I need just a few sections with black background/white letters

Coolmeadow · 05-30-2016, 11:40 PM

Hi, I hope this is the correct place to post this. I need a black background with white letters. I can make this happen, but I'm not finding a way to black out the entire line. I want it to look exactly opposite of the black lettering on the white page. I want the entire page to be black and the white letters to go to the next line. So far, I've only been able to highlight sections and turn the background black just under the letters. If I stop a sentence in the middle of the page, or if there are blank spaces at the end of the line where the word is too long, I want that to be black also. There has to be a way. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Jim.

jackie_w · 05-31-2016, 07:47 AM

Try creating a CSS style rule something like:

Code:

.negative {background-color: #000; color:#fff}

Then wrap the text sections you want to be white-on-black with a <div class="negative">. Like this:

Code:

<div class="negative">
<p>Paragraph 1 in reverse</p>
<p>Paragraph 2 in reverse</p>
... etc ...
</div>

If you want the whole of a "chapter" to be white-on-black then try adding the negative class to the <body> tag instead, i.e. <body class="negative">

Caveat: If you intend to read on a device which has a "Night Mode" you might need to test the results in advance.

Coolmeadow · 05-31-2016, 01:48 PM

Excellent! Thank you for the help. I'll try this tonight and see if I can make it happen. This will be for sale on Amazon for the Kindle, so night mode would be possible. It will also only be a small part of one chapter. Would this make the selection when viewed in night mode look like everything else? Or revert it back to black letters on white back ground? Or is there no way to predict?

Thanks again for your help. I knew there had to be a way to do it, but no clue as to how. Jim.

jackie_w · 05-31-2016, 02:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coolmeadow

Would this make the selection when viewed in night mode look like everything else? Or revert it back to black letters on white back ground? Or is there no way to predict?

I don't know, hence the need for some advance testing

It may well depend on each reading app. You don't want your new magnum opus to end up black-on-black!

Coolmeadow · 06-01-2016, 09:02 PM

Well, I played with it for a while last night, and it's obvious....I have no clue what I'm doing! What little I've done with HTML in Calibre is looking at patterns and duplicating (copy and paste) what I need to do to make it look the way I want. Three books in the last 9 months, each over 125,000 words, and no issues until now. And it drives me nuts that every time I load a book to into Calibre to edit, the HTML is totally different. I have to start completely over and figure it out again. So I loaded just the section I want different and got it straightened out. Moved the chapters around so I could make this new section stand on it's own so I can try to do the white on black on just that piece and copy and past it's HTML into book 4 in a section all it's own .... It has it all skewed up again. Font sizes are even erratic, and the HTML is totally different and bizarre. So I go back to Word and clean that up after all the experimenting I've been doing, and load it as a new book. Even stranger effects. Is there a way to make it react the same way every time? Or is there something I'm doing weird in my Word processor that makes it change every time?
Back to the beginning I go. Jim.

gbm · 06-01-2016, 09:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coolmeadow

Well, I played with it for a while last night, and it's obvious....I have no clue what I'm doing! What little I've done with HTML in Calibre is looking at patterns and duplicating (copy and paste) what I need to do to make it look the way I want. Three books in the last 9 months, each over 125,000 words, and no issues until now. And it drives me nuts that every time I load a book to into Calibre to edit, the HTML is totally different. I have to start completely over and figure it out again. So I loaded just the section I want different and got it straightened out. Moved the chapters around so I could make this new section stand on it's own so I can try to do the white on black on just that piece and copy and past it's HTML into book 4 in a section all it's own .... It has it all skewed up again. Font sizes are even erratic, and the HTML is totally different and bizarre. So I go back to Word and clean that up after all the experimenting I've been doing, and load it as a new book. Even stranger effects. Is there a way to make it react the same way every time? Or is there something I'm doing weird in my Word processor that makes it change every time?
Back to the beginning I go. Jim.

Do not go back to "word" to do your changes, use the calibre built-in epub editor or Sgil.

Unless you are doing your black background for a small frame i.e. representing a sign, do not use. I like seeing a blockqoute/div with larger margins and font. Be sure to put scene break indicators at atthe beginning and end.

CSS Tutorial

http://www.idpf.org/accessibility/gu.../reference.php

bernie

BetterRed · 06-02-2016, 01:51 AM

@Coolmeadow - I get the impression you're saving HTML from Word and importing it into the editor. I suggest you save your Word document in DOCX format and import the DOCX into into the editor. My experience is that Calibre does a better job of converting MS DOCX than its does converting MS HTML.

