[Plugin] ePub3-itizer - epub3 output plugin for Sigil

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by explorabeth

Hello all, forgive me if this belongs on or already exists on another thread, I will gladly take a redirection.

I am in the accessibility field and have to use EPUB3. I know not many people support or are developing for EPUB3. Currently, I am converting from docx to EPUB2 in Calibre and using Sigil to convert EPUB2 to 3. I have a small team helping me with this task for the conversion of hundreds of books.

My goals are to condense the workflow down to 1 software for this process. Is there any way that I can edit or incorporate the epubitizer and epubchecker into a Calibre plugin? Has this already been done?

Thanks for your advice!

There are several Sigil plugins that will allow you to import DOCX (or OpenOffice docs) into Sigil, and there is an EpubCheck Sigil plugin. Any combination of those should allow you to open DOCX, verify with epubcheck, and output to EPUB3 entirely within Sigil. Check the plugin index thread to find the DOCX import plugins and epubcheck plugin.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by explorabeth

Is there any way that I can edit or incorporate the epubitizer and epubchecker into a Calibre plugin? Has this already been done?

AFAIK, Toxaris's MS Word epub add-on can generate epub3 files.

It's also possible to convert docx files to epub3 books with pandoc, but the last time I checked, it broke some hyperlinks. If you get pandoc to work, you could download the stand-alone epubcheck validator and run it after the pandoc conversion.

[BetterRed]

@explorabeth - I think Mammoth (DOCX Import PI uses it) can be run from command line - to do conversions en-masse in a script

BR

[KevinH]

Also, This plugin is pretty self-contained in that it really only makes use of very basic calls to access xhtml files, create a nav, modify the content.opf, etc of the current book. I am sure Calibre has similar or better capabilities in their edit plugins. So if someone wanted to port it to Calibre, I would be happy to license it under GPL 2 or GPL 3 so that all can benefit.

Just let me know.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by KevinH

It still will sometimes not appear as anything other than an icon even with the latest tk.

I spent some time searching the web and found the following potential solution:

    localRoot = tkinter.Tk()
    localRoot.withdraw()
 
    # localRoot is is an empty topmost root window that is hidden by withdrawing it
    # but localRoot needs to be centred, and lifted and focus_force used
    # so that its child dialog will inherit focus upon launch
    localRoot.overrideredirect(True)
    # center on screen but make size 0 to hide the empty localRoot
    w = localRoot.winfo_screenwidth()
    h = localRoot.winfo_screenheight()
    x = int(w/2)
    y = int(h/2)
    localRoot.geometry('%dx%d+%d+%d' % (0, 0, x, y))
    localRoot.deiconify()
    localRoot.lift()
    localRoot.focus_force()

    fpath = tkinter_filedialog.asksaveasfilename(
        parent=localRoot,
        title="Save ePub3 as ...",
        initialfile=fname,
        initialdir=_USER_HOME,
        defaultextension=".epub"
        )
    # localRoot.destroy()                                                                                                       
    localRoot.quit()

If this added code will not hurt anything on Windows or Linux I can add it to the plugin to prevent this type of issue from happening to others.

KevinH

Sorry I'm late to this, but the new code doesn't work for me on Linux (Sigil HEAD/Python 3.6). The file dialog launches behind Sigil's window, and nothing new opens on the taskbar to even indicate anything was launched. Until I happened to minimize Sigil, I thought the plugin was hung up.

The problem on Linux seems to be the line:

localRoot.overrideredirect(True)

When I comment that out, the file dialog pops in front of Sigil and a new item appears on the taskbar.

If that line is absolutely needed on Macs, you may want to limit using it on that platform with an "if sys.platform.startswith('darwin')"

EDIT: indeed, changing the code to the following makes everything work "normally" on Linux/Windows for me. I assume it would fix the Mac issue as well.

    localRoot = tkinter.Tk()
    localRoot.withdraw()

    if sys.platform.startswith('darwin'):
        # localRoot is is an empty topmost root window that is hidden by withdrawing it
        # but localRoot needs to be centred, and lifted and focus_force used
        # so that its child dialog will inherit focus upon launch
        localRoot.overrideredirect(True)
        # center on screen but make size 0 to hide the empty localRoot
        w = localRoot.winfo_screenwidth()
        h = localRoot.winfo_screenheight()
        x = int(w/2)
        y = int(h/2)
        localRoot.geometry('%dx%d+%d+%d' % (0, 0, x, y))
        localRoot.deiconify()
        localRoot.lift()
        localRoot.focus_force()

    fpath = tkinter_filedialog.asksaveasfilename(
        parent=localRoot,
        title="Save ePub3 as ...",
        initialfile=fname,
        initialdir=_USER_HOME,
        defaultextension=".epub"
        )
    # localRoot.destroy()
    localRoot.quit()

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Sorry I'm late to this, but the new code doesn't work for me on Linux (Sigil HEAD/Python 3.6). The file dialog launches behind Sigil's window, and nothing new opens on the taskbar to even indicate anything was launched. Until I happened to minimize Sigil, I thought the plugin was hung up.

