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Mobipocket Creator - work round for IE9 problem
Like others I found that Mobipocket Creator wouldn't work properly when I upgraded to Windows 7 and IE9. This is due to the fact that Mobipocket Creator uses html pages as part of its internal processing and these are incompatible with IE9.
However Microsoft have provided a way for people with old html to continue using it in IE9. See the following http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...9.aspx#SetMode The essence of this is that that if, for example, you have old html that works in IE8 and you want it to continue to work in IE9, then all you need to do is insert the following two lines immediately after the <head> statement in ALL the html files in the "C:/Program Files/mobipocket.com/mobipocket creator" folder (i.e. those in the rsc/html folder and the /rsc/html/editor/popups folder) Code:
<!-- Mimic Internet Explorer 8 --> <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=EmulateIE8" > ONLY ATTEMPT THIS IF YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING WITH HTML AND MAKING CHANGES TO THE PROGRAM FILES FOLDER! TAKE A BACKUP COPY OF YOUR EXISTING FOLDERS SO THAT YOU CAN USE THEM TO RESTORE THE ORIGINAL POSITION IF NECESSARY. NOTE 1: these changes should be done using a text editor such as Notepad and NOT a word processor. NOTE 2: You do NOT need to add these lines to any html for books you are creating. The change is purely to the html that mobipocket uses to run. NOTE RE TABLE OF CONTENTS (added 26th April 2012) The above changes fix the Guide option, but not the Table of Contents option. However I have further investigated the table of contents problem and believe I have now found a solution. To fix this, some additional changes are required. These are explained on the following thread. https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=176378 Mike2046 Last edited by mike2046; 04-26-2012 at 06:31 AM. Reason: add NOTE RE TABLE OF CONTENTS |
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Hello mike2046
Thanks for your contribution to this problem, but your solution does not work to the fully. If one needs to create a table of content it crashes (does not create it), if one does not need to create a table of content it creates a mobipocket eBook apparently without problems. Any insight further about the table of content problem? Best regards, Last edited by DDHarriman; 04-14-2012 at 04:36 PM. |
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I've not tested this purported "work-around"--but if it won't create a TOC, then it's not a workaround. The whole IE9 compatability issue was predicated upon, and caused by, the creation of a TOC, which was when MBPC would crash if Exploder 9 was installed on the same computer. If DDHarriman's observation is correct, then this "workaround" solves absolutely nothing, and MBPC is in the same state it was prior to the "fix." The post IExploder9 problem was that MBPC would crash when asked to create the TOC, so...not sure I understand what this solution fixes, as it worked fine post-Exploder9 as long as one wasn't creating the TOC therein?
I frequently recommend MBPC to noobs trying to learn now to make basic (k7) Kindle books, if they don't have Exploder9 installed, and had hoped that this "workaround" would allow me to do so again, as most noobs aren't quite up to using something like Sigil yet--but it doesn't sound like the workaround worked--if it crashes during TOC creation, then, what, exactly, is it purported to "fix," since the TOC creation was the only thing that was crashing in the first place? Hitch |
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#4 |
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Hi DDHarriman,
I'm puzzled. The compatability mode change I've described does allow one to create table of contents and also (with editing of the opf file) to further incorporate the toc.ncx file to provide for the Kindle navigation. Originally I had the same problem with IE9 installed ie creating a TOC failed. At first I reverted to using IE8, then found this compatability mode information on the Microsoft site, tried it and it worked. I have used this to successfully create several books with TOC and the toc.ncx file as well. To recap, the change I've indicated needs to be made to ALL the html files that are part of the mobipocket creator program - these are found in C:/Program Files/mobipocket.com/mobipocket creator/rsc/html folder and the C:/Program Files/mobipocket.com/mobipocket creator/rsc/html/editor/popups folder). As I understand it this compatability setting allows IE9 to run javascript on the old basis in such instances. The compatability setting is needed because by default IE9 works differently re Javascript compared to IE8. I do NOT make this change to any of the html for the books I am creating, and they work fine. I think the change is only needed within the mobipocket program html files themselves, and that largely because they use javascript and IE9 handles javascript differently than IE8. If you have IE9 installed and you make the changes to your book html instead of to the mobipocket program html then it will fix nothing and you will continue to get crashes with mobipocket when trying to generate a toc. I hope this clarifies things. |
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Hello mike2046
I have tried now for 3 times your solution, adding the text you advise immediately after <head> in all the html files of the program and checked and rechecked if I did not missed one instance of it. When I try to create a table of contents, I always get the error message one can see in the screen annexed. Best regards, |
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Hi DDHarriman,
I think I undersand what is going on now, and apologize as my earlier information is not clear enough, due to a lack of understanding on my part. If I understand you correctly, you are trying to use the "Table of Contents" option on the view menu. I have never used this, and when I try it now I do get the same crash problem such as you have reported. I have the Mobipocket Creator Publisher edition installed, and on this there is a "Guide" option on the view menu. This may not be present on the Home edition. This is the option I have used to add the table of contents, which I had previously defined within the html for the book itself. I had crashes with IE9 when I tried to use the Guide option, and it was this that I was able to fix by the changes I have described. The following link explains the process of adding the table of contents in this way, and updating information via the Guide option. https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=126721 This is the approach that I have used and which has worked for me. I hope that this makes things clearer. |
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#7 | |
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Quote:
