Google Play Books and Nested Lists - Some Weird Display Issue

[Quoth]

No-one should be reading ebooks (actual epub files) or PDFs in a browser. You can't insure against people using the wrong programs.

A "cloud" reader isn't the same thing.

We actually tried to craft special HTML samples for people that insist on doing things in a browser. But we removed them because it didn't make sense.

If it works in real Apps, Calibre Viewer and real ereader then stupidity of browser extensions is irrelevant.

See samples here https://www.corvidspress.com/fiction...ne-of-destiny/
and https://www.corvidspress.com/fiction...ntices-talent/

The epub samples are the same source as the full book edited in LO Writer (odt format) and an extra "Save As" in "docx" format, imported to Calibre and converted with our defaults to epub2. No edits to CSS or HTML

The PDF is not a final version, but a quick mock up of the source "odt" edited as a separate "odt" file and exported as a PDF, all with LO Writer.


If I was doing something that needed CSS & HTML edited (i.e. a more complicated book than is possible automatically from docx to epub2) I'd use Sigil rather than InDesign, which is really a desktop publishing tool for paper via PDF to the printing company that's been kludged to make Kindle or epub ebooks.

I've not looked at "PlayBooks_NestedLists_Test_V03.epub" so I can't comment on the specific example except to say I'd never waste my time looking at an epub with a browser extension.

I don't remember doing more than one level lists in a novel. But certainly I've done nested lists in reports, technical documents and manuals and I'd not have read any of those in a browser. The most evil technical document I did was exporting a powerpoint to HTML for a website after it was presented in person to the intended audience using MS Office XP on a laptop.

I might put a heading on a list with a Page Break Before, but of course on a 4.3" screen or a 600x800 eink (5" and older 6" screens) a large list will break in the middle, or someone might increase the font size. You only have total control of layout on a PDF and inherently if the screen isn't large enough it's rubbish. The entire idea of a PDF is to proof on a screen big enough for a whole page, or ideally two side by side pages, of what is going to be printed on paper.

That's why Mac originally had laser printer, Display Postscript and giant screens to capture the print publishing market. Adobe InDesign might have been Aldus Pagemaker then. It's long ago and back then I was more involved with CAD/CAE schematics and PCB layout on PCs and later networking Mac OS9 machines to Windows Server, HP plotters and Lasers and making presents of three button PC USB mice to Mac users with the awful single button puck. But OS9 and earlier was better than Win98, though not as good as even NT 3.51 never mind NT 4.0. The first OS X (Mac OS 10) was a huge improvement under the GUI.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by MicroDrie

Now what I'm curious about is the difference in rendering of the original EPUB before sending to Google Books, downloaded again from Google Books and read again in the same EPUB reader and rendered EPUB. Only if there is a difference with the same EPUB reader, we have established that something goes wrong during processing at Google.

There isn't a tiny difference in the ePub after uploading, publishing, and downloading through the Google Books. The ePub is identical in every aspect. The nested lists issue was there before (in our Google Books testing, this issue don't appear on any other reader or device) so we thought to upload and publish the book, have it pass through the Google Books system and see if the issues remains or not.

The issue remains. The author is also in touch with the Google support as to find out whether they pin-point the cause of this issue or not.

[Quoth]

If it's only in a browser plug in, then it's a browser plug in issue. Do not ever use a Web Browser (even old versions of Edge) to view epubs, PDFs or actual MS Office files. Download them. Only use the browser for either webpages or a web "cloud application", never with actual files.

Originally Posted by rsuchwani

There isn't a tiny difference in the ePub after uploading, publishing, and downloading through the Google Books. The ePub is identical in every aspect. The nested lists issue was there before (in our Google Books testing)

HOW are you testing Google Books?
With the App for GoogleBooks or some other mysterious method?

