ebook Formatting Workflow
Since I've trial'd and error'd it out for myself, and it's not that difficult, here's the Official David Barron eBook Formatting Workflow! Note that it doesn't include how to do images, because I haven't tried that yet. It's also pretty bare-bones, but you can probably figure it out... (This doesn't count as my Friday article) If you totally want to hire me to format an eBook, first, seek professional help because you're insane, then give me $50 and I'll do it, I guess. Free money, am I right? (This takes...15 minutes.)
eBook Formatting
Programs
FocusWriter for text
Microsoft Word 2007 for DOC and pre-formatting
jEdit for HTML
calibre for conversion to EPUB and MOBI
GIMP for cover art
Kindle Previewer
FocusWriter text
type, use -- for — (em dash)
Microsoft Word 2007 preformatting
double quotes : " with "
single quotes : ' with '
em dash : -- with —
ellipses : ... with …
Ctrl-i to <i>^&</i>
jEdit entities
paragraphs: ^(.+)$ with <p>$1</p>
search for <p></i> and fix
" with ”
" with “
' with ‘
' with ’
… with …
— with —
è with è
é with é
Bold with <strong>Bold</strong>
Strikethrough with <del>Strikethrough</del>
jEdit styles
Apply this header, wrap with body tags
Book Chapters/Collection Stories =
<p class="chapter">Chapter Title</p>
Individual Short Story 'chapter' (for clean ToC) =
<p class="chapter" style="display:none">Short Story Title</p>
<p class="story">First paragraph of text</p>
Apply other styles
*** with <p class="centered"><span class="centered">***</span></p>
Search for & in browser window, then manually replace & with & in jEdit
Calibre conversion
Add HTML to Calibre, edit metadata, add cover
Convert to EPUB
Table of Contents
Level 1 TOC (XPath Expression) = //h:p[re:test(@class, "chapter", "i")]
EPUB Output
check 'Preserve cover aspect ratio'
Convert to MOBI
Check DOC in Word 2007, upload to Smashwords
Check MOBI in Kindle Previewer, Upload to Amazon KDP
Check EPUB in calibre, Upload to Others
Samples
Collection
Short Story
Available Stories
eBook Formatting
Programs
FocusWriter for text
Microsoft Word 2007 for DOC and pre-formatting
jEdit for HTML
calibre for conversion to EPUB and MOBI
GIMP for cover art
Kindle Previewer
FocusWriter text
type, use -- for — (em dash)
Microsoft Word 2007 preformatting
double quotes : " with "
single quotes : ' with '
em dash : -- with —
ellipses : ... with …
Ctrl-i to <i>^&</i>
jEdit entities
paragraphs: ^(.+)$ with <p>$1</p>
search for <p></i> and fix
" with ”
" with “
' with ‘
' with ’
… with …
— with —
è with è
é with é
Bold with <strong>Bold</strong>
Strikethrough with <del>Strikethrough</del>
jEdit styles
Apply this header, wrap with body tags
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml...
<head>
<style type="text/css">
html, body, div, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, ul, ol, dl, li, dt, dd, p, pre, table, th, td, tr { margin: 0; padding: 0em; }
p
{
text-indent: 1.5em;
margin-bottom: 0.2em;
}
p.noindent
{
text-indent: 0em;
margin-bottom: 0.2em;
}
p.preview
{
margin-top: 5em;
margin-bottom: 2em;
}
p.title
{
page-break-before: always;
font-size: 3em;
font-weight: bold;
margin-top: 5em;
}
p.subtitle
{
text-indent: 3em;
font-size: 2em;
font-weight: bold;
}
p.author
{
text-indent: 3em;
font-size: 2em;
}
p.matter
{
text-indent: 3em;
font-size: 1.5em;
}
p.chapter
{
page-break-before: always;
text-indent: 1.5em;
font-weight: bold;
font-size: 2em;
margin-top:5em;
margin-bottom:2em;
}
p.story
{
text-indent: 1.5em;
font-size: 1em;
margin-top: 5em;
margin-bottom: 0.2em;
}
p.centered
{
text-indent: 0em;
text-align: center;
}
span.centered
{
text-indent: 0em;
text-align: center;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
</body>
Book Chapters/Collection Stories =
<p class="chapter">Chapter Title</p>
Individual Short Story 'chapter' (for clean ToC) =
<p class="chapter" style="display:none">Short Story Title</p>
<p class="story">First paragraph of text</p>
Apply other styles
*** with <p class="centered"><span class="centered">***</span></p>
Search for & in browser window, then manually replace & with & in jEdit
Calibre conversion
Add HTML to Calibre, edit metadata, add cover
Convert to EPUB
Table of Contents
Level 1 TOC (XPath Expression) = //h:p[re:test(@class, "chapter", "i")]
EPUB Output
check 'Preserve cover aspect ratio'
Convert to MOBI
Check DOC in Word 2007, upload to Smashwords
Check MOBI in Kindle Previewer, Upload to Amazon KDP
Check EPUB in calibre, Upload to Others
Samples
Collection
Short Story
Available Stories
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