FYI, the TOC-crashing problem, in either Home or Pro edition, is the same problem that has prevented anyone from being able to use MBPC for the last year+, due to Exploder 9. This "solution" from Microsoft hasn't done anything to fix the only problem that prevents it from being used. It's fine to use the Guide items, ala an ePUB, if one already has an html toc, but most MBPC users--the noobs--use it to create the TOC via the built-in function in MBPC Pro, so unfortunately, the information that you found on Microsoft is not really helpful--as long as you're not using the TOC function, you can run MBPC with IE9 all day long. In short, the solution posted is not the solution to the actual problem. It may have an impact on some other aspect of glitches with MBPC, but with regard to the overweening "error message" problem that everyone has been talking about for over a year, this has no effect whatsoever; you still can't use MBPC to build a MOBI with an html TOC created from headers or other identified elements. Hitch |
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Hello
Tanks for the clarification. Conclusion: there is no way (at today) to create an eBook with Mobipocket Creator (with IE9 on the same computer) with a table of contents using Creator’s own internal way of doing so. Best regards, |
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#9 |
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Hitch,
Thank you for explaining the situation regarding the table of contents problem in Mobipocket creator in regard to IE9, of which I was unaware. When I started using Mobipocket creator the tutorials that I came across were using the Guide option as the way of adding a pre-existing table of contents, so this was the method I learnt. They also highlighted that the Guide feature didn't work with IE9, and it was this problem that I eventually found a work around for. In the light of your explanation of the problem with Mobipocket creator's internal method of creating a table of contents, I can see now that a different title for this thread would have been better. This would have made it clear that what was provided was a work around for the Guide option problem in IE9, but not for the table of contents option. |
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Mobipocket Creator and IE 9
Quote:
Thanks for posting that information. I believe it is the answer to the problem, but there are still a few details to be considered. I agree with you that the error happens only when the Guide Items are inserted. It is not the TOC that causes the problem. Also... contrary to your comment... The Guide Item does not place the TOC in the file, it just provides a link. If you build a TOC with MS Word wizard, it works just fine and produces a working Kindle format book with working TOC. (Don't try to use the TOC built by Mobipocket.) The only thing that isn't working is the Guide Item that provides a link or a jump to the TOC. I have done this many times using a TOC built with MS Word. All is well until I try to add the Guide Items, then Mobipocket crashes with the error message that was quoted here earlier. I saw your message as a probable solution, but I am unable to make the changes to my html files because they are protected in some way. I know enough about html to make the simple change you suggested, but not enough to know how to remove this protection. Do you have a suggestion? CJ |
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Hey, CJ:
(Hitch waves at CJ) It also doesn't solve the problem of what to do for those folks who work with external stylesheets. Now granted, the average MBPC user probably doesn't; but we frequently use MBPC as a training tool in-house, so all our people, of course, start out with external CSS--which, you can see, obviously be resolved with the infamous MBPC "workaround" that gets kicked around on the KDP forums, which is to fill in the attributes, etc. It's clear that Amazon is phasing MBPC out, which is (sentimentally) sad; as I said, we only use it now to start training the utter noobs, and not on any live books, but it was a nice tool while it lasted. Hitch |
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Quote:
I have not forgotten that you and I have discussed this problem many times in the past. BUT... as far as I know, the info Mike offers now is new... The Microsoft article does offer a way to make IE 9 look like IE 8 to Mobipocket... which would solve the incompatibility problem. It does not need to solve the TOC problem, because it's better to use the MS Word TOC, anyway. I realize this conversation happened a few weeks ago but it addresses a problem you and I both want to solve... and Mike appears to offer the solution. I think the reason the previous discussion did not reach a successful conclusion was that the participants were trying to create their TOCs with Mobipocket, which doesn't work in this case. I don't know html well enough to modify the html files, so I came back here hoping one of the html experts would dive in and explain how to do that. As you know, I write for the total newbie... so whatever is easier for them, that is what I want to describe for them. CJ |
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Can you not "solve" the problem by using KindleGen instead of Mobi Creator?
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Quote:
Both CJ and I are, in our respective ways, teaching people who use WORD to go directly to MBPC. I do it as an interim step--I let them make some practice books (PD stuff) in-house, so that they can see what the entire process "looks" like, from the crapola that is output by Word, then in the html editor that they can use inside MBPC; to the GUIDE items, which MBPC "guides" them through, no pun intended, really. After that, we move them over to NoteTabPro, Sigil and then KG/Previewer; but as a teaching tool, it's valuable for those who think that they know html, or some html, but have never made an eBook. As 99% of what we make ends up in both deilverables--ePUB & MOBI, we like them to get a feel for the limitations of mobi before they start reinventing the wheel (inevitably unsuccessfully), with the ubiquitous margin-right: yadda or dropcaps or whatever. I mean, sure--they work up to that for K8; but the hardest thing to teach, IME, has been living within the K7 limitations, for new bookmakers, adn seeing what html created by Word can be used with minor mods, and what has to be thrown out with the bathwater. CJ spends a lot of time both on the KDP and her website teaching DIY'ers to convert from Word--so, no, her problem would not be solved by using KG, at all. @cjallan: No, it doesn't solve the problem as I see it; creating a TOC by "hand" using Word, to me, is extra work, when one can simply use html heading styles and auto-create one (not only in MBPC but Sigil, as well). From our standpoint--at Booknook--we use various clips/programs to then convert the ncx into an html toc, which we "plunk" into the ePUB just prior to conversion via Previewer/KG, which is our weapon of choice. Again--strictly from our workflow--creating TOC's by hand, particularly for plain fiction is just a lot of "makework," when we can easily regex the chapter headers and do it "auto-magically," but for those working in Word, yes, I can see how it might solve your problem for your noobs. I still, however, being pig-headed, stand by my statement that MBPC isn't "fixed" with that workaround. ![]() Hitch |
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Quote:
Yes, there are other ways to create the Kindle format file, but there is so much to love about Mobipocket that I hate to throw it out if the incompatibility with IE 9 can be fixed. CJ |
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Tags |
creator, explorer, ie9, internet, mobipocket |
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