Also Google Books has maybe the smallest share of the Ebook Market. Amazon, Kobo, Apple, Nook, Tolino and maybe Scribd are bigger. Use an epub2 for Amazon KDP, and the SAME epub2 for Smashwords (who will send it to Kobo, Apple, Nook, Tolino and Scribd and it will be in their catalogues as if you uploaded direct). Upload the same epub2 to Google simply for exposure, but most seeing it on Google will check Amazon, Apple or Kobo because purchase details on Playstore are obnoxious. Set Google price higher too. Make the epub2 into a Dual Mobi on Calibre and secondly also upload to Smashwords for their local Kindle sales. They only redistribute the epub2. Apple "converts" the epub2 they get from Smashwords into the Apple Book format which is just a sort of wrapper.

However I've checked some of our ebooks in the Google Android Playbook App anonymously (by temporarily having them free) and they were fine.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by Quoth

HOW are you testing Google Books?
With the App for GoogleBooks or some other mysterious method?

Here are the steps to side load the epub to Google/Play Books app on an Android device:
1. Transfer the ePub to your Android Phone.
2. From any File Manager, select the ePub, you'll get the context menu, and on this menu you'll have the option 'upload to Google/Play Books', select it. (It's actually uploading to your Google Books account.)
3. After the upload, the ePub will then download to the app and you can start testing/reading it.

And as for suggestions/advice, it's very practical and hassle free, I'll surely discuss this with the author.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by rsuchwani

Here are the steps to side load the epub to Google/Play Books app on an Android device:
1. Transfer the ePub to your Android Phone.
2. From any File Manager, select the ePub, you'll get the context menu, and on this menu you'll have the option 'upload to Google/Play Books', select it. (It's actually uploading to your Google Books account.)
3. After the upload, the ePub will then download to the app and you can start testing/reading it.

And as for suggestions/advice, it's very practical and hassle free, I'll surely discuss this with the author.

I did want to second what Quoth says about GoogleBooks--their market share is quite literally infinitesimal. Now...your client may have a good reason to want to be there, but I tend to find, for what it's worth, that generally speaking, authors seem to have very little connection to reality, about where books sell, where they're found, and all that. I've had some convinced that putting their books on GBooks would somehow magically enhance their organic SEO for their book titles and the like.

So...perhaps, before you drive yourself crazier, you could ask the author and make sure that there's good reason for all this angst?

Typically, by the time I get to where you are, with the yanking-out-hair stage, I've simply told the customer that it can't be done. We warn them about this upfront, and I invoke the ripcord clause ("can't be done") as needed.

Hitch

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by rsuchwani

Here are the steps to side load the epub to Google/Play Books app on an Android device:
1. Transfer the ePub to your Android Phone.
2. From any File Manager, select the ePub, you'll get the context menu, and on this menu you'll have the option 'upload to Google/Play Books', select it. (It's actually uploading to your Google Books account.)
3. After the upload, the ePub will then download to the app and you can start testing/reading it.

No, that does NOT test Google Books. That is simply using Google as an ebook library or something. Google actually has three different things they call Google Books:
1) The Google Books searchable site that has scans of many books Google doesn't sell as well as ebooks sold by others and their own ebook catalogue. They seem to give a copy of any scan THEY think is Public Domain to the Internet Archive.
2) A Personal Cloud Library.
3) Google Books that they sell via the Playstore. Includes comics and pdfs as well as real ebooks. There are usually some free titles. I used free comics and ebooks to test their app on a 7.8" eink Android ereader-Tablet and compare it with the 6" phone and 10" LCD tablet. Comics on eink are not as nice as on a colour LCD, but 10" needed.

You need a Publisher account at Google.
1) You "publish" the ebook at google. There are forms for metadata, pricing etc and you upload the epub and cover separately, usually from Mac OS, Windows PC or Linux using your Browser. I use Chrome on Linux. It's the same but different as creating a new title at Amazon KDP or Smashwords. By default they assume a PDF. But change all the options including less obvious ones.

2) Google processes it.

