Context Breaks

[ways2read]

Knowledge base reference: http://kb.daisy.org/publishing/docs/html/context.html

[LauraB7]

User story: "As a screen reader user I hear when there is a change in context in the book, so my experience is equitable to someone who sees the visual separator."

[jonaslil]

Background

Context breaks—shifts in thought, time, location, or similar—are often represented by noticeable blank spaces between paragraphs. They may include embellishments like characters (e.g., asterisks) or images.

In EPUB, context breaks should be marked with a self-closing <hr/> element.

Current status

InDesign’s current EPUB export does not support creating an empty, self-closing <hr> element for context breaks, nor does it include the appropriate CSS styling.

For example:

• A paragraph containing asterisks with hr assigned as the export tag is exported with the following invalid markup:
  <hr class="asterisks">***</hr>.
• An empty paragraph export tagged as hr is not exported at all.

Types of context breaks

Context breaks in book layouts are typically represented in three ways: blank space, characters, or images. Below are recommendations for mapping these to EPUB/HTML structures:

1. Blank Space

• InDesign: Empty paragraph styled with a paragraph style.
• HTML: <hr/> with a class.
• CSS: Use the class to hide the default horizontal line and apply horizontal spacing.
  See Daisy Knowledge Base, Example 1

2. Characters (e.g., asterisk)

• InDesign: Paragraph containing the character(s), styled with a paragraph style.
• HTML: <hr/> with a class.
• CSS: Hide the default horizontal line. Use the ::after pseudo-element to add the character(s) and style them as needed.

3. Images

• InDesign: Paragraph containing an inline image, styled with a paragraph style.
• HTML: <hr/> with a class.
• CSS: Similar to the character-based approach, but use the background property to display the image instead of ::after.
  See Daisy Knowledge Base, Example 2

Proposed solution

• When hr is assigned as the export tag for a paragraph style, the exported element should be empty and self-closing.
• Add CSS support for styling the <hr/> tag to accomodate the various types of context breaks, prioritizing them in the order they are listed above.

[jonaslil]

Here's some sample code for case 2, Characters:

HTML

<hr class="asterisk"/>

CSS

hr.asterisk {
    border: none;
    text-align: center;
    margin: 1em auto;
    font-size: 1.25em;
}
hr.asterisk::after {
    content: "∗";
    display: block;
}

Screenshot of result (Thorium):

[VennelaKailasa]

Hi @LauraB7 , can you please provide us with the list of all different characters that are used as dingbats?
cc: @gregoriopellegrino , @jonaslil , @ways2read

[LauraB7]

Hello @VennelaKailasa. There are no specific characters that publishers use for dingbats. Some of the editorial break markers are driven by fonts, not images, and so what is keyed in the paragraph could be anything. It could be asterisks (***) or em-dashes (——) or blank. Or it might be a lower-case e, for example, with a font shift applied so that it's displaying an ornament of some kind. As such, it's best to not to restrict the context break markers.

[VennelaKailasa]

Hi @LauraB7, you are absolutely right — dingbats can be of any character, not just those from the Unicode dingbat block. I initially misunderstood dingbats as only special character breaks, but I now see that any keyed-in character used as an ornamental break (like ***, em-dashes, or even a styled letter) would qualify as a dingbat.

From a development standpoint, though, I’m classifying context breaks into these categories for implementation:

1. Empty Paragraph Breaks – new lines, blank spaces, or empty paragraphs.
2. Text Breaks – paragraphs with text but no inline image. This can include dingbat markers, since they’re effectively text-based.
3. Image Breaks – paragraphs that contain inline images.

This way, dingbats are covered under the text break category, even if they’re visually styled or decorative.

[Nainabhandari24]

Hi @LauraB7 @gregoriopellegrino @ways2read @jonaslil ,

The "Accessibility- Context Break" feature is available in the InDesign Pre-release build 21.0.0.156, with the following known issues:

• Anchored Image and Paragraph with style tagged "hr" disappear in reflowable epub.
• Lines are emitted for blank lines with "hr" tagged paragraph style in vertical text exported to reflowable epub.
• Context break is not applied for all the copied images.
• Duplicates dingbat characters observed when user applied character style and paragraph style having "hr" tag.
• When an anchored image is placed within a paragraph style that includes an "hr" tag, the associated alt text may not be displayed as expected.

We would appreciate it if you could review this and let us know if there are any possible improvements that can be made.

CC: @VennelaKailasa

Thanks,
Naina

[VennelaKailasa]

Hi @LauraB7 @gregoriopellegrino @ways2read @jonaslil,

Could you please help us with the following two issues we are facing:

1. Vertical rule in vertical text frames:
   When the "hr" tag is applied, we are seeing a vertical rule appear in vertical text frames.
   Adding height: 0 in CSS removes the line, but we need confirmation if this is the correct and valid approach to handle this case.
2. Character style information lost:
   Currently, when deleting children in the HTML, the character style information (applied via tags with CSS) is lost.
   This results in styled text not being preserved. Could you suggest the recommended way to handle cases where a character style is applied?

We are targeting these fixes for the MAX release, so your quick inputs and guidance on the best solutions would be greatly appreciated.

cc: @Nainabhandari24

[VennelaKailasa]

Hi @LauraB7 @gregoriopellegrino @ways2read @jonaslil, just a gentle reminder about the above queries