The InDesign Fixed-Layout ePub —> Kindle Dilemma

Report · Oct 10, 2023

Greetings -

It is a known issue that fixed-layout ("print replica") ePubs exported from InDesign work fine in Apple Books, but are "broken" on a Kindle e-reader, with—among other problems—fonts being substituted, incorrect kerning and word spacing, and sometimes worse.

In the past, such ebooks also displayed and worked (hyperlinks, etc.) just fine in the Kindle App (now know as Kindle Classic, and soon to be discontinued). But with the introduction of the "new" Kindle App for Mac in September 2023 (Version 6.85.2), this is no longer the case; fixed-layout ebooks now display incorrectly, just as horribly as on a Kindle e-reader... except, of course, that photos, etc. are displayed in color.

Amazon clearly intends to do nothing to fix this. If anything, they seem intent on making it worse.

So I would like to know if Adobe intends to address this issue, and finally provide an InDesign Export function for "EPUB (Fixed Layout for Kindle)."

Failing this, I would very much appreciate knowing about any third-party work-arounds to fix InDesign fixed-layout ePubs so they will work properly on a Kindle. Note that I am aware of the "export to PDF and then run it through Kindle Create" option, but find it unacceptable because it breaks at least half of the hyperlinks in the book, and makes the rest look butt-ugly (and offers no way to control or correct any of this).

And, please, please, please, no "ALL ebooks should be reflowable" comments. There are books—most books, in fact—that work beautifully as reflowable. And there are books that absolutely do not. This problem involves the latter.

Thanks!

Report · Oct 10, 2023

FXL EPUB is, and always has been, a broken format of limited use. Its only real purpose, especially these days, is for picture-page books. It should not be used for text, no matter how elaborate.

That said, it's also a terribly difficult format to work with, with extremely complicated code for the fixed positioning of everything. Which means that post-export surgery and fixup is nearly impossible. (Quite unlike r*fl*w*ble, which lends itself to all kinds of very elegant manipulation both pre- and post-export.)

All of which means: it's not really Kindle's fault, and no, there's not much you can do except try to optimize the export, with what little CSS adjustment is possible, and use it only for its one strength, picture-pages. No one, Adobe or other, is going to put further resources into "fixing" it at this late date. What little advancements there are are fixing more significant problems with reflow... well, you know.

Sorry. 🙂

Report · Oct 10, 2023

Thanks James -

But this doesn't explain why the same fixed-layout ePub file exported out of InDesign displays and works perfectly in Apple Books and in the old Kindle app (now called "Kindle Classic" v. 1.40.2). Fonts, formatting, styles, kerning, leading, etc., etc. all remain intact. Exactly. And all of the links within this particular book also work exactly as intended; ToC-to-chapters, linked text within the document, photos and graphics with links; doesn't matter if they're internal (to other locations within the book) or external (to outside sites).

In essence, indistinguishable from a good PDF. And, also, even better and with a higher quality appearance than the printed version of the book (Amazon paper and print quality being what they are).

I open the same exact purchased-from-Amazon copy of the ebook in the [old] Kindle app: Perfection. In a Kindle e-reader and the new app: Chaos. So, yes, it is Kindle's fault. And, to add insult to injury, they've taken a huge step backward with their new Kindle for Mac app, to boot. What did they change, and why would they do that??!!?

There is unquestionably something more going on here that I would very much like to understand. And, of course, find a way to fix.

Fingers crossed...

Report · Oct 10, 2023

EPUB =/= PDF =/= Kindle. It's that simple. Three different formats, generated under three different sets of standards. And for Kindle, since there is no good way to directly generate their format, it's all up to how they choose to handle conversion from other formats.

You're looking at it a bit backwards, to tell the truth. FXL is and always has been a fairly substandard format. That it works on some platforms is more the anomaly than not working on another.

As for then and now, the platforms and the readers are continually evolving. That one (so far) has evolved away from 'perfect' support of this largely obsolete format is unsurprising. Kindle has moved forward with a more capable format, overall, and has deprecated most of what came before, including its original MOBI format. It does not support EPUB directly, despite some marketing razzle-dazzle; it converts EPUB to its own current proprietary format whether it announces the fact or not. (Such as the supposed big deal of being able to side-load EPUBs; they aren't EPUB on the device.)

