[eggheadbooks1]

Having now caught up with the thread, it is my understanding that, while Calibre does a wonderful job of converting HTML to .mobi, retaining the formatting as was my goal, it is not currently suitable for creating mobi files for upload to Kindle due to the lack of header space for Kindle to add its metadata “including a token, asin, guid, kindle drm server, text to speech and etc metadata values” (thank you KevinH). This makes perfect sense to me now that it has been properly explained.

This is unfortunate and I hope, Kovid, that you will consider this for the next version as you mentioned because it would take the use of your software to the next level, IMHO. (And as I recommend to my readers that they donate to programmers who solve their problems, it might even make you some money. And if you do change the program to include this new feature, could you please email me at mad(at)mademers(dot)com with the news as I am writing a manual on self-publishing, using my experience as a case study, and if one could use Calibre to get around this Kindle formatting nightmare that would be brill.)

@Hitch: You wrote that “The entire discussion came about because the OP does not wish to use CSS to eliminate Kindle's default first-line indent on paragraphs, and announced to the KDP that using Calibre ‘fixed’ the issue.” It wasn't quite so simple, as my screen shots here and on the Kindle forum show: it’s more than just first line indenting that Kindle screws up. So if someone wanted to publish something like a legal book that involves multiple levels of indenting, using HTML-to-Kindle or HTML-to-Mobipocket Creator-to-Kindle would produce unsatisfactory results. And Calibre did fix the formatting problems but, as you say, it isn’t suitable because of the header issue.

Unfortunately, your explanation of the header issue was that “Calibre ... lacks the proper amount of spacing in the headers to allow all the ‘Kindle For X’ apps to run (as PC, Mac, and iPad apps all require a 2nd layer of encryption).” But as I noted on the forum, I had a mobi file converted to azw using Kindle's @free.Kindle service and the file worked on all devices. Your information thus appeared incorrect. Had you explained, as KevinH did, that the Calibre mobi lacks room for Kindle’s additional metadata (which is added upon upload to one’s account), that would have been the end of it. But you didn’t. Instead you proceeded to blow your horn about how your CSS House Styles were personally requested by a Kindle Technical Account Manager and worked fine. Great for you; not so great for someone unfamiliar or unwilling to learn code, which is what I’m trying to help others achieve. We are authors, after all, not programmers, and unfortunately we are led by Kindle’s advertising to believe the whole business is sooooo easy when it’s fraught with technical difficulties.

As for your agenda, I believe it not to be about promoting one software over another, but of protecting your own ego and your business formatting books. Your information has proven outdated on other occasions, but instead of saying thank you to those who supplement your knowledge with new info, you get all snarky and then blame it on your work schedule. If you’re so busy that it makes you condescending and mean, then stop wasting time on the forums and get back to work.

M. A. Demers,
[non-forum signature & self-promotion links removed - moderation]