I don't convert until I have a 'print ready proof' in DOCX. The only ePUB editing I regularly need to do relates to layout of images, front matter titivating, and removal of superfluous metadata. I regard the DOCX files as the 'master' - there's where I'd go to create a second edition.

BR

Divingduck · 06-02-2016, 05:41 AM

That's the way I do it too.

In most cases I open the Word document w/o conversion directly with the editor for generating a epub.

Coolmeadow · 06-02-2016, 10:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BetterRed

@Coolmeadow - I get the impression you're saving HTML from Word and importing it into the editor. I suggest you save your Word document in DOCX format and import the DOCX into into the editor. My experience is that Calibre does a better job of converting MS DOCX than its does converting MS HTML.

I don't convert until I have a 'print ready proof' in DOCX. The only ePUB editing I regularly need to do relates to layout of images, front matter titivating, and removal of superfluous metadata. I regard the DOCX files as the 'master' - there's where I'd go to create a second edition.

BR

No, I do MS DOCX and convert to EPUB to edit the HTML in Calibre. But I still find that a lot of the formatting changes though, and I have to edit that by straightening out the HTML. Or at least my version of straightening it out. It's all cutting and pasting the HTML from a section I find I can figure out what it is doing in the final product. Then I make the whole book match that. One of the weird things the last few attempts have done is in the HTML editing screen is the text is in bold, but it isn't in the viewing screen. This never happened in the first three books I've written and edited in Calibre. But the HTML looks very weird. I just finished editing it out of part of a 182 KB section of the book. It will take me a few days to get all of it done, but I'll get it where I want it. At least with everyone's help here, I've got a plan that I think will work. Like all things in life, time will tell.

Thanks again for all the suggestions. I really do appreciate the help. Jim.

BetterRed · 06-02-2016, 11:05 PM

@Coolmeadow - do you make use of Word Styles?

If one uses MS Word like a typewriter -- i.e. using tabs and spaces for horizontal spacing, empty paragraphs for vertical spacing etc -- then one will probably get an unsatisfactory result with lots on inline styling within the XHTML.

However, if you use Word Styles assiduously then calibre will use them pretty much 1-for-1 to create CSS entries, in which case the XHTML will be much tidier -- and the reader will see a consistent presentation and layout.

To clarify my earlier post, I use DOCX->EPUB conversion for texts with simple styling, and the Editor DOCX Import for texts with more complex styling - its an intuitive decision. Conversion suits my daily document intake workflow because I can queue them, and whilst they are chugging along I can do housekeeping on metadata, and workflow records.

BR

Divingduck · 06-03-2016, 06:02 AM

Maybe it a good suggestion to look a little bit more on Word styles and the using within a document. One of the major problems come form what BetterRed describes before.

The problem with it is, that each of this manual adjustments within a text will generate a separate style and your set of styles will blow up paragraph-, word- and/or character wise with tons of styles instructions and this document will then generate a really bad EPUB (and as result you will have tons of unnecessary styles instructions and manual work to correct that mess.

For a better overview on what happen with Word styles in your document it is maybe a good point to permanently switch on the detailed styles view in word and reduct the view to used styles in a document. Then you are able to recognize if your set of styles grow up in an not wanted way.

05-30-2016, 11:40 PM	#1
Coolmeadow Junior Member Posts: 6 Karma: 10 Join Date: Nov 2015 Device: Kindle	I need just a few sections with black background/white letters Hi, I hope this is the correct place to post this. I need a black background with white letters. I can make this happen, but I'm not finding a way to black out the entire line. I want it to look exactly opposite of the black lettering on the white page. I want the entire page to be black and the white letters to go to the next line. So far, I've only been able to highlight sections and turn the background black just under the letters. If I stop a sentence in the middle of the page, or if there are blank spaces at the end of the line where the word is too long, I want that to be black also. There has to be a way. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Jim.

05-31-2016, 07:47 AM	#2
jackie_w Grand Sorcerer Posts: 6,251 Karma: 16539642 Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: UK Device: ClaraHD, Forma, Libra2, Clara2E, LibraCol, PBTouchHD3	Try creating a CSS style rule something like: Code: .negative {background-color: #000; color:#fff} Then wrap the text sections you want to be white-on-black with a <div class="negative">. Like this: Code: <div class="negative"> <p>Paragraph 1 in reverse</p> <p>Paragraph 2 in reverse</p> ... etc ... </div> If you want the whole of a "chapter" to be white-on-black then try adding the negative class to the <body> tag instead, i.e. <body class="negative"> Caveat: If you intend to read on a device which has a "Night Mode" you might need to test the results in advance. Last edited by jackie_w; 05-31-2016 at 07:50 AM.

