Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Mon, 2009-12-14 05:05
Hi EP fans.
For those who are interested, I'm currently making a lightweight version of the core rulebook - a dry PDF with all the data, but no pictures and no page layout. It's definitely not as nice as the original version, but:
- it will weight a few megabytes max
- it displays instantly on old hardware
- it is printer-friendly (much better if you need to print a few pages for your players)
There will be typos in the transcription, as text selection in the PDF file sometimes do weird things, but I will also release the LaTeX sourcecode for those who want to fix a few things. I'm currently at the "System gazeteer" section of the book. If you are interested in a preview, please tell me.
PS: thanks for releasing the material under CC licence and make such a thing possible and legal. And I'm currently waiting for my hardcopy version to arrive here in france, by the way.
Mon, 2009-12-14 11:45
#3
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Maybe then you should send an e-mail to CGL requesting a copy of the text-only version and what you want to do, and they may be more then willing to help you out with it.
__________________
Juan Rodriguez, PhD
Bio-engineer
Pinochet
Your mind is original. Preserve it.
Your body is a temple. Maintain it.
Immortality is an illusion. Forget it.
Extinction is approaching. Fight it!
Rep: 33
Sun, 2009-12-20 14:37
#7
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
That's really easy to read, thanks for the work.
Tue, 2009-12-29 18:50
#8
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Thanks a lot it helps when you are low on money ! I'll buy the book/pdf combo when I have the money !
__________________
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Singularity is ... All migthy ! 
Wed, 2010-02-10 17:06
#9
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Is there a finished pdf version of this available? Is it simply the link given above?
Sat, 2010-04-10 06:36
#11
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Hi,
I finished the character creation chapter (apart form the example characters).
Didn't get the hang of git right away and didn't want to start a fork.
Here are the modified/created files:
http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/ep-tex
http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/5-character-creation-tex
and here is the pdf of the light version so far:
http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/ep-pdf
I did the conversion but did not proof-read it yet.
Tue, 2010-04-13 13:49
#13
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
How exactly are you formatting tables? I'm interested in this project because I've been wanting to produce an epub version of the book, but if I'm to contribute I need to know exactly how I'd go about doing so.
__________________
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear." - Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Peter Carr, 1787
"That sounds like heresy. We're going to wipe you from the history books for that crap!" - Texas Board of Education, Ruling on March 12th, 2010
Wed, 2010-04-14 03:32
#14
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
You can find a table example in the section "spend free points" (5.1.5)
Basically, here is the LaTeX source code :
\begin{tabular}{ccccccc}
COG & COO & INT & REF & SAV & SOM & WIL \\
20 & 15 & 15 & 20 & 10 & 15 & 10 \\
\end{tabular}
the {ccccccc} parameter declares the number of columns, and the alignment for each (here, 7 centered columns). Then, your cells are separated with the "&" symbol, and your rows by the "\\" symbol
You shall find a lot of LaTeX tutorials on the internet - and it's best to have a working environment so you can compile your document to see the final result.
It's nice to hear from people willing to participate 
Wed, 2010-04-14 03:36
#15
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Thanks for the info. Lastly, can you give me some info on whether there is a way to convert LaTeX to other formats? I know it sounds selfish, but I don't know if I want to contribute if I myself can't get a use out of it. Specifically, is there a way to convert to epub or lit format?
__________________
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear." - Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Peter Carr, 1787
"That sounds like heresy. We're going to wipe you from the history books for that crap!" - Texas Board of Education, Ruling on March 12th, 2010
Wed, 2010-04-14 05:48
#17
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Awesome, thanks for all the info. Admittedly, this project would be infinitely easier if we had access to the original InDesign files they used to make the book, but I suppose that isn't necessary with enough effort, eh?
Well, I guess I'll start from the back since everyone else is already doing the front. I'll do chapter 12.
__________________
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear." - Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Peter Carr, 1787
"That sounds like heresy. We're going to wipe you from the history books for that crap!" - Texas Board of Education, Ruling on March 12th, 2010
Wed, 2010-04-14 10:33
#19
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
great to see this little project rolling again.
