omulosi/latex-nonfiction-ebook-template

A LaTeX template for typesetting a professional print-on-demand nonfiction technical book, eBook (.epub, .mobi), and website

LaTeX Nonfiction Book/eBook Template

This is a template for creating the various formats of a technical non-fiction book using content written in LaTeX. Modern books need to be formatted for printing, as PDFs, as websites, and as eBooks (for Apple iBooks, KOBO, Amazon Kindle and other electronic publishers). This template provides a model for creating all of these versions, using the same LaTeX source files. You will need to annotate your LaTeX files using commands supplied in the zzInit.tex commands file in order to build all your book formats successfully.

Note that these tools are specifically for use by independent self-publishers or small publishers, and not for authors who are using one of the big four publishers. Larger publishers have their own requirements for book formatting that are entirely different than these.

This is the print version from book.tex as a PDF

This is the eBook version from eBook.tex as PDF

This template is for a fully publishable book, rather than a toy example, so it contains:

1. Front matter

• A Half Title page (just the book title)
• A Frontispiece/Epigraph - image and/or quote
• A title page with an image
• A copyright and publication data page
• A summary table of contents
• A detailed table of contents
• A List of Figures
• An optional List of Tables
• A Preface

2. Main matter

• An introductory chapter
• As many body chapters as you have

3. Back matter

• Notes grouped by chapter
• Bibliography
• A List of Authors cited
• A permuted index
• A configurable list of abbreviations and terms used

Many of these sections are optional, and there are variations to the formatting when eBooks are generated.

To use this project you'll need to have some familiarity with LaTeX. To be really successful, you'll need to become comfortable editing and creating new commands, but this should give you a big head start.

Structure

BookParameters.tex is the LaTeX file containing defines about your book. You edit this while constructing your book. All LaTeX root files for the same publication include this file. There are currently six LaTeX root files, book.tex, eBook.tex, and four cover/*.tex files (if you import my Github cover project).

book.tex is the LaTeX root file for the Print on Demand (CreateSpace or Ingram Spark), distribution PDF, and ASCII plain text draft formats for your book.

The book.tex will used to generate a greyscale version for printing and a color version for a distribution PDF (A PDF that looks like the print version, but has live hyperlinks and images in color).

eBook.tex is the LaTeX root file for hyperlinked formats (EPUB (for KOBO and iBooks, MOBI for Amazon's Kindle (KDP), and html websites).

The ./tex sub-directory contains all of your book chapters, as will as the initialization macros (./tex/zzInit.tex), your abbreviations and special terms definitions (./tex/zzAbbr.tex), your title page ((./tex/zzTitlepage.tex), and your copyright page (./tex/zzCopyright.tex).

The ./tex/bib sub-directory contains one or more BibTeX formatted bibliography files. For this Github project I've used only one, but, for a full sized book, I find its useful aggregate bibliographies by subject. You can have one set of bibliographies for all of your books, as only entries you actually \cite in your book will be generated in the bibliography and authors lists.

The ./images sub-directory contains all images and figures used in the book. You should create _BW greyscale versions for the print formated version or you may get a nasty surprise from your printer. The makebook script generates _BW image versions for any that you've forgotten, but such images often require contrast adjustment by hand before they are really right for publication.

eBook.cfg is used to add metadata to the OEBPS/Content.opf section of your eBooks. You'll need to manually edit this as described in the eBook format section below.

Building

You can run the provided script:

    ./bin/makebook --all

This will build all versions of the book to subdirectories. You can build individual variants using options described in the utilities section. You should run this daily while writing to avoid having subtle problems in your text that creates errors in some formats and not others. Its much easier to debug a document incrementally than to try to do it after you have many conflicting issues in it.

While working on a book, I usually just build from within TeXstudio, but since there are a number of steps, its easy to leave one out and get an improperly formatted book (incomplete or incorrext index, missing bibliographic references, bad table of contents, etc.)

Paperback Book Cover

Createspace allows you to create a quickie cover using their on-line tool, but these are not terribly professional looking and cannot be used with other printers. I use my Github latex-createspace-bookcover project. The best way to get this is to run ./bin/installcover -g, which will fetch it from github and install it in this directory.

When you build the book PDF with ./bin/makebook, it runs setBookTotalPageCount against the LaTeX log to set the page count in BookParameters.tex for the proper spine width of your book's cover.

BookParameters.tex Values

You will need to manually edit these values, but rarely.