06-01-2016, 09:02 PM	#5
Coolmeadow Junior Member Posts: 6 Karma: 10 Join Date: Nov 2015 Device: Kindle	Well, I played with it for a while last night, and it's obvious....I have no clue what I'm doing! What little I've done with HTML in Calibre is looking at patterns and duplicating (copy and paste) what I need to do to make it look the way I want. Three books in the last 9 months, each over 125,000 words, and no issues until now. And it drives me nuts that every time I load a book to into Calibre to edit, the HTML is totally different. I have to start completely over and figure it out again. So I loaded just the section I want different and got it straightened out. Moved the chapters around so I could make this new section stand on it's own so I can try to do the white on black on just that piece and copy and past it's HTML into book 4 in a section all it's own .... It has it all skewed up again. Font sizes are even erratic, and the HTML is totally different and bizarre. So I go back to Word and clean that up after all the experimenting I've been doing, and load it as a new book. Even stranger effects. Is there a way to make it react the same way every time? Or is there something I'm doing weird in my Word processor that makes it change every time? Back to the beginning I go. Jim. Last edited by Coolmeadow; 06-01-2016 at 09:10 PM.

06-02-2016, 11:05 PM	#10
BetterRed null operator (he/him) Posts: 21,717 Karma: 29711016 Join Date: Mar 2012 Location: Sydney Australia Device: none	@Coolmeadow - do you make use of Word Styles? If one uses MS Word like a typewriter -- i.e. using tabs and spaces for horizontal spacing, empty paragraphs for vertical spacing etc -- then one will probably get an unsatisfactory result with lots on inline styling within the XHTML. However, if you use Word Styles assiduously then calibre will use them pretty much 1-for-1 to create CSS entries, in which case the XHTML will be much tidier -- and the reader will see a consistent presentation and layout. To clarify my earlier post, I use DOCX->EPUB conversion for texts with simple styling, and the Editor DOCX Import for texts with more complex styling - its an intuitive decision. Conversion suits my daily document intake workflow because I can queue them, and whilst they are chugging along I can do housekeeping on metadata, and workflow records. BR Last edited by BetterRed; 06-02-2016 at 11:21 PM.

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05-31-2016, 01:48 PM	#3
Coolmeadow Junior Member Posts: 6 Karma: 10 Join Date: Nov 2015 Device: Kindle	Excellent! Thank you for the help. I'll try this tonight and see if I can make it happen. This will be for sale on Amazon for the Kindle, so night mode would be possible. It will also only be a small part of one chapter. Would this make the selection when viewed in night mode look like everything else? Or revert it back to black letters on white back ground? Or is there no way to predict? Thanks again for your help. I knew there had to be a way to do it, but no clue as to how. Jim.

06-02-2016, 01:51 AM	#7
BetterRed null operator (he/him) Posts: 21,717 Karma: 29711016 Join Date: Mar 2012 Location: Sydney Australia Device: none	@Coolmeadow - I get the impression you're saving HTML from Word and importing it into the editor. I suggest you save your Word document in DOCX format and import the DOCX into into the editor. My experience is that Calibre does a better job of converting MS DOCX than its does converting MS HTML. I don't convert until I have a 'print ready proof' in DOCX. The only ePUB editing I regularly need to do relates to layout of images, front matter titivating, and removal of superfluous metadata. I regard the DOCX files as the 'master' - there's where I'd go to create a second edition. BR

06-02-2016, 05:41 AM	#8
Divingduck Wizard Posts: 1,166 Karma: 1410083 Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Germany Device: Sony PRS-650	That's the way I do it too. In most cases I open the Word document w/o conversion directly with the editor for generating a epub.

06-03-2016, 06:02 AM	#11
Divingduck Wizard Posts: 1,166 Karma: 1410083 Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Germany Device: Sony PRS-650	Maybe it a good suggestion to look a little bit more on Word styles and the using within a document. One of the major problems come form what BetterRed describes before. The problem with it is, that each of this manual adjustments within a text will generate a separate style and your set of styles will blow up paragraph-, word- and/or character wise with tons of styles instructions and this document will then generate a really bad EPUB (and as result you will have tons of unnecessary styles instructions and manual work to correct that mess. For a better overview on what happen with Word styles in your document it is maybe a good point to permanently switch on the detailed styles view in word and reduct the view to used styles in a document. Then you are able to recognize if your set of styles grow up in an not wanted way.

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