Viewing "most recent" from Calibre in Kindle Fire

saxondawg · 04-15-2012, 05:31 PM

I've gone back and forth on whether to post this under KFire forums or here, and finally decided it's probably a Calibre thing. I'm probably wrong.

On my K2 and K3, I would load several new books from Calibre onto the device and they would show up at the top of the home page if I sorted by "most recent" rather than "author" or "title." Simple enough.

Kindle Fire doesn't move a book to the "head of the class" until you actually open it on the device. In other words, out of 1,000 books on board, a book you just now loaded may be the 340th listed book. Another one, loaded at the same time, may show up 257th. There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to it. I can't figure out what date tag the Fire is looking at, but i would really like to see my newest books up top, without having to immediately hunt them down title by title.

Yes, it's a very small annoyance, little to complain about, but I'm just curious if anyone knows how to beat this. Anything I can do in Calibre to tell Kindle Fire that these books are the "most recent." Thanks, and I realize the problem is not at all with Calibre here--it's just that Calibre might help me.

kovidgoyal · 04-15-2012, 10:12 PM

Have you set you Fire to sort by most recent first? I don't know if the FIre has such a setting, but the eink kindles do.

saxondawg · 04-16-2012, 08:59 PM

Yes, it's a very simple "tap" at the top of the screen: most recent, by author, by title. When I use "most recent,' it works only in terms of most recent opened books; not most recent uploaded ones. I guess I'm really just interested in figuring out why. I assume it has to do with those mobi .mbp files, but it's odd since the e-ink Kindles DO put the newly added books at the top.

wallcraft · 04-16-2012, 09:26 PM

As you say, Books -> Device -> By Recent first lists ebooks you have opened (in last read order) and then lists "new" ebooks (ones you have not opened). I have "new" ebooks that are months old. There does not seem to be any particular order to the "new" ebooks.

The "new" ebooks do not have a .mbp file, and the opened ebooks are sorted based on the last modify date of the .mbp file (or perhaps the same date inside the file).

wallcraft · 04-16-2012, 10:08 PM

I tried downloading an ebook from Amazon. It shows up as "new" and at the top of the Device -> By Recent list.

The only difference I see is that it has an empty .mbp file, which Calibre does not create. However, when I tried creating an empty .mbp file for an existing Calibre-created ebook this seemed to have no effect (did not move the ebook to the top of the list).

kovidgoyal · 04-17-2012, 12:09 AM

Try messing with the PDOC tag. The behavior might be influenced by that.

wallcraft · 04-17-2012, 05:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Try messing with the PDOC tag. The behavior might be influenced by that.

Marking as personal documents puts the ebooks in the Docs app, but does not change the "By Recent" sorting which still seems to be arbitrary for "new" ebooks.

kiwidude · 04-17-2012, 06:05 AM

I don't own a Fire, but is it perhaps using the Published Date column (the Kindle 3 when you sort by Author displays in reversed published date order). Just speculating...

saxondawg · 04-18-2012, 10:52 PM

Interesting theory. This is what I was hoping, that there would be a column I could exploit. Again, it's not exactly a huge issue, but with a big library it's an irritating one. Especially with the lack of collections, which is a real shocker for the Fire. Another shocker for me was the lack of universal search (though it does take out the indexing problems that sometimes plagued earlier Kindles).

04-15-2012, 05:31 PM	#1
saxondawg Connoisseur Posts: 65 Karma: 50952 Join Date: Mar 2010 Device: kindle paperwhite	Viewing "most recent" from Calibre in Kindle Fire I've gone back and forth on whether to post this under KFire forums or here, and finally decided it's probably a Calibre thing. I'm probably wrong. On my K2 and K3, I would load several new books from Calibre onto the device and they would show up at the top of the home page if I sorted by "most recent" rather than "author" or "title." Simple enough. Kindle Fire doesn't move a book to the "head of the class" until you actually open it on the device. In other words, out of 1,000 books on board, a book you just now loaded may be the 340th listed book. Another one, loaded at the same time, may show up 257th. There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to it. I can't figure out what date tag the Fire is looking at, but i would really like to see my newest books up top, without having to immediately hunt them down title by title. Yes, it's a very small annoyance, little to complain about, but I'm just curious if anyone knows how to beat this. Anything I can do in Calibre to tell Kindle Fire that these books are the "most recent." Thanks, and I realize the problem is not at all with Calibre here--it's just that Calibre might help me.

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04-15-2012, 10:12 PM	#2
kovidgoyal creator of calibre Posts: 44,030 Karma: 22669822 Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Mumbai, India Device: Various	Have you set you Fire to sort by most recent first? I don't know if the FIre has such a setting, but the eink kindles do.

04-16-2012, 08:59 PM	#3
saxondawg Connoisseur Posts: 65 Karma: 50952 Join Date: Mar 2010 Device: kindle paperwhite	Yes, it's a very simple "tap" at the top of the screen: most recent, by author, by title. When I use "most recent,' it works only in terms of most recent opened books; not most recent uploaded ones. I guess I'm really just interested in figuring out why. I assume it has to do with those mobi .mbp files, but it's odd since the e-ink Kindles DO put the newly added books at the top.

04-16-2012, 09:26 PM	#4
wallcraft reader Posts: 6,975 Karma: 5183568 Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Mississippi, USA Device: Kindle 3, Kobo Glo HD	As you say, Books -> Device -> By Recent first lists ebooks you have opened (in last read order) and then lists "new" ebooks (ones you have not opened). I have "new" ebooks that are months old. There does not seem to be any particular order to the "new" ebooks. The "new" ebooks do not have a .mbp file, and the opened ebooks are sorted based on the last modify date of the .mbp file (or perhaps the same date inside the file).

04-16-2012, 10:08 PM	#5
wallcraft reader Posts: 6,975 Karma: 5183568 Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Mississippi, USA Device: Kindle 3, Kobo Glo HD	I tried downloading an ebook from Amazon. It shows up as "new" and at the top of the Device -> By Recent list. The only difference I see is that it has an empty .mbp file, which Calibre does not create. However, when I tried creating an empty .mbp file for an existing Calibre-created ebook this seemed to have no effect (did not move the ebook to the top of the list).

04-17-2012, 12:09 AM	#6
kovidgoyal creator of calibre Posts: 44,030 Karma: 22669822 Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Mumbai, India Device: Various	Try messing with the PDOC tag. The behavior might be influenced by that.

04-17-2012, 06:05 AM	#8
kiwidude Calibre Plugins Developer Posts: 4,654 Karma: 2162064 Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: Australia Device: Kindle Oasis	I don't own a Fire, but is it perhaps using the Published Date column (the Kindle 3 when you sort by Author displays in reversed published date order). Just speculating...

04-18-2012, 10:52 PM	#9
saxondawg Connoisseur Posts: 65 Karma: 50952 Join Date: Mar 2010 Device: kindle paperwhite	Interesting theory. This is what I was hoping, that there would be a column I could exploit. Again, it's not exactly a huge issue, but with a big library it's an irritating one. Especially with the lack of collections, which is a real shocker for the Fire. Another shocker for me was the lack of universal search (though it does take out the indexing problems that sometimes plagued earlier Kindles).

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