• TotalPageCount: This is the number of pages in the printed form of the book. It is essential for calculating the thickness of the spine in the cover. makebook computes this from the PdfLaTeX log whenever that format is built and changes it in this file.
• PaperWidthPt: {6in} The 6" by 9" book format is the most common one used for high quality non-fiction paperbacks. This is the default used by CreateSpace but you can change it as needed.
• PaperHeightPt: {9in}
• TheMainTitle: {The Ultimate Book}
• TheSubTitle: {Hey! Why Not Read This One?}
• TheBookSeries: {Books That Are Really Odd Series}
• TheAuthor: {Wilson J. Schmeggles}
• TheAuthorLNF: {Schmeggles, Wilson, J.}
• TheCopyrightYear: {2017}
• TheEdition: {First Edition}
• ThePublisherName: {Your Press} Just the short form name
• ThePublisherLineA: {Your} Just one part of the name
• ThePublisherLineB: {Press} Just one part of the name
• ThePublisher{\ThePublisherName} Add Ltd, Inc, LLC etc here
• ThePublisherAddrA: {1234 Xyzzy Plugh Ln}
• ThePublisherAddrB: {North Wyodaka, QM 45678}
• ThePublisherCity: {Wyodaka}
• ThePublisherState: {QM}
• ThePrinter: {CreateSpace, An Amazon.com Company}
• TheSubjectArea: {Yada, Yada, Yada}
• TheKeywords: {Yadas, Books, Odd, Wierd}
• PrintISBN: The 13 digit ISBN. Get from Bowker.
• PrintISBNShort: The 10 digit ISBN. Get from Bowker.
• HardcoverISBN: Optional for your hardback version. Get from Bowker.
• HardcoverISBNShort: The short version of the above.
• EbookISBN: The ebook ISBN, if you need one.
• EbookISBNShort: The short version of the above.
• TheCIPSubjectHeadings: Library of Congress Catalog Subject Headings. Get from QualityBooks
• TheLCCN: Library of Congress classification number (NOT a Control Number)
• TheDDSN: Dewey Decimal System classification number
• TheLCPCN: Library of Congress’ Preassigned Control Number (PCN) (also called an LCCN) are acquired from the Library of Congress. This is done by contacting: http://www.loc.gov/publish/pcn/newaccount.html after you have purchased an ISBNs from Bowker, preferably for all your print and eBook versions.
• TheCopyrightKeywords: Obtain from QualityBooks
• ShortDescription: Normally restricted to 300 t0 350 characters depending on publisher.
• BackDescription: Typically max 2000-4000 characters
• AuthorBio : A short description of the author for the back cover

Important Command Macros

The various versions of your book are controlled by \Boolean parameters specified in the root of book.tex or eBook.tex. When makebook creates a subdirectory for each version, it also updates some of these Boolean parameters so that the book is typeset correctly.

You need to assist this by using command macros that adapt to the version. These are located in zzInit.tex, and you should become familiar with the ones shown in this section.

Boolean Parameters

These \Boolean parameters are in the top section of your root LaTeX files book.tex and eBook.tex. You can set them manually, although others are automatically set by makebook.

• FINALFORM: Ready for publication. Set by makebook -f. Removes DRAFT marks and throws errors on missing image files.
• EDITMODE: Editing mode. Enable double spacing for text that you sent to human editors for manual markup.
• WATERMARK: Only valid for eBook. Allows you to set a background watermark (very slow to typeset).
• TOHTML: Format for Tex4HT conversion. Set by makebook for eBooks and HTML output.
• TOMOBI: Extra Formatting for Kindle .MOBI: Set by makebook. Testable in your text for pubication type specifics.
• TOEPUB: Extra Formatting for IDPF .EPUB. Set by makebook. Testable in your text for pubication type specifics.
• RAWHTML: Allow /HCode directly in text [no PDF].
• TOPRESS: Format for paper printing. Set by makebook. Hyperlinks include the url in the text.
• NOCOLOR: Format for monochrome output. Set by makebook. Controls whether \Image will look for BW variant files.
• SUBCAPTIONS: Allow subcaptioned figures. These are nice but is not supported by html (ebook) formats. For those you need to build a new image that contains the two (or more) images that you wanted, with their supcaptions.
• PARENTIMAGES: Images are in a parent directory. This is set by makebook depending on whether the image subdirectory needs to be copied to the target.
• CHAPTERNOTES: Place endnotes at end of each chapter
• NOBODY: Incude only the intro [debugging]
• NOLISTS: Do not generate lists of figures and tables
• NOFIGLIST: Do not generate list of figures
• NOTABLIST: Do not generate list of tables
• NOINDEX: Do not generate index entries. Useful in debugging.
• NOAUTHORS: Do not include the Authors section.
• NOHYPERREF: Disables hyperref - href linking.
• NOABBR: Suppress abbreviations is mostly used in debugging.
• NOIMAGES: Disable Graphics inclusion which is useful when you are doing lots of text editing, and image typesetting slows down rebuilds to the point you're annoyed.

Images

Your image files should be referenced with the \Image or \IMAGE command forms.

