Formatting Epub Output

kazbates · 04-24-2011, 05:18 PM

I have recently started purchasing my books in the epub format. For those of you here that know me, I prefered purchasing in .lit format and converting for use on my Sony Reader to .lrf. Because most publishers are now going predominantly to epub, I had to bite the bullet. . .so to speak.

My problem is this (and probably a familiar one for many of us); the formatting on some of the ebooks I've purchased is horrible! There is a good 1/2 inch border on all sides and it is not fully justified. I tried to bring it up in Sigil to see if there was an easy fix for someone like me who doesn't know the code and has little extra time to learn it, but have absolutely no idea where to begin. I did compare the Style files of a purchased epub ebook with great formatting to the one without but don't know what changes to make. Could I just copy the CSS and page_template files from the good epub to the bad? What would happen to the TOC, to the title formats? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Note: I did read through the Sigil user's manual and searched MR, but didn't find the answer.

Pablo · 04-24-2011, 05:34 PM

Replacing the CSS is not an option. Each book has its own styles and you will end up losing all formatting. You have to edit the existing CSS.
It is very difficult to give generic advise that is of any use. Maybe you could post the contents of the CSS files (I don't think that would be a copyright violation, but who knows?, better ask a moderator...).
Although the CSS itself is not enough, it is better than nothing.
Good luck
Pablo

theducks · 04-24-2011, 05:59 PM

Learn to reverse engineer your book.
Sigil is a fantastic tool for doing this.

Remember, EPUB uses the Box Model and inheritance.
So you start at the span/Paragraph and work outward through towards the Page level until you find what affects what you want (and does not mess the rest

)
Sometimes, you tweak a value, other times, yau specify attributes that were not present (or available to be inherited).

My choice is to set the overall style at the Body level, and make finer adjustments from there for individual elements.

In other words, I only set EXCEPTIONS to the basic overall style.

JSWolf · 04-24-2011, 06:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazbates

I have recently started purchasing my books in the epub format. For those of you here that know me, I prefered purchasing in .lit format and converting for use on my Sony Reader to .lrf. Because most publishers are now going predominantly to epub, I had to bite the bullet. . .so to speak.

My problem is this (and probably a familiar one for many of us); the formatting on some of the ebooks I've purchased is horrible! There is a good 1/2 inch border on all sides and it is not fully justified. I tried to bring it up in Sigil to see if there was an easy fix for someone like me who doesn't know the code and has little extra time to learn it, but have absolutely no idea where to begin. I did compare the Style files of a purchased epub ebook with great formatting to the one without but don't know what changes to make. Could I just copy the CSS and page_template files from the good epub to the bad? What would happen to the TOC, to the title formats? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Note: I did read through the Sigil user's manual and searched MR, but didn't find the answer.

I have an idea. If we have the same ePub, I can fix it up and you can then download a copy of notepad++ and compare the original CSS to the modified CSS. That would help to let you see what sort of changes were made to change the formatting.

kazbates · 04-24-2011, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I have an idea. If we have the same ePub, I can fix it up and you can then download a copy of notepad++ and compare the original CSS to the modified CSS. That would help to let you see what sort of changes were made to change the formatting.

Jon, that would be great! Do you have an epub that would work? I hesitate to give you a copy of what I have because of copyright rules.

This is, I'm sure to you, seem like a silly question, but is the code that is used in these file, html? It may be worth my time to learn some basic programming once school is out for the summer. It's been a loooong time since I did any programming, but, hopefully

, it's like riding a bicycle.

Thanks in advance for your help. I start teaching another 4th grade class Tuesday and won't have much time for anything until the end of school in June but am hoping I can squeeze in some time to work on this. The formatting of the ebook I purchased is atrocious. . .and I had to pay full paperback price for it. Arg!

JSWolf · 04-24-2011, 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazbates

Jon, that would be great! Do you have an epub that would work? I hesitate to give you a copy of what I have because of copyright rules.

This is, I'm sure to you, seem like a silly question, but is the code that is used in these file, html? It may be worth my time to learn some basic programming once school is out for the summer. It's been a loooong time since I did any programming, but, hopefully

, it's like riding a bicycle.

Thanks in advance for your help. I start teaching another 4th grade class Tuesday and won't have much time for anything until the end of school in June but am hoping I can squeeze in some time to work on this. The formatting of the ebook I purchased is atrocious. . .and I had to pay full paperback price for it. Arg!

