Semi Automatic copy of content to Kindle

[mowbray]

I have been looking for software that will allow me to plug in my Kindle and have content in a specific folder copied automatically. Idea is to plugin Kindle before leaving the office and copy all the documents I need for the evening over in one hit. I don't want content to be automatically copied to any other USB device I plug in though.

As I didnt find a free solution that did exactly this, I decided to go half way and give myself a one double-click solution.

Steps
====
Plug in the Kindle to USB
Right Click My Computer and click Manage
Click on Disk Management
The Kindle will be displayed as a Volume called Kindle(x:) where x: is any drive letter
Right click on the Kindle name and click Change Drive Letter and paths
Click the change button
Change the drive letter to K: and click OK
Click OK
The Volume name should now change to Kindle(K:)
Close Computer Management

Create a Folder on the root of the C: drive called Kindle - C:\Kindle

Right click on the desktop and create a new text file. This should be renamed to SendToKindle.cmd
Right click the SendToKindle.cmd file on the desktop and click Edit
Enter the following text into the file and Save it.

@Echo off
cd /d c:\kindle
dir |find " 0 bytes" && if not errorlevel 1 cls && Echo No files to copy && Goto LeaveNow
if not exist k:\. cls && Echo Kindle not plugged in && Goto LeaveNow
@Echo Copying files to Kindle
move c:\kindle\*.* K:\documents\unknown
@Echo Copy complete
:LeaveNow
Pause

Connect your kindle to usb

Double click on the SendToKindle.cmd file on the desktop. You should get a message saying "No files to copy".

Place a .mobi or .pdf or whatever file into the C:\Kindle folder.
Double click on the SendToKindle.cmd file on the desktop. You should get a message listing the files as they are copied and saying Copy complete.

IMPORTANT NOTES!!!

NB: This article is based on you *not* having another disk or network drive allocated to drive K already. If you do then you will have to tinker with the steps and with the script.

NB: The script MOVES the files from the C:\Kindle folder to the Kindle. It does not leave a copy of the files on your Computer.

NB: Obviously if you assign the letter K: to another drive and run the script then you are going to end up with your files on that drive.

[daffy4u]

Clever solution! Question, would it be easier just to give the Kindle the drive letter "Z", that way you'd be pretty safe in not having another device use the same drive letter.

[mowbray]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

Clever solution! Question, would it be easier just to give the Kindle the drive letter "Z", that way you'd be pretty safe in not having another device use the same drive letter.

I thought of that. I have quite often seen z: used in non-commercial environments for a network drive letter - that is what Explorer offers you by default.

If you have a CD drive and a DVD drive plus two hard disks and you plugged in two USB drives simultaneously then you would use drive letters C, D, E, F, G, H in a default Windows installation - so K: seemed like a good choice. Besides K is for Kindle

Of course z: will work just as well - just replace the K:'s in the steps and script above.

[rcuadro]

Maybe it is just me but since you have to copy the files into the directory and then double click on the sendtokindle file anyhow... why not just open an explorer window, select all, and then drag to the kindle?

[mowbray]

Originally Posted by rcuadro

Maybe it is just me but since you have to copy the files into the directory and then double click on the sendtokindle file anyhow... why not just open an explorer window, select all, and then drag to the kindle?

Fair point. However this way I just have to plugin the device and double click the icon, rather than navigating through Explorer.

This is actaully step one in a plan to try to use my Kindle as an alternative to printing things out. The idea is to use a pdf printer (or the pdf publish feature in Word 2007) to place all the files I want to print into the c:\kindle folder and then when I am ready to leave the office I just have to plug in the kindle and double click the icon.

What I really wanted was a printer driver for Kindle to make it into a virtual printer, but it doesnt seem to have been invented yet.

[daffy4u]

I suggest you created a custom page size for the Kindle in MS Word. If you print to pdf using and 8.5 x 11 inch document, you are going to have very tiny type, especially since we can't change font sizes on PDFs. If you create a custom size of 3.5 x 4.75 (you may have to play a bit with sizes to get it right for your needs), copy your text to the custom size then print to pdf, you'll have better results.

[Mike L]

Mowbray,

A nice simple solution. Thanks for sharing it.

Going further, it should be possible to write a program that detects when the Kindle gets connected, than automatically does the file copying. The program would run in the background. As soon as you plug the Kindle in, the program would sping to life, do its work, and then go back to sleep again.

Maybe I'll write it one day (but don't hold out too much hope for that).

[kc5cychris]

I use paper port as my PDF print imager, it qwould work well for this and doesnot care what other print devices you are using or if you have a printer hooked up all.
excellent idea