[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Welcome to MR!

Same. Welcome to MR, kawaberitan!

Originally Posted by kawaberitan

I don't want to do it manually Is there a macro or shortcut to link the endnotes?

No.

But to speed things up, there are a few tricks you can do with:

• Regular Expressions
• + Merging, then splitting files

If the code in your EPUB is clean, it's relatively simple.

- - -

Let's say your book has footnotes in the form of:

Chapter1.xhtml:

<p>This is an example.<sup>1</sup></p>

Endnotes.xhtml:

<p>1. This is an endnote.</p>

See how all little note numbers have:

• ^{• + a number
•}

and all endnotes have:

• <p>
• + a number
• + a period

Your book will probably have slightly different code/patterns...

But these will help when you create a regular expression!

What you ultimately want is something like this:

<p>This is an example.<a href="#fn1" id="ft1">[1]</a></p>

<hr />

<p class="footnote"><a href="#ft1" id="fn1">[1]</a> An example footnote.</p>

• The first one says:
  
  • "go visit fn1" + "my id is ft1"
• The second one says the opposite:
  
  • "go visit ft1" + "my id is fn1"

These are just 2 simple HTML links pointing back/forth!

So... How do we get there?

Step 1: Regular Expressions

- - -

Note: In Sigil/Calibre, make sure you put your search into "Regex" Mode.

After you are done, make sure you set it back to how it was.

- - -

Step 1.1: Change Superscript into Clickable Link

We want to change ¹ into an actual link:

Search: ^(\d+)
Replace: <a href="#fn\1" id="ft\1">[\1]</a>

How does this search work?

• <sup> = look for a superscript
• \d+ = look for ONE OR MORE numbers
  
  • This has () wrapped around it.
    
  • Parentheses are special symbols in regular expressions they stand for a "Capture Group".
    
  • It says "Take whatever you found between these parentheses, and shove it into Group 1".
    
• </sup> = look for a closing superscript

Replace says:

• <a = Create a new link
• href="#fn\1" = Point to "fn" + whatever we captured in Group 1
• id="ft\1"> = Make my id "ft" + whatever we captured in Group 1
• [\1] = Put a bracket, then whatever we captured, then a closing bracket.
• </a> = Close the link.

- - -

Now, we just do the opposite.

Step 1.2: Change Footnote/Endnote into Clickable Link

Search: <p>(\d+)\.
Replace: <p class="footnote"><a href="#ft\1" id="fn\1">[\1]</a>

Again, this is very similar. The Search is doing:

• <p> = Look for a paragraph.
• (\d+) = Look for a ONE OR MORE numbers + toss it into "Group 1".
• \. = Look for a period.
  
  • Note: The '.' is a very special symbol in Regular Expressions. Because we want to look for an actual PERIOD character, we need the slash.

Replace is very similar.

- - -

Step 1.3: Test Links Back/Forth

Open up the book in Preview, then click the links and see if they work!

If they send you to the proper location, great! You're all done.

- - -

Step 2 (Optional): Merge + Split Files

Honestly, I recommend footnotes at the end of each file... this:

• makes the <a> code MUCH MUCH easier.
• keeps each chapter as a standalone file.

If you want to have a separate endnotes file... you can follow the trick I wrote about in:

• 2021: "Indexing in SIGIL - How to add "See also..."" (Post #6)

This combines all files into one "merged.xhtml" file, then splits them all back up.

This lets Sigil/Calibre take care of all the renaming of chapter links.

- - - - - - -

Side Note: If you want to learn even more about footnotes, I've written about this extensively over the years.

Type this in your favorite search engine:

footnotes tex2002ans site:mobileread.com

and there are over 500 topics which I've discussed this. Most recently:

• 2022: "Footnotes: Best Practices"

And remember:

Get the notes into clean links.

And KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid)!

The less complicated your make your code, the less likely things are going to go wrong.