What eBook is this in case I have it?

The code is supposed to be XML. But some of the time it is HTML. XML is like HTML just stricter rules. So if you know HTML, XML is not really an issue.

It's not that hard to pick up XML (HTML)/CSS in order to fix up eBooks. In fact, I'll even help you get sorted so on your 650 you won't need or want LRF as the ePub will look so much nicer with true bold, true italics, and a nicer looking font.

kazbates · 04-25-2011, 11:06 AM

I highly doubt you would have it as it's a romance novel.

I would be very willing to purchase a book you have upon which you had to do a lot of reformatting so that we could compare notes or if you know of something that is in open domain that I could download. I'm not sure what you like to read, but mysteries, sci fi, or spy novels will work for me, but. really anything will do. Would it help if posted or sent a copy of the CSS of the book to see what you think as earlier suggested? I think that would be okay with the lawyers.

It's times like these that I really dislike the copyright laws.

Thanks again, Jon, for all your help. This process has made me realize that I need to learn more about the coding aspect of book designing. I've been doing a lot of scanning and making ebooks but have been using BD to create the lrf version. If I can get the epubs to look better, than I am anxious to learn the process.

theducks · 04-25-2011, 11:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazbates

I highly doubt you would have it as it's a romance novel.

I would be very willing to purchase a book you have upon which you had to do a lot of reformatting so that we could compare notes or if you know of something that is in open domain that I could download. I'm not sure what you like to read, but mysteries, sci fi, or spy novels will work for me, but. really anything will do. Would it help if posted or sent a copy of the CSS of the book to see what you think as earlier suggested? I think that would be okay with the lawyers.

It's times like these that I really dislike the copyright laws.

Thanks again, Jon, for all your help. This process has made me realize that I need to learn more about the coding aspect of book designing. I've been doing a lot of scanning and making ebooks but have been using BD to create the lrf version. If I can get the epubs to look better, than I am anxious to learn the process.

You could use a Baen Free Library book.
No charge copies are encouraged

by the (evil, book pushing) Publisher

Unfortunately, the don't usually need much 'touchup'

Faster · 04-25-2011, 01:15 PM

@kazbates PM me the author and title of the book and I will see if I can find and fix it for you or tell you how to do it.

kazbates · 04-25-2011, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by theducks

You could use a Baen Free Library book.
No charge copies are encouraged

by the (evil, book pushing) Publisher

Unfortunately, the don't usually need much 'touchup'

"Therein lies the rub". . .neither do the books here at MR.

I don't mind paying for books, I figure the authors and, yes, even the publishers deserve their pound of flesh, since I certainly can't do what they do. Having said that, I think that once someone has purchased it, there shouldn't be restricitions on how they use it, as long as they are not making copies to sell. Sharing a book with a friend should be allowed. I just wish they didn't view ebooks as the obnoxious cousin you have to invite to the party but don't really want there.

Not that I would know about such things. . .

susan_cassidy · 04-25-2011, 01:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kazbates

It may be worth my time to learn some basic programming once school is out for the summer.

By the way, using or learning HTML or XML is not programming, it is just formatting, or editing.

kazbates · 04-25-2011, 06:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by susan_cassidy

By the way, using or learning HTML or XML is not programming, it is just formatting, or editing.

I really know very little about it. I worked as a programmer MANY years ago before becoming an elementary school teacher. Now I am very much out of the loop. Looking at the commands and trying to make some sense of them can be a bit daunting to a layperson.

But, I will say, that if it looks like code and smells like code, etc., etc., etc.

JSWolf · 04-25-2011, 08:02 PM

I have a good idea. I'll find a free ePub that could use some format fixing and we can use that. It doesn't have to be one that I want to read.

Toxaris · 04-26-2011, 03:20 AM

Some books are quite easily changed to display better. However, the code in some books looks more like a bowl of spaghetti. It is awful and it will take some time to clean up.

Dopedangel · 04-26-2011, 05:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toxaris

Some books are quite easily changed to display better. However, the code in some books looks more like a bowl of spaghetti. It is awful and it will take some time to clean up.

Most epubs that have started out as Microsoft Word html are usually very bad.
90% of the time using Calibre to convert to htmlz then using open word to open and then saving the file as html cleans half of it. Then I use htmltidy in notepad++ if I feel their is still to much code left before using sigil to clean up the rest.
Its a long process but it works for me I don't even use sigil to split on chapter page breaks just mark the chapter heading etc And then import into calibre to do an epub to epub conversion.

