icons don't show in the Kindle

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icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
Hi,

I use `:icons: font` but the icons don't get displayed in the Kindle.

The file gets rendered with `asciidoctor-epub3 -D output -a ebook-format=kf8 book.adoc`

PDF and HTML export works fine.

Does anybody have the same problem or does anybody know the solution?

  Stefan
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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
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Can you clarify which Kindle we are talking about? (model, year, etc) Also, how are you getting the book to the Kindle? Different Kindles support different CSS features, so this could be an issue with CSS3 support.

We also recently fixed how the CSS3 is loaded in master, so there's a fix in the latest alpha if we're hitting that problem. From the README:

"Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) strips out select font-related CSS rules (e.g., font-family) under certain conditions (for reasons that have proved nearly impossible to reverse engineer); the known workaround is to add a layer of indirection by using @import to hide the CSS files from the script, which we now do.

Also, could check the book to see if it works in the Kindle App? I think all of the Kindle Apps now support CSS3.

-Dan

On Sun, Feb 14, 2016 at 7:11 AM, wintermeyer [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
Hi,

I use `:icons: font` but the icons don't get displayed in the Kindle.

The file gets rendered with `asciidoctor-epub3 -D output -a ebook-format=kf8 book.adoc`

PDF and HTML export works fine.

Does anybody have the same problem or does anybody know the solution?

  Stefan


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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
> Can you clarify which Kindle we are talking about? (model, year, etc)

The iOS Kindle client. Here is the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Ruby-Rails-5-0-Autodidacts-English-ebook/dp/B01BKFPTJ0

I'm happy to provide a gift code for it for debugging purpose.

The source code is at https://github.com/amooma/rails-5.0-book and you have full
read/write privileges for that private repository.

> Also, how are you getting the book to the Kindle?

People bought it from Amazon.

> Different Kindles support different CSS features, so this could be an issue with CSS3 support.

hmmm... do I have to live with that or is there a way to make it run on all devices?

> We also recently fixed how the CSS3 is loaded in master, so there's a fix in the latest alpha if we're hitting that problem.

I rendered the file on the 8th of February. I'll update the Asciidoctor software and update the book today.

For the record: I'm thankful that you invest so much work in Asciidoctor. I used DocBook in the past and Asciidoctor is so much nicer to work with.

  Stefan
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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator
Stefan,

Thanks for your appreciation. I'd be happy to help. However, I probably won't be able to look at it until later in the week and perhaps even the weekend.

>> Also, how are you getting the book to the Kindle? 

> People bought it from Amazon. 

This could be where the problem is being introduced. If you published to Amazon, that means you went through KDP. KDP postprocesses (read as: mangles) books on their way to the store. One thing it does is attempt to strip away fonts. I found a workaround to this problem and included it in the last release on Jan 5 (https://github.com/asciidoctor/asciidoctor-epub3/releases/tag/v1.5.0.alpha.6).

> I rendered the file on the 8th of February. I'll update the Asciidoctor software and update the book today.

Make sure you use 1.5.0.alpha.6 and see if the problem still exists. If it does, it means we haven't totally beat the KDP postprocessor. But I'm optimistic that it will work as I've tested the pipeline with a sample book.

>> Different Kindles support different CSS features, so this could be an issue with CSS3 support. 

> hmmm... do I have to live with that or is there a way to make it run on all devices? 

Kindle has moved all their devices to the KF8 format (which is essentially EPUB3). This brings CSS3 support. There will always be old devices out there that don't support CSS3, but any device purchased recently should work just fine. That's just the nature of the technology cycle. Font-based icons simply cannot work without CSS3 and custom font support.

Cheers,

-Dan

On Sun, Feb 14, 2016 at 11:12 PM, wintermeyer [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
> Can you clarify which Kindle we are talking about? (model, year, etc)

The iOS Kindle client. Here is the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Ruby-Rails-5-0-Autodidacts-English-ebook/dp/B01BKFPTJ0

I'm happy to provide a gift code for it for debugging purpose.

The source code is at https://github.com/amooma/rails-5.0-book and you have full
read/write privileges for that private repository.

> Also, how are you getting the book to the Kindle?

People bought it from Amazon.

> Different Kindles support different CSS features, so this could be an issue with CSS3 support.

hmmm... do I have to live with that or is there a way to make it run on all devices?

> We also recently fixed how the CSS3 is loaded in master, so there's a fix in the latest alpha if we're hitting that problem.

I rendered the file on the 8th of February. I'll update the Asciidoctor software and update the book today.

For the record: I'm thankful that you invest so much work in Asciidoctor. I used DocBook in the past and Asciidoctor is so much nicer to work with.

  Stefan


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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer

On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 9:20 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
>> Also, how are you getting the book to the Kindle? 
> People bought it from Amazon. 

This could be where the problem is being introduced. If you published to Amazon, that means you went through KDP. KDP postprocesses (read as: mangles) books on their way to the store. One thing it does is attempt to strip away fonts. I found a workaround to this problem and included it in the last release on Jan 5 (https://github.com/asciidoctor/asciidoctor-epub3/releases/tag/v1.5.0.alpha.6).

I updated the book with 1.5.0.alpha.11 yesterday.

Unfortunately the icons are still not rendered on the iOS Kindle client.

Make sure you use 1.5.0.alpha.6 and see if the problem still exists. If it does, it means we haven't totally beat the KDP postprocessor. But I'm optimistic that it will work as I've tested the pipeline with a sample book.

hmmm... is there a chance that we use a different setup?

Regards
  Stefan

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AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator

On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 1:31 AM, wintermeyer [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
I updated the book with 1.5.0.alpha.11 yesterday.

