problem with mobi from Indesign plug-in - Page 2

Jellby · 07-04-2012, 04:11 AM

You probably want use "margin-top" in those cases. The "p+p" selector affects all <p> tags that are preceded by another <p> tag (i.e., they affect the second <p> of the pair), so if you want to control the spacing between paragraphs you need to change the top margin of the second paragraph (or the bottom of the first, but there's no selector for that, as far as I know).

sidmagee · 07-04-2012, 12:59 PM

thanks for the response. unfortunately I don't know my way around the e-book universe. what is a CSS file? what is an "adjacent selector?" if that's a manual operation, there are a hell of a lot of paragraphs in a 650 page manuscript. is there no "global" formatting tool in the mobi world?

Jellby · 07-04-2012, 01:11 PM

CSS is the "global" formatting you ask for, and it's really simple to learn the basics of. Search for some tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/css/ is one).

However, it's not available for mobi, mobi does not support CSS. But most converters do the translation themselves, so you can use CSS in your source document and have it nicely transferred to mobi.

DiapDealer · 07-04-2012, 01:52 PM

I don't think the InDesign MOBI plugin allows much in the way of tweaking, modifying or otherwise altering the final output. You'll probably want to export to ePub first -- tweak the CSS of that ePub and then convert the ePub to MOBI with kindlegen.

iain robinson · 07-05-2012, 02:48 AM

To answer sidmagee's specific question - no, you wouldn't need to do something to each individual paragraph. The ePUB has one CSS file which contains all the style info for everything in the HTML files (which is what ePUBs are made of). If you have two types of paragraphs that you want to have a certain amount of space between then you can use CSS (in just a couple of lines of code) to always do that when these paragraphs are adjacent to each other.

I've been dipping my toe in and out of ePUB (and slightly into mobi also) for the last couple of years and it has become clear that if you want to get a file (ePUB or mobi) that you are happy with then you are going to have to get to grips with HTML and CSS to some extent. The tools for automatically creating these files (eg, Indesign) are just not able to give you exactly what you want and may never be, so you have to do some tweaking yourself. It's not really that hard once you accept you have to do it.

sidmagee · 07-05-2012, 01:05 PM

Thank you both for the help.
I taught myself Basic on the first IBM PC, then learned how to tweak the Epson driver to format on a Canon laser printer, and later modified HP's graphic language. But that was a long time ago, and my mind was more elastic.
In fact it's never easy - I can remember wrestling to get AutoCad to Pagemaker (then InDesign) via CoreDraw, then Illustrator. I get a headache just thinking about it.
So now I gotta learn ePub and CSS!
Maybe that's the antidote to Alzheimers.
Go well.

iain robinson · 07-06-2012, 02:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sidmagee

Maybe that's the antidote to Alzheimers.

I think there might be something in that!

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07-04-2012, 04:11 AM	#16
Jellby frumious Bandersnatch Posts: 7,556 Karma: 19500001 Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Spaniard in Sweden Device: Cybook Orizon, Kobo Aura	You probably want use "margin-top" in those cases. The "p+p" selector affects all <p> tags that are preceded by another <p> tag (i.e., they affect the second <p> of the pair), so if you want to control the spacing between paragraphs you need to change the top margin of the second paragraph (or the bottom of the first, but there's no selector for that, as far as I know).

07-04-2012, 12:59 PM	#17
sidmagee Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jul 2012 Device: none	thanks for the response. unfortunately I don't know my way around the e-book universe. what is a CSS file? what is an "adjacent selector?" if that's a manual operation, there are a hell of a lot of paragraphs in a 650 page manuscript. is there no "global" formatting tool in the mobi world?

07-04-2012, 01:11 PM	#18
Jellby frumious Bandersnatch Posts: 7,556 Karma: 19500001 Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Spaniard in Sweden Device: Cybook Orizon, Kobo Aura	CSS is the "global" formatting you ask for, and it's really simple to learn the basics of. Search for some tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/css/ is one). However, it's not available for mobi, mobi does not support CSS. But most converters do the translation themselves, so you can use CSS in your source document and have it nicely transferred to mobi.

07-04-2012, 01:52 PM	#19
DiapDealer Grand Sorcerer Posts: 28,645 Karma: 204624552 Join Date: Jan 2010 Device: Nexus 7, Kindle Fire HD	I don't think the InDesign MOBI plugin allows much in the way of tweaking, modifying or otherwise altering the final output. You'll probably want to export to ePub first -- tweak the CSS of that ePub and then convert the ePub to MOBI with kindlegen.

07-05-2012, 02:48 AM	#20
iain robinson Connoisseur Posts: 75 Karma: 10 Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: UK Device: none	To answer sidmagee's specific question - no, you wouldn't need to do something to each individual paragraph. The ePUB has one CSS file which contains all the style info for everything in the HTML files (which is what ePUBs are made of). If you have two types of paragraphs that you want to have a certain amount of space between then you can use CSS (in just a couple of lines of code) to always do that when these paragraphs are adjacent to each other. I've been dipping my toe in and out of ePUB (and slightly into mobi also) for the last couple of years and it has become clear that if you want to get a file (ePUB or mobi) that you are happy with then you are going to have to get to grips with HTML and CSS to some extent. The tools for automatically creating these files (eg, Indesign) are just not able to give you exactly what you want and may never be, so you have to do some tweaking yourself. It's not really that hard once you accept you have to do it.

07-05-2012, 01:05 PM	#21
sidmagee Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jul 2012 Device: none	Thank you both for the help. I taught myself Basic on the first IBM PC, then learned how to tweak the Epson driver to format on a Canon laser printer, and later modified HP's graphic language. But that was a long time ago, and my mind was more elastic. In fact it's never easy - I can remember wrestling to get AutoCad to Pagemaker (then InDesign) via CoreDraw, then Illustrator. I get a headache just thinking about it. So now I gotta learn ePub and CSS! Maybe that's the antidote to Alzheimers. Go well.