Quote:
Originally Posted by tompe
But that is what you want to avoid. If I was setting up this for myself I would define a simple format. I would then write translators from this format to HTML or other formats that is suitable for each enginge that is used to transform to the final format.
And it would probably take me much less time than 24 hours to write these translator programs...
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You could do us all a big favor and write those translator programs, and make a fortune on them to boot.
Except--wait!
--people have been trying to do that (Calibre, et al.), and the process is still buggy and infuriating.
And that's without even getting into the special formatting that some writers--cough! cough!--like to use to portray situations like alien communication. Trying to get that to look right in ebook format is enough to drive you to drink.
Everything Steve said is completely consistent with my own experiences. It can take days to debug formatting problems, and even then you finally just throw up your hands and say, "Good enough!"
As for why people use Word, it's because, love it or hate it, it's the industry standard writing tool. Everyone can read it, and everyone knows how to use it, and it works well as a tool for composing, editing, and (simple) formatting. Few people are going to choose a writing tool based primarily on its suitability for making ebooks. Not until ebooks are a far bigger part of the market.
I don't think that's the problem, anyway. The problem is getting ebook formatting incorporated into the workflow for typesetting. That's coming, I think, but it's not there yet.