iTunes Constantly Rejects EPUB Created in Calibre...

[writingboy]

Hello, Calibres!

I'm hoping one or more you might be able to shed some light on an issue I'm having. I have repeatedly tried to submit the EPUB I created in Calibre to iTunes; though Kindle had no issue with it, iTunes constantly rejects it and the EPUB Validator brings up dozens of error messages, with no hint as to how to fix the "problem."

The majority of the pings come from one specific section of HTML, which contains several hundred ↺ characters meant to link readers back to the sections from which my endnotes originate. I've tried tweaking that, but no such luck.

I don't want to fill up a post with error codes until someone here asks for the specifically, but as an indicator, they all include "Error while parsing file 'attribute..."

Ironically, the EPUB in question works fine on the iBooks Reader. I have a feeling the problem is on their end and not through Calibre's creation of the EPUB, but they suggested connecting with my "third-party" program before further pressing them for a solution. So here I am!

Thanks in advance for any light you guys can shed on this frustrating turn of events!

Mike

[dwig]

Originally Posted by writingboy

...The majority of the pings come from one specific section of HTML, which contains several hundred ↺ characters ...

Left Open-headed Arrow?? If so, it should be loarr (Left Open ARRow) and not olarr (Open Left ARRow).

[writingboy]

Hi, Dwig! Thanks for the response. With ↺ I was actually going for a counterclockwise circle arrow, but, inspired by your reply I figured maybe that character was too fancy for iTunes Producer so I redid my EPUB 9 times with a different character each time, and they all flagged. I don't know why iTunes is making this so difficult when it cut through Kindle like butter. After this, I am convinced the problem is with iTunes and not my EPUB. I appreciate your attempt to help, though!

[kovidgoyal]

The problem is really with epubcheck, which iTunes uses under the hood. epubcheck generates tons of useless errors/warnings for things that are not actually problems. If you paste some of those error messages someone can probably tell you how to fix them. Note that calibre guarantees that the epub it produces will satisfy epubcheck only if you give it input HTML/CSS that satisfies epubcheck. https://manual.calibre-ebook.com/faq...e-is-not-valid

[writingboy]

Hello, Kovid! I'm honored that Calibre's creator is willing to try and help me solve this EPUB conundrum. From what you're saying, my instinct is right: it's not an EPUB issue from my end. iTunes must set up all these obstacles to test just how badly you want your eBook made available there!


Anyway, now that we've gotten into it, here are the first three error messages I've gotten (there are more, but you get the idea):

ERROR ITMS-9000: "I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub: /Users/brighthorse/Music/iTunes Producer/Playlists/9780692979266.itmsp/I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub/iSam_ebook_fixed_split_023.html(14): [RSC-005] Error while parsing file 'attribute "_title" not allowed here; expected attribute "accesskey", "charset", "class", "coords", "dir", "hreflang", "id", "lang", "rel", "rev", "shape", "style", "tabindex", "target", "title", "type" or "xml:lang"'..
This error occurs 465 times. (For more information refer to http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6213)" at Book/BookAssets

ERROR ITMS-9000: "I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub: /Users/brighthorse/Music/iTunes Producer/Playlists/9780692979266.itmsp/I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub/iSam_ebook_fixed_split_023.html(14): [RSC-005] Error while parsing file 'attribute "to" not allowed here; expected attribute "accesskey", "charset", "class", "coords", "dir", "hreflang", "id", "lang", "rel", "rev", "shape", "style", "tabindex", "target", "title", "type" or "xml:lang"'..
This error occurs 465 times. (For more information refer to http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6213)" at Book/BookAssets

ERROR ITMS-9000: "I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub: /Users/brighthorse/Music/iTunes Producer/Playlists/9780692979266.itmsp/I_Samantha_Take_This_Mortal_Darrin_-_Adam-Michael_James.epub/iSam_ebook_fixed_split_023.html(14): [RSC-005] Error while parsing file 'attribute "chapter" not allowed here; expected attribute "accesskey", "charset", "class", "coords", "dir", "hreflang", "id", "lang", "rel", "rev", "shape", "style", "tabindex", "target", "title", "type" or "xml:lang"'..
This error occurs 465 times. (For more information refer to http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6213)" at Book/BookAssets



It turns out "...split_023.html" is the section that contains all my endnotes. Of which there are...465. So that narrows that down.


