Sigil failed me, alas! (Kindle conversion)

[Notjohn]

I have been uploading Sigil-generated epubs to the Amazon store for two and a half years, at least a dozen of them counting both new books and revisions of earlier ones. Yesterday for the first time an upload failed.

In the early morning I'd uploaded a version of this same book without any difficulty. But then I added a teaser chapter from a related book and made a few others tweaks, which somehow changed the epub in some fundamental way. It passed Flight Crew and Epubcheck verification without any errors or warnings, and it was accepted by Draft2Digital for distribution to its various retailers including Apple iBookstore, always the most persnickety. But even on D2D, the Amazon Kindle "mobi" conversion failed, yielding a 500 error. So I don't think it was just a glitch or a sudden change of heart at Amazon.

With great reluctance, I fired up Calibre and used it to convert the epub to a mobi. It checked out okay; I uploaded it; the preview checked out okay; I published it; and now, just a couple hours later, the Look Inside preview is duly displayed on the Amazon store. It looks pretty good, though it doesn't follow my Sigil formatting as closely as do the books I uploaded as epubs.

Can anyone point me to what I (presumably) did wrong, which Calibre was apparently able to do right?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Notjohn

Can anyone point me to what I (presumably) did wrong, which Calibre was apparently able to do right?

One thing you did wrong was upload a Mobi only copy. You are lucky that Amazon accepted a Calibre Mobi conversion as normally that won't happen. That means no AZW3 (KF8) version available. If I was to have bought your book and found no KF8 version, I would want my money back. There is no excuse for not having a KF8 version these days.

That said, there's not a lot anyone can do without seeing your code.

You can try a conversion of the ePub using Kindlegen and upload that (if it works) to Amazon to replace the Mobi only copy you posted.

Sorry, but I feel that anyone who has posted a Mobi only copy is disappointing the readers with a forced obsolete format. So anyone with KF8 support gets shafted.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Notjohn

Can anyone point me to what I (presumably) did wrong, which Calibre was apparently able to do right?

Most likely you've introduced a syntax error. However, without seeing the actual Kindlegen log, it's hard to tell.
To display it simply compile the ePub with Kindle Previewer and click Compilation Details. (You can copy the text with CTRL+SHIFT+END & CTRL+C.)

[DiapDealer]

Just because an epub passes FlightCrew and EpubCheck validation doesn't mean it might not include something that the Kindlegen conversion process doesn't support/can't handle.

As Doitsu suggested, do a conversion of the epub locally (with the very latest Kindlegen/Kindle Previewer) to see what might be going on. I'd recommend uploading kindlegen output instead of epubs anyway. That way you know before uploading that there may be an issue.

[JSWolf]

A 500 error is an internal server error. Makes no sense to get one from Kindlegen.

Did you happen to add in any links?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

A 500 error is an internal server error. Makes no sense to get one from Kindlegen.

He didn't get the 500 error from Kindlegen. He's uploading epubs to Amazon and allowing them to do the conversion.

[Notjohn]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

A 500 error is an internal server error. Makes no sense to get one from Kindlegen.

Did you happen to add in any links?

The 500 error was on the Draft 2 Digital website when I tried to convert the epub to mobi format.

Yes, I did add links (to an external website, not to a book on the Amazon store).

I will try Kindle Previewer. I'd never found that necessary before. Thanks.

[Notjohn]

Okay, this is the error I get from Kindle Previewer:

Error(opfparser):E20006: There are more than one title defined in OPF metadata. But none of them is refined with "title-type" as "main" title. Refer http://idpf.org/epub/30/spec/epub30-...ec-opf-dctitle for more info.

("There are more than one title," OMG!)

That's probably it. I did change the title, probably between the morning and afternoon uploads. Thanks again for pointing me at Kindle Previewer.

[DiapDealer]

So wait; it's a third-party conversion/distribution service ... and yet you're assuming Sigil has failed you in some way??

[Notjohn]

Okay, that converts. There were two title [sic] indeed. Thanks again.

[JSWolf]

These different titles won't all display. so you are best to just have one title that is the title as you want it displayed. Then it will work as an ePub and KF8 and Mobi. Otherwise, you won't have all those titles displayed in all the different formats.