Can't get rid of paragraph spaces converting to Mobi

vanpelten · 03-10-2011, 12:27 PM

I'm just getting the handle of this business of conversions using Calibre and Sigil to reformat, tweak, etc.

I've run into a unique (for me) problem of not being able to get rid of those extra spaces between paragraphs with two similarly formatted ebooks -- despite ticking off "remove spacing between paragraphs" and later, also using heuristic processing to "delete blank lines between paragraphs".

I'm converting from ePub to Mobi. The paragraph issue isn't as prominent when viewing the Mobi in the Kindle for PC software, but when transferred to my Kindle, those blasted para spaces are still there

I have checked the stylesheet.css in Sigil and the line-hight of 1.2 seems to match other conversions and epubs that had no similar problems.

Is this a matter for the Calibre forum or Sigil? I'd love to stamp out those nasty spaces asap!!

Here's the stylesheet, just in case some maven here can spot the problem right off:

@namespace h "http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml";
.big {
font-size: 1.29167em;
font-weight: bold;
line-height: 1.2;
}
.calibre {
display: block;
font-size: 1em;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-left: 5pt;
margin-right: 5pt;
margin-top: 0;
padding-left: 0;
padding-right: 0;
text-align: justify
}
.calibre1 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-align: center;
text-indent: 1.5em
}
.calibre10 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-align: justify;
text-indent: 1.5em
}
.calibre2 {
display: block;
font-size: 2em;
font-weight: bold;
line-height: 1.2;
margin-bottom: 0.67em;
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
margin-top: 0.67em
}
.calibre3 {
display: block;
line-height: 1.2;
}
.calibre4 {
display: block
}
.calibre5 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-indent: 1.5em
}
.calibre6 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-align: center;
text-indent: 1.5em
}
.calibre7 {
font-style: italic
}
.calibre8 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-indent: 1.5em
}
.calibre9 {
border-bottom: 0;
border-top: 0;
display: block;
margin-bottom: 0;
margin-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 0;
padding-top: 0;
text-align: justify;
text-indent: 1.5em
}

theducks · 03-10-2011, 01:19 PM

your stylesheet only has 1, non-zero margin (calibre2)

Your code may have blank paragraphs coded

Code:

<p class="something">&nbsp;</p>

or

Code:

<p class="something"><br />;</p>

user_none · 03-10-2011, 01:20 PM

This is going to come down to how the spacing is being inserted. It might be an actual blank paragraph in between every onr containing text. Without seeing the full document its hard to say for sure why you still have spacing in the MOBI output when using the remove spacing option.

vanpelten · 03-10-2011, 03:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by theducks

your stylesheet only has 1, non-zero margin (calibre2)

Your code may have blank paragraphs coded

Code:

<p class="something">&nbsp;</p>

or

Code:

<p class="something"><br />;</p>

theducks, you may be onto something. Here's some code from the first few paragraphs of the book (sorry to chew up so much space):

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd">

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" xmlns:xml="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace">
<head>
<title>1969-1973</title>
<link href="../Styles/stylesheet.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />

<style type="text/css">
@page { margin-bottom: 5.000000pt; margin-top: 5.000000pt; }
</style>
</head>

<body class="calibre">
<div class="calibre1"></div>

<div class="calibre5">
<br class="calibre4" />
<br class="calibre4" />
<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<p class="calibre6"><span class="big">1969-1973</span></p>

<div class="calibre5">
<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
I used to love listening to stories about faraway places. It was almost pathological.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
There was a time, a good ten years ago now, when I went around latching onto one person after another, asking them to tell me about the places where they were born and grew up. Times were short of people willing to lend a sympathetic ear, it seemed, so anyone and everyone opened up to me, obligingly and emphatically telling all. People I didn't even know somehow got word of me and sought me out.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
It was as if they were tossing rocks down a dry well: they'd spill all kinds of different stories my way, and when they'd finished, they'd go home pretty much satisfied. Some would talk contentedly; some would work up quite an anger getting it out. Some would put things well, but just as often others would come along with stories I couldn't make head nor tail of from beginning to end. There were boring stories, pathetic tear-jerkers, jumbles of half-nonsense. Even so, I'd hold out as long as I could and give a serious listen.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
Everyone had something they were dying to tell somebody or shout to the whole world – who knows why? I always felt as if I'd been handed a cardboard box crammed full of monkeys. I'd take the monkeys out of the box one at a time, carefully brush off the dust, give them a pat on the bottom, and send them scurrying off into the fields. I never knew where they went from there. They probably ended their days nibbling acorns somewhere. But that, after all, was their fate.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
That was the thing about it. There was so little return on all the effort involved. Thinking back on it now, I'll bet if there had been a World's Most Earnest Listener contest that year, I'd have won hands down. And I'd probably have won a box of kitchen matches.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

Me again:
If you think the <div class="calibre5"> at the top of each paragraph is causing the problem, I can manually do a "search & destroy" in each of the xhtml pages' codes. Or could it (also) be the </div> at the bottom of each paragraph too that have to go, too?