3) At release date you can buy it or download a sample. This is done in the Books section of the Playstore. It's best done on an Android phone or tablet. If you never used Google Books before the Android Gadget gets the Google Playbook App. Then it has a manager to manage the downloads. I forget, but there might be an option to have a sample before release. Oddly the sample on Google Books Web Site that has everyone's books that Google can grab and scan is an option.

4) By default the ebooks from Google are only available via the PlayBook App, though they can be DRM free on publisher request and you might find them somewhere on the phone/tablet so you can read them in some other App. Like Kindle books bought on iPhone, iPad, Fire or Android Kindle App, the intention is that they are ONLY read on the Google App. Though they can be completely downloaded and then read without any Internet.

So a special Google account and desktop browser is used to fill in the metadata, pricing, upload the epub and the cover, all separately.

Then the customer is expected to use the Playstore on Andriod to buy & download the ebook. Maybe sideloading is feasible if you use the Playstore on a PC/Mac/Linux, but that would be rare. Google sets up a special nearly impossible to delete connection if you use Paypal. You have to use a Browser to remove it from the Playstore and then ask Paypal to delete it from your Paypal account, you can't remove that end manually. I'd hate to give Google my Credit card details.

[Quoth]

As an aside, because Google encouraged PDF and didn't check rights, piracy was rampant via GoogleBooks on the Playstore. So they totally blocked anyone joining as a publisher for ages. We used an account created by someone else as back then it was simple to have multiple users on a publisher account. Possible with Amazon and Smashwords too.

So I've absolutely NO idea how you create a Google Playbooks Publisher account. A kind existing Publisher that trusted us added us.

Smashwords covers almost everyone worth listing with (inc Overdrive) EXCEPT Amazon KDP and Google PlayBooks. Ingram Spark does the same thing including Amazon, but for $49 per ebook. Amazon, Smashwords and Google are free to add your titles to and list on indefinitely for ebooks. Amazon also for Print. If you publish on paper, buy your own block of 100 or 1000 ISBNs or else you are not the publisher. If you do that then the ISBN titles can be listed in a database for free. This only matters for physical bookshops.

Download the free Smashwords ebooks on publishing related topics.
https://www.smashwords.com/about/supportfaq#Publishing

Smashwords was founded to sell erotica (but not illegal content) that Amazon would not list. But now that's just one aspect and there is checkbox to hide it.
They are now the only serious ereader hardware independent ebook seller and have the most formats. All DRM free. Customers have free access to all later updates (not true on Amazon automatically). Recently they partnered with an Audiobook company once the main supplier to libraries in some countries.

While Amazon has 90% of English ebooks*, Smashwords may exceed Apple, Kobo, Scribd, Barnes & Noble, Tolino and Google combined for Self Published and Micropublisher titles. Sadly the Big Publishers (4, 5 or 6 this week?) are obsessed with DRM yet many of their titles are pirated before launch from ARC. It's trivial to pirate printed books never mind ebooks. DRM doesn't work.


* Apple and Kobo do more countries and Amazon isn't even significant in some non-English markets. Only use KDP, not KDP Select.

KDP Select requires exclusivity, which means you can't sell your book in other stores such as Smashwords and the retailers and library suppliers Smashwords distributes to such as Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, OverDrive, Scribd and others. Amazon only reaches ebook readers in about 14 countries, whereas Apple Books reaches 51 countries (and dominates the Australian ebook market), Kobo reaches about 160 countries and the Smashwords store reaches almost 200 countries.

[MicroDrie]

Good news for rsuchwani, I have so simple solution for the "Loss of text" and "Indent character(s) at the top of new page". The cause is the use of a nested list and a render rule unknown to me for block elements. Building the list with a paragraph or div element in combination with a "before" content does solve the loss of text, but you still keep the indent characters on a new page.

So I'm building a list using a table that has broad support for E-readers and EPUB apps. Here I give the table 100% width and I define in CSS the size and behavior of the first (left) cell, such as indent width.

Since you wrote that your indent characters are in most fonts, I use those. This increases the applicability to E-readers that cannot load fonts.

By defining a separate class for each indent level containing the required indent width with right alignment, it becomes even simpler. You can put in any indentation character or number you want.

