Kindle doesn't open e-book on first page | General InDesign Topics | Forum

Kindle doesn't open e-book on first page

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9:38 am
June 22, 2011

fionaraven

Canada

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Is there something I can add to my code so that Kindle opens the e-book at the first page? I followed Anne-Marie's tutorial on lynda.com, exported to EPUB from ID5.5, tweaked in Sigil 4.0, then converted to MOBI using Amazon's Kindle Previewer. Everything looks fine except the book opens at chapter 30 instead of the first page. Is there something I can add in Sigil that will tell Kindle where to open the book for the first time? Thanks in advance for any advice!

8:59 pm
September 22, 2011

vickihnh

Boston

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I'm having the same problem. Did you ever find a solution to this?

6:13 am
September 24, 2011

Anne-Marie

Admin

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Did you download and read through the Kindle Publisher Guidelines pdf? You can get it on the KDP site at this very bookmarkable page (has all Amazon's free guides and utilities for publishing Kindle books):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/featu…..1000234621

Your question is answered in there.

Basically, you're supposed to add a "Start" entry in the final Guide section of the content.opf file (the "brains" of the epub, the file with the metadata, manifest, etc.) that tells the Kindle file where to begin… that is, what page should it open to by default, if you've never opened the book before. They recommend you specify the first page of real content, like the first page of Chapter 1, as opposed to, say, the copyright page. There is also a default menu item in a Kindle device and in Kindle software called Go To > Beginning, and the page that you set as the Start is also that Beginning page.

Here's an example from one of my Kindle projects, where we wanted the start of the book to be the Preface, which was its own HTML file named Preface.html:

<guide>

</guide>

10:47 am
January 12, 2012

Julie

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After following your Lynda.com tutorial – which is great – Anne-Marie I still can't resolve this problem. I've tried what you've suggested but no matter what I do the Kindle previewer and my kindle think that the beginning of my document is the last page. Do you have any more suggestions?

By the way I was delighted when you responded to me following you in Twitter (until my son pointed out that you are such techie genius that you had probably set up an automated reply to followers! Duh!!)

The code I've typed is:

<guide>

</guide>

</package>

but the Kindle goes straight the document "0816_Microsoft_Freeform_ipadv2-12.xhtml" which is the last page of the document – even when you click on Go to beginning in the Kindle menu!

10:49 am
January 12, 2012

Julie

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Oh I forgot to say I'm using InDesign CS5 and all the free apps you recommend in your tutorial and I converted from the epub using Kindle Previewer

11:12 am
January 12, 2012

fionaraven

Canada

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I did finally figure out something that works, although it's probably not "right" at all! In fact, the epub validator doesn't approve it, but Kindlegen does. I, too, couldn't get any of the other suggestions to work, even though I tried 1) adding "start" into the guide as described above, and 2) only including three "types" in the guide (cover, toc, and text) which was suggested on a blog I read. Anyhow, here's the workaround I use, and this seems to work fine:

You've already noticed that the Kindle opens your book at the start of the LAST page rather than the first page. At the end of the line in the guide for the last page, remove the phrase type="text". Then remove that same phrase from all the lines above it EXCEPT for the first one (where you want your book to open). Voila. This will show up as an error message in all validators, however it does seem to work just fine and KindleGen will still congratulate you.

I would love to learn of a way to do this that doesn't produce error messages, but so far have had zero luck. I hope this helps!

11:48 am
January 12, 2012

Julie

Community Member

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Fiona you have saved my life – Thank-you, Thank-you, Thank-you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It works !!!!!!!

12:25 pm
January 12, 2012

fionaraven

Canada

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Julie, you are more than welcome!!

12:52 pm
January 12, 2012

lizcastro

New Member

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Another option is to only have three items in the guide section: the cover, the toc, and the document that should open first, as in Anne-Marie's example. And then you won't generate any validation errors.

It's interesting to note, though, that iBooks will open an ebook on the *first* file that contains type="text" while it looks like Kindle wants to open the *last* file that contains type="text". Again, it seems like the best solution is to only have one file identified with type="text".

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