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https://github.com/cradloff/text2epub

Text to EPUB converter
https://github.com/cradloff/text2epub

ebook epub-converter java text-to-epub-converter

Last synced: 6 months ago
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Text to EPUB converter

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README 

          
# Text to EPUB converter



`text2epub` is a simple but powerful tool to convert text to ebooks in EPUB 

format. It converts text from the following formats:



* [Markdown](https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/) (\*.txt, \*.md)

* [Textile](https://txstyle.org/) (*.textile)

* Wiki / [MediaWiki](https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki) (*.wiki)

* [Trac](https://trac.edgewall.org/) (*.trac)

* [Confluence](https://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence) (*.confluence)

* [Asciidoc](http://asciidoctor.org/) (*.adoc)



If your content is already in XHTML-Format (*.xhtml), it will also be included.



When first called, it creates a template `epub.xml` and exits. You just fill out

this file with the metadata (author, title, etc.) and the next time you call

`text2epub`, it will scan for content and create a ebook from it. The files are 

added alphabetically, so you should add a prefix to sort it (e.g. `01_index.txt`, 

`02_chapter_one.txt`, ...). The cover has to be named `cover.jpg` (or 

`cover.png`, `cover.gif` or `cover.svg`) and will be embedded in a html file.



Filenames with special character such as whitespace, accents or umlauts will be renamed so the

ebook contains only valid filenames in Ascii. This support is somewhat limited, e.g.

cyryllic or greek letters wont be replaced. In these cases, rename your files so

that they conform to the epub standard.



## Stylesheet

You can provide a stylesheet for the complete book or for each content file. The 

global stylesheet must be named `book.css`, the other stylesheets 

`.css`. If you don't provide a stylesheet, a default one is embedded.



## Table of contents

A table of contents is created by default. `text2epub` scans for header tags, 

default is `h1`, other tags can be specified in the properties.



## Internationalization

`text2epub` has builtin support for english and german. To add support for 

another language, extract the file `Text2Epub_en.properties` and rename it to 

match you language (e.g. `Text2Epub_es.properties` for spanish). Put that file 

in the directory where the jar archive is installed. Please send me your 

translation so I can include it.



## Scripting

`text2epub` uses [FreeMarker](https://freemarker.apache.org/) to create the ebook.

You can also use it for scripting. Just place your script inside the content and

`text2epub` will execute it before converting to XHTML. To disable that 

feature, set the `freemarker` property to `false`. There are already some

predefined macros you can use:





pagebreak


This macro can be used to place pagebreaks in you ebook, these are references to 

actual page numbers in the printed version of the book. The first call in each file 

has to specify the starting page (e.g. <@pagebreak 1/>) in the following calls 

the page number is automatically increased an can be omitted (<@pagebreak>). 

If there is at least one pagebreak, text2epub 

creates a pagemap for the book.



link


Creates a link to another file in the ebook. The macro gets the filename as parameter. 

The filename is automatically resolved, i.e. you can specify the filename of the source file 

(e.g. chapter.md) which will be replaced with the filename in the ebook (chapter.xhtml).



refnote


Creates a link to a footnote in another file (default 99_footnotes.xhtml).

The macro has three parameters:


note


the id of the footnote (if omitted it gets automatically increased)


linktext


the text shown in the link (default is note)


file


filename containing footnotes (default 99_footnotes.md).




Example: <@refnote 1 "*"/>




footnote


Creates a footnote with a back link to the refnote entry. The macro has three parameters:


note


id of the footnote (if omitted it gets automatically increased)


file


filename which contains the reference (default current file)


linktext


the text shown in the link (default ↑)




Example: <@footnote 1 "chapter01.md" "^">Here is the text</@footnote>




spacer


Creates an empty line. If specified, more lines can be created: 

<@spacer 3/> creates three empty lines



resolve(srcFilename)


Resolves the given filename of a source file and returns the filename in the ebook. If srcFilename 

is not known, it will be returned. Example: ${resolve("chapter.md")}






You can access the properties from `epub.xml` with the expression 

`${property.}` e.g. `${property.title}` for the book title.



## Customization

Most files are created from FreeMarker templates which are contained in the jar 

archive. If you want to change these templates, just extract them from the jar 

using some zip tool and put them in the local directory. Here you can customize 

them as you wish.



Resources (but not content!) are searched in the following locations:

1. First they are searched in the local directory where your content resides

2. Next, all parent directories are scanned

3. Last the classpath is used



So, if you want to customize a certain resource for all of your books, put the

corresponding template in a common base directory or in the same directory where 

the jar archive is installed.



## Prerequisites

`text2epub` is written in Java, so you have to install a JRE (version 17 or higher).

The JRE can be downloaded from here: 

[https://java.com/en/download/](https://java.com/en/download/)



## Installation

Just unzip the Jar and the shell script somewhere where it can be accessed. You can 

put it in its own directory or in an existing one. Add this directory to your 

`PATH` variable.



Thats all!



## Usage

The shell script has two optional parameters:

1. Directory containing the content. Defaults to current working directory.

2. Output file name. Defaults to the filename specified in `epub.xml`, if 

not specified `" - .epub"` is used.