization of eBooks is one of the things I dislike the most. I like when different books by the same author use different styles. Often, that style is related to the story, theme, genre, etc.

EDIT:
You do realise that mobi books don't have CCS and limited fonts and no embedded fonts and the newer Kindles by default use an Amazon font.
Many epub apps ignore embedded fonts and most of the CSS.
People use KOReader because ir allows fine-grained CSS and even HTML overrides.

Exactly which authors do you mean?

End Edit.

I guess that's your preference. Most people want clean easy to see words. Perhaps happy with a different style of chapter heading per series or genre.

Styles tend to vary by publisher more than by author. Sticking penguins at each chapter head is rather irrelevant to the content.

The bulk of my 3000 approx paper books only really change a bit by era or publisher. Most do not have drop caps, small cap first paragraph leadins or obviously different fonts.

I see more variation on ebooks today.

[JSWolf]

Here is a some CSS from a Tor eBook. It should not be there. The font is not embedded. It displays Time New Roman were available and may prevent some software that allows a font choice not to work. It is in almost all classes including <body>.

CSS

font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;