Epub problem

[Murray Phillips]

I have had a pause in using Help and Manual for a while so I am a bit rusty. I am now using it again to update our documentation. The update went well but I'm having some difficulties with the publication process. As was the case previously my very large (contains lots of videos) documentation publishes reliably to ChM but EPUB is more problematic. I found previously that if I tried to publish the entire documentation to EPUB it would go through the motions and report no error message but produced a file of size 0 bytes. I worked around the problem by subdividing the documentation publishing as three separate volumes. In the previous version of the documentation it was possible to logically subdivide the documentation to work this way. However this time around it is not(The largest logical subset won't publish), so I am currently unable to publish to EPUB.
Has anyone encountered this problem and are there any suggestions? I am currently running version 6.4.1. I will probably upgrade to version 7 shortly but I'd prefer not to do that in the middle of my current publication. Is there any chance that version 7 will overcome the problem?

Thanks

Murray

[Tim Green]

Hi Murray,

I am currently running version 6.4.1.

That is badly out of date. Please always check if there is an update to the current version you are using before posting questions. That saves a lot of time because frequently any issues you encounter in an obsolete version will have been corrected in the current version. The current version of HM6 is 6.5.6 Build 3027. You can download the installer here (just install on top of your current version to update): http://www.helpandmanual.com/downloads.html#oldver

Generally speaking, you will not usually be able to just throw a normal complex project into the ePUB format and expect it to work. Please read the chapter on ePub in the help carefully to gain an understanding of what you are dealing with here: Publishing > Configuring Your Output > Apple iBooks® - ePub. ePub is much, much more primitive than a normal web browser and only supports a tiny subset of the formatting and features normally available in HTML.

Remember that ePub eBooks are primarily designed to be viewed on hardware reader devices with e-ink screens that are like the most primitive monochrome LCD screens available on MS-DOS laptops in the 1980s. In addition to this, the screens are relatively tiny -- particularly when being viewed in landscape mode with two pages side by side. This means you need to avoid tables like the plague, they will almost always break your ePub layout completely. Chapters without text are also forbidden in ePub books. A single chapter without text in your project will make the whole book invalid.

The ePub settings in Configuration > Publishing Options are an absolute requirement. If the required settings there are not filled out correctly the ePub book will also be invalid.

You mention videos: Videos are only supported in the Apple iBooks viewer and only if you create videos that will fit on the screen and are rendered with in the .m4v format using an Apple profile.

If you continue to have problems after checking all the above, please mail a demo project that you can't publish to ePub to support AT ec-software.com (replace the AT with @) and we will check it out for you.

[Murray Phillips]

Hi Tim

Thanks for the prompt response. I have just downloaded the latest version but the problem persists. There is an important point to note, I can publish the entire document in separate chunks (using the option to publish only selected TOC items). This would seem to preclude the problem being due to an issue with the publishing options or an absence of text in a particular topic. Is this the case?
I'm aware of the video and tablet issues you mention, you gave me a lot of good advice on this way back when I first started. However the fact is that the documentation is fabulous on any iPad post the first retina display version. Page scrolling is fast and the videos look great. The users find this format very convenient.
Initially I only published it when the EPUB option became available out of curiosity. But I was stunned at how well it ran and how good the videos looked. The usability of video seems to be related to the pixel density rather than the physical size that is to say although the video is of quite small on the iPad it is still quite legible and usable.
Perhaps I should never have published two EPUB but I did and has become very popular with our users so I appear to be stuck with it.
You mentioned uploading a demo version, given that the problem appears to be related to size I probably have to upload the entire lot which is very large.I have never tried to transfer help and manual job to another computer so I'm not even sure how to go about it. I presume I need to include everything in the H & M project folder plus all videos and images is this the case?

Thanks again

Murray

[Tim Green]

Hi Murray,

It sounds as though there is a specific topic where the publishing operation is hanging.

I presume I need to include everything in the H & M project folder plus all videos and images is this the case?

Not to begin with. It would be best to start with just the project itself. If the problem is there then nothing else is needed. Just select Save As... in the File menu and save the project as a single-file compressed HMXZ project. This is actually a ZIP, so there is no need to compress it further. Then mail me that project on its own to the support mail addresss with a brief description of the problem and a note that it is Help & Manual 6 (otherwise I might test it in version 7...)