How to get no justification when converting to AZW3

[svenlind]

I often convert especially epub books in Danish to AZW3 in order to read them on my Kindle.

Unfortunately Calibre justifies the text and I really prefer left justified or no justification.

The source epub is not justified.

I have tried to add an extra CSS under look and feel, { text-align: left }, but to no avail.

According to the manual there should a section "Miscellaneous" under "Look & Feel", where you can specify "No text justification"
But this section seems to be missing in my version of Calibre, V3.19.

What can I do to get no justification?

In the Kindle there is a page setting that is left aligned, but I think it only works with the new Amazon format.

[deback]

Look under Preferences > Conversion > Common Options > Look and Feel > Text > Text Justification > Left Align > Apply

Remove the extra CSS that you added.

[kovidgoyal]

It's moved to Look & feel->Text

[svenlind]

Originally Posted by deback

Look under Preferences > Conversion > Common Options > Look and Feel > Text > Text Justification > Left Align > Apply

Remove the extra CSS that you added.

Thank you for your reply. But it will not work with a Kindle. I found out that justification in the Kindle is only supported for the KFX format.

You need a KFX output plugin if you want to have justification from an epub.

The enhanced typesetting features, such as switching between justified and ragged right alignment, require the book to be on the device in KFX format. Most books purchased from Amazon are delivered in that format.

If you are starting with an ePub, rather than a book purchased from Amazon, your only option to obtain KFX is to use the KFX Output calibre plugin and side load the result. Doing this may not be worth the bother.

This is all from the point of view of a user rather than an author/publisher.

The quote is from this thread

And thank you to jhowell
for the KFX plugin.

Edit: The suggestion from deback does work my mistake, sorry.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by svenlind

Thank you for your reply. But it will not work with a Kindle. I found out that justification in the Kindle is only supported for the KFX format.

You need a KFX output plugin if you want to have justification from an epub.



The quote is from this thread

And thank you to jhowell
for the KFX plugin.

Minor nit is that applies if you want to switch justification on the fly. An AZW3 book can fully justified or ragged right or ragged left, you just can't switch without editing the source.

[JSWolf]

Left, full, right, and center are all forms of justification. It is impossible to have no justification for an eBook. It has to be justified in some way.

What you can do is convert your eBook to KF8 and use the Calibre editor to edit the CSS. Delete all instances of text-align: justfy and text-align: left. If there is a body style in CSS add in your choice of justification be it justify or left. If there isn't a body style, add one in with your justification choice. After that, you'll be all set.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Left, full, right, and center are all forms of justification. It is impossible to have no justification for an eBook. It has to be justified in some way.

What you can do is convert your eBook to KF8 and use the Calibre editor to edit the CSS. Delete all instances of text-align: justfy and text-align: left. If there is a body style in CSS add in your choice of justification be it justify or left. If there isn't a body style, add one in with your justification choice. After that, you'll be all set.

Technically, all except justify, are ALIGNMENTS.
Even the CSS setting is TEXT-ALIGN

Ducks has set Hot and cold type. The CSS way is way easier

[retiredbiker]

I have struggled with this. What I found is, if there is no "text-align: ...;" defined in the CSS, my Kindles (an ancient keyboard model and an Oasis) will just fully justify it. If I edit the book and have whatever style is in control specifically set to "text-align: left;", the Kindle will always respect that. I want the left alignment because of poor eyesight and the need for a large font display, but I imagine the other alignments would work similarly when you convert from, say, epub to azw3. I don't know how the conversion options actually affect the coding--I do this in the editor.

[svenlind]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

It's moved to Look & feel->Text

Yes indeed.

And it does work, my books are now shown with left justification, or ragged right if you wish.

That is all I want. No need, for me, to convert to kfx or edit the book.

In the Kindle, a new Oasis, it is still not possible to shift alignment, but I really don't like full justified.

The other page settings, spacings, margins and orientation still works.

[deback]

Originally Posted by svenlind

Yes indeed.

And it does work, my books are now shown with left justification, or ragged right if you wish.

That is all I want. No need, for me, to convert to kfx or edit the book.

In the Kindle, a new Oasis, it is still not possible to shift alignment, but I really don't like full justified.

The other page settings, spacings, margins and orientation still works.

So, it does work, huh? You responded earlier that my solution didn't work, but I figured it should work.

[svenlind]

Originally Posted by deback

So, it does work, huh? You responded earlier that my solution didn't work, but I figured it should work.

I don't know what I did wrong, I did as you instructed, at least I thought so. This time I changed it directly without it being the default. But changing the default as you said works now. I must have fumbled somehow, sorry.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by retiredbiker

I have struggled with this. What I found is, if there is no "text-align: ...;" defined in the CSS, my Kindles (an ancient keyboard model and an Oasis) will just fully justify it. If I edit the book and have whatever style is in control specifically set to "text-align: left;", the Kindle will always respect that. I want the left alignment because of poor eyesight and the need for a large font display, but I imagine the other alignments would work similarly when you convert from, say, epub to azw3. I don't know how the conversion options actually affect the coding--I do this in the editor.

There is a possible solution for your problem. You can use the plugin for Calibre to convert to KFX and then you will get hyphenation and this, not so large gaps. Your eBooks do have to be DRM free. You can find out about remove Kindle DRM from Apprentice Alf’s Blog.

[svenlind]

There are a few things that I would like to say to clarify the subject of this thread.

I wanted to get ragged right justification from my azw3 books.

If you want to be able to switch between full justified and ragged right while reading your book, then you need to convert to kfx.

If all you want is to have ragged right all the time, then you don't need to convert to kfx. All other settings, spacings, margins, orientation, font, boldness in the Kindle and font size will work.

If you have downloaded using "transfer via USB" from Amazon, then you NEED to make an AZW3 to AZW3 conversion as described by deback in thread #2. If you don't do that, then you will have full justification no matter the settings in the book.

If you make the conversion as described, then the Page settings in the Kindle will still indicate Full Justified, but will actually be ragged right.

In short if you want ragged right, then follow the instructions in thread #2. All you loose is the ability to switch between full justified and left justified/ragged right while reading your book.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by svenlind

I don't know what I did wrong, I did as you instructed, at least I thought so. This time I changed it directly without it being the default. But changing the default as you said works now. I must have fumbled somehow, sorry.

You didn't do anything wrong. Once you convert a book it saves the conversion settings. If you convert the same book again it will use the saved settings even if you have changed the over all calibre default conversion settings. It finally worked for you when you went to convert your book and once the settings for that book came up you changed the previous settings that were saved for that book.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by DoctorOhh

You didn't do anything wrong. Once you convert a book it saves the conversion settings. If you convert the same book again it will use the saved settings even if you have changed the over all calibre default conversion settings. It finally worked for you when you went to convert your book and once the settings for that book came up you changed the previous settings that were saved for that book.

And for future reference, there is a Restore Default Settings button on the Conversion dialogue to the left of OK, IIRC it removes the book specific settings so that the settings set up in Preferences will be used.

- if would be useful if this button were 'greyed out' if the book doesn't have book specific conversion settings

BR