Google Play Books has no problems reading and displaying.

Before printing to a PDF you will have to look at the settings, converting does not present any problems here either.

Good luck with this very simple old-school Proof-of-Concept.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I did want to second what Quoth says about GoogleBooks--their market share is quite literally infinitesimal. Now...your client may have a good reason to want to be there, but I tend to find, for what it's worth, that generally speaking, authors seem to have very little connection to reality, about where books sell, where they're found, and all that. I've had some convinced that putting their books on GBooks would somehow magically enhance their organic SEO for their book titles and the like.

So...perhaps, before you drive yourself crazier, you could ask the author and make sure that there's good reason for all this angst?

Typically, by the time I get to where you are, with the yanking-out-hair stage, I've simply told the customer that it can't be done. We warn them about this upfront, and I invoke the ripcord clause ("can't be done") as needed.

Hitch

You are right @Hitch, although we know that Google Books' marker share is a tiny bit, the author is adamant to have an Android presence through Google Books.

The ePub works on other apps without any significant issues so I've already suggested the author have the ePub sell through his website too.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by Quoth

No, that does NOT test Google Books. That is simply using Google as an ebook library or something. Google actually has three different things they call Google Books:
1) The Google Books searchable site that has scans of many books Google doesn't sell as well as ebooks sold by others and their own ebook catalogue. They seem to give a copy of any scan THEY think is Public Domain to the Internet Archive.
2) A Personal Cloud Library.
3) Google Books that they sell via the Playstore. Includes comics and pdfs as well as real ebooks. There are usually some free titles. I used free comics and ebooks to test their app on a 7.8" eink Android ereader-Tablet and compare it with the 6" phone and 10" LCD tablet. Comics on eink are not as nice as on a colour LCD, but 10" needed.

You need a Publisher account at Google.
1) You "publish" the ebook at google. There are forms for metadata, pricing etc and you upload the epub and cover separately, usually from Mac OS, Windows PC or Linux using your Browser. I use Chrome on Linux. It's the same but different as creating a new title at Amazon KDP or Smashwords. By default they assume a PDF. But change all the options including less obvious ones.

2) Google processes it.

3) At release date you can buy it or download a sample. This is done in the Books section of the Playstore. It's best done on an Android phone or tablet. If you never used Google Books before the Android Gadget gets the Google Playbook App. Then it has a manager to manage the downloads. I forget, but there might be an option to have a sample before release. Oddly the sample on Google Books Web Site that has everyone's books that Google can grab and scan is an option.

4) By default the ebooks from Google are only available via the PlayBook App, though they can be DRM free on publisher request and you might find them somewhere on the phone/tablet so you can read them in some other App. Like Kindle books bought on iPhone, iPad, Fire or Android Kindle App, the intention is that they are ONLY read on the Google App. Though they can be completely downloaded and then read without any Internet.

So a special Google account and desktop browser is used to fill in the metadata, pricing, upload the epub and the cover, all separately.

Then the customer is expected to use the Playstore on Andriod to buy & download the ebook. Maybe sideloading is feasible if you use the Playstore on a PC/Mac/Linux, but that would be rare. Google sets up a special nearly impossible to delete connection if you use Paypal. You have to use a Browser to remove it from the Playstore and then ask Paypal to delete it from your Paypal account, you can't remove that end manually. I'd hate to give Google my Credit card details.

Thanks, @Quoth for providing this insight, I've already had some info about Google Books and how it works.

The method I defined earlier works for me because it enables me to test the ePub intended for Google Books without actually publishing, and there's very little difference between the test ePub and the published ePub.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by Quoth

So I've absolutely NO idea how you create a Google Playbooks Publisher account. A kind existing Publisher that trusted us added us.

I didn't make any publisher account because it isn't supported in my country and using VPN wouldn't enable me to open the publisher account because too much information would be missing.

For now, I'm using this client's publisher account with Google Books, the book in question is already published and available to buy with a free sample.