The original modified code worked fine for me on my Arch Linux machine, however, I'm using OpenBox as window manager. Maybe the problem that you encountered is caused by your window manager?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Doitsu

The original modified code worked fine for me on my Arch Linux machine, however, I'm using OpenBox as window manager. Maybe the problem that you encountered is caused by your window manager?

That's possible. I use Cinnamon.

What about the taskbar behavior I mentioned concerning that one specific line? Does the file dialog create a new item on your taskbar with the new code?

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

What about the taskbar behavior I mentioned concerning that one specific line? Does the file dialog create a new item on your taskbar with the new code?

I use plank and it displays a generic icon in the dock. However, even after killing plank, the Save epub3 as... dialog box was displayed as the topmost Sigil window.

(Your modified code also worked fine on my Arch Linux machine.)

[KevinH]

If that extra code is not needed for Windows and Linux (ie. if the old original code works fine even on Linux with different window managers), then restricting just to darwin is fine. I will change that in ePub3-itizer master and use it for the next release.

Thanks

[KevinH]

Okay, I pushed that change to ePub3-itizer master. I will wait a week or two to see if any other bugs are reported and then push it out as version 0.3.8.

Version 0.3.6 will continue to work well for Linux and Windows users. Mac users should choose Version 0.3.7, and then all users can update to 0.3.8 when it is released.

For all current and previous releases - see the ePub3-itizer github site:

https://github.com/kevinhendricks/eP.../master/plugin

[DiapDealer]

Thanks, Kevin!

[blackest]

Originally Posted by KevinH

Okay, I pushed that change to ePub3-itizer master. I will wait a week or two to see if any other bugs are reported and then push it out as version 0.3.8.

Version 0.3.6 will continue to work well for Linux and Windows users. Mac users should choose Version 0.3.7, and then all users can update to 0.3.8 when it is released.

For all current and previous releases - see the ePub3-itizer github site:

https://github.com/kevinhendricks/eP.../master/plugin

Hi I am having a major problem with that dialogbox on osx yosemite.

running the plugin swiftly runs through the files but the python dialog box for saving is hidden at the back of my screen and i can't click on it there is a spinning beachball.

Any suggestions i even updated python to 3.6

[KevinH]

What exact version of Sigil and exact version of this plugin are you using? Upgrading to Python 3.6 will not help. The OSX version of Sigil embeds the correct version of Python inside. It will always use that version unless you tell it not to in Plugin Preferences.

The spinning beachball can indicate a system crash of some kind. So I need more information in order to help.

[blackest]

Originally Posted by KevinH

What exact version of Sigil and exact version of this plugin are you using? Upgrading to Python 3.6 will not help. The OSX version of Sigil embeds the correct version of Python inside. It will always use that version unless you tell it not to in Plugin Preferences.

The spinning beachball can indicate a system crash of some kind. So I need more information in order to help.

Sigil 0.97
loaded Qt 5.61
OSX Yosemite
Plugin Versions
0.37
0.36
0.35
0.34
0.33
0.32
I downloaded the repository.

I've tested on ubuntu in parallels with version 8.2 Sigil and that works fine.

I've just rerun and got the same failed result on osx and see after cancelling because of the spinning beachball it says launcher process crashed.

If there is anything i can do, run a debug version. I am more than willing to help.

thank you

[KevinH]

First stick with plugin version 0.3.7. Stick with Sigil 0.9.7. Make sure you have installed the latest Tk as explained in each Sigil release announcement specifically for Mac Users.

Under Manage plugins, delete all versions of ePub3-itizer.

Also make sure the box is checked to use the bundled internal Python.

Then go to this thread and or the link provided and download a fresh copy of ePub3-itizer v0.3.7.

Use Finder to manually move the plugin Zip folder to your Desktop (This is required for Sierra). Then fire up Sigil and use Manage Plugins to install the eUb3-itizer plugin.

Please triplecheck you have checked the box to use the bundled internal python.

Load your epub into Sigil and run Flightcrew or eoubcheck to verify your epub is a valid epub2.

Then run epub3-tizer on it. If no save as dialog appears, then check the Finder panel to see if a rocket blasting off icon is in the panel, and select that icon if needed to force the save-as dialog to come to the front.

If you get a launcher error, then your copy of Sigil is broken. Download a fresh copy (verifying the checksums as directed) and repeat all of the above.

Please let me know what problems you run into.

KevinH