It's possible your book could be tweaked into better Kindle compliance, but again, one of FXL's weaknesses is that it is very difficult to work with once generated. If you're not familiar with the structure, reflowable EPUB is basically a packaged web site; a flowing text file with some markup that is presented, in liquid form, according to style rules. You can edit both the text and the styles pretty easily, if you have a little bit of HTML/CSS knowledge. FXL is... <giant gob of code; put an 'e' here><giant gob of code; put a 't' here><giant gob... well, you get it. A wonky, fragile, overwrought method to "paint" a page on the screen. Thus, it was always strongest for picture-based pages like children's books and comics, rather than positioning hundreds of characters on a screen, one at a time like a Lite-Brite.

I assure you that no 'fix' is coming from any direction. If you can't generate an adequate FXL file now, tomorrow will just be more so as the readers and platforms continue to evolve away from it.

Learn reflowable export, and how much can be done with it once things like CSS style control is mastered. It is not limited to streaming body text, as almost any of my published books will show.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

To give a full follow-through, so you don't conclude I'm just blowing you off, consider this. I created this simple page in ID:

It exported to both FXL and reflowable EPUB without issues, and opened in Kindle Previewer with only slight variations in line spacing between the two.

Opening them in Calibre was similarly identical except that the liquid version was a comfortable reading size, and the FXL version much smaller and not easily enlarged.

Here's the relevant content code from the reflowable export:

And here's the code for the exact, same, but 'fixed' layout from the FXL export:

Besides being horribly complex and bloated, just to "paint" each letter in a specific location, it's nigh impossible to edit in any way. (And if the page has any complexity of font styles, sizes, layout, etc. — this code multiplies like rabbits.) Compare that with the simple code above, which anyone with a little web experience can hack to Dubuque and back... well, that's just the start of why FXL is not really a viable format for text. And it hints at why conversion to another e-doc format might not be a completely faithful translation.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

I appreciate the time you've spent on this, and I'm sure your explanation makes sense. Unfortunately, I do not have the skill set to either verify or implement your suggestions. I am merely an "old-school" graphic designer who likes things to work correctly.

The from-InDesign ePub (fixed layout) book I'm referring to with all of this cannot even be opened by Kindle Previewer 3. Attempting to do so returns the error message [within the conversionLog]: "Kindle conversion has encountered an internal error while enabling Enhanced Typesetting on this book." Nevertheless, when published with KDP it displays and works entirely correctly in the [old] Kindle app.

So—and I'm sure this displays my naiveté—it is a fact that FXL works fine in some readers but not in others (specifically, the Kindle device and new Kindle app for Mac). I found this (from w3.org) interesting, although I have no idea how old it is:

"EPUB format can be read at least by the Kobo eReader, Blackberry Playbook, Apple's iBooks app running on iOS devices such as the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, Barnes and Noble Nook, Sony Reader, BeBook, Bookeen Cybook Gen3 (with firmware v. 2 and up), COOL-ER, Adobe Digital Editions, Lexcycle Stanza, BookGlutton, AZARDI, FBReader, Aldiko, Moon+ Reader and WordPlayer on Android, Freda on Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7, the Mozilla Firefox add-on EPUBReader, and Okular. Several other desktop reader software programs are currently implementing support for the format, such as dotReader, Mobipocket, uBook.

"The only notable device lacking integrated support for the EPUB format is the Amazon Kindle, although there has recently been speculation that the Kindle will soon support this format.

"Adobe Digital Editions uses .epub format for its e-books, with DRM protection provided through their proprietary ADEPT mechanism."

and...

"Kindle devices do not support the EPUB file format used by many other e-book readers. Instead, they are designed to use Amazon's own e-book formats: AZW, MOBI and, in later devices, KF8. These formats are intended for reflowable, richly formatted e-book content and support DRM restrictions, but unlike EPUB, they are proprietary formats.

"It is unlikely Amazon will support EPUB3 (they could have done that with KF8). Amazon has valid reasons for using KF8: it has a built-in dictionary index and fixed layout, which EPUB does not really have yet, (but currently under development)."

