[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by roland1

Also, Affinity Publisher does not export to anything in the text based world, other than pdf [...].

Woof.

Originally Posted by roland1

When I created my ebook, I copied and pasted from the original APub doc. layout. I didn't copy and past anywhere else but into SIGIL because I thought I might get app-specific gremlins stuck to my text.

Yes, usually that's an issue.

Gremlins getting introduced (especially when copying/pasting from outside sources).

But, in this specific case, it would be helpful to get the text + italics + (any other basic formatting) out.

So you could do something like this:

• Copy index out of Affinity Publisher
• Paste into LibreOffice/Word
  
  • (Optional) Adjust Styles to make sure indentation matches print book.
    
  • Save as ODT (or DOCX, or whatever)
    
• Convert to HTML.
  
  • With a "Save As" or Calibre convert.
• Copy/Paste index's HTML into Sigil.

Then you could do the usual cleaning of dirty HTML -> clean HTML:

<p class="calibre123">dogs, 123</p>
<p class="calibre456">Mammals. <i class="calibre1234">See also</i> Animals.</p>

After:

<p class="index">dogs, 123</p>
<p class="index">Mammals. <i>See also</i> Animals.</p>

You could use Doitsu's fantastic "TagMechanic" plugin to help with some of that cleanup.

(Or, if it's not so bad, just simple S&R. There shouldn't be too much HTML mess introduced.* [Famous last words.])

Side Note: You may even be able to paste your index directly from Affinity Publisher into Sigil's PageEdit. Perhaps the HTML code may be slightly cleaner.

Originally Posted by roland1

Today I started using dictation with the index and that made it easier to find phrases in SIGIL (easier on my hands and faster, too).

??? What do you mean?

Originally Posted by roland1

I have one concern and you guys would know the scoop on this: why are some entries in the index (subtopics) not in alphabetic order?

Did I do something wrong? Are those reference numbers I see linked to their ordering in the index?

Can you give an example + step-by-step instructions?

I think I get what you're saying, but not 100% sure.

You're talking out of Sigil's Index Editor + Create Index?

So while main entries like:

Animals
Mammals
Zoology

are getting sorted A->Z... the subentries aren't?

Animals
	giraffes
	zebras
	cats
	dogs
Mammals
Zoology

where you expect the subentries alphabetical as well?

Animals
	cats
	dogs
	giraffes
	zebras
Mammals
Zoology

Anyway, some:

• HTML to reproduce the problem
• Tools > Index > Index Editor, so we could see what "Text to Include" + "Index Entries" you have

would help.

Originally Posted by roland1

P.S. This is my first flowable text ebook, so I'm still getting my wings in terms of understanding the whole process. I did put out a fixed format kindle ebook, but that was easy. Not as work intensive as this.

Fixed Layout (FXL) books are... ass. Those have also been discussed to death over the years.

99.99% of the time, you don't want them.

They are awful for actual, human readers, because they throw away all the advantages of actual ebooks:

• Resizing/changing fonts
• Adjusting margins
• Easy copy/paste/search
• Footnote popups
• Perfectly fitting your device
• [...]

With FXL, you have to pinch-zoom, pinch-zoom, scroll, pinch-zoom.

They don't sell. They don't work across devices. And they are the absolute worst of all worlds (even worse than just reading a PDF).

Originally Posted by roland1

Tex, thanks for the extended and insightful post on the page numbering. I just now read every bit of it and it all makes sense.