Strange text characters and missing chapter marks on Kindle 3

Grahamk · 02-27-2011, 05:31 PM

Why do I get these ? marks throughout my book?

“?It’?s not like we’?ve murdered someone,”? she hissed when Brynn balked at the proposed plan. “?Anyone in our situation would do the exact same thing.”?

Also some of my books don't have the small chapter marks ( . ) on the % line of book I'm reading along the bottom page of my Kindle 3.

Using Calibre 7.47
Thanks, Graham

Manichean · 02-27-2011, 05:48 PM

Needs more info. I'm guessing these problems occur after conversions? What format do you convert from? What format do you convert to (probably MOBI)?

Grahamk · 02-27-2011, 05:56 PM

It's like that in the original Epub and in the Mobi conversion. Actually when it's viewed in Calibre the ? marks are solid vertical lines (like this "I" ) instead. But on my Kindle they are ? marks.

fulltimer · 02-27-2011, 09:56 PM

I noticed that character in one of my books where a dash should be.

I used the search and replace option in the convert books screen and pasted the odd character in the search regular expression field and put the Dash(-) in the replacement text field, clicked OK and in about 20 seconds all those characters were replaced with dashes.

ldolse · 02-27-2011, 10:34 PM

The book was incorrectly converted when the epub was created. Basically epub requires UTF-8. Odds are that was assumed/configured as the encoding when the original conversion to epub happened. Now that it's epub it's incorrectly encoded.

Your options are to manually fix with a series of search and replace - the ? mark characters are actually other strings that you could potentially search for and replace.

The other option is to guess the original encoding and try to re-convert. Under look and feel in the conversion options there is a box to set the encoding. cp1252 is a popular encoding, so you could try that, but it could be any number of things.

Grahamk · 02-27-2011, 11:15 PM

Ok, thanks. Bad formatting. So can Calibre fix the chapter marker problem?

ldolse · 02-27-2011, 11:47 PM

I'm no Kindle expert, but I believe those depend on creating a TOC during conversion - odds are the epub has no TOC. Check this tutorial and let me know if you have any luck/questions:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=122222

DMSmillie · 02-28-2011, 03:14 AM

Just to clarify, the Kindle relies on the NCX file TOC for those chapter marks. Simply having an HTML TOC embedded in the content of the ebook won't be sufficient.

02-27-2011, 05:31 PM	#1
Grahamk Member Posts: 22 Karma: 186 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kobo One	Strange text characters and missing chapter marks on Kindle 3 Why do I get these ? marks throughout my book? “?It’?s not like we’?ve murdered someone,”? she hissed when Brynn balked at the proposed plan. “?Anyone in our situation would do the exact same thing.”? Also some of my books don't have the small chapter marks ( . ) on the % line of book I'm reading along the bottom page of my Kindle 3. Using Calibre 7.47 Thanks, Graham

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02-27-2011, 05:48 PM	#2
Manichean Wizard Posts: 3,130 Karma: 91256 Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Germany Device: Cybook Gen3	Needs more info. I'm guessing these problems occur after conversions? What format do you convert from? What format do you convert to (probably MOBI)?

02-27-2011, 05:56 PM	#3
Grahamk Member Posts: 22 Karma: 186 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kobo One	It's like that in the original Epub and in the Mobi conversion. Actually when it's viewed in Calibre the ? marks are solid vertical lines (like this "I" ) instead. But on my Kindle they are ? marks.

02-27-2011, 09:56 PM	#4
fulltimer Enthusiast Posts: 26 Karma: 23438 Join Date: Nov 2009 Device: K2, K3(3G-WIFI), Fire	I noticed that character in one of my books where a dash should be. I used the search and replace option in the convert books screen and pasted the odd character in the search regular expression field and put the Dash(-) in the replacement text field, clicked OK and in about 20 seconds all those characters were replaced with dashes.

02-27-2011, 10:34 PM	#5
ldolse Wizard Posts: 1,337 Karma: 123455 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Malaysia Device: PRS-650, iPhone	The book was incorrectly converted when the epub was created. Basically epub requires UTF-8. Odds are that was assumed/configured as the encoding when the original conversion to epub happened. Now that it's epub it's incorrectly encoded. Your options are to manually fix with a series of search and replace - the ? mark characters are actually other strings that you could potentially search for and replace. The other option is to guess the original encoding and try to re-convert. Under look and feel in the conversion options there is a box to set the encoding. cp1252 is a popular encoding, so you could try that, but it could be any number of things.

02-27-2011, 11:15 PM	#6
Grahamk Member Posts: 22 Karma: 186 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kobo One	Ok, thanks. Bad formatting. So can Calibre fix the chapter marker problem?

02-27-2011, 11:47 PM	#7
ldolse Wizard Posts: 1,337 Karma: 123455 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Malaysia Device: PRS-650, iPhone	I'm no Kindle expert, but I believe those depend on creating a TOC during conversion - odds are the epub has no TOC. Check this tutorial and let me know if you have any luck/questions: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=122222

02-28-2011, 03:14 AM	#8
DMSmillie Enquiring Mind Posts: 562 Karma: 42350 Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: London, UK Device: Kindle 3 (WiFi)	Just to clarify, the Kindle relies on the NCX file TOC for those chapter marks. Simply having an HTML TOC embedded in the content of the ebook won't be sufficient.

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