Do you use chapter lists?

[issybird]

I'm in the multiple devices that don't sync camp. Chapter lists are critical to finding where I left off.

[frddgls]

Originally Posted by issybird

I'm in the multiple devices that don't sync camp. Chapter lists are critical to finding where I left off.

me too

[deddajay]

Personally, I don't use them, don't like them and don't want them. I would love an automatic TOC /Chapter listing removal in Calibre. I don't sync between devices and tend to read a book all the way through, so don't see any need for them. If I need to go back somewhere I have the history or bookmark to do so.

I might find them useful in a reference book, however...

[BeccaPrice]

For reasons unknown, sometimes my K3 won't pick up where I left off in a book, but opens to the front cover. I never remember what location I'm at, or percentage read, but I can almost always remember which chapter I left off in. Interactive chapter listings, especially ones that give chapter titles, not just numbers, are invaluable to me.

also, I'm getting to the "many devices that don't sync" stage, since I side-load all my content, and have just started reading on my smart phone (Razr Droid), so yeah, I love chapter titles and interactive TOCs.

[AlexBell]

Originally Posted by JoeD

Can't you get whatever you're producing the ebooks with to auto generate the table of contents based on the content headers?

I'll admit to been rather ignorant of what software is used for ebooks, but open office, word, lyx, latex all support auto generation of table of contents prior to exporting to whatever output formats they support.

I do my ebooks by hand, and make valid HTML files out of the the text before putting them in an ePub template and making the content.opf and toc.ncx files.

And even if there was a dead easy way for me to generate the chapter titles in the ToC and the toc.ncx file I still want to know whether people use them.

[AlexBell]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I want it there, always. Even though I use it rarely.

Could you tell me why, please?

[AlexBell]

Thanks to all who mention synchronising between readers. I don't do that, and hadn't thought of that use for chapter titles.

I guess I should continue to provide them. But I still can't bring myself to provide a long list of chapter numbers without titles. It looks so ugly.

[DrNefario]

I occasionally look at the list to see where I am, and how much is left. I don't often actually navigate by it, but I really can't understand why people would want to go so far as to remove the TOC. What harm is it doing?

[Belfaborac]

Agreed, it's hard to see what harm the TOC does. Although I never actually use it, I certainly don't want it gone.

[Abtacha]

Originally Posted by DrNefario

I occasionally look at the list to see where I am, and how much is left. I don't often actually navigate by it, but I really can't understand why people would want to go so far as to remove the TOC. What harm is it doing?

That's what I do too. Since my Sony doesn't have any other way of showing chapter length the TOC is the only way to judge if I can reasonably squeeze in another chapter instead of going to sleep.
And if the chapters have meaningful titles it's also a nice way to see what's coming next, or what happened before (e.g. going back to the last chapter with a specific character POV in Martins Song of Ice and Fire to see where you left).

[paola]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

Thanks to all who mention synchronising between readers. I don't do that, and hadn't thought of that use for chapter titles.

I guess I should continue to provide them. But I still can't bring myself to provide a long list of chapter numbers without titles. It looks so ugly.

If you don't like having to think of a title for each chapter, you may simply use the first two or three words of that chapter. I can't remember now in which books I've seen it, but I rather like it in novels, as it seldom gives anything away or tells me what I should prepare for. Just a thought...

[ebusinesstutor]

For non-fiction, I like chapters that tell me what is included in each one so I can skip to the one I need.

For non-fiction, I never use chapters or care about them. When I stop reading, I just bookmark where ever I was and don't go to the end of a chapter. My wife, however, will continue to the end of a chapter and then stop.

[Don0801]

The chapter list does come in handy sometimes -- when I press my Kindle 3 "Back" button once too many and it jumps all the way to an earlier section that I can't just keep turning the pages or jump from chapter to chapter to find it. A chapter list does save time when that happens.

[sun surfer]

I'm ambivalent about ToC links. I rarely use them, but when I actually do need to use them they're very helpful.

Jumping around an e-book is much more difficult than jumping around a p-book, so when I need to, chapter links can be invaluable in finding a specific place.

But sometimes ToCs can be really bothersome. I do really dislike huge ToCs. Some are humongous, and I appreciate that someone took the time to do it, but it becomes a mess.

For instance, when I read Walt Whitman's Deathbed version of Leaves of Grass, the ToC took up pages; I think it was around twenty pages or so. It was ridiculous. And what was more amazing was that someone bothered to take all the time to make links for each and every poem or section, but then just left all those links in a huge unmanageable jumble.

They weren't divided in any way whatsoever, so it was just twenty uninterrupted pages of single-space links, some in all capitals, some with no capitals, some capitalised correctly but with strange characters randomly included, some misspelled or with incorrect grammar, without rhyme or reason as to why (i.e. the all-capitals titles were not all capitals in the book at the actual poem).

If one were going to take the time-consuming task of making such a large ToC one would think more thought would be put into actually making it useful. I would first have a page of just links to the main sections, short and sweet. Then on following pages I'd have the links to the particular poems separated into groups of the larger sections of the book, well-formatted, with a new page break for each large section.

Not only was it a mess to look at, it also interfered with my reading the book. Somehow what they did slowed down the book for me, so that it was torture turning pages or making notes. I had to come here to mobileread asking for help on what to do (not understanding the problem and not being tech-savvy) and finally, with help realising the links might be the problem, load it into calibre and eliminate all the links and then it worked fine. This interference with the speed of the book in the e-reader is why I decided that I really dislike huge ToCs.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

It probably would if I had the slightest idea how to use Regex functions. My eyes just glaze over when I try to learn about them.

I normally do a lot of copying and pasting to make HTML markup templates, and then fill in the details by hand.

REGEX does work if the info is available in a way that you can grab it with a pattern. Sometimes you need to start the capture trigger at the <body tag (only works in A chapter per file case )
Manichean wrote a nice beginners REGEX tutorial in the Calibre forum that penetrated this ducks thick skull