I was able to get the free sample to test and the result/issue is the same.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by MicroDrie

Good news for rsuchwani, I have so simple solution for the "Loss of text" and "Indent character(s) at the top of new page". The cause is the use of a nested list and a render rule unknown to me for block elements. Building the list with a paragraph or div element in combination with a "before" content does solve the loss of text, but you still keep the indent characters on a new page.

So I'm building a list using a table that has broad support for E-readers and EPUB apps. Here I give the table 100% width and I define in CSS the size and behavior of the first (left) cell, such as indent width.

Since you wrote that your indent characters are in most fonts, I use those. This increases the applicability to E-readers that cannot load fonts.

By defining a separate class for each indent level containing the required indent width with right alignment, it becomes even simpler. You can put in any indentation character or number you want.

Google Play Books has no problems reading and displaying.

Before printing to a PDF you will have to look at the settings, converting does not present any problems here either.

Good luck with this very simple old-school Proof-of-Concept.

This sounds amazing, yet so simple.

Let me thoroughly check the code and application, but I'm sure it works just as you said.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by rsuchwani

You are right @Hitch, although we know that Google Books' marker share is a tiny bit, the author is adamant to have an Android presence through Google Books.

The ePub works on other apps without any significant issues so I've already suggested the author have the ePub sell through his website too.

An Android "presence" through GoogleBooks? What about B&N's Nook, or KoboBooks' Kobo, or Amazon's Kindle4Droid(phones), or...? Or Kindle4Win8, which is for, yup, Droid-based tablets, too?

I mean...whatever. If they really want an Android presence, publish it on bloody Amazon, B&N and Kobo. GBooks is the absolute LAST place I'd put a book of mine, around sales. (Right behind Apple's Books platform, which is the penultimate location I'd put an eBook, for the same reason...pretty lousy sales.) YOU did tell him or her all this already, yes?

Offered solely fwiw.

Don't assume that MicroDrie's solution will work everywhere, either. Tables are at best poorly supported in eBooks. Just...FYI. It's a clever-enough workaround, IF IF IF the recipient device and software support tables adequately. OR, they support them, but the table misbehaves anyway. Which is the more-likely outcome.

Hitch

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by MicroDrie

Unfortunately, no one knows which E-reader supports which CSS commands. That makes it all very difficult to make EPUB that can do something more than bold, italic and underlined text.

There were quite extensive tests done over the years.

epubtest.org tested devices/apps from ~2014-2018. I wrote about it earlier this year:

"Overview of features supported by ebook readers?" (Post #30)

The website died for a few years, and is back (but it's a shell of its former self). Perhaps they'll get back into releasing more detailed tests/info... but you can easily use Archive.org to look at all their older information—a ton of it is still relevant.

[rsuchwani]

Originally Posted by Hitch

An Android "presence" through GoogleBooks? What about B&N's Nook, or KoboBooks' Kobo, or Amazon's Kindle4Droid(phones), or...? Or Kindle4Win8, which is for, yup, Droid-based tablets, too?

I mean...whatever. If they really want an Android presence, publish it on bloody Amazon, B&N and Kobo. GBooks is the absolute LAST place I'd put a book of mine, around sales. (Right behind Apple's Books platform, which is the penultimate location I'd put an eBook, for the same reason...pretty lousy sales.) YOU did tell him or her all this already, yes?

I've explained everything to the Author, but the Author wants to sail the waters on his own terms.

Originally Posted by Hitch

Don't assume that MicroDrie's solution will work everywhere, either. Tables are at best poorly supported in eBooks. Just...FYI. It's a clever-enough workaround, IF IF IF the recipient device and software support tables adequately. OR, they support them, but the table misbehaves anyway. Which is the more-likely outcome.

Hitch

I've extensively tested MicroDrie's solution in a number of ways and on different devices it works really well except on Tolino (vision 5). This device doesn't acknowledge the indents at all. For reference, I'm including the link to the screenshots and the ePub file.

Screenshots

ePub

Exported PDF