Author Profile

[Ephemerality]

Ever since getting my Paperwhite, I have been very picky as to the organization of my books on it and making full use of the extra features on each book. All my books (including sideloads) have their proper Amazon ASINs instead of the Calibre-generated ones, APNX files for page numbers, X-Ray files with chapters and excerpts, and now I am working on adding the author profiles as well. I don't know about on the other devices, but on the Paperwhite at least, there is an "About the Author" option when you have a book opened, provided the profile file exists.
I didn't see any other threads about this, so I thought I would give a run down of what the file contains. Forgive me if it has been discussed before.
I've attached one of the profiles I created as an example.
Located in the .sdr folder for each book, the file is called "AuthorProfile.profile.[Book's ASIN].asc".

The name of each entity is 1 letter. In the order they appear in the file:
u = Authors
An array of author entities associated with the book.
I have not tested the use of multiple authors in a single file yet.

The author entity:
y = Height of the author's picture
l (lowercase L) = List of ASINs or ISBN-10s from the author
n = Name
a = Author's ASIN
b = Biography (all seem to end with a <br/>)
i = Base64-encoded JPG (width should be 185)

The rest:
a = This book's ASIN (does not seem to matter)
d = Epoch timestamp, referred to as "as of"
  possibly the time the profile was last updated
o = List of book entities to describe each book

The book entity:
e = 1 if book is a Kindle eBook edition, 0 if otherwise
a = Book's ASIN
t = Book title

Pretty simple, it's mainly just a matter of gathering the different books and ASIN/ISBN-10s for them!

[gers1978]

I get OCD and like the idea of done the things you suggest.

How do you insert the correct ASIN and what's the advantage of doing so?

Also, would any of this break last page syncing between PW and iPad Kindle app when I email books from Calibre to my Kindle email address?

Your author profile thing seems like it could be fairly easily implemented in a Calibre plugin or script.

[Ephemerality]

Originally Posted by gers1978

I get OCD and like the idea of done the things you suggest.

How do you insert the correct ASIN and what's the advantage of doing so?

Also, would any of this break last page syncing between PW and iPad Kindle app when I email books from Calibre to my Kindle email address?

Your author profile thing seems like it could be fairly easily implemented in a Calibre plugin or script.

I've been using mobi2mobi (both the GUI and the command line versions) to change the ASINs. The only thing the Amazon ASIN adds is the ability to long-press on a book and select "Book Description" (it sends you to the Amazon store page for the book).
Getting it on the iPhone/iPad also relies on having filesystem access. I have SSH setup on mine, I think there are tools out there that don't require a jailbreak.

It would likely break any already-existing syncing between your devices...
I had issues getting my PW to sync with my Kindle PC and iPhone apps, but so far I've had the best luck with this process:

1. Send to Kindle via the Email address
2. Pull the new .azw off the Kindle, grab the Database Name from it.
3. Change ASIN in the original .mobi to Amazon's with mobi2mobi
4. Change the Database Name to the one Amazon generated (starts with CR!... I have not tried generating my own yet) with mobi2mobi (--databasename)
5. Delete the .azw from Amazon
6. Copy mobi to Kindle, Kindle PC folder, SSH to iPhone

When I left the database name from Calibre and only changed the ASIN, the Kindle would sync with other Kindles, and the Kindle PC/iPhone apps would sync with each other, but they wouldn't all sync together.
With the database name set to the CR! one and the ASIN changed, it seems to be working properly so far. Hasn't been extensively tested yet though, just on a couple books.

Edit: After playing with it a bit more, one of the books I had working fine on all 3 now only works on the Kindle PC and PW... the iPhone app will not sync at all (sync button grayed out)... and the other one that worked previously will still sync, but only to the very first update that my Kindle sent out yesterday... so I have no idea what's causing that.

[gers1978]

Which folder do you put the books in once you've SSH'd into on your phone?

When you say copy mobi to Kindle in step 6, do you mean side load using Calibre?

In step 3, when you say "original mobi", you mean the one you started with BEFORE you emailed it to the Kindle?

How do I generate page numbers?

Thanks a lot.

[Ephemerality]

Originally Posted by gers1978

Which folder do you put the books in once you've SSH'd into on your phone?

When you say copy mobi to Kindle in step 6, do you mean side load using Calibre?

In step 3, when you say "original mobi", you mean the one you started with BEFORE you emailed it to the Kindle?

How do I generate page numbers?

Thanks a lot.

On the phone it's in /var/mobile/Applications/APPFOLDER/Library/eBooks. I use a jailbroken tool, iFile, to find which app folder it is; they are hash strings.

I copy directly to my Kindle, I don't use Calibre very much. Doing it that prevents some of the automatic stuff like Calibre copying the book cover and the apnx file, but I prefer to have the ASINs matching so it's a matter of preference, really.

Yes, the original mobi is the one before it was emailed. The emailed file becomes a .azw.

I use an APNX Generator plugin, which is really just a manual way to do what Calibre does automatically with its send to device.

Again, messing around with all that stuff will break your existing sync and may not sync properly afterwards... it doesn't seem to work in all cases, still not sure why yet...

[gers1978]

I can't get this to work - I put the file in the sdr folder, but nowhere in my PW interface can I see an option for "About this author", not in the book, not in the list, nowhere.

[Ephemerality]

If the file is built/named correctly, it will show up when you have the book opened under the top-right menu.

[gers1978]

Simply doesn't work for me. I've named the file with the correct ASIN, I've modified the book to have the correct ASIN, etc, but I just don't get an About The Author on any menu...

[gers1978]

Update: My bad, I left the .txt extension on by mistake! D'oh!

[gers1978]

Got it working, but would be much, much easier with a GUI and/or Calibre plugin.