karl said:

"Save as HTML" normally is not good enough.

well, that tells me what's "not good enough". but it doesn't tell me about what "good" is...

Why do you ask?

because i want to know what you think. and, as i said, i think the conversation here would benefit from creating a _standard_ that we can use to _evaluate_ the output that we expect from the methodology we adopt. if a procedure can create an .html version and a .pdf version -- and whatever other versions we decide are necessary -- that meet this standard, then we know we've got a winner...

We can keep the old file unchanged for the time being. XML produced by http://www.pgdp.net/ is good enough to work with.

ok, i'll take you word for it on that. so i can take an e-text, run it through some converter located somewhere on the site (where, exactly, is it?), and come out with some x.m.l., if i understand correctly. if i do, then the question as to how you get the entire library converted over is answered -- run all the e-texts through this. and thus the conversion to x.m.l. is simple. (if i understand you.) and then what? how do i turn that x.m.l. file into an .html file? into a .pdf? back into a plain-text file? (for looking "ahead" to the time when the x.m.l. file, as the "master", is the only one retained.) i know the standard answer is through x.s.l.t. conversions, but how does a person step through those conversions today? there is also the question of _maintaining_ the x.m.l. file -- entailing things like editing errors out of it, updating it, etc. where do we get volunteers who have the expertise to do that? a quick review at x.m.l.-coding -- i'm looking at a .tei version of alice in wonderland from marcello -- reveals it is complex, definitely not the type of thing you could entrust to most people. since the whitewashers are even now at the point of overload and burnout, just from the task of verifying the submissions of distributed proofreaders, who will be responsible for _this_?

For converting TEI XML to HTML and PDF you can use Sebastian Rahtz' XSL stylesheets: http://www.tei-c.org/Stylesheets/teixsl.html

thanks, that's good info. would you please take some e-texts -- you can choose any you want -- and convert them to x.m.l. and do the output conversion to .html and .pdf for us please? that way, we can subject these output-files to evaluation...

I'm old fashioned and like playing with DSSSL tools (that's all in German and not that polished nor finished -- take it as a proof of concept): http://www.gnu.franken.de/Tieck/ http://www.gnu.franken.de/Tieck/Dokumente/Koepke/

i don't know what "dsssl" is, or understand german, but i'll go take a look at those websites to see what i see... in the meantime, will you generate those samples please? (or feel free to point us to some that you've already done.) -bowerbird p.s. i've jotted down a few of the elements that _i_ think are essential to an electronic-book, and which should be included in any "standard" that we create, and will post that...