ePub to Mobi conversion, error on a book

[Julien Pham]

Hi,

I have an ePub book I want to convert to Mobi to read on my Kindle Touch.
First, I have tried to convert it using Kindle Previewer. It worked except that I have lost some kind of formatting. The original ePub has extended formatting options.

Original ePub :


Converted Mobi (with Kindle Previewer) :


As you can see, the formatting is weird on the converted book.

Then, I tried to use Calibre conversion tool, and it failed, here is the log file :

calibre, version 0.8.50
ERREUR : Erreur lors de la conversion: <b>Échoué</b>: Conversion du livre 1 sur 1 (7 histoires pour tous les soirs)

Conversion du livre 1 sur 1 (7 histoires pour tous les soirs)
Resolved conversion options
calibre version: 0.8.50
{'asciiize': False,
 'author_sort': None,
 'authors': None,
 'base_font_size': 0.0,
 'book_producer': None,
 'change_justification': u'original',
 'chapter': u"//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h2') and re:test(., '\\s*((chapter|book|section|part)\\s+)|((prolog|prologue|epilogue)(\\s+|$))', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']",
 'chapter_mark': u'pagebreak',
 'comments': None,
 'cover': u'/var/folders/m8/ftbtwb2s2n72wx78c21q8f6m0000gn/T/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_naz7Mq/l0vz1j.jpeg',
 'debug_pipeline': None,
 'dehyphenate': True,
 'delete_blank_paragraphs': True,
 'disable_font_rescaling': False,
 'dont_compress': False,
 'duplicate_links_in_toc': False,
 'enable_heuristics': False,
 'extra_css': None,
 'extract_to': None,
 'filter_css': u'',
 'fix_indents': True,
 'font_size_mapping': None,
 'format_scene_breaks': True,
 'html_unwrap_factor': 0.4,
 'input_encoding': None,
 'input_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.InputProfile object at 0x108a2f1d0>,
 'insert_blank_line': False,
 'insert_blank_line_size': 0.5,
 'insert_metadata': False,
 'isbn': None,
 'italicize_common_cases': True,
 'keep_ligatures': False,
 'language': None,
 'level1_toc': None,
 'level2_toc': None,
 'level3_toc': None,
 'line_height': 0.0,
 'linearize_tables': False,
 'margin_bottom': 5.0,
 'margin_left': 5.0,
 'margin_right': 5.0,
 'margin_top': 5.0,
 'markup_chapter_headings': True,
 'max_toc_links': 50,
 'minimum_line_height': 120.0,
 'mobi_ignore_margins': False,
 'mobi_keep_original_images': False,
 'mobi_toc_at_start': False,
 'no_chapters_in_toc': False,
 'no_inline_navbars': False,
 'no_inline_toc': False,
 'output_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.KoboReaderOutput object at 0x108a2f910>,
 'page_breaks_before': u'/',
 'personal_doc': u'[PDOC]',
 'prefer_author_sort': False,
 'prefer_metadata_cover': False,
 'pretty_print': False,
 'pubdate': None,
 'publisher': None,
 'rating': None,
 'read_metadata_from_opf': u'/var/folders/m8/ftbtwb2s2n72wx78c21q8f6m0000gn/T/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_naz7Mq/Fa5DG2.opf',
 'remove_fake_margins': True,
 'remove_first_image': False,
 'remove_paragraph_spacing': False,
 'remove_paragraph_spacing_indent_size': 1.5,
 'renumber_headings': True,
 'replace_scene_breaks': u'',
 'search_replace': '[]',
 'series': None,
 'series_index': None,
 'share_not_sync': False,
 'smarten_punctuation': False,
 'sr1_replace': None,
 'sr1_search': None,
 'sr2_replace': None,
 'sr2_search': None,
 'sr3_replace': None,
 'sr3_search': None,
 'tags': None,
 'timestamp': None,
 'title': None,
 'title_sort': None,
 'toc_filter': None,
 'toc_threshold': 6,
 'toc_title': None,
 'unsmarten_punctuation': False,
 'unwrap_lines': True,
 'use_auto_toc': False,
 'verbose': 2}
InputFormatPlugin: EPUB Input running
on /var/folders/m8/ftbtwb2s2n72wx78c21q8f6m0000gn/T/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_naz7Mq/2BOCiD.epub
Found HTML cover OEBPS/Text/new_mc_cover.xhtml
Parsing all content...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p15_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p13_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p7_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p14_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p9_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p10_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p13.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p2.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p18.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p12.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p16_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p6.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p5_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p10.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p3_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p7.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p1.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p2_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p12_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p15.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p11.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p19_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p1_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p14.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p4.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p16.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p9.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p3.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_cover.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p19.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p18_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p8_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p17_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p6_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p5.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Styles/new_mc_p4_stylesheet.css ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p17.xhtml ...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/new_mc_content_p8.xhtml ...
Referenced file u'OEBPS/Fonts/Times.dfont' not found
Reading TOC from NCX...
Merging user specified metadata...
Detecting structure...
Python function terminated unexpectedly: All strings must be XML compatible: Unicode or ASCII, no NULL bytes
Flattening CSS and remapping font sizes...
Source base font size is 9.36000pt
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Applications/calibre.app/Contents/Resources/Python/lib/python2.7/site.py", line 147, in main
    return run_entry_point()
  File "/Applications/calibre.app/Contents/Resources/Python/lib/python2.7/site.py", line 116, in run_entry_point
    return getattr(pmod, func)()
  File "site-packages/calibre/utils/ipc/worker.py", line 191, in main
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/convert/gui_conversion.py", line 31, in gui_convert_override
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/convert/gui_conversion.py", line 25, in gui_convert
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/conversion/plumber.py", line 1075, in run
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/transforms/flatcss.py", line 148, in __call__
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/transforms/flatcss.py", line 438, in flatten_spine
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/transforms/flatcss.py", line 410, in flatten_head
  File "lxml.etree.pyx", line 821, in lxml.etree._Element.text.__set__ (src/lxml/lxml.etree.c:33308)
  File "apihelpers.pxi", line 646, in lxml.etree._setNodeText (src/lxml/lxml.etree.c:15287)
  File "apihelpers.pxi", line 1295, in lxml.etree._utf8 (src/lxml/lxml.etree.c:20212)
ValueError: All strings must be XML compatible: Unicode or ASCII, no NULL bytes

So, anybody has an idea on how I could convert this book?

Thanks

Edit : I have tried some online converting tools, and either they do not accept the book at all (conversion error), or the output mobi file is not like the original ePub one. Formatting issue with those colored floating text.

[Doitsu]

AFAIK, the KF8 support in Calibre is experimental and probably cannot handle complex fixed layout ePubs yet.
You may want to have a look at the Amazon KF8 fixed layout documentation and create a separate ePub file for Kindle conversion that complies with the KF8 guidelines for fixed layout books. (Have a look at the children's book sample files.)

[Julien Pham]

Thanks for the answer. I think this is mostly because of a font issue. The ePub includes in the file some fonts used by the book. I guess KF8 can handle this, but perhaps not with the same syntax. But this goes beyond a Calibre issue so I will not discuss this here

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Julien Pham

Thanks for the answer. I think this is mostly because of a font issue. The ePub includes in the file some fonts used by the book. I guess KF8 can handle this, but perhaps not with the same syntax. But this goes beyond a Calibre issue so I will not discuss this here

Since three threads in a row describe the exact same error it might be worth waiting for an answer from Kovid.

[kovidgoyal]

https://bugs.launchpad.net/calibre/+bug/996665