Do you mean 1.5.0.alpha.6? That's the most recent version of asciidoctor-epub3.

> Unfortunately the icons are still not rendered on the iOS Kindle client.

Do you see the problems in the book you generate locally or only the copy you download from Amazon? If you see the problems with your local copy, then we probably have a build problem (and probably a simple fix). If the latter, then it gets more complex.

-Dan


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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 9:57 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
Do you mean 1.5.0.alpha.6? That's the most recent version of asciidoctor-epub3.

Sorry for the asciidoctor-pdf mixup. Yes, I meant Asciidoctor EPUB3 1.5.0.alpha.6 using Asciidoctor 1.5.4.
 
> Unfortunately the icons are still not rendered on the iOS Kindle client.

Do you see the problems in the book you generate locally or only the copy you download from Amazon? If you see the problems with your local copy, then we probably have a build problem (and probably a simple fix). If the latter, then it gets more complex.

When opening the mobi file with Calibre everything is fine. So it seems to be some Amazon "optimization".

  Stefan

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AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator

On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 2:50 AM, wintermeyer [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
When opening the mobi file with Calibre everything is fine. So it seems to be some Amazon "optimization".

I don't have access to an iOS device (which is the only way to preview on iOS since there is no Kindle emulator for it), so a screenshot would help me wonders here. I can tell a lot by what I see in the screenshot because I'm so familiar with the stylesheet and how it should look.

-Dan


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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 10:55 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
I don't have access to an iOS device (which is the only way to preview on iOS since there is no Kindle emulator for it), so a screenshot would help me wonders here. I can tell a lot by what I see in the screenshot because I'm so familiar with the stylesheet and how it should look.

I attached one.

The AsciiDoctor source code for the "important" part is:
---cut---
IMPORTANT: With a classic `Ctrl+C` you can stop the web server.
---cut---

  Stefan


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AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

https://twitter.com/wintermeyer

IMG_3575.PNG (326K) Download Attachment
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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator
It definitely looks like the fonts have been stripped away. But before we jump to that conclusion...

Do you see an option in the Kindle app for "Publisher Fonts" in the font selection dialog? If not, that confirms the fonts are not there.

Could you check the book in the Kindle App for Mac (from the iTunes store)? (and also do a screenshot). I know that application supports publisher fonts, so that will tell us whether this is an issue with the iOS app or whether the fonts are really gone.

If we find out that the fonts have been taken away, I'm really at a loss for how to hack around this. What I can tell you is that this is not limited to Asciidoctor EPUB3. Amazon is breaking books that people upload, plain and simple. This is why I'm a big believer in going to direct sales because Amazon obviously cares very little about getting a good product to end users.

-Dan

On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 3:05 AM, wintermeyer [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 10:55 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
I don't have access to an iOS device (which is the only way to preview on iOS since there is no Kindle emulator for it), so a screenshot would help me wonders here. I can tell a lot by what I see in the screenshot because I'm so familiar with the stylesheet and how it should look.

I attached one.

The AsciiDoctor source code for the "important" part is:
---cut---
IMPORTANT: With a classic `Ctrl+C` you can stop the web server.
---cut---

  Stefan


--
AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

https://twitter.com/wintermeyer

IMG_3575.PNG (326K) Download Attachment



If you reply to this email, your message will be added to the discussion below:
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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 11:16 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:
Do you see an option in the Kindle app for "Publisher Fonts" in the font selection dialog? If not, that confirms the fonts are not there.

I see that option but selecting it doesn't make any difference. Actually selecting any font doesn't make a difference.

Could you check the book in the Kindle App for Mac (from the iTunes store)? (and also do a screenshot). I know that application supports publisher fonts, so that will tell us whether this is an issue with the iOS app or whether the fonts are really gone.

Is attached.

If we find out that the fonts have been taken away, I'm really at a loss for how to hack around this. What I can tell you is that this is not limited to Asciidoctor EPUB3. Amazon is breaking books that people upload, plain and simple. This is why I'm a big believer in going to direct sales because Amazon obviously cares very little about getting a good product to end users.

For me Amazon is a one stop shop solution. If I have to life with technical limitations: So be it. Still the advantages of the Amazon ecosystem are big for me.

  Stefan

--
AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

https://twitter.com/wintermeyer

Bildschirmfoto 2016-02-16 um 11.34.48.png (172K) Download Attachment
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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator

That pretty much confirms for me that we're losing the fonts.

What I don't understand is how my test works but it's not working in your case. The next step, then, is to get into more detail about the publishing workflow.

I'll start by making sure my test works for your book. That will tell us whether there's yet another processor later in the stream messing with the book file. But at least we know where to focus.

I'm concerned not just because the icons are missing, but because none of the fonts are right. You'll also be missing any code callout numbers, likely.

-Dan

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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

mojavelinux
Administrator
In reply to this post by wintermeyer

Btw, I'm sorry if I'm coming across a bit frustrated. I'm just very angry with Amazon because they're costing people a lot of time and money for what is supposed to be turn key. It's also very wrong of them to be modifying an author's work.

-Dan

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Re: icons don't show in the Kindle

wintermeyer
In reply to this post by mojavelinux
On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 11:44 AM, mojavelinux [via Asciidoctor :: Discussion] <[hidden email]> wrote:

That pretty much confirms for me that we're losing the fonts.


Would it be much work to use images instead of fonts? I know that it would be a work around but 
at the end of the day it would make many readers happy.

  Stefan

--
AMOOMA GmbH - Bachstr. 124 - 56566 Neuwied  -  http://www.amooma.de
Geschäftsführer: Stefan Wintermeyer, Handelsregister Montabaur B14998

https://twitter.com/wintermeyer