[GeoffR]

Calibre's Kobo driver supports sending the series information to Kobo (Mini/Touch/Glo) devices, which shows on the device as "{series} - {series_index}", and allows {series} to work with the predictive search function.

In Calibre {series_index} is limited to numeric values, this seems to be set in Calibre itself rather than the Kobo driver. The Kobo devices can handle non-numeric indices.

I would really like to be able to use non-numeric indices for some series, such as omnibus volumes (e.g. {series}="The Chronicles of the Black Company", {series index}="1-3") or split books (e.g. {series}="A Song of Ice and Fire", {series_index}="5, Part 2"}.

First of all is there any way to do this in Calibre now, using plugboards or something?

If not, would it be better to put a feature request in for Calibre to allow {series_index} to be non-numeric, or for the Kobo driver to support the use of a special or custom column for the series index?

Edit: Another option would be for Calibre to retain {series_index} as a numeric field within Calibre, but allow a plugboard to alter it to a non numeric value before being sent to the device. At the moment it doesn't seem possible to define a plugboard with {series_index} as a target.