    \Image[options]{filebase}

The [options] are just passed to \includegraphics.

{filebase} is the filename without the extension. You should create a {filebase}_BW.jpg or .png variation for every image rather than sending color images to your printer.

You don't need to specify the file type, but it must be be jpg or png to be compatible with all eBook forms. Do not use gif, svg or multi-media image formats, or you'll get nasty surprises depending on the format you are using.

    \IMAGE[options]{filename}

Like \Image, but the exact filename is provided. All image files must be in the ../images subdirectory, but you may add further subdirectories within it.

Nomenclature and Abbreviations

Technical books will usually define or use a number of terms and abbreviations. Use the zzAbbr.tex file to add the ones that are relevant for your book. The standard definition macro will also create a \ prefixed command. Use this in your text instead of the raw name in order to get standardized formatting and indexing of the term usage.

When an abbreviation contains non alphabetic characters, or already exists as a LaTeX command, you'll need to use the alternate * form.

I've include a couple of example macros for defining AI and Neuroscience terms, but you'll need to make equivalent ones that a applicable to your topics. The \PrintAcronyms command must be edited to format this appendix.

Indexing

Indexing is usually a tedious process, but you can assist this by using semantic macros in your text. These insert the appropriate \Ix macros as needed.

- \BookName
- \StoryName
- \ArticleName
- \FilmName
- \IdeaName
- \ConditionName
- \OrganismName
- \AnimalName
- \AnatomyName
- \ComputerName
- \PersonName
- \CompanyName
- \ProjectName
- \InstitutionName
- \UniversityName

When you have a specific item in your text to index that doesn't fit into one of the semantic macros, you should either add an appropriate semantic macro, or use one of the following inline in your text.

    \Index{text to index}
    \Inx{text to index and display}
    \PInx{category name}{text to display and index}
    \PInx[text to index]{category name}{text to display}  

\Index will just add an index entry but otherwise does nothing. The second \Ix form both typesets the text and adds it to the index under a specific category name. The third form both displays and indexes the text, but allows you to index by a name different that than displayed. This is most useful when you have variant forms of the text that should all be indexed to the same entry such as nicknames, abbreviations, etc.

Note that the \PersonName index command is special in that if the name is in the form first last, then it is indexed as 'last, first'. If your name is in any other format, then use the optional form: \PersonName[indexed name]{displayed name}, otherwise your index will look stupid.

Book Formats

The book formats are:

• Print on Demand Grayscale
• Distribution PDF
• ASCII Plain Text Draft
• ePub eBook
• mobi kindle eBook
• html single page site

Format: Print on Demand Grayscale

The Print on Demand Grayscale format has exact images of every page that will be between the covers of your book. Where hyperlinks were used in your book, reasonable accomodations for the printed version need to be made.

This format is based on the book.tex root which uses KOMA-Script Book Formatting. The results are better for printed books than the LaTeX book class, but unfortunately not all packages required for eBooks are compatible with KOMA-Script so we use two different root files. This also limits the number of confusing conditionals you would have to maintain.

Format: Distribution PDF

A distribution PDF should not be confused with an eBook format, although they can be hosted on most eReaders. A PDF renders the actual page formatting of the print version of the book including headers, footers, page numbers, and so-on. An eBook uses flow layouts to reformat the text for the geometry of the reader and are better suited to a wide range of devices including smart phones and tablets.

Format: ASCII Plain Text Draft and Publishers Data

The ASCII text draft format is what Quality Books damands for you to obtain a Publisher's Cataloging-in-Publication Data section for placement on your copyright page. All libraries, and most bookstores and textbook stores require this information.

You should go to Quality Books Publisher's Cataloging-in-Publication to get started with this. You'll need to send them $100 and the text draft of your book. Don't do this until you have the book at least half done in order to get a meaningful and complete classification.

Format: ePub ebook (Applie iBooks, KOBO, Barnes and Noble)

The .epub is the most complicated format since it includes many different hyperlinks, and while largely derived from html, does not have all the flexibility of a set of web pages. The LaTeX is converted to html for eBooks, by the aptly named tex4ebook program which is included with the TexLive 2016 distribution.

You must manually edit the eBook.cfg file which defines some metadata about your book, including its description and where to find the eBook cover image (which is not the same as the cover of your paperback version and is not necessarily the cover image inserted in the front of the eBook. This file looks like:

\Preamble{xhtml}
  \Configure{CoverMimeType}{image/jpeg}
  \CoverMetadata{images/ebookcover.jpg}
  \Configure{OpfScheme}{uuid}
  \Configure{UniqueIdentifier}{92cb3522-cf8b-4f58-b066-6aee78b2bee4}
  \Configure{OpfMetadata}{\EndP\HCode{<dc:subject>Non-Fiction</dc:subject>}}
  \Configure{OpfMetadata}{\EndP\HCode{<dc:subject>Science</dc:subject>}}
  \Configure{OpfMetadata}{\EndP
    \HCode{<dc:description>}
      <div><h3>Book Description</h3>[your HTML description of your book]</div>
    \HCode{</dc:description>}}
\begin{document}
\EndPreamble

Some useful links: ePub Secrets, Authorship Tag

Note that there will be problems with your epub file and you will need to edit it with a good editor such as the Calibre eBook editor which you should have installed. There are almost always some issues of metadata and table of content links which you will need to manually resolve using the editor. Sorry, but that's how it is at this point.