I should be done with chapter 6 soon. (still haven't checked chapter 5 though.)
about epub: I never used the format. But it seem to be a bundled pack of xhtml and css (+ possibly pictues...). converting latex files to html is a solved problem. so creating a pub file should be possible. (take all of this with a grain of salt please!)
could you test this file, and tell us how it works, please:
http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/eclipse-phase-chapters01-05-test-epub
used the first (non-crashing) online pdf-to-epub converter I could find (http://ebook.online-convert.com/convert-to-epub) and got the file. the app I opened it with produced reasonable results. (appart from ff and fi and ffi getting screwed up. but that should be easy to fix)
Wed, 2010-04-14 11:46
#21
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
You got rid of the them! they got back in by compiling the .tex file to .pdf and then converting to .epub 
I was very happy to see, that someone else had taken care of that.
Mon, 2010-04-19 05:15
#25
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
+1 rep to jiyunatori
__________________
"People think dreams aren't real just because they aren't made of matter, of particles. Dreams are real. But they are made of viewpoints, of images, of memories and puns and lost hopes." - John Dee
Sat, 2010-05-15 07:42
#26
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
update: I tried to generate txt files for chapters, by merging the pages. The main problem here is that some pages are not strictly two columns, so I had to manually choose for each page between the "full" and the "processed" version.
EDIT: and the chapter 5 is pretty much finished.
Haven't seen any commits for a while, so I'm thinking about offering my help. I've forked yout github repo, and I have some LaTeX proficiency.
I've begun working on the Skills section, and I got a few questions:
1. Tables. Do we just include them as they are? Any preferences as to formating?
2. Basic methodology. I'm copying text directly from Adobe Reader and the Second printing PDF; the only problems here are that I get spaces after "fi" etc. The columns are selected and copied correctly. I see you're using another approach. Will this be a problem? Should I conform to your methodology, using comments to mark the text file number etc?
3. References. I'm labeling every subsection header for easy referencing via \pageref later. Is correcting all references ("see pp. XX") later part of the plan?
4. Should I just make a Pull request via Github when I got something that I think should be merged, or should I send the files to you in some other form?
5. Is it OK that I begin with the Skills chapter, or should I begin at some other chapter, later on? It'd be kind of crap if we found out we're working on the same chapter...
Thoughts?
EDIT: http://github.com/krank/Eclipse-Phase-Latex is where my fork is at.
Sat, 2010-05-15 17:46
#27
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
skills is almost done. sorry for the long wait.
Sat, 2010-05-15 18:08
#28
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
skills is almost done. sorry for the long wait.
No problems.
Anyways... If my help is needed or even wanted, just holler. I'd love to help.
Sat, 2010-05-15 19:41
#29
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Great, krank!
How about you look into Chapter 7: Action & Combat.
I will try to be faster with Chapter 8: Mind Hack.
Chapter 6: Skills is here: http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/6-skills-tex
The updated book up to chapter 6 is here: http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/ep-pdf-2
I used the command latex2html on linux and got this as the result:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7127699/ep.html
Sun, 2010-05-16 03:09
#30
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Great, krank!
How about you look into Chapter 7: Action & Combat.
I will try to be faster with Chapter 8: Mind Hack.
Chapter 6: Skills is here: http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/6-skills-tex
The updated book up to chapter 6 is here: http://drop.io/eclipsephase/asset/ep-pdf-2
I used the command latex2html on linux and got this as the result:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7127699/ep.html
OK.
So... You're not using Git then? It's a great tool for collaborative work! =)
Git, subversion, I'm open to suggestion - but just passing tex's around manually seems... erh, inefficient.
I know this is an effort of individuals, but I think the work would benefit from some guidelines - how we pull/push our changes so everyone can see them, "coding" style, how (and when) we deal with things such as references etc. For instance, if I were to remove all those extra newlines in all the current tex files, it'd be a pain to distribute the result...
I'd be more than happy to do a lot of the heavy lifting on this project; things like removing the extra newlines for instance. If we want them to be removed.
Anyways, I'll begin working on Action & Combat as soon as I can.
I'll also push your chapter 6 to my Git repository.
Sun, 2010-05-16 03:15
#31
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
I see you're watching my git repo. Nice =)
If you'd like a few pointers on how to fork, pull/push etc, don't hesitate to ask.
Sun, 2010-05-16 04:45
#32
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Hi. First, thanks for participating !
You are right, there hasn't been much commits recently, for I don't have much time to spend on this project.