Thanks in advance. I HATE those spaced paragraphs!!!

theducks · 03-10-2011, 03:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vanpelten

theducks, you may be onto something. Here's some code from the first few paragraphs of the book (sorry to chew up so much space):

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd">

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" xmlns:xml="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace">
<head>
<title>1969-1973</title>
<link href="../Styles/stylesheet.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />

<style type="text/css">
@page { margin-bottom: 5.000000pt; margin-top: 5.000000pt; }
</style>
</head>

<body class="calibre">
<div class="calibre1"></div>

<div class="calibre5">
<br class="calibre4" />
<br class="calibre4" />
<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<p class="calibre6"><span class="big">1969-1973</span></p>

<div class="calibre5">
<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
I used to love listening to stories about faraway places. It was almost pathological.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
There was a time, a good ten years ago now, when I went around latching onto one person after another, asking them to tell me about the places where they were born and grew up. Times were short of people willing to lend a sympathetic ear, it seemed, so anyone and everyone opened up to me, obligingly and emphatically telling all. People I didn't even know somehow got word of me and sought me out.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
It was as if they were tossing rocks down a dry well: they'd spill all kinds of different stories my way, and when they'd finished, they'd go home pretty much satisfied. Some would talk contentedly; some would work up quite an anger getting it out. Some would put things well, but just as often others would come along with stories I couldn't make head nor tail of from beginning to end. There were boring stories, pathetic tear-jerkers, jumbles of half-nonsense. Even so, I'd hold out as long as I could and give a serious listen.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
Everyone had something they were dying to tell somebody or shout to the whole world – who knows why? I always felt as if I'd been handed a cardboard box crammed full of monkeys. I'd take the monkeys out of the box one at a time, carefully brush off the dust, give them a pat on the bottom, and send them scurrying off into the fields. I never knew where they went from there. They probably ended their days nibbling acorns somewhere. But that, after all, was their fate.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

<div class="calibre5">
That was the thing about it. There was so little return on all the effort involved. Thinking back on it now, I'll bet if there had been a World's Most Earnest Listener contest that year, I'd have won hands down. And I'd probably have won a box of kitchen matches.<br class="calibre4" />
</div>

Me again:
If you think the <div class="calibre5"> at the top of each paragraph is causing the problem, I can manually do a "search & destroy" in each of the xhtml pages' codes. Or could it (also) be the </div> at the bottom of each paragraph too that have to go, too?

Thanks in advance. I HATE those spaced paragraphs!!!

You are seeing (the) Red

vanpelten · 03-10-2011, 03:34 PM

Yesssir! I just experimented ridding the red in the first few chapters and ...voilalala...Calibre did it's thing, the spaces are gone.

Thank you very very much for pointing me in the right direction, this is such an educational experience,

Blessings

user_none · 03-10-2011, 03:35 PM

It's the br before the closing div tag that is causing the blank line.

vanpelten · 03-10-2011, 05:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by user_none

It's the br before the closing div tag that is causing the blank line.

You are absolutely correct -- I should have known better, even in the very short time I've been tweaking a few of my ebooks for conversion...

03-10-2011, 12:27 PM	#1
vanpelten Member Posts: 19 Karma: 10 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle	Can't get rid of paragraph spaces converting to Mobi I'm just getting the handle of this business of conversions using Calibre and Sigil to reformat, tweak, etc. I've run into a unique (for me) problem of not being able to get rid of those extra spaces between paragraphs with two similarly formatted ebooks -- despite ticking off "remove spacing between paragraphs" and later, also using heuristic processing to "delete blank lines between paragraphs". I'm converting from ePub to Mobi. The paragraph issue isn't as prominent when viewing the Mobi in the Kindle for PC software, but when transferred to my Kindle, those blasted para spaces are still there I have checked the stylesheet.css in Sigil and the line-hight of 1.2 seems to match other conversions and epubs that had no similar problems. Is this a matter for the Calibre forum or Sigil? I'd love to stamp out those nasty spaces asap!! Here's the stylesheet, just in case some maven here can spot the problem right off: @namespace h "http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"; .big { font-size: 1.29167em; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.2; } .calibre { display: block; font-size: 1em; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left: 5pt; margin-right: 5pt; margin-top: 0; padding-left: 0; padding-right: 0; text-align: justify } .calibre1 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-align: center; text-indent: 1.5em } .calibre10 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.5em } .calibre2 { display: block; font-size: 2em; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0.67em; margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0; margin-top: 0.67em } .calibre3 { display: block; line-height: 1.2; } .calibre4 { display: block } .calibre5 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-indent: 1.5em } .calibre6 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-align: center; text-indent: 1.5em } .calibre7 { font-style: italic } .calibre8 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-indent: 1.5em } .calibre9 { border-bottom: 0; border-top: 0; display: block; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; padding-top: 0; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.5em }

03-10-2011, 01:19 PM	#2
theducks Well trained by Cats Posts: 29,754 Karma: 54401244 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: The Central Coast of California Device: Kobo Libra2,Kobo Aura2v1, K4NT(Fixed: New Bat.), Galaxy Tab A	your stylesheet only has 1, non-zero margin (calibre2) Your code may have blank paragraphs coded Code: <p class="something">&nbsp;</p> or Code: <p class="something"><br />;</p>

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03-10-2011, 01:20 PM	#3
user_none Sigil & calibre developer Posts: 2,488 Karma: 1063785 Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Florida, USA Device: Nook STR	This is going to come down to how the spacing is being inserted. It might be an actual blank paragraph in between every onr containing text. Without seeing the full document its hard to say for sure why you still have spacing in the MOBI output when using the remove spacing option.

03-10-2011, 03:34 PM	#6
vanpelten Member Posts: 19 Karma: 10 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle	Yesssir! I just experimented ridding the red in the first few chapters and ...voilalala...Calibre did it's thing, the spaces are gone. Thank you very very much for pointing me in the right direction, this is such an educational experience, Blessings

03-10-2011, 03:35 PM	#7
user_none Sigil & calibre developer Posts: 2,488 Karma: 1063785 Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Florida, USA Device: Nook STR	It's the br before the closing div tag that is causing the blank line.

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