DIY e-book: creating e-books. Free Publishing Software Review (Print Layout Creation) Creating an ebook

Consider the process of creating an e-book or eBook in the format PDF using office suite OpenOffice.org... The resulting document will have interactive content and a bookmark bar for easy navigation, as well as the ability to search the document, print it, select and copy text.

Using this approach, you can quickly produce a high-quality electronic textbook or electronic document with advertising materials and you do not need to be an experienced OpenOffice user at all.

A PDF document can be posted on the Internet, read on a computer screen using your favorite PDF viewer or browser.

As an example, we will create an electronic guide to free and free software for working with PDF, which will contain information about the programs described on this site.
Source document: PDF-programs.odt
Resulting PDF document: PDF-programs.pdf

Document preparation:


Create a new OpenOffice Writer document.
Place the cursor on the first page of the document, select "Format" -\u003e "Styles" in the main menu, or press the F11 key.
In the dialog that appears, click the "Page Styles" icon (the fourth button at the top left of the window) and double-click on the "First Page" item to apply this style to the current page.

According to the default OpenOffice settings, the page with the "First Page" style will be followed by a page with the "Normal" style, which is what we need to design the first page of the document in a style different from the rest of the pages.


We design the first, title page of the document. In our reference, the first page looks like this.

Let's "hang up" the page - after finishing filling the title page, press the Ctrl and Enter keys simultaneously.
The second page of the document appears - on it the contents of the reference book will be located. Enter the title - "Content", center it and press Enter.
The content itself does not need to be created manually - it will be automatically generated by OpenOffice based on the structure of the finished document. Therefore, we "beat off" the page (Ctrl + Enter), go to the third page and fill the directory with information.

Formatting:

This article does not cover the basic techniques of working with text, its formatting, we will only consider inserting a hyperlink and adding headers and footers.

Inserting a hyperlink:


Place the cursor where you want the link to be in the document. Select the "Insert" -\u003e "Hyperlink" menu.
In the dialog box that appears, fill in the "Address" and "Text" fields approximately as shown in the image.
Click the Apply button and then Close. The hyperlink that appears will be in the usual blue with an underscore.

Adding headers and footers:

Let's go to the "Insert" -\u003e "Footer" menu and select the "First Page" item. The cursor will be positioned at the bottom of the title page, enter the required text.

The rest of the pages are automatically set to the "Normal" style, all these pages will have a header and footer. The header will contain the page numbering.
Select the menu "Insert" -\u003e "Header" -\u003e "Normal", the cursor will move to the top of the first page with the style "Normal", in our case this is the second page of the document.
Then the menu "Insert" -\u003e "Fields" -\u003e "Page number" - the numbering will be done automatically.

Creation of footers is similar - menu "Insert" -\u003e "Footer" -\u003e "Normal" and enter the desired text.


Right-click in any header and footer and select "Edit paragraph style" in the context menu. In the dialog box that appears, you can customize the appearance of the header - font color and size, border and indents.

Structuring:

Let's move on to the most crucial stage - document structuring.

To subsequently generate the content of the document automatically, it is necessary to properly structure our directory, which consists of two sections - "Programs for creating PDF" and "Programs for viewing PDF" - these are the first level headings, as well as from subsections - the names of programs - these are the second level headings ...


PDF Creation Software (Level 1)
- Scribus (Level 2)
- PDF Creator (Level 2)
- doPDF (Level 2)


PDF Viewers (Level 1)
- Evince (Level 2)
- PDF-XChange Viewer (Level 2)
- SumatraPDF (Level 2)
- Brava Reader (Level 2)


Select the heading of the first level with the pointer, as in the image, right-click and select the "Paragraph" item in the context menu.


In the dialog box, set the Outline Level property to Level 1 and click OK.

This operation must be carried out with all headings of the first level.


Select the heading of the second level with the pointer, as in the image, right-click and select "Paragraph" in the context menu.


In the dialog box, set the Outline Level property to Level 2 and click OK.

This operation must be carried out with all headings of the second level.

