EPUB (CSS) tweaker app

[Loccy]

Hi all,

A week or so I posted about how frustrating it was that, when using Calibre to convert from LIT format, you have no control about the justification of your final EPUB - depending on the LIT it'll either be left justified or fully justified, but you get no ability to choose your preferred option. The sound of tumbleweeds drifting by was deafening (translation: no-one appeared to care based on the lack of responses I got to my post).

In the end I threw together the attached Java app and am posting here in case others also find it useful. Basically, it'll open up an EPUB and let you edit the CSS directly, then let you save the changes, saving you the aggro of extracting the EPUB and repacking it afterwards. In the simple editor the more "interesting" attributes (ie. the ones I find myself changing most often) are bolded, to assist the user when scanning down them:

text-align:
font-size:
and text-indent:

Those of you not CSS savvy, basically if you look for any references to text-align: left and change them to text-align: justify, that should do the trick. On some LIT conversions I've seen double paragraph indentation happen - usually this is because there's a base style called section AND individual styles for the paragraphs, both with an indent. If you remove the text-indent line from the section style, that'll resolve the double indent.

This has not been tested to any great degree so you are advised to back up any EPUBs first! It's also only been tested on a Mac (but it's Java, so should run OK on pretty much anything).

To use, download the file, BUT DO *NOT* EXTRACT THE ZIP. Instead, rename it from epub-tweaker.zip to epub-tweaker.jar. If you have Java you should then be able to run it by double-clicking, and load an EPUB from the File menu.

[ChristopherTD]

Wonderful! I was wondering about something to do just that (see http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69837).

Your script works on my Mac! I will tinker with it in depth shortly, but it looks like just what I want to amend CSS from ePub titles that I have purchased, but which don't render nicely on the PRS-600 or iPhone. Brilliant stuff.

Many thanks.

[Solicitous]

Absolutely brilliant. I posted a while ago about converting from .LIT to .EPUB with text justification problems. This java app solves the problem. Just for your reference I ran it on Ubuntu 9.10 without any issues.

Thanks for posting the app.

[ChristopherTD]

Outstanding! Using this I was quickly able to refine a troublesome book so that it easy to read on my PRS-600.

Many, many thanks for such a wonderful little utility!

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Loccy

Hi all,

A week or so I posted about how frustrating it was that, when using Calibre to convert from LIT format, you have no control about the justification of your final EPUB - depending on the LIT it'll either be left justified or fully justified, but you get no ability to choose your preferred option. The sound of tumbleweeds drifting by was deafening (translation: no-one appeared to care based on the lack of responses I got to my post).

I don't recall seeing your post. I thought that what you are doing is what the extra CSS area under look and feel area was for. This area states that you should place here:

"Either the path to a CSS stylesheet or raw CSS. This CSS will be appended to the style rules from the source file, so it can be used to override those rules."

I haven't used it but there are threads talking about using this field to adjust exactly what your doing.

Anyway Kudos for creating a tool to help the community here.

[Loccy]

Originally Posted by dwanthny

I don't recall seeing your post. I thought that what you are doing is what the extra CSS area under look and feel area was for. This area states that you should place here:
I haven't used it but there are threads talking about using this field to adjust exactly what your doing.

"Either the path to a CSS stylesheet or raw CSS. This CSS will be appended to the style rules from the source file, so it can be used to override those rules."
Anyway Kudos for creating a tool to help the community here.

But I don't want (and it seems, neither do other people in this thread ) extra CSS. I wanted to be able to quickly and easily modify one single parameter of one single CSS style on my EPUB. Basically I want to control, exactly, what the CSS says - not to add additional, potentially contradicting rules. For example, on the extra CSS area, how would you go about modifying a particular style's text-justify parameter from left to justify? It's also a lot lighter weight than Calibre proper if all you want to do is quickly change from left to right justify, or tweak indention or font sizes.

[ChristopherTD]

Also, if you are tweaking the CSS for a book purchased in ePub format, this avoids the need to do an ePub-2-ePub conversion in Calibre (a usually harmless step, but one that cannot easily be undone).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ChristopherTD

Also, if you are tweaking the CSS for a book purchased in ePub format, this avoids the need to do an ePub-2-ePub conversion in Calibre (a usually harmless step, but one that cannot easily be undone).

Providing the eBook has no DRM or you are able to strip the DRM.

[heddhunter]

Originally Posted by Loccy

But I don't want (and it seems, neither do other people in this thread ) extra CSS. I wanted to be able to quickly and easily modify one single parameter of one single CSS style on my EPUB. Basically I want to control, exactly, what the CSS says - not to add additional, potentially contradicting rules. For example, on the extra CSS area, how would you go about modifying a particular style's text-justify parameter from left to justify? It's also a lot lighter weight than Calibre proper if all you want to do is quickly change from left to right justify, or tweak indention or font sizes.

The "C" in "CSS" stands for "Cascading"... it's MEANT to be overridden!

That said, your utility is awesome... I gave it a shot and it looks like it will be really handy. Nice one!

[DoctorOhh]

Welcome to Mobileread.

Originally Posted by heddhunter

That said, your utility is awesome... I gave it a shot and it looks like it will be really handy. Nice one!

When possible please do not reopen year old obsolete threads. There is a reason you were presented with and Old Thread Warning when you went to post to this thread.

This feature is essentially built into calibre via the right click menu. Select the book you wish to tweak in calibre's library view. Right click the book and choose Tweak Epub, explode the epub and open the css in your favorite editor, I use notepad++. Edit and save the css, rebuild epub.