1. Tables
there are a few examples in the chapter 5, character creation (line 535). It could be nice to follow the same pattern.
2. Basic methodology
Properly extracting the text from the PDF has been quite a pain. What you can find in the txt folder is cleaned out of ligature character (fi etc). But there is one big problem : it is coming from the Eclipse Phase 1.0.
3. References
You are right, I was thinking of fixing the references later. But you can start adding references to the various sections, it won't hurt.
4. Merging
Well, I guess you can make a merge request on github - it's something I've never tried yet, should be fun.
5. Starting with skill chapter
If no one else is doing it already, it's perfectly fine to do the skill chapter.
MAXI BONUS
As I said earlier, my text extracts are coming from EP 1.0. Correcting the whole thing by hand later will be a pain ... For this reason, I've been trying to extract the text in a more clever way.
Basically, "pdftohtml -i -xml" convert the pdf to an xml file with a lot of interesting information: the position of each line, and the type of font used. I'm planning on using those informations to grab the text more efficiently. But it's more complicated than I thought, so I'm not sure I'll succeed.
Sun, 2010-05-16 05:10
#33
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Hi. First, thanks for participating !
No problems. I'm doing it out of selfinterest since I'd like to be able to split the book and hide certain aspects I don't want my players to know about from the beginning... and also, I've missed working with LaTeX. =)
You are right, there hasn't been much commits recently, for I don't have much time to spend on this project.
No problem =)
1. Tables
there are a few examples in the chapter 5, character creation (line 535). It could be nice to follow the same pattern.
OK, agreed.
2. Basic methodology
Properly extracting the text from the PDF has been quite a pain. What you can find in the txt folder is cleaned out of ligature character (fi etc). But there is one big problem : it is coming from the Eclipse Phase 1.0.
Ah. Copy-pasting manually from the 2.0 PDF, using Adobe Reader, seems to fix the ligatures for some reason =)
3. References
You are right, I was thinking of fixing the references later. But you can start adding references to the various sections, it won't hurt.
I've added a lot of labels to things, but I think the best way would be to do a proper sweep at the end...
4. Merging
Well, I guess you can make a merge request on github - it's something I've never tried yet, should be fun.
I'll do so. I've also taken the liberty to remove all the extra newlines etc; word wrap for the first five chapters should now work as it should =)
5. Starting with skill chapter
If no one else is doing it already, it's perfectly fine to do the skill chapter.
Seems like wint-R-mute already did the Skills chapter. Since he isn't using Git, I'll stay away from "his" chapters for the time being. If he wants me to fix the newlines and other formatting stuff later on, I will...
MAXI BONUS
As I said earlier, my text extracts are coming from EP 1.0. Correcting the whole thing by hand later will be a pain ... For this reason, I've been trying to extract the text in a more clever way.
Basically, "pdftohtml -i -xml" convert the pdf to an xml file with a lot of interesting information: the position of each line, and the type of font used. I'm planning on using those informations to grab the text more efficiently. But it's more complicated than I thought, so I'm not sure I'll succeed.
OK. My additions will be from the 2.0 edition. I don't thing there's any real good way to track the changes between editions; line numbers and pages as well as layout are bound to change, and the PDF format is essentially crap when it comes to text coherence.
Sun, 2010-05-16 05:13
#34
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Pull request sent. Like I said, I've done a bunch of changes - not added a lot of text yet, mostly just "fixing" chapters 1-5.
I'll begin working on Action and Combat and perhaps The Mesh during the week.
Sun, 2010-05-16 05:22
#35
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Oh, another thing: LaTeX can be converted to XHTML with very little effort. EPUB is, essentially, XML/HTML. There are tools like https://www.bookglutton.com/api/convert.html which can be used to convert from html+images to EPUB.
Now... I haven't tried it yet, but doesn't it look like an awesome way to go?
Given, you know, that one is willing to shell out $5. I could probably hack together a tool in Python that does the same thing, for free.
Sun, 2010-05-16 06:06
#37
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
okay, I'm RTFMing right now to understand how the pull request works. I will integrate your work as soon as possible.
Take your time =)
Sun, 2010-05-16 08:05
#39
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
I know this is an effort of individuals, but I think the work would benefit from some guidelines
That was never my impression or my idea! I just didn't get Git. So I forked kranks branch and added a couple of fixes.
