Amazon should offer a GUI for collections

[BobKat]

The way it's set up it Takes forever. If you have alot of books it's alot of searching, swiping checking. On top of that the kindle slows down when you are doing all this. The keyboard you have to cycle through numbers/uppercase/lowercase to write out the names.

[BobKat]

Another BIG problem with the collection set up is;
When you make a collection they don't go under that item like it was a folder. Then you make another collection and all the items are showing up even if they are already in a different collection. This makes you go though all the books you categorized already while you try to find the books you want in the new collection.

I have no clue on this stuff but I would guess maybe it makes it easier to be able to list them as items or collections for search purposes if the filesystem is set up like it is?

If so another good reason to have a gui to organize things.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by BobKat

Another BIG problem with the collection set up is;
When you make a collection they don't go under that item like it was a folder. Then you make another collection and all the items are showing up even if they are already in a different collection. This makes you go though all the books you categorized already while you try to find the books you want in the new collection.

That's really the only way it can work and still allow you to put the same book in multiple collections ... without having multiple copies of the same file, that is (which would be nightmare IMO).

I think you might be slightly confused when you refer to a "gui," though. You are, in fact, already using a gui to manage your collections... it's just not very feature-rich. Perhaps you mean an external app that you can run on your desktop?

I don't disagree that an "official" external app for collection management would be a boon.

[DuckieTigger]

There is a way to do what you want, but you have to do it one book at a time. Go to collection sort method. Now the collections will show up first and then only books that are not in a collection. You long press on a book and add it to the collection you want. It will disappear from the home screen and you can tackle the next book and so on.

Alternatively you could jailbreak your PW and install collection manager which allows you to nest collections, import collections you can manage in calibre, create collections from file structure. Check out the dev subforum for research and see if that is an option for you.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by BobKat

Another BIG problem with the collection set up is;
When you make a collection they don't go under that item like it was a folder. Then you make another collection and all the items are showing up even if they are already in a different collection. This makes you go though all the books you categorized already while you try to find the books you want in the new collection.

That's for the very simple reason that a collection is not a folder, but a tag, and that means that you can have the same book in different collections, even though it's only present once on the Kindle. Eg, if you categorise your books by genre, you might very well want to classify Isaac Asimov's "The Caves of Steel" under both "SF" and "Detective".

[BobKat]

Thanks.
I meant by GUI a graphical application user interface that runs under Windows/ *add flavor here* nix/ mac OS's.
Point and click with a real keyboard to type in information. Drag and drop would be nice.

It probably becomes a concern only when you have many books/files. Maybe the majority of the user base for the kindle would not need it, but I was never part of the majority

[Synamon]

Sounds like you want a library management program to organize your ebooks on your computer. Let me introduce you to calibre.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by BobKat

Thanks.
I meant by GUI a graphical application user interface that runs under Windows/ *add flavor here* nix/ mac OS's.
Point and click with a real keyboard to type in information. Drag and drop would be nice.

It probably becomes a concern only when you have many books/files. Maybe the majority of the user base for the kindle would not need it, but I was never part of the majority

You mean you want Amazon to put out something like Kindlean

[BobKat]

Calibre is a fantastic library managment program but would like something that handles the collection function.

Yes Kindlean or this app which I use on my K4
http://www.kindlecollectionmanager.com/

Collection Manager is an excellent program and, once you get used to it, it may be better than the Kindlean program. Simple and functional. Lets you know what books are in collections and what books you didn't catagorize yet. Lets you make a collection and add items to it. All Drag and drop and click and command.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by BobKat

http://www.kindlecollectionmanager.com/

Collection Manager is an excellent program and, once you get used to it, it may be better than the Kindlean program. Simple and functional. Lets you know what books are in collections and what books you didn't catagorize yet. Lets you make a collection and add items to it. All Drag and drop and click and command.

Interesting program, hadn't heard of it before.

[KimberlyFDR]

Originally Posted by BobKat

It probably becomes a concern only when you have many books/files. Maybe the majority of the user base for the kindle would not need it, but I was never part of the majority

I have 1600 books on my Kindle and I've never had a problem sorting into collections. Then again, I tend to do it in small batches (1-10 files per day) so I never have a problem sorting through which books still need to be put into collections. I just open the relevant collection, tag my books, and I'm done. I use Calibre to organize all my Non-Kindle books, too.

[shalym]

I just make my collections using Kindle For PC, and then go to the device and import the collection from the cloud--would that do what you are looking to do?

Shari

[Robmonster]

I thought that external programs could no longer edit Kindle colection information n a Paperwhite since that data was no longer visible over the USB connection.

Saying that, the Kindlean link above claims that it works with Paperwhites.... I used to use the Calibre collection plugin, but that doesnt work on PW's for the above reason.

Has anyone had success with the software linked above on a PW?

Rob

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Robmonster

I thought that external programs could no longer edit Kindle colection information n a Paperwhite since that data was no longer visible over the USB connection.

That's correct. The tools that do work with PW collections only work if you jailbreak your PW, for that very reason.

[Robmonster]

Ah, I see. I thought someone had come up with a way of doing it since the Kindlean pages don't mention anything about jailbreaking as far as I can see.