Here is a small sampling of my HTML that includes links meant to take my readers back to the the passage from where they clicked on the endnote:

<p id="e1016">16. <em>The Bewitched Continuum</em>, pg. 223<a href="#ref1016" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>
<p id="e1017">17. &ldquo;Mrs. Stephens, Where Are You?&rdquo; (#160)<a href="#ref1017" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>
<p id="e1018">18. &ldquo;Samantha on Thin Ice&rdquo; (#246)<a href="#ref1018" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>


This all works fine on the eReaders I've tested it on...including iBooks!


So if this fills in any blanks...! I thank you, Kovid, for filling in a few more me. iTunes Producer shall not win this battle! I shall be vindicated! LOL

[kovidgoyal]

You will need to remove or rename the attributes mentioned int he those error messages, use the calibre editor to do it.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by writingboy

The majority of the pings come from one specific section of HTML, which contains several hundred &olarr; characters meant to link readers back to the sections from which my endnotes originate. I've tried tweaking that, but no such luck.

One possibility that comes to mind is that epub3 does not support HTML named entities. You might want to try replacing &olarr; with &#x21ba; (double check that as it's not a character I make use of). Repeat for any other HTML enties such the the right and left quotes. I've been bitten by this a few times since my favourite &nbsp; entity is not supported and & #160; (remove the space) just lacks the same human readability.

For epub3, I would suggest using Sigil instead of calibre's editor. At this time, it simply supports epub3 better than calibre's editor does.

[kovidgoyal]

Originally Posted by DNSB

One possibility that comes to mind is that epub3 does not support HTML named entities. You might want to try replacing &olarr; with &#x21ba; (double check that as it's not a character I make use of). Repeat for any other HTML enties such the the right and left quotes. I've been bitten by this a few times since my favourite &nbsp; entity is not supported and & #160; (remove the space) just lacks the same human readability.

The calibre editor does not use named entities in any version of epub. And from the OP's error messages, they have nothing to do with entities.

For epub3, I would suggest using Sigil instead of calibre's editor. At this time, it simply supports epub3 better than calibre's editor does.

Really, why?

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by DNSB

One possibility that comes to mind is that epub3 does not support HTML named entities. You might want to try replacing &olarr; with &#x21ba; (double check that as it's not a character I make use of). Repeat for any other HTML enties such the the right and left quotes. I've been bitten by this a few times since my favourite &nbsp; entity is not supported and & #160; (remove the space) just lacks the same human readability.

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

The calibre editor does not use named entities in any version of epub. And from the OP's error messages, they have nothing to do with entities.

The &olarr; in his code is a HTML named entity. As are the &rdquo; and &ldquo;. While these were correct in epub2 and supported by DTD, epub3 does not recognize named entities other than the quo, amp, apos, lt and gt quintet.

Originally Posted by DNSB

For epub3, I would suggest using Sigil instead of calibre's editor. At this time, it simply supports epub3 better than calibre's editor does.

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Really, why?

As I said, Sigil has better support for epub3 at this time. Even such minor items as the AddiBookXML, epub2 output and ePub3-itizer plugin make life a bit easier.

[DNSB]

Further looking at your code;

<p id="e1016">16. <em>The Bewitched Continuum</em>, pg. 223<a href="#ref1016" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>
<p id="e1017">17. &ldquo;Mrs. Stephens, Where Are You?&rdquo; (#160)<a href="#ref1017" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>
<p id="e1018">18. &ldquo;Samantha on Thin Ice&rdquo; (#246)<a href="#ref1018" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>

1. epub3 requires every tag be terminated. So use <br /> instead of <br>.
2. You've quoted the entire title element. Use title=" instead of "title=
3. And again, replace the named HTML entities with their numeric equivalent.

