Meatgrinder (Smashwords) Venting

[Freeshadow]

Originally Posted by teh603

The response I remember getting was, "Well, maybe its time for grammar to adapt to the internet instead of expecting the internet to adapt to grammar."

To which I'd have responded: Well, I have expected a publisher to know the difference between grammar and typesetting.

[AlexBell]

Originally Posted by teh603

HTML has no provision for a first- line indent, and from what I've seen the software engines will strip out any attempt at using a style sheet to provide one.

It is a trivial exercise to set paragraphs to be indented or not indented using HTML/CSS, and not that much more difficult to package the whole thing as a valid ePub and then convert into whatever format is wanted. That's how I do all the ebooks I design.

But I agree it is rather more work.

[Justin Nemo]

I've noticed that there is far less formatting jargon in an OpenOffice .odt than in a word .doc, which is probably why Calibre accepts them.

[kacir]

Originally Posted by Justin Nemo

I've noticed that there is far less formatting jargon in an OpenOffice .odt than in a word .doc, which is probably why Calibre accepts them.

The reason is that odt files are well documented human-readable xml files inside a zip archive. Much like epub.
Take an *.odt file and rename it to *.odt.zip
Now you can look inside and change anything.
Docx are similar to odt, except Microsoft doesn't adhere to their own standard ;-)

On the other hand *.doc files (newer than MSWord 6.0) are DESIGNED to be undecipherable by anybody but Microsoft. And it did wonders for building monopoly. Phew!

[teh603]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

It is a trivial exercise to set paragraphs to be indented or not indented using HTML/CSS, and not that much more difficult to package the whole thing as a valid ePub and then convert into whatever format is wanted. That's how I do all the ebooks I design.

But I agree it is rather more work.

And as I said, even if you take that step, Goodreads and most other HTML processors will strip out that part of the CSS. I've already run into it.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by teh603

And as I said, even if you take that step, Goodreads and most other HTML processors will strip out that part of the CSS. I've already run into it.

GoodReads accepts ePUB and as far as I can tell doesn't modify it at all. Since ePUB is what the customer is buying, ePUB is what should be submitted. ot txt or html.

[Marj]

For myself, I'm very pleased that Smashwords is based on a Word doc. I would never have coped with anything more difficult. As it was, I took 3 days to upload the first book - and a lot of chocolate to help me cope with the stress.
And afterwards, the other formats seemed to be fine as far as I can tell. Only that there's no conversion to Amazon at this stage, though there is a Smashwords Kindle version.

[Freeshadow]

Word is no tool suitable for composition of longer structured text pieces and completely unusable if you want add illustrations, glossaries, tables and bibliographic annotations. There's a reason why people used special software for book authoring (like nota bene) and use TeX for such tasks now.
By demanding their submitters not using professional tools Smashwords indirectly declares not being interested in publishing professional quality ebooks.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

WHY. WHY ARE WE CREATING EPUBS FROM WORD DOCS? THAT IS SO BLOODY STUPID.

Just had to get that off my chest.

Because Smashwords doesn't care. Direct ePub uploading is what many authors and many customers have requested. I think it's the #1 requested feature.

If they can code a meatgrinder, there is no reason at all not to be able to code a direct upload that bypasses the meatgrinder, goes to the validation bit and if it passes, use the ePub with Calibre to make all the other formats. That would work best and it's not hard to do.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by teh603

Well, it beats trying to figure out exactly how many carriage returns will generate a new page on each reader.

I'll be honest, I wasn't too keen on the idea of using a Word document, but it has its advantages. By reading the Word style sheet data, the meatgrinder is able to quickly and effectively generate a functional document. It might not be pretty under the hood, but it works.

Functional and worth buying are two different things. The code being that bad is why I don't buy from Smashwords. I just wish I could return any Smashwords eBooks I accidentally bought via other sites that don't say these atrocities came from Smashwords. I do sometimes tweak the ePub I buy and I don't like doing so with MS Word converted ePub. It's just wrong.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

Funny how HTML is so much more space-efficient than Word. It's almost like Word docs are crammed full of poorly optimized code that shouldn't be used as the base for a transform.

Actually, a Word document IS crammed full of poorly optimized code with styles that are not used and garbage in the styles that are/are not used that should not be there. Look at the ePub from the Word file and you will see how much crap is added to it.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Functional and worth buying are two different things. The code being that bad is why I don't buy from Smashwords. I just wish I could return any Smashwords eBooks I accidentally bought via other sites that don't say these atrocities came from Smashwords. I do sometimes tweak the ePub I buy and I don't like doing so with MS Word converted ePub. It's just wrong.

So what does it do to your e-reader, crash it or something? It works just fine in my off-brand one, and I haven't heard meaningful complaints from people using the big name ones either.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Marj

For myself, I'm very pleased that Smashwords is based on a Word doc. I would never have coped with anything more difficult. As it was, I took 3 days to upload the first book - and a lot of chocolate to help me cope with the stress.
And afterwards, the other formats seemed to be fine as far as I can tell. Only that there's no conversion to Amazon at this stage, though there is a Smashwords Kindle version.

From what I've been reading, it's easier to learn to use Sigil (and learn CSS/XML) to make a good looking ePub then it is to learn to format a Word document to match the Smashwords style guide.

If it was me, I'd go for the make my own ePub and be a lot happier with a nice eBook then a substandard eBook.

Also, you have MR to help when you need it. But a lot of the errors people come here to try to get fixed that are caused by the Word/meatgrinder combination are not easy to fix as they have to be fixed in Word and the error message posted has nothing to do with whatever it is in Word that needs to be fixed. But come to MR with code samples (from the ePub), the error message(s), and it can be fixed.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by teh603

So what does it do to your e-reader, crash it or something? It works just fine in my off-brand one, and I haven't heard meaningful complaints from people using the big name ones either.

I'm not saying the resulting eBook won't work. But when the code is that bad under the hood, it's a substandard eBook (IMHO). I do look at the code most of the time and it's very bad from Smashwords.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm not saying the resulting eBook won't work. But when the code is that bad under the hood, it's a substandard eBook (IMHO). I do look at the code most of the time and it's very bad from Smashwords.

Ah. I'll be honest, I've never messed with the code of an ebook, and my HTML dates back to before the days when CSS was an encoding process used on DVDs. <BR> was easier to use then <P> and </P>, and you still had to keep a hex chart on hand for determining text colors.

Either way, you'll find I'm a bit of a pragmatist compared to most Linux and a fair few Windows users; if the code works, it works and that's all that matters. If it doesn't, then we have a problem. I'm not as concerned about how elegant or ideologically pure (which is a huge issue in Linux land) it is, compared to whether or not it works.