04-24-2011, 05:18 PM	#1
kazbates Wizard Posts: 2,627 Karma: 406616 Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Northern Virginia Device: SurfacePro, SurfaceBook 2	Formatting Epub Output I have recently started purchasing my books in the epub format. For those of you here that know me, I prefered purchasing in .lit format and converting for use on my Sony Reader to .lrf. Because most publishers are now going predominantly to epub, I had to bite the bullet. . .so to speak. My problem is this (and probably a familiar one for many of us); the formatting on some of the ebooks I've purchased is horrible! There is a good 1/2 inch border on all sides and it is not fully justified. I tried to bring it up in Sigil to see if there was an easy fix for someone like me who doesn't know the code and has little extra time to learn it, but have absolutely no idea where to begin. I did compare the Style files of a purchased epub ebook with great formatting to the one without but don't know what changes to make. Could I just copy the CSS and page_template files from the good epub to the bad? What would happen to the TOC, to the title formats? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Note: I did read through the Sigil user's manual and searched MR, but didn't find the answer.

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04-24-2011, 05:34 PM	#2
Pablo Guru Posts: 972 Karma: 4999999 Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Rosario, Argentina Device: SONY PRS-T2, Kindle Paperwhite 11th gen	Replacing the CSS is not an option. Each book has its own styles and you will end up losing all formatting. You have to edit the existing CSS. It is very difficult to give generic advise that is of any use. Maybe you could post the contents of the CSS files (I don't think that would be a copyright violation, but who knows?, better ask a moderator...). Although the CSS itself is not enough, it is better than nothing. Good luck Pablo

04-24-2011, 05:59 PM	#3
theducks Well trained by Cats Posts: 30,891 Karma: 60358908 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: The Central Coast of California Device: Kobo Libra2,Kobo Aura2v1, K4NT(Fixed: New Bat.), Galaxy Tab A	Learn to reverse engineer your book. Sigil is a fantastic tool for doing this. Remember, EPUB uses the Box Model and inheritance. So you start at the span/Paragraph and work outward through towards the Page level until you find what affects what you want (and does not mess the rest ) Sometimes, you tweak a value, other times, yau specify attributes that were not present (or available to be inherited). My choice is to set the overall style at the Body level, and make finer adjustments from there for individual elements. In other words, I only set EXCEPTIONS to the basic overall style.

04-25-2011, 11:06 AM	#7
kazbates Wizard Posts: 2,627 Karma: 406616 Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Northern Virginia Device: SurfacePro, SurfaceBook 2	I highly doubt you would have it as it's a romance novel. I would be very willing to purchase a book you have upon which you had to do a lot of reformatting so that we could compare notes or if you know of something that is in open domain that I could download. I'm not sure what you like to read, but mysteries, sci fi, or spy novels will work for me, but. really anything will do. Would it help if posted or sent a copy of the CSS of the book to see what you think as earlier suggested? I think that would be okay with the lawyers. It's times like these that I really dislike the copyright laws. Thanks again, Jon, for all your help. This process has made me realize that I need to learn more about the coding aspect of book designing. I've been doing a lot of scanning and making ebooks but have been using BD to create the lrf version. If I can get the epubs to look better, than I am anxious to learn the process.

04-25-2011, 01:15 PM	#9
Faster Connoisseur Posts: 61 Karma: 12096 Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Tasmania Device: Sony PRS 650	@kazbates PM me the author and title of the book and I will see if I can find and fix it for you or tell you how to do it.

04-25-2011, 08:02 PM	#13
JSWolf Resident Curmudgeon Posts: 79,029 Karma: 144284074 Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Roslindale, Massachusetts Device: Kobo Libra 2, Kobo Aura H2O, PRS-650, PRS-T1, nook STR, PW3	I have a good idea. I'll find a free ePub that could use some format fixing and we can use that. It doesn't have to be one that I want to read.

04-26-2011, 03:20 AM	#14
Toxaris Wizard Posts: 4,520 Karma: 121692313 Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Heemskerk, NL Device: PRS-T1, Kobo Touch, Kobo Aura	Some books are quite easily changed to display better. However, the code in some books looks more like a bowl of spaghetti. It is awful and it will take some time to clean up.