Tag Archives: epub

Getting set up to freely create your type

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One of the more daunting aspects of book design for the inexperienced is page layout. Most people have Word experience and as I have said countless times already—Word cannot do professional page layout. In fact, it is worse than that because Word’s feeble attempts give you bad habits and poor expectations—which must be corrected. I’m assuming that you have your preferences set up; and that you have designed a good, efficient workspace that fits your style of … Continue reading →

A look at the ebook revolution: known & unknown

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Four years into the ebook revolution: things we know and things we don’t know – The Shatzkin Files. I received a link to this from Joel this morning. It’s a good review and an eye-opener, if you haven’t been paying attention. Mike says: “One could say (and I would) that the ereading revolution is coming up to its 4th anniversary since it was late November 2007 when Amazon first released the Kindle. There had been dedicated ereading … Continue reading →

Writing in InDesign gives you layout power

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I’ve been working on a new expanded version of “Writing In InDesign” for my peers in ministry. (I haven’t figured out how to add the updates into the first edition.) I may write “Drawing In InDesign” first. Then I’ll do a radically expanded 2nd edition of “Writing In InDesign”—but that’s all in flux. I also received this in an email this morning: From Don in Colorado: I was up until 3:am reading Writing in InDesign. I can tell you’ve put … Continue reading →

Writing in InDesign ebooks are up or coming

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Apple is always slow with additions to iBooks, but you can get the ePUB that will be there from Lulu or NookBooks. Amazon just let me know that the Kindle version is up. It will take a while before the print and Kindle versions are linked up. The response to the book has been very good I am really pleased that several people seem to think the basic concept has merit. You can see a discussion of … Continue reading →

Forcing InDesign to write acceptable CSS

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Sometimes I feel so stupid. The solution to the incomplete CSS in exported ePUBs is so much more simple than I thought. Your mind just seems to turn a little corner and the solution pops up in front of you. My beef with InDesign CS5.5’s ePUBs was the need to edit the CSS I’ve posted several times here and published a couple books about fixing the ePUB CSS. What I wrote was accurate. It’s not difficult, as … Continue reading →

My newest book: Writing in InDesign

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Check out my page on the book This book has been replaced by “Writing In InDesign Revised Edition 2.5” This first edition, first formatting of the new book is no longer available available on Amazon. It includes many of the recent postings on this blog, plus more help for authors writing in InDesign (version 7.5 especially). I’m convinced that InDesign is best place to write. Read and find out why that is true and how it can … Continue reading →

Writing books in InDesign

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Here I am again recommending a road less traveled by—not unusual in my life and work. Before the choruses rise up in defense of others, let me tell you my reasonings. I fully recognize that most people write in Word. What they do not realize [in most cases] is this simple fact starts their book under a great handicap. They are missing out on the best tools for communicating with readers. Books are not entirely about words … Continue reading →

Writing in InDesign: Part 6, Fixing the ePUB CSS

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ePUB CSS Repair Once you have your ePUB It will usually open in ADE (depending on what you have installed on your computer). Proof it carefully. Redo as necessary. If your computer is like mine, the graphics will be very poor in ADE. Basically ADE is very crude. Then drop a copy of the ePUB file onto iTunes and sync it into iBooks on your iPad to read it in iBooks. The reason you need to use … Continue reading →

I just added CSS editing instructions to the free ePUB design booklet

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There is nothing long and extended here, because I remain convinced that most book designers consider coding anathema. But after finding the script I mentioned earlier today, I have found several interesting things that can be easily fixed in the ePUB. Edit the CSS if you can (or don’t if you can’t) The problem with this has been the difficulty with decompressing the .epub file and then recompressing back into .epub. For that you will need a … Continue reading →

Editing ePUBs

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One of my largest frustrations with desgining ePUBs has been the difficulty of decompressing and recompressing them to edit the CSS. Today on one of the groups I work with I was sent this:   Because of the problem with the mimetype-compression, rearchiving is on the Mac only via Terminal or via script possible. One Script is called ePUB Zip 1.0.2.   This script works very well. Just Google it, and download it. It would be a … Continue reading →