See sample below.

<p id="e1016">16. <em>The Bewitched Continuum</em>, pg. 223<a href="#ref1016" title="return to Chapter 10">&#x21ba;</a></p><br />
<p id="e1017">17. &#x201c;Mrs. Stephens, Where Are You?&#x201d; (#160)<a href="#ref1017" title="return to Chapter 10">&#x21ba;</a></p><br />
<p id="e1018">18. &#x201c;Samantha on Thin Ice&#x201d; (#246)<a href="#ref1018" title="return to Chapter 10">&#x21ba;</a></p><br />

Best I can do for now.

[kovidgoyal]

Originally Posted by DNSB

The &olarr; in his code is a HTML named entity. As are the &rdquo; and &ldquo;. While these were correct in epub2 and supported by DTD, epub3 does not recognize named entities other than the quo, amp, apos, lt and gt quintet.

And they were not put there by the calibre editor. And they aren't what the OP is getting error messages about. What is your point?

As I said, Sigil has better support for epub3 at this time. Even such minor items as the AddiBookXML, epub2 output and ePub3-itizer plugin make life a bit easier.

Umm the only thing from that list you mention that is, even in the slightest way relevant to epub3 support is the epub3-itizer plugin (and even that is for the conversion of epub 2 to epub 3, not actual epub 3 support)

[kovidgoyal]

@writingboy: Do the following:

1) Open your book in the calibre editor. Run Tools->Beautify all files
2) Click the Check Book icon (the one with the bug symbol on it)
3) Click try to fix all errors automatically in the resulting report
4) Install the epubcheck plugin for the editor from https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=282067 Plugins can be installed in the main calibre program via Preferences->Plugins->Get new plugins
5) Fix whatever remaining errors it reports. They will almost all be of the form 'attribute "XXX" not allowed here Just locate the file and line number in the error message and delete the attribute it mentions.

At the end of that you should have a book Apple will accept.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DNSB

[*]epub3 requires every tag be terminated. So use <br /> instead of <br>.

All of those </p><br> are invalid. Even if you fixed it to be </p><br/>, it would still be wrong. The <br/> has to be before the </p>. <br/> cannot be on their own.

Also, as for ePub 3, you can install the epubcheck plugin for the Calibre editor and use it to validate ePub 3 code in the editor.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by writingboy

Here is a small sampling of my HTML that includes links meant to take my readers back to the the passage from where they clicked on the endnote:

<p id="e1016">16. <em>The Bewitched Continuum</em>, pg. 223<a href="#ref1016" "title=return to Chapter 10">&olarr;</a></p><br>

In addition to what others have said the glaring error to me is in the <a> tag's title attribute. One of your double-quotes is in the wrong place. It should be

<a href="#ref1016" title="return to Chapter 10">

not

<a href="#ref1016" "title=return to Chapter 10">

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

And they were not put there by the calibre editor. And they aren't what the OP is getting error messages about. What is your point?

I was under the impression that he had used the calibre editor to create the ebook. As you advised, errorchecking before sending to iBooks is a good idea using both the F7 for a quick check and epubcheck for the final check.

I was quite happy to notice the F7 error check in calibre gives a named entities present error after correcting the "title= error.

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Umm the only thing from that list you mention that is, even in the slightest way relevant to epub3 support is the epub3-itizer plugin (and even that is for the conversion of epub 2 to epub 3, not actual epub 3 support)

iBooks is an epub3 variant and having the required XML automatically inserted rather that doing by hand? Worth having the plugin. Epub2 Output converts epub3 to epub2 which works quite well on the commercial epub3 ebooks I've used it on. And yes, I use epub3-itizer to do some of the grunt work when I convert epub2 to epub3.

I do use both Sigil and the calibre editor. For some tasks, I find Sigil to be the better tool, for others, calibre's editor.