UUID

[crutledge]

After following the sad Sigil news, I decided to checkout JUTOH which has been mentioned several times as a possible substitute.

One thing JUTOH requires to open a project is a UUID.

Sigill generats a UUID, eg:

<dc:identifier id="BookId" opf:scheme="UUID">urn:uuid:3beecda8-59fe-4bcf-94a2-01c6aac75cd5</dc:identifier>

Acccording to JUTOH, these must be purchased.

How does SiGil come up with a UUID?

[DiapDealer]

You have to request/register (and probably purchase) ISBNs, which can be used as BookID's, but needing to "purchase" a UUID is certainly news to me. There must be some miscommunication somewhere.

[crutledge]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

You have to request/register (and probably purchase) ISBNs, which can be used as BookID's, but needing to "purchase" a UUID is certainly news to me. There must be some miscommunication somewhere.

Perhaps I am refering to the wrong thing. The following is a quote from JUTOH help file.

You can buy a set of ISBNs from the relevant agency (in the UK, it's Nielsen), or you can see if your ebook publisher such as Smashwords can supply ISBNs.

Apparently, free UUIDs can be obtained at:

http://www.famkruithof.net/uuid/uuidgen

[Toxaris]

UUID can be anything you want. All UUID's are free and there are multiple generators out there.

[roger64]

Originally Posted by Toxaris

UUID can be anything you want. All UUID's are free and there are multiple generators out there.

One example below

Spoiler:

roger@lmde64:~$ uuidgen
281499f9-4659-4f83-bf9f-9e6ca87d4327

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by Toxaris

UUID can be anything you want.

Right. I, for instance, set my UUID like this:

Jellby:YYYYMMDDx

Where YYYYMMDD is the date I create the book, and x is just a letter I add if I happen to create more than one book the same day.

But if you plan to sell your ebooks in some store, then you'll probably need to take care of how the UUID is set in order to place nicely with the store.

[DaleDe]

Atlantis, similar to Jutoh, automatically generates a UUID as well.

Dale

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Jellby

Right. I, for instance, set my UUID like this:

Jellby:YYYYMMDDx

Where YYYYMMDD is the date I create the book, and x is just a letter I add if I happen to create more than one book the same day.

But if you plan to sell your ebooks in some store, then you'll probably need to take care of how the UUID is set in order to place nicely with the store.

Some day, I'm going to find the genius who came up with UUID, hunt him down and strangle him with his own skivvies. I've lost track of the bloody threads on UUID's, as if they have any relevance anywhere in the ebook universe.

UUID's are practically the ultimate oxymoron--"unique" identifiers that have zero central control, no standards other than length (not really, before you all leap in here), five variants and almost no practical purpose in the non-software world, and nearly no practical purpose in the software world. I could name every single book we did the exact same UUID, and nothing--nothing--would ever happen. The world would not stop spinning on its axis, the Apocalypse would not start, the 6th Seal wouldn't be broken, Amazon wouldn't notice...and neither would anyone else.

I wish I could think of one instance--ONE--in which a client, distributor or publisher actually required a UUID. I "get" why the ePUB standards folks thought that someday, somehow, the UUID might be nice, needed, kinda-nice, sorta-needed...but it's never going to happen. Without a centralized registry, just like ISBN'S, mind you!, it's just...absurdity. And who's going to administer some type of centralized registry, unless they can make money off of it? And if they can't, who will create one? And if one is not created, what is the purpose of "practically, maybe, kinda, unique ID's?"

UURRGGGHHH! Can we create a sticky about UUID's?

Hitch

[Jellby]

By the way, last time I checked neither flighcrew nor epubcheck complained if the UUIDs in the OPF and NCX files did not match. It is still so?