Pressbooks Documentation

# Installation

# Downloads

Download the latest releases of Pressbooks (opens new window), McLuhan (opens new window), and Aldine (opens new window), as well as the latest releases of any other book themes (opens new window) you wish to install.

# Installation (Manual)

IMPORTANT!

  • Do not install Pressbooks on an existing WordPress blog -- create a new WordPress install instead.
  • Pressbooks works with PHP 7.3 (opens new window) and (usually) the most recent version of WordPress right now. Lower versions are not supported.

# Part 1: WordPress

  1. Install WordPress using the Famous 5-Minute Install (opens new window).

  2. Create a Network (opens new window) of WordPress sites, i.e.:

  3. Edit the wp-config.php file and add the following:

define('WP_ALLOW_MULTISITE', true);

  1. Login to the WordPress admin area. Navigate to Tools → Network Setup, click Install.

  2. Complete the steps printed on the screen (i.e. edit your wp-config.php and .htaccess files with the information provided).

# Part 2: Pressbooks

  1. Copy the Pressbooks plugin folder to: /path/to/your/site/wp-content/plugins/*.

  2. Copy Pressbooks' autoloader file from /path/to/your/site/wp-content/plugins/pressbooks/hm-autoloader.php to /path/to/your/site/wp-content/mu-plugins/hm-autoloader.php. You may need to create the wp-content/mu-plugins/ directory if it doesn't yet exist.

  3. Copy the Pressbooks Book, Pressbooks Aldine and other theme folders to: /path/to/your/site/wp-content/themes/* (NOTE: theme folders must not have version numbers on the end. GOOD: pressbooks-aldine. BAD: pressbooks-aldine-3.1.0. Make sure that you rename the folders appropriately.)

  4. Log out, log in, navigate to: My Sites → Network Admin → Dashboard.

  5. Navigate to Plugins → Installed Plugins.

  6. Network Enable "Pressbooks".

  7. Navigate to Themes → Installed Themes.

  8. Network Enable "McLuhan", "Aldine", and any other Pressbooks theme you want to use.

  9. Navigate to Settings → Network Settings.

  10. Pick the most appropriate Registration setting:

    • User accounts may be registered. (Do not use this setting, since it will not allow users to create new books!)
    • Logged in users may register new sites. (If you are a publisher using Pressbooks as a production tool, this is the best setting: it allows network administrators to add new users, who can then create books/sites. However, registration is not available to the public.)
    • Both sites and user accounts can be registered. (Use this setting if you intend on offering a publishing-platform open to the public, such as Pressbooks.com (opens new window))

  11. Navigate to My Catalog → Your Site → Dashboard

  12. Navigate to Appearance and activate "Aldine".

  13. Navigate to My Catalog → Add A New Book (this will be your first book).

  14. Navigate to My Catalog → Your First Book → Dashboard.

  15. Navigate to Book Info. Make sure to fill out Title, Author and Publication Date.

  16. Navigate to Text → Organize. Make sure some content is selected for export.

# Part 3: Pressbooks Dependencies

Pressbooks requires some third-party libraries to be installed on your server to enable export capabilities.

  • For PDF export, you have three options:
    1. Configure DocRaptor (opens new window), which is a software as a service version of PrinceXML (opens new window). To do this, you just need to add your DocRaptor API key to wp-config.php: define( 'DOCRAPTOR_API_KEY', 'YOUR_API_KEY_HERE' );
    2. Install PrinceXML (opens new window) 12 on your server (note: this is not free software although you can use it free of charge for non-commercial purposes, see their license).
    3. Install the mPDF for Pressbooks (opens new window) plugin to use the open source mPDF library. (Note: As of May 2019 this project is unmaintained (opens new window) )
  • For EPUB validation install EpubCheck (opens new window) 4.1.1
  • For XML validation install xmllint (opens new window) 20903
  • For ODT export install Saxon-HE (opens new window) 9.7.0-10
  • For the Cover Generator feature, install:
    • Ghostscript 9.18: sudo apt-get install ghostscript
    • ImageMagick 6.8.9: sudo apt-get install imagemagick
    • PdfToPpm and PdfInfo 0.41.0: sudo apt-get install poppler-utils
  • For MathJax export install (and host!) master branch of pb-mathjax (opens new window)
  • Certain Linux installations do not ship with the php-xsl library enabled by default. If you attempt to export an ePub and get a either a white screen with minimal text, or a "Fatal error: Class 'XSLTProcessor' not found" error, you may need to run a command like sudo apt-get install php-xsl.
  • Certain Linux installations do not ship with the php-exif library enabled by default. If you attempt to export an ePub and get a either a white screen with minimal text, or an error, you may need to install this extension (e.g. sudo apt-get install php-exif )
  • Linux installations do not ship with Microsoft fonts, which can be useful when producing PDF exports. See https://itsfoss.com/install-microsoft-fonts-ubuntu/ or similar for instructions on installing.

Unlisted versions are not supported. Upgrade/downgrade accordingly.

Once installed, define the following wp-config.php variables (make sure to update the paths to correspond to your specific installation). The defaults are:

define( 'PB_PRINCE_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/prince' ); // Only required if you are using Prince on your server
define( 'PB_EPUBCHECK_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/java -jar /opt/epubcheck/epubcheck.jar' );
define( 'PB_XMLLINT_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/xmllint' );
define( 'PB_SAXON_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/java -jar /opt/saxon-he/saxon-he.jar' );
define( 'PB_MATHJAX_URL', 'http://localhost:3000/' );

Example config files for a dev site hosted at http://localhost/~example/textopress/

# wp-config.php file [snippet]:

/**
 * For developers: WordPress debugging mode.
 *
 * Change this to true to enable the display of notices during development.
 * It is strongly recommended that plugin and theme developers use WP_DEBUG
 * in their development environments.
 */
define('WP_DEBUG', true);
define('WP_DEBUG_LOG', true);

/**
 * Multi-site support, Part 1
 */
define('WP_ALLOW_MULTISITE', true);

/**
 * Multi-site support, Part 2
 */
define('MULTISITE', true);
define('SUBDOMAIN_INSTALL', false);
$base = '/~example/textopress/';
define('DOMAIN_CURRENT_SITE', 'localhost');
define('PATH_CURRENT_SITE', '/~example/textopress/');
define('SITE_ID_CURRENT_SITE', 1);
define('BLOG_ID_CURRENT_SITE', 1);

/**
 * Pressbooks
 */
define( 'PB_PRINCE_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/prince' );
define( 'PB_EPUBCHECK_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/java -jar /home/example/bin/epubcheck/epubcheck.jar' );
define( 'PB_XMLLINT_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/xmllint' );
define( 'PB_SAXON_COMMAND', '/usr/bin/java -jar home/example/bin/saxon-he/saxon-he.jar' );
define( 'PB_MATHJAX_URL', 'http://localhost:3000/' );

/**
 * Optional definitions
 */
// define( 'AUTOSAVE_INTERVAL', 60 ); // Autosave every N seconds
// define( 'WP_POST_REVISIONS', 5 ); // Limit post revisions: int or false
// define( 'EMPTY_TRASH_DAYS', 1 ); // Purge trash interval. PB default is after 30 days.

/* That's all, stop editing! Happy blogging. */

# .htaccess file:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /~example/textopress/
RewriteRule ^index.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule  ^[_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) $1 [L]
RewriteRule  ^[_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/(.*.php)$ $1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

TIP

Need a wp-cli deploy? Start here: https://github.com/pressbooks/snippets/blob/master/deploying/wp-cli-example.md