Any chance of mobi created files supporting K2 5-way controller?

[twister]

I love Calibre! Great Program! I have converted many of my books to mobi format for my Kindle 2. I'm sorry if this has been asked. I did a search and paged through many pages before posting.

I know this is a long shot but I have to ask. Might there be any way to convert books to mobi format and have them support the 5-way controller of the Kindle 2? I do not miss it as much in books as I do on news made by Calibre. Using it is very nice when going through articles on mags/blogs that I get via Amazon. The news feature in Calibre is fantastic and most of them that are created are better than the same official Amazon one. If I could have the 5-way controller work on these I would be stoked.

Thanks!

[wallcraft]

Do you mean: allow the use of the 5-way for navigation? From the K2 user's guide:

Navigating within a Periodical

At the bottom of a newspaper or magazine you will see options for quickly navigating within an issue. When viewing a blog, you will see similar options for navigation.

Previous Article takes you to the previous article when you move the 5-way controller to the left.

View Sections List takes you to the sections list of a newspaper or magazine when you press the 5-way.

View Articles List takes you to the articles list of a blog when you press the 5-way.

Next Article advances you to the next article when you move the 5-way controller to the right.

By default, "View Sections List" for newspapers and magazines is highlighted and when you press the 5-way, a list of the sections will appear. If you are viewing a blog, "View Articles List" is highlighted and pressing the 5-way shows a list of the blog's articles.

To navigate to a particular article within a section or blog, simply move the 5-way controller to underline the article title and press to select. To dismiss this view and return to where you were last reading in the magazine or newspaper, select "Close Articles List" located at the bottom of the screen.

This is presumably controlled by a particular structure for the MOBI (AZW) file, but I don't think this is documented anywhere.

Are the current Calibre news feeds identified as books?

[sirbruce]

I read some posts here before about people turning ebooks on Kindle into periodicals to create a folder-like structure, but the results were unreliable.

[kovidgoyal]

Given a deDRMed AZW file that shows this behavior, it should be easy, probably just special tags in the MOBI markup

[sirbruce]

In some books, the five-way controller advances between chapters. But I don't know how you would make an 'article list' from just one book.

Here's the thread that talks about turning books on the Kindle 1 (not 2) into newspapers, and how it's unreliable:
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30947

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

In some books, the five-way controller advances between chapters.

This is apparently via the <mbp:section> tag, see K2 is prejudiced against "Pride and Prejudice". However, this has not been confirmed by a forum member so far as I know, see K2 v K1: Chapter-to-chapter missing from some books?.

This is a "standard" MOBI tag, see Mobipocket Custom Tags.

[twister]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

This is apparently via the <mbp:section> tag, see K2 is prejudiced against "Pride and Prejudice". However, this has not been confirmed by a forum member so far as I know, see K2 v K1: Chapter-to-chapter missing from some books?.

This is a "standard" MOBI tag, see Mobipocket Custom Tags.

Interesting. If it a standard mobi tag is it something that can be added to Calibre? Even mobi books I download from Feedbooks do not support this feature (though it looks like Hadrien is working on it).

It is a very nice feature. With books I can use 5-way stick to go backwards or forwards by chapter. In periodicals and blogs I can go through the articles quickly. I use it much more for periodicals and blogs than books. In the progress bar at bottom you can see little dots where the chapters or articles are. When you click to the right the progress bar fills to the next dot. It has worked for all books, periodicals, and blogs purchased through Amazon.

Thanks!

[kovidgoyal]

I just tried it with <mbp:section> doesn't work. So I will need a deDRMed version of a file that shows this behavior

[kovidgoyal]

I just looked at one such file and big surprise, they dont use documented mobi pocket tags as far as I can tell with a brief look. I lack the time to invest in reverse engineering it properly right now, so hopefully someone else will do it.

[wallcraft]

I guess <mbp:section> would have been too easy. Another theory is that it is based on OEB tours. See K2 is prejudiced against "Pride and Prejudice". This was from a month ago, though, and feedbooks has not released Kindle-optimized MOBIs yet.

[kovidgoyal]

the only opf elements in that file that I could find were a <guide> that contained a link to a reference_list, but the reference list was empty

[kovidgoyal]

Another hint, while the next and previous article links work in the deDRMed file, the View Sections does not. Hooray for Amazon and proprietary ways of doing things. And I found that record 116 in the file I have contains some sort of list of sections.

[Nate the great]

I think I figured it out. I am fairly certain that the following bit of code is what the K2 is looking for:

<a></a> <a></a>

It should be placed immediately before the place where you want to jump to. For example:

<a></a> <a></a> <h3>A Title</h3>

Could someone give it a shot? You might also need to label the ebook as a periodical.

[Nate the great]

I don't think the "view section list" will be possible.

[twister]

Bummer...that would be fantastic if it could be done. While having it on books is not a huge deal to me it makes a huge difference on periodicals. I'm close to pulling the trigger on the Amazon Newsweek and the I prefer the Calibre version (it has more content). As crazy as it sounds the feature is hard to not have once you get used to it. I hope someone reverse engineers it. I PMed Hadrien and he has not a chance to get to it either.