On the second page of the document, select the heading "Contents" and define it as a heading at the outline level "Level 1".


The resulting heading structure can be viewed by clicking the Navigator button on the OpenOffice toolbar or by using the F5 hotkey.

Generating content:

When the structure of the document is correctly defined, position the cursor where you want to place the table of contents in the document and go to the menu "Insert" -\u003e "Table of contents and indexes" -\u003e "Table of contents and indexes".

In the dialog box that opens, set the appropriate settings:


The "Elements" tab contains basic settings. The "Structure" line defines what components each line of content will consist of.
The default settings are fine, but for more convenient navigation through the PDF document, lines of content from the text must be turned into links to their corresponding pages.

Print and samizdat in our time are unlikely to deal with only one or two markets when it comes to distributing their publications. In addition to printed and audio books, they should also publish electronic versions of books, which will guarantee protection against the loss of a certain segment of the audience.

Since e-books are released in certain formats, sometimes not all devices can support them. If you want your publication to reach a larger number of readers, then you should take care of the many formats in which the book will be released.

Our today's article will tell you about several interesting and useful tools that will help you get into the process of creating and composing e-books for distribution on the web and for reading via Amazon Kindle, the Barnes & Noble Nook, iPad, iPhone, iPod, smartphones based on Android and many other devices.

Tool for creating books in EPUB and MobiPocket formats. The EPUB format is open source and can be used by anyone. Numerous devices easily support EPUB, including Android devices, Barnes & Noble Nook, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Sony Reader and many more.

eCub allows you to easily compose simple EPUB books using text or XHTML files. The app also helps you create simple covers and even convert text to audio file. eCub also supports the creation of MobiPocket books, which are accepted by many devices, personal computers, and the Amazon Kindle. eCub is not equipped with a WYSIWYG editor or text highlighting, which limits the ability to compose complex e-books. But for novels with simple formatting, eCub is the best option. Plus, the app is completely free and you can download versions for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, FreeBSD, and even Solaris.


If you're using Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) service, HTML is the preferred formatting language. Most HTML tags work, so you can easily format your book using an HTML editor. In most cases, however, WYSIWYG editors will provide you with all the tags you need to help you convert your publication to the Kindle format.

While many prefer to edit HTML code, it is a WYSIWYG editor developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Amaya is a free and open source application available for Windows and operating systems such as Unix and Linux, including Mac OS X. Check out the Kindle for more information.


Treesaver is great for creating a book format that is easily readable by any device connected to the Internet. This application is a user-friendly and easy-to-use HTML magazine / ebook creation script. If your plan is to have your own domain and organize a high-quality presentation of your brand on the web, this application will be just right!

Unlike other e-book creation tools on the web, this application does not require Flash, Java or any other plugins. It works in almost all browsers and adapts to any display size (depending on the device). Those. iPhone owners who use their gadget for reading will see the app in much the same way as PC users. The app also supports keyboard flicking, mouse scrolling, finger swiping (for touchscreens), and the old-fashioned click function. Moreover, books created with Treesaver can be decorated with images, videos and links, since the application is intended for composing e-books (which is currently rare in books).

Treesaver is completely free and open source. You can download the javascript file and read the tutorial for publishing content on the official project website.


In addition to e-book formats and standard web formats, many devices can also support PDF books. If you need something that you can distribute or sell online, then PDF is ideal for that purpose. Many text editors such as OpenOffice.org / LibreOffice have a built-in function to export documents to PSD format. There are also online PDF converters such as Neevia Document Converter. It's free, but there are some limitations.

It is also important to keep in mind that you should not make too complex a design so that it works perfectly on all devices. Many readers prefer a solid text with various diagrams and graphs (if we are not talking about a children's book, of course). Readers are interested in the text itself, not your fine art skills.

You can very conveniently and simply provide your book to a large number of readers without resorting to paid software. The above tools are just a small selection of the huge list of eBook applications available. Choose the best option for yourself and enjoy the easy gravity process.

