Over trying to manage Kobo reader with Kobo desktop. Some help with Calibre?
 

Hey,
I'm sort've over the whole "re-add all kobo content with weird bookmarks