To me, the most important thing is to have the book in tex code. I have to admit that consistency (when it comes to the formating) is something, that is low on my priority list. For now I formated everything roughly according to jiyunatori's first chapters. Like using quotations for sidenotes in 'bubbles'.
I build krank's fork. Somehow there was no index. I was really fond of that.
Sun, 2010-05-16 08:09
#40
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
wow. you guys/girls/squids post fast.
tried to copy from the 2nd printing out of acrobat reader on linux/ubuntu, but the ligatures are not fixed for me...
Does anyone want to extract the text from the 2nd printing all over again? if not, i'll just continue with the existing text from the first.
Sun, 2010-05-16 09:25
#42
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
I build krank's fork. Somehow there was no index. I was really fond of that.
Weird. I haven't changed anything when it comes to the index. I'll look into it.
In regards to consistency etc: I'm more than happy to take care of a lot of that work. My experience is that in the long run, such work pays off. On the other hand, not everyone have the patience - and that's OK. I have no problems whatsoever with "boring" work like cleaning up code etc.
At some point, perhaps someone should write a set of "practices"; like how to format tables or how we deal with text boxes (I've been inserting the text wherever it seemed natural...).
I like that this has now become a team effort, rather than the work of a single individual. It seems fitting, given the subject matter... I hope we can all continue to focus on what we find exciting and important, and that we can continue to move forward, building on and improving eachother's work. We are individuals, after all, and as individuals we have different priorities and different workflows.
I hope my edits aren't taken as an insult or anything. I'm not saying you should adopt my methods. If either of you would like me to stop formatting the code, I'll do so =)
Sun, 2010-05-16 09:40
#43
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Anyway, I've done it and added the file to the txt/ folder on github.
Merged.
Hm. I must admit I'm kind of new to get. Feels good to learn something new...
Anyways, I was thinking about structure: Right now, I pull and merge from both jiyunatori and wint-R-mute... Should we have a "master fork"? Right now, I forked jiy, and wint forked me. Is this a good setup? I dunno, like I said, I'm new to this. Right now, if wint-R-mute makes a pull-request, I pull. And then I need to make my own pullrequest to jiy in order to get wint-R-mute's changes into jiy's repo...
/slightly confused
Sun, 2010-05-16 11:42
#45
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
As for the master branch, git is a distributed versionning system - thus we should have much trouble forking and merging around.
For something consistent, we can use my repository to merge the new changes on a regulat basis. Just send a pull request and I will do it ASAP.
Sounds like a good idea.
It means wint-R-mute should make a new fork, directly from yours, right? And he and I work on separate forks, using you as our common point?
Sun, 2010-05-16 17:04
#46
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
chapter 8 is commited. as soon as jiyunatori has pulled it, I will close the current fork and fork directly form jiyunatori.
I knew why I just uploaded each .tex file one by one
I ended up copying it out of the pdf by hand and fixing the ligatures.
The shape of the new CAT21000_EclipsePhase_2ndPrinting.txt complicates thing too much, I think. Even with extensive vim-/emacs-foo this will take much longer to whip into shape than the old version.
Sun, 2010-05-16 17:15
#47
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Just a note that the updated version of the Core Rulebook PDF and the Glory adventure PDF in the GM Screen have been updated to use Acrobat layers, so you can now choose which layers to display/hide while reading or printing, to speed things up/conserve ink.
Sun, 2010-05-16 17:54
#48
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Hey, krank! I wanted to steal jiyunatori's thunder!!!
http://delicious.com/infomorph
Sun, 2010-05-16 23:59
#49
Re: Core Rulebook, lightweight version
Hey, krank! I wanted to steal jiyunatori's thunder!!!
http://delicious.com/infomorph
Heh.
Luckily, it says right there: "forked from jiyunatori/Eclipse-Phase-Latex".
The thunder is still his. Or hers, whatever.
Zhem?
The English language needs a gender neutral pronoun... =)
I like the idea of a stuff - no fluff book. You should hand over a copy of your book to CGL after your done and they may sell off the PDF for you as a handbook version of the PDF (or at least give it away on the EP website).
Juan Rodriguez, PhD
Bio-engineer
Pinochet
Your mind is original. Preserve it.
Your body is a temple. Maintain it.
Immortality is an illusion. Forget it.
Extinction is approaching. Fight it!
Rep: 33