EBOOKGENTOOLS

EBookGenTools is a set of GNU/Linux shell scripts to process plain
text for a book into HTML and electronic book formats. It was
developed to create EPUB and DOC files from book text exported
from novel writing software such as Manuskript, StoryBook, or your
favourite text editor.

EBookGenTools builds on the power of other software to create the
following ebook formats:

• EPUB: Calibre - ebook management
• DOC: LibreOffice - free office suite

These tools can be used directly to create ebooks. The advantage
provided by EBookGenTools is to automate the process, thus saving an
author time when creating and recreating ebook formats.

EBookGenTools is a shortened form for Electronic Book Generation
Tools.

USAGE FLOWCHART

You provide the following three (or four) files:

Novel content     Novel book        Novel details:    Optional
in plain text     cover image       author, etc.      book excerpt

+-----------+     +-----------+     +-----------+     +-------------+
| novel.txt |     | novel.jpg |     | novel.cfg |     | preview.txt |
+-----------+     +-----------+     +-----------+     +-------------+
      \                 |                 /                  /
       -----------------+-----------------  <----------------
                        |
                        v
             /---------------------\
  Execute    | book2html novel.txt |    Creates HTML
             \---------------------/
                        |
                        v
                  +------------+
                  | novel.html |
                  +------------+
                        |
                        v
            /-----------------------\
  Execute   | html2ebook novel.html |   Creates EPUB, DOC
            \-----------------------/
                        |
               ---------+---------
              /                   \
              v                   v
        +------------+     +------------+
        | novel.epub |     | novel.doc  |
        +------------+     +------------+

Note that you can optionally check for common generation issues that
arise from the novel content plain text file, such as mismatched
quotation marks, with the checkbookhtml novel.html command.

INSTALLATION

1. Make a copy of the ebookgentools scripts.

   Either - download a release tarball and extract it:

   tar -xvf ~/Downloads/ebookgentools-*.tar.gz -C ~
   

   Or - clone the git repository.

   git clone git://git.code.sf.net/p/ebookgentools/code ~/ebookgentools
   

2. Add ebookgentools/bin directory to the PATH environment
   variable.

   export PATH="$HOME/ebookgentools/bin:$PATH"
   

   To make this PATH addition persist across computer reboots,
   edit ~/.profile and append lines similar to the following:

   # Extend path with ebookgentools
   if [ -d "$HOME/ebookgentools/bin" ] ; then
       PATH="$HOME/ebookgentools/bin:$PATH"
   fi
   

3. Install the following software package dependencies:

   • Calibre - ebook management
   • LibreOffice - free office suite

USAGE

1. Create a directory to hold your ebook files.

   mkdir yourbook
   cd yourbook
   

2. Prepare book text in the required ebookgentools format.

   The ebookgentools text format is basically plain text with some
   additional rquirements to ensure correct processing of chapters
   and scenes. The required format is documented in the
   sample-book.txt file. The optional preview.txt file should be
   an excerpt from another book in the same required format.

   Save yourbook.txt in yourbook directory.

   Note that novel writing tools such as Manuskript and StoryBook
   provide Compile or Export options respectively to create the
   required plain text yourbook.txt file.

3. Copy configuration file sample-book.cfg to yourbook.cfg, and
   edit the content to be specific to your novel.

4. Copy your novel cover yourbook.jpg into yourbook directory.

   Suggested JPEG file size is about 1 MiB with dimensions 1594x2550
   pixels. To change image size consider adjusting the image quality
   percentage in a graphic tool such as GIMP.

5. Generate html file yourbook.html from the book text.

   book2html yourbook.txt
   

6. View yourbook.html file in a web browser and check if html is
   valid.

7. Check html file for common errors arising from book text and fix if
   appropriate.

   checkbookhtml yourbook.html
   

8. Generate .epub and .doc book files.

   html2ebook yourbook.html
   

   Note that the file yourbook.doc styles will need editing.

9. Consider checking the validity of the generated yourbook.epub
   EPUB file.

   epubcheck yourbook.epub
   

LICENSING

EBookGenTools is distributed under the GNU General Public License
version 3 or (at your option) any later version.

AUTHOR

EBookGenTools was written by Curtis Gedak.
Website: http://ebookgentools.sourceforge.net
Email: gedakc@users.sf.net

APPENDIX A: SOME NOVEL WRITING TOOLS

• Calibre - ebook management
• epubcheck - validation tool for EPUB
• Firefox - web browser
• Firefox HTML Validator Add-on
• GIMP - GNU image manipulation program
• LibreOffice - free office suite
• Manuskript - open-source tool for writers
• novelWriter - a markdown-like text editor for writing novels
• oStoryBook - open source novel writing software
• Plume Creator - open source tool for novelist
• Sigil - multi-platform EPUB ebook editor

APPENDIX B: SOME NOVELS CREATED WITH EBOOKGENTOOLS

Greek mythology thrillers by Linda Temple:

• The Medusa Deception
• The Dodona Prophecy
• The Olympus Reckoning

Cyberpunk thriller by Linda Temple:

• SIMBiotic

APPENDIX C: EBOOKGENTOOLS HISTORY

The EBookGenTools scripts were originally written to process exported
book text from StoryBook. StoryBook was open source novel writing
software that has since disappeared from Sourceforge.net. The code
has since been forked into the oStoryBook
project. Next the EBookGenTools scripts were updated to
work with book text compiled from
Manuskript. More recently
these scripts have been updated to work with a small subset of
MarkDown, and also
markdown text exported from Org mode for Emacs.

APPENDIX D: CHANGELOG

0.8 (Apr 14, 2023)

• Add conversion and check for left single quote before word
• Add check for missing punctuation at end of paragraph to checkbookhtml

0.7 (Oct 5, 2021)

• Remove MOBI file generation (no longer accepted for Kindle ebooks)
• Add echo_do function and program block headings
• Add inclusion of optional preview of another book in preview.txt

0.6 (Sep 15, 2021)

• Add optional Dedication front matter
• Add optional Also by Author back matter
• Add optional Prolog(ue)/Epilog(ue) novel sections similar to Chapter
• Add support for subset of Markdown headings
• Add basic support for emacs org-mode export to md
• Add color highlighting of potential issues to checkbookhtml
• Fix replace cover with larger image for kindle epub and mobi
• Keep epub file generated for the mobi file creation
• Only attempt mobi file creation if kindlegen executable in PATH
• Improve support for more recent Calibre (4.99.4 on Ubuntu 20.04)

0.5 (May 2, 2017)

• Initial release