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Old 02-18-2011, 09:59 PM   #1
jasewell
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Losing Chapter function after conversion

First, I'm new to eReaders (Kindle 3) and the forums, so bear with me if these are dumb questions. These forums are full of great info, but it is a little overwhelming at first. So thanks for any help ahead of time.

So I added a Kindle ebook to calibre (and I deDRM'd). It is now a MOBI file with no DRM. Chapters work if I then send back to my Kindle device. But I want to add the original cover art to the book, so in calibre I download the correct cover art and then convert the file again? (Is this the right procedure?) Well this is how I've done it, so now I have the MOBI file with the new cover art and no DRM. But when I send it to my Kindle I have the new cover, but I have lost the chapter locations on the progress bar and the 5-way skip function doesn't work anymore. What am I doing wrong? I'm not very tech savvy, so be you might have to dumb the answer down a little.
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Old 02-19-2011, 02:07 AM   #2
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post detail of exactly how you did the conversion i.e. what options were ticked on the various screens - or was everything set to default ?
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Old 02-19-2011, 02:43 AM   #3
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Everything was default.
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Old 02-19-2011, 08:16 AM   #4
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i think you need to start over & check at each stage what is going on with chapters.

it will be faster if you use kindle for PC or configure calibre viewer to view mobi - then you can keep checking if chapters are still OK

this time around though I would go through each conversion screen & tick reset to default, just in case you accidentally changed something.

at the stage wherer you reckon the book as added to calibre & dedrmsed take a backup - open path - copy file. then you will not have to repeat that step.

then I guess you are editing metadata to add the picture, followed by mobi to mobi conversion to add that into the book?
check the output again there, before sending to kindle, either by viewing in calibre & checking TOC or my opening in kindle for PC
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Old 02-19-2011, 08:23 AM   #5
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start over.
delete what is in calibre. configure calibre to view mobi with its own viewer, or install kindle for PC , or both.

add teh book to calibre - you now have a .mobi format book
view it with calibre / with kindle for PC check that all is Ok with chapters & navigation.

then redo your book cover changes. ( that is in edit metadata I assume)

then reconvert mobi to mobi - double check all settings - the one most likely to mess with chapters is having heuristics turned on.

view the output of that stage on PC.

if OK, then send to kindle, but I would delete the original from kindle before placing the new version on there ( or change the title ) so that Kindle is not being confused by an overwrite of what it had before ( it shouldn't be , but its safer to rule that out ). you can always retrieve your amazon original from amazon archives.

to be honest though, K3 makes such a poor job of displaying book covers I wonder why you are bothering ? - you can only see covers on K3 by selecting book then right arrow, or by opening book at start followed by left arrow, and the former only shows a tiny black n white thumbnail .
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Old 02-19-2011, 09:19 AM   #6
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Cybmole- Thanks for helping. As far as wanting the cover art on the Kindle, it's just one of those things- if I pay for an ebook, I would appreciate having the cover art there. It's important to me.

Going step by step as you described hasn't worked. I will say this- the book I have does not have a TOC but when reading on the kindle it as the little "waypoints" on the progress bar at the bottom, which indicate the start of each new chapter (easy to navigate). So the initial conversion to .mobi keeps these intact, but when I go in and alter the metadata (change the cover art) and then do another conversion they are lost.

Like I said, I'm new to this but I would like to know what was happening in this process. It will probably go way over my head. But in the conversion, would the area that controls this be the tab "Structure Detection"? If so, I see where words such as "chapter", "section", "part" are used to locate a new chapter. In my particular book the chapter headings are numbers spelled out, i.e.- Chapter 1 in my book is denoted as
"One", "Two", and so on.

Don't know if this helps. Thanks again.
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Old 02-19-2011, 09:37 AM   #7
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actually, - thinking about this some more - you don't need to do that 2nd conversion at all. i just add original version of book to calibre, change cover art, then use calibre to send book to device. When calibre sends it back to kindle it should automatically add in the new art work

but if that fails / or you want to debug - then read on....

the 5 way navigation on kindle looks for things called header tags in the code.