It is difficult to overestimate the role of a modern computer in the workflow process. Moreover, the digital format of data presentation preserves not only hectares of forests intact, but also the time, nerves and strength of ordinary office workers. Therefore, let's take a closer look at how to create an e-book for storing documents:

What is an e-book

An interesting fact of the appearance of the electronic version of the book is that it was the US Declaration of Independence. It was created back in 1971 by an American inventor Michael Stern Hart... It was he who became the founder of the Gutenberg project, which involves digitizing and preserving world literature in electronic form, as well as providing free access to books:

In the modern concept, an electronic book is an electronic version of a paper original, made in digital form. The created e-book can be in one of the generally accepted formats. An e-book is often called an e-book or e-text.

An e-book is also understood as any educational publication in any discipline, made in one of the digital formats and provided with notes or exercises. As well as explanatory illustrations in the form of bitmap images.

The term e-book is used both for digital versions of books and for portable devices designed specifically for reading them.


E-book can be made in various digital formats. We will try to highlight their main types:

  • Plain text - I mean the txt format, which can be created (read) using a regular text editor (Notepad);
  • In the form of raster graphic images - these include DjVu, TIFF, JPEG and others;
  • Multimedia e-book formats can be files with exe, SWF extensions. As well as various formats of audiobooks (MP3, Vorbis);
  • Java books are applications designed specifically for mobile devices based on Java.

In more detail, I would like to dwell on several basic formats currently used to create e-books.

Basic e-book formats

Nowadays, e-books are most often presented in several of the most popular formats.

These include:

  • HTML - Created using Hypertext Markup Language. Books are html pages linked together. Hyperlinks are used to navigate between sections. You can open such a book using a regular browser or through a special interface;
  • Electronic Publication (ePub) is an open international standard created specifically for e-books. The format allows you to record and distribute a book in a single file. At the same time, the source itself is a ZIP-archive, in which data is stored in the standards HTML, XML, PDF;
  • DjVu - the format is an implementation of low loss image compression technology. It was specially designed to save scanned texts, illustrated with various pictures, graphs and diagrams. The technology is optimally adapted for transferring DjVu files over the network. This allows you to start reading the book while it is loading:
  • PDF (Portable Document Format) Is a cross-platform standard for storing and creating electronic documents from Adobe. In its implementation, a number of features of the PostScript language are used. The format is designed specifically for displaying various printed publications in electronic form. It supports the use of vector and bitmap graphics in the text and the embedding of the required fonts (line by line). We'll talk about how to make a book in pdf a little later. The free Adobe Acrobat application is most often used to read documents in this format:
  • fb2 (FictionBook) - the structure of the format is described in XML. That is, each element of the book is located in its own tag. This ensures that the standard is cross-platform and that the data is ready for change ( editing, creating) and read on any device.

But all this information is for reference, and does not explain the practical side of the issue. For example, how to create an electronic textbook. Therefore, let's leave the theoretical component and get down to practice.

Creating an HTML-based tutorial

Let's look at the process of creating an HTML-based eBook using eBook Maestro. The weight of the installation package of the program is small and amounts to only 2.7 MB. After installing and launching the application, you are greeted by a dialog box informing you that you are using the free version of this software product. Which, in turn, somewhat “infringes” on the program's capabilities:

For novice users, in the application help, it is suggested to download the template under the html page for the book on the official website. This should make the whole process much easier:

In fact, the template turned out to be just a collection of simple web pages, the code of which is not very complex. But to add content and images to them, you need a special editor with html support:

After inserting the names of the pages and their contents into the html, we saved all the files again:

Now we return to our application again. On the General tab, enter the title of the book and the contact information of its author:

On the "Files" tab, we inform the program about the location of the book files. That is, we set the path where we saved the web pages of the standard template we edited. Also here you can specify the path to the icon for the book, and in the field “ Output EXE file of the book"- the place to save the finished sample:

In the "Interface" tab we set up the user interface: set the size, color and layout of the main elements of the book:

This is what we got as a result of creating a sample e-tutorial in html. Of course, some amendments could be made, but to demonstrate the whole process it is quite suitable:

A few more similar programs:

  • HTML Help Workshop;
  • eBooksWriter LITE.