In any case, as there does not seem to be a solution to my InDesign fixed layout[for Kindle] dilemma, my solution, in future, will have to be to use Amazon only for printed books and Apple Books for ebooks, when "print replica" is required. Or, on occasion—in the unlikely event that budget permits, which will not likely be often—hire a professional to fix what Adobe and Amazon will not. Thankfully, I have only one more "coffee-table-style" book in the queue, and the rest will be reflowable.

Thanks again.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

That content is not inaccurate, but it's rather outdated and coming from a party that is both highly interested and frustratingly disinterested... which would take too much time to explain here.

The first of two crucial takeaways here is that hardly any two EPUB readers manage the format and its presentation the same way. There is a standard, frequently updated (these days, largely with nits about accessibility, with no attention paid to major faults and needs for upgrade), but there is not even a weak enforcing body or one with enough "gravity" to pull reader developers into a common orbit. That your exports work on Apple is very mildly surprising; while their reader is fairly standard, Apple follows its general principle of doing things "differently and better." They at least have the engineering muscle to to things right as far as code quality and product testing. Many of the other readers come from very small shops, if not solo developers, and incorporate every quirk the maker can think of, often with minimal stability and compatibility testing.

Put another way, EPUB is not as much a standard as a concept, and issuing works in it mean every single user will have a different experience, depending on their reader/app, its settings, their preferences, minor variations in the EPUB file itself and sometimes (it seems) just the phase of the moon. Set aside the idea that there is some body of "working" platforms and a few outliers; besides a few pure, standard-driven, vanilla readers, they are all outliers. Kindle is actually the best technical solution because it's a closed ecosystem, much like Apple technology, and if something is there, it works. But conversion from outside docs is... unpredictable and the conversion process is wholly undocumented. So again, you need to set aside the idea that you can somehow do "perfect" EPUBs and it's _________'s fault if one doesn't work there — you can only optimize your docs for each platform and let the chips fall for any user who uses some other app or reader.

The other takeaway is that the production tools only take the job so far. There is no perfect EPUB generator. It's not like using InDesign to PDF to a print service, where zero outside (or "internal") knowledge is needed; just use the app right and all will shine. But with a fragile, mishandled format like EPUB, InDesign (for example) does its best, but that 'best' has limits not addressable from within the app, and a truly superior result requires skills and knowledge outside the menu-driven interface.

You can remain an "old school designer" — my experience goes back to blueline boards and wax pasteup — and decline to learn new skills, but that leaves you at the mercy of what platforms and what file types work within a narrow range of erratic alternatives. Your book — even in FXL — is likely fixable to Kindle-import standards, but not (most likely) with anything to be found in an InDesign menu, or even in the menu-driven EPUB editors. It's just a world where success means knowing more than what key combination to press. 🙂

Maybe one day we'll get a real e-doc format, one more flexible (literally) than PDF. But for now, EPUB v3 rules, and does so badly.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

Have you tried uploading your book from a PDF? I have only hazy ideas about file types and conversion for fixed-page, but PDF is an option for Kindle.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

Greetings -

Yes, I'm also "old-school" enough to have done wax pasteups and drawing-table drafting. And to have been in the midst of the conversions to Postscript and PDF, and the adaptation required for same using QuarkXPress and InDesign sice, almost, Day One. Also a pre-release beta tester for Photoshop, after having used Scitex, Full Color Publisher, and Letraset ColorStudio.

But coding; damn! For whatever reason, the old grey cells balk. It's not that I don't want to learn new skills, but part of the current situation is that I simply don't have the time to do it quickly enough to solve the ongoing problem(s). On the to-do list... but not very near the top.

Once again, thank you very much for the time you've spent on this.

Report · Oct 11, 2023

KDP dissuades you from uploading a PDF for an ebook, although PDF is listed as an "also accepted" format. For print books it is the recommended format.

What can be done is to export to "Adobe PDF (Print)" (PDF/X-1a format recommended) from InDesign, and then run the PDF through Kindle Create. The problem is that none of the PDF/X formats allow hyperlinks. So I tried doing this by exporting as "Adobe PDF (Interactive)" and it worked, more or less... but Create also broke about half of the links (including all of the links in photos), and messed up the formatting of the text links that it didn't break. So... not a complete solution.

I am going to go ahead and just submit a PDF, to see what happens. Thanks for the reminder.

OK; done. Nope. It converted very quickly, but is even more screwed up in Previewer than when a .epub file was uploaded. >sigh<

Thanks again...