How to remove blank line between paragraphs

[theducks]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Sorry, but that's a HORRIBLE solution. PLEASE don't do it that way.

+ 10

[Jellby]

First consequence: indents no longer work.

[HarryT]

There are probably even worse consequences. Follow that advice and you'd end up with a single paragraph in each chapter. On many devices, jumping to a hyperlink takes you to the start of the paragraph in which the link destination occurs, so all your hyperlinks break, too.

[Greg P]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Sorry, but that's a HORRIBLE solution. PLEASE don't do it that way.

This is not a horrible solution. It is a solution worth looking at.
Just as webpages can use a mixture of <br /> and <p></p> tags, you can use whatever works for a particular purpose.
What you have to consider is the value of the extra space that <p> gives you, in terms of reading comfort, but there are times when you don't want that space.

[Greg P]

Originally Posted by Jellby

First consequence: indents no longer work.

This would be useful if true. At least in Sigil, you can still indent after doing what I suggested. To be sure, this results in insertion of <p></p> tags, and <blockquote>, but isn't that a desired outcome when you might indent?

[Jellby]

With indents I mean first-line indents in every paragraph. Sure, you can add them by adding back <p></p> to every paragraph, but why remove them the first time?

And <p></p> does not give extra space, at least not if you have them properly styled. In fact, a style such as "p { margin: 0, text-indent: 0; padding: 0; }" should give the same visual appearance as <br/>, but with the advantage of it being more semantic, easier to modify, and easier to process (some applications process one paragraph at a time, if everything is a single paragraph they'll struggle to process everything in one chunk).

[JSWolf]

I just want to quote this well written post in the ePub section about using Calibre to do ePub > ePub conversions.

Originally Posted by Toxaris

In some cases conversion within Calibre will break things that are perfectly fine to begin with. So, it adds unnecessary code and potentially breaks things. If your ePUB is not working, you should solve it in the source instead on relying on a Calibre conversion.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Sorry, but that's a HORRIBLE solution. PLEASE don't do it that way.

+20. That's just crappy coding. And it's not less "complicated" than fiddling with CSS, if someone has to regex it to make it happen.

Learning to write even moderately decent CSS isn't like learning to create a nuclear bomb. Someone can teach himself in almost no time, and the average DIY book takes about 10-12 classes; a few header classes, 3-4 paragraph classes, and that's about it. Our internal, House CSS has over 100 classes, but we do this professionally, and need styles for everything from lists to tables to Bob's weirdo paragraph. The average joe can even lift a sheet of CSS from Jellby to save time (highly recommended clean code).

And, trust me on this, taking a few minutes to learn it, and apply it properly, will not only give you a feeling of accomplishment, but will give you a basis to build on the NEXT time you want to convert a book. Taking shortcuts now won't help you when you DO want to do something a little more complicated--like 2-way footnotes, or what-have-you.

Just my $.02
Hitch

[Sinom Bre]

Just fix the CSS. CSS is easier than trying to fix all the in-line HTML. One change in the CSS, and everything is done.

Now here's MY problem. How do I get rid of blank lines in code view? I don't want them and don't need them, but the ebooks I edit seem bound and determined to put a blank line between each paragraph in code view. Very annoying.

[Turtle91]

Hello Sinom Bre,

Welcome to Mobile Read! This is a slightly old thread - almost 4 years old.

When you speak of blank lines between paragraphs in code view, do you mean an actual paragraph with an empty line, or just empty space?

If it is empty space, then there is nothing you need to do. That space is there just to make it easy for the formatter (you) to differentiate the paragraphs. Blank space is not recognized by the renderer and condensed down to a single space within tags, and completely ignored outside of tags.

If it is an actual paragraph tag with empty space in there, eg. <p>&nbsp;</p> (or something) then you can just use a search and replace to delete them.

search: <p>&nbsp;</p>
replace: "" (without the quotes)

One bit of warning... sometimes those empty paragraphs are intentionally left in there to signify scene breaks...an extra space between one time/place and the next. So I would check to make sure they are not intended before deleting them.

Cheers,


edit: If you absolutely HAVE to get rid of the space between paragraphs then you can use a search/replace.
eg:
search: </p>\s*<p> (or something)
replace: </p>\n<p>

Just remember to disable the prettify code otherwise it will put spaces back in there.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Sinom Bre

Now here's MY problem. How do I get rid of blank lines in code view? I don't want them and don't need them, but the ebooks I edit seem bound and determined to put a blank line between each paragraph in code view. Very annoying.

With existing epubs: upgrade to Sigil 0.9.2+, delete the blank lines, and never use the Prettify Code feature.

With new epubs: upgrade to Sigil 0.9.2+, never use the Prettify Code feature.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

With existing epubs: upgrade to Sigil 0.9.2+, delete the blank lines, and never use the Prettify Code feature.

With new epubs: upgrade to Sigil 0.9.2+, never use the Prettify Code feature.

Does the Prettify Code feature not work?

[KevinH]

It works just fine. The issue is it puts back the blank lines (actually extra linefeed character) after every line, which is exactly what he wants to get rid of.

KevinH

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Does the Prettify Code feature not work?

Like Kevin said, "of course it does." But Sinom Bre doesn't want the empty lines between elements in Code View that Prettify provides. So I was telling him how to achieve that. Prior to Sigil 0.9.2, he would just have to deal with it. Sigil 0.9.2 got rid of any automatic (and constant) Prettifying of code and made it a manual process that the user has to initiate.

If he upgrades to the latest Sigil, he'll be able to format well-formed code pretty much any way he wants anyway and Sigil won't automatically Prettify it.

[Coolmeadow Kid]

Originally Posted by HarryT

You might find it easier to use Calibre. Do an "ePub to ePub" conversion, and check the "Remove spacing between paragraphs" check box. It won't work in all cases, but it will sort out the problem in the majority of circumstances.

Thank you! It worked great for me. All 7 books I've converted from DOCX to EPUB in Calibre renders the html differently. I can usually play with it and figure it out. But not tonight. I could get rid of the extra line by changing the html on the 'paragraph' above it, but that would change that one. No combination would work, until I found your solution above. Thanks! Jim.