Create PDF books

We used SunRav BookOffice to create a PDF book. A lot of information about the app can be found on the official website. Particularly pleased with the presence of an extensive section of technical documentation:

The application supports the creation of not only PDF documents, but also the creation of books based on other standards:

We have chosen the easiest way. Therefore, in the menu shown above, we selected Word articles as the source.

Most commercial publishing software is expensive. But don't despair, there are at least two excellent free programs that will allow you to cope with the specific task of designing a print layout. One of these programs is designed for small businesses and is a great alternative to Microsoft Publisher. The other is a serious high-end competitor, not inferior to multifunctional commercial programs.

Review of free software for publishing (creating a print layout)

Scribus multi-platform complete layout solution

The first and most advanced program is open source. Scribus was originally designed for Linux systems only, but over time it also began to support Mac OS X, OS2 and Windows.

Scribus is truly a program capable of creating professional creations that can be sent to print right away, without any need for pre-processing. The list of features is impressive. Everything that can be useful, including support for CMYK colors, separators, management of ICC color profiles, pdf creation and much more. The layout procedure is somewhat similar to Gimp (a fairly well-known open source program). In addition, Scribus can import and export data from Open Office, a powerful counterpart to Microsoft Office.

Although Scribus is a very, very functional application, the user interface still lags slightly behind its commercial brothers. Of course, the program allows you to use different display templates (shells), but you can still feel the difference. Scribus is well documented and development continues to this day.

Overall, Scribus places more emphasis on functionality rather than beauty. Therefore, this program is more suitable for those who need to create printed layouts of any complexity.

PagePlus Starter Edition is a great product for budding publishers and small organizations

The second program is from Serif, the creators of the renowned free photo editor PhotoPlus. PagePlusSE is a simplified version of PagePlus X8. Of course, the free version lacks many of the features of the commercial version, but the functionality available is more than enough to create the relatively simple brochures, flyers, announcements and newsletters often used by small businesses and charities. In fact, the lack of complex features makes PagePlusSE much more intuitive and user-friendly for novice users with regular publishing needs.

The program comes with a good set of ready-made templates (additional templates can be downloaded from the Internet), so that even a novice user can create beautiful and presentable print materials in a short time. PagePlusSE has quite good tools for processing text and images (insertion, resizing, etc.). There is also a basic set of forms: folding flyers, business cards, letter forms, etc. The tools for managing the color palette are limited in places, but, however, they are sufficient for most needs. The limitations also apply to the available file formats for saving your works (for example, there is no PDF).

Note: However, you can use programs for creating pdf to get around this limitation.

If there is one thing that really sets PagePlus SE apart from its peers, it is undeniably ease of use. In fact, the program's interface is designed in such a way that if you are at least a little familiar with Microsoft Word and similar office suites, then consider that you already know how to use PagePlus SE. In this case, it feels good that this product is based on commercial software.

NoteA: Of course, you should not in any way assume that free and open source products cannot be attractive, beautiful and user-friendly. And that all commercial products have a better interface by default. In reality, this is not always the case. It's just that, unlike free products, the main focus of commercial software should almost always include appearance (interface, etc.). Otherwise, they simply cannot withstand the competition.

Quick Pick Guide (Free Publisher Download Links)

Scribus

Very powerful, can do anything you can imagine.
Perhaps too complex and powerful for casual users.
http://www.scribus.net/canvas/Scribus
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70 MB x86; 82 MB x64 1.4.4 Unrestricted freeware Windows 2000 - 8 x86, Vista - 8 x64, Mac OS X, Various Linux distributions, OS2 eComStation.
64-bit OS support
Before installing Scribus (for Windows), install Ghostscript. It is required for EPS import and preview printing.

PagePlus Starter Edition

Easy to use. Lots of ready-made backgrounds, templates, swatches, styles, and more Most likely to be the best choice for everyday creation of relatively simple layouts.
Basically basic functionality.

 

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