Format: mobi eBook (Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing)

Generates an .epub and converts it to a .mobi. The generated .mobi is just useful as a draft, since you will need to edit the .epub file with a good ePub editor such as Calibre which can then be used to generate the .mobi. The TOMOBI parameter is set before generation. It's important to use this, since Kindles provide less flexibility in font display, as well as other characteristics, so subtle variations in content are required to get the best results.

Calibre can also be used to generate Kindle only AZW3 formatted books, which are essentially just highly compressed versions of mobi with DRM.

Format: Html Single Page Website

The single page website is also the most convenient way to do a quick evaluation of your eBook formatting. Open the eBook.html in your browser and look especially carefully at equations, images, table of content and index references. Validate all of the hyperlinks.

To copy the Html site to a webserver, you will need to copy the ./images directory, eBook.html, eBook.css, and all eBook*.png files.

ISBN Numbers

You should have ISBN numbers for each verson of your book. In the United States these must be either purchased directly from Bowker at MyIdentifiers.com. I recommend buying a block of 10 ISBNs for $250. Alternatively, you can get a 'free' ISBN from CreateSpace if you are publishing your print version ony with them. There are issues with doing this, that may make it difficult to use other printers, but you may decide to save the bucks.

Once you have your ISBNs, modify the BookParameters.tex fields, PrintISBN, PrintISBNShort, EbookISBN, and EbookISBNShort. 13 digit ISBN numbers can be converted to 10 digit and vice versa using this tool.

Utility Programs

makebook book formatter

makebook can build any or all versions of your book. These are built in their own sub-directories, and the root LaTeX file's \Boolean properties are modified to reflect the format of the book being built.

Usage: makebook [version(s)] [options] [booktypes]
Build some or all versions of a book

[versions] (more than one may be selected):
  --book   : grayscale PDF formatted for a paperback book
  --pdf    : color PDF with hyperlinks formatted for reading
  --epub   : eBook .epub archive with epubcheck validation
  --html   : single html file webpage of the book
  --ascii  : draft ASCII txt file for Publisher CIP data
  --mobi   : draft Kindle .mobi file
  --cover  : paperback book cover PDF generation
  --all    : alternative to using -a

[options]:
  -a    Generate ALL versions (same as --all)
  -f    Generate FINAL (non-draft) book versions
  -g    Use hardCover ISBN and optional price for barcode
  -t    Trial run: commands are shown but not executed
  -e    Deep trial run: sub-commands are shown but not executed
  -v    Verbose output during command execution
  -q    Quiet output during command execution

A [booktype] is a [version], without the leading '--'.
Either [version] or [booktype] can be used to select targets.

texclean Utility

Running pdflatex generates a lot of trash intermediate files. You can delete these with this ./bin/texclean utility.

Usage: texclean [texfilename]
Clean up intermediate and trash files for a LaTeX .tex file.

-a             clean for all .tex files in the directory.
-t             trial run -- commands are shown but not executed.
-q             quiet output during command execution.
-v             verbose output during command execution.

All the various intermediate files created during LaTex processing
of a file are deleted.

bookinfo Utility

The BookParameters.tex and book.tex or eBook.tex defines and boolean values can be displayed as a group.

Usage: bookinfo [options] [bookname]
Display parameters and boolean values about a book.tex file.

Options:
  -v             verbose output during command execution.
  -q             quiet mode. Disables all console output.
  -t             trial run -- commands are shown but not executed.

Installation

Just copy the contents to your directories and use as is. You will need a complete LaTeX environment, which includes pdflatex. This project was developed on Linux Mint. All of the required tools are available for both Windows and Mac OS X, but I have not tested it on those platforms. Some fiddling will no doubt be required. This section describes the tools that you need on your system and how to get them. You will need:

• A Bash command line shell
• LaTeX TexLive 2016
• TeXstudio LaTeX editor
• Calibre eBook Manager
• ePubCheck
• Pinta Graphics Editor

Installation Notes are found here (INSTALL.md).

License

This code is licenced under the MIT License and the Free Public License 1.0.0. You are free to choose the one that works for you. if you want to grab parts for use in your own project then please remove my name and hack away.