Reflowable EPUB and paragraph rules

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    • #98446

      Help! I’m designing a book that has a thick rule underneath the chapter title as a design element, but when it’s output to EPUB, the rule disappears. I ended up just drawing a line with the line tool and dropping it as an inline, anchored object, but I’m not happy with this process, since it’s a lot of cutting and pasting for each chapter. I’d like to be able to set a paragraph style for the rule, but the EPUB export seems to ignore “rule above” or “rule below” text. Any ideas?

    • #98447
      Aaron Troia
      Participant

      Hey Tera,

      I’m not sure how comfortable you are with HTML and CSS, but my work arounds/hacks are either to add border-bottom:1px solid; to my paragraph style if I want the line to go across the full width of the screen (or you can put it in a dive with width and margin values and set the width), if I want it just to extend past the text and change lengths depending on the length of your line length, I give the style an underline and add about 5 non-breaking spaces to each side of the text, its not perfect, but its the closest I’ve found to give text a bottom rule.

      Aaron

    • #98456

      I’m getting more comfortable with CSS, and have been editing/fine-tuning the EPUB after it’s written. The “border” didn’t work because it spanned the entire column, and I just want it spanning a few characters in the center. I’ll play with the “div” feature. Thanks.

    • #100056
      Clark Kenyon
      Participant

      Have you tried using the underline option in the chapter title paragraph style (as opposed to paragraph rules)? It will only underline the text, it won’t extend across the whole column like a paragraph rule would, but it does export to ePub. If you have to insert the line as an image you could position a piece of text (I use 3 asterisks) with its own paragraph style, centered under the title. Then create your line (or use any kind of image, divider, or flourish you want) on the pasteboard, cut it, then in Find/Change search for *** and change it to ^c (contents of the clipboard). It will replace all instances of the 3 asterisks with your line and each line will be anchored in place under the title. If you need to move the line up or down, you can do that by adjusting spacing of the *** paragraph style. Of course you have to go through your book and insert the asterisks, but it’s a lot easier than pasting and anchoring the line one chapter at a time.

    • #100063

      Thanks, Clark. Yes, I already use the ^c to paste the clipboard contents — what a handy trick!
      The underline feature doesn’t work for this instance because I want a thicker rule (underline is too fine, no matter the font), and I also need more space between the title and the rule, which underline doesn’t allow. But thanks for your comments. :)

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