I cannot think of anything in calibre processing that would remove those, so
describe in riduculous detail exactly how you "I go in and alter the metadata (change the cover art) and then do another conversion"
& maybe that will help.
it must be something in your "another conversion" settings

check how do things look & work after you have edited metadata but before the 2nd conversion

try also - on the screen called mobi conversion there is an option to force generate TOC - see what happens if you tick that box when doing the 2nd conversion

as you are new to this i recommen bypass understanding structure detection for now. this seems to be a case of the structure beign ok to begin with, but something is getting lost / over-written in mobi to mobi conversion.

actually, - thinking about this some more. you done have to do that 2nd conversion at all. it should be suffiicent to just add book to calibre, change cover art, send book to device. when calibre sends it back to kindle it should automatically add in the new art work

Last edited by cybmole; 02-19-2011 at 09:43 AM.
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Old 02-19-2011, 10:00 AM   #8
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Ok- After importing the book into calibre I have a .mobi file in my library. I click on edit Metadata and then I click on download cover. The cover art I want shows up, so I hit OK. If at this point I send the book to my Kindle, the cover art I downloaded does not show up, but the chapter markers on the progress bar are still intact. So now I click convert books and it is a .mobi to .mobi conversion with all defaults intact. Now once I send the book to the kindle, my cover art is there, but the chapter markers are not. I did try the force generate TOC with no luch and I do remove the book from my Kindle before sending the newer one to it.

Thanks
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Old 02-19-2011, 11:35 AM   #9
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ps - there is a long thread here, which explains why covers are not updated wiithout the 2nd conversion
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...=covers+kindle
short version: cover is not considered to be part of metadata ( even though you confusingly have to edit it on the metadata screen)

so your issue becomes one of why am I losing chapter navigation.

how about this time turning on the bells n whistles - turn on the heuristics - detect n markup chapter... option & see if that helps.

I convert into epub & use epub tools to get everytign as it should be, then convert back to mobi, that way I can examine the code, & epub code is easier to understand + is more accessible.
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Old 02-19-2011, 01:34 PM   #10
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Just doesn't seem to work. Oh well. Thanks for the info, though. I'll keep at it.
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Old 02-19-2011, 02:41 PM   #11
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can you test with other books ?

if you plan to do this often, I suggest you convert to epub with heuristics on, get hold of the sigil program & use that to open / edit/save the epub as needed.

then convert back to mobi.

that is how I do all my kindle stuff & I can now get everything as I want it on Kindle ( but only after lots of help from others in this forum along the way )

that may seem long winded but the epub format is easy to work with and the free tools are very good.

there is just one more trick you can try. email the mobi+new cover book to your free kindle address - maybe when it goes via amazon the navigation will get repaired - bit of a long shot but does not cost you anything to try.

Last edited by cybmole; 02-19-2011 at 02:46 PM.
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Old 02-19-2011, 03:26 PM   #12
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I tried the same thing with another Kindle ebook and have had the same results. After the conversion to "save" the new cover art, I lose all chapter markers. Thanks for the help though. I'll try to scour these forums or maybe someone knows what I'm doing wrong.
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Old 02-19-2011, 11:24 PM   #13
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See if reading this and following these instructions helps you:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho....php?p=1404793
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Old 02-20-2011, 02:28 AM   #14
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glad to see someone else has stepped up to help - what baffles me is that just adding a different cover should not cause any chapter headings to go astray. & OP claims original books have working chapter navigation

so those search replace regex wizards woirk on mobi code ?
I tried peeking at one of my mobi books with a wizard , but compared with epub, the book code is a horrible condensed mess ; it looked like chapter waypoints had been changed into filepos code by the epub to mobi conversion ?


ps whoever who posted this on kindle forum has the opposite issue - no chapter points in original Kindle book but a calibre conversion adds them OK
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=122072

Last edited by cybmole; 02-20-2011 at 02:53 AM.
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Old 02-20-2011, 04:16 AM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cybmole View Post
glad to see someone else has stepped up to help - what baffles me is that just adding a different cover should not cause any chapter headings to go astray. & OP claims original books have working chapter navigation

so those search replace regex wizards woirk on mobi code ?
I tried peeking at one of my mobi books with a wizard , but compared with epub, the book code is a horrible condensed mess ; it looked like chapter waypoints had been changed into filepos code by the epub to mobi conversion ?


ps whoever who posted this on kindle forum has the opposite issue - no chapter points in original Kindle book but a calibre conversion adds them OK
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=122072
Search and replace works fine on Mobi input - it supports all input types - the code does sometimes look a lot different, as you've seen, but it works fine.

I'm not sure what the state of Calibre's support for mobi TOC on input is - clearly based on this thread it doesn't seem to support it. Someone else would need to comment if that's expected behavior.

That said, Calibre definitely supports building a TOC for mobi output. The 'sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't' behavior is because most users don't bother configuring the Xpath under structure detection, but the default xpath does catch a number of common chapter headings. Most likely the poster in the thread you linked had chapter headings that were 'Chapter xxx' wrapped in <h2> tags, which works with the default xpath.
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