How to Generate an ePub eBook from an Anki Deck

In this tutorial, we propose a simple yet effective way to generate an ePub book from an Anki deck.

Whether you're looking to share your study materials, create a portable reference, or simply enjoy your flashcards in a more accessible format, this step-by-step guide will assist you in porting your digital flashcards into a refined eBook.

This approach has been particularly useful for creating an ePub version of our interactive Python flashcard Anki deck, which can be given to users as complementary material. Additionally, it allows us to create a concise preview to share as product info on this website.

To begin, you'll need to install the Basic Printing Support add-on in Anki. This add-on enhances the printing capabilities of Anki, enabling you to generate HTML versions of a deck. After installing the add-on, it's essential to adjust a specific configuration setting to optimize the output. By navigating to the add-on's configuration, you can change the JSON key cardsPerRow to 1. This adjustment ensures that each card is displayed individually, making it easier to format for ePub.

Once the add-on is configured, you can generate the HTML version of your Anki deck. Simply navigate to the deck you wish to export and select the Print option from the tool menu, as shown in the video below. This action will create an HTML file named print.html, which will be saved in your Desktop folder and displayed in your browser for a quick preview.

With the HTML file ready, the next step is to convert it into an ePub format using Pandoc, a powerful document converter. If you haven't already installed Pandoc, you can easily download it from their official GitHub repository. After installation, open your terminal or command prompt and navigate to the Desktop folder where the print.html file is located.

Running the command:

   pandoc print.html -o output.epub 

will generate output.epub file in the same directory.

Additionally, our website features a web application where you can preview the ePub created in this tutorial.

Understanding EPUB Structure

An EPUB file is essentially a compressed archive that contains a collection of HTML files, CSS stylesheets, images, and metadata, all of which work together to create a digital publication.

All of these elements can be included in the EPUB using Pandoc from the command line. Typically, this is better done through a Makefile or a Bash/PowerShell script, allowing for automated and efficient creation of the EPUB file with the desired content, styling, cover image, and metadata.

Below is a simple example of a typical CSS stylesheet for an EPUB file. This stylesheet includes basic styles for body text, headings, links, and images, which can be customized further based on your design preferences.

/* Basic styles for EPUB */
/* styles.css */
body {
    font-family: Arial, sans-serif; /* Sets the font for the body text */
    line-height: 1.6; /* Increases line spacing for readability */
    margin: 1em; /* Adds margin around the content */
    color: #333; /* Sets the text color */
    background-color: #fff; /* Sets the background color */
}

h1, h2, h3 {
    color: #2c3e50; /* Sets the color for headings */
    margin-top: 1.5em; /* Adds space above headings */
    margin-bottom: 0.5em; /* Adds space below headings */
}

p {
    margin-bottom: 1em; /* Adds space below paragraphs */
}

a {
    color: #3498db; /* Sets the color for links */
    text-decoration: none; /* Removes underline from links */
}

a:hover {
    text-decoration: underline; /* Underlines links on hover */
}

img {
    max-width: 100%; /* Ensures images are responsive */
    height: auto; /* Maintains aspect ratio of images */
    display: block; /* Ensures images are block elements */
    margin: 0 auto; /* Centers images */
}

blockquote {
    border-left: 4px solid #ccc; /* Adds a left border to blockquotes */
    margin: 1em 0; /* Adds margin above and below blockquotes */
    padding-left: 1em; /* Adds padding to the left of blockquotes */
    color: #555; /* Sets the text color for blockquotes */
    font-style: italic; /* Italicizes blockquote text */
}

The full pandoc command line would look like this:

   pandoc print.html -o output.epub --css=styles.css --epub-cover-image=cover.png --metadata title="title" --metadata author="author" --standalone

For more advanced editing or post-production adjustments, tools like Calibre Portable can be utilized. Calibre is a powerful EPUB editor that enables users to modify existing EPUB files, add or change metadata, insert cover images, and even customize the layout and styling of the content.