RE: Re: Newbie question on making-editing ebooks

If I look in the coding of an ebook converted to a Calibre ebook, I see "Calibre" named headings, etc. Are you sure it is not a Calibre ebook after the conversion? Why would all the headings change names if it is not a conversion?
 

 To understand further, patience please:
 1. Calibre is only used to convert between different ebook formats?
 2. The coding within ebooks is html and css?
 3. What is the difference in html and css?
 

 Just trying to understand how to change the insides from such ugly designs. 
 

---In [email protected], <[email protected]> wrote:

 ���� Hello, would someone kindly direct me to a web site that is similar to an ebooks for dummies?
 
 
 I use, but am not an expert, in Calibre and Sigil, to edit existing ebooks I download. I have basic beginner questions, like: Why did I have to convert an ebook to a Calibre ebook, in order to add my own ebook cover jpg? Also, is there a basic for dummies way to code existing ebooks I download. I don't understand the ugly way folk's style the ebooks. Why all the Capital letters? Lazy? How do I break a subhead into two lines, but not two subheads?
 
 
 Any help would be appreciated. ����John R
 
 
 
 John,
 
 If you have some knowledge of html and css, this is not a problem that should hold you up long. You know that pdf is one form of ebook. But the most usual intended are the epub, mobi and ibook. The last is an App that I do not know about. But it may be tha same coding����as the mobi (for Kindle) and the epub (for most other things). Calibre is the program to turn a good epub into other formats.
 
 These two are effectively zip folders containing other folders and content, as well as a small signpost file. I've seen the whole described as a website. If you open an epub in Sigil you will see on the left column most of the folders and contained files [I would not use Calibre to make the epub, or to add pages]. and in Sigil you can see the content text or cover or pictures, or add them, or correct them. And you can see both the presentation, and the html and the css. 
 
 If you unzip in something like 7-zip you will see the folders and files. Explore those to see what they are made of and how put together. Experiment in Sigil with a shortish and simple book; you will soon get the hang of how it works, and what gives the����kind of result you want. 
 
 The rest is really doing it. Others might chime in with specific advice. But I do advise first taking one apart a putting it back together. There are plenty of free epubs to download and look at. Or make a copy of something that permits that; then if it goes wrog just delelte and make another ocpy to test your skills with :-) .
 
 On the Kindle publisher pages there is advice, and an excellent pdf to download [free] on Smashwords. There����is endless other stuff to be found with a search. But have a good look at one first to see its make up.
 
 HTH
 
 Joseph Harris [By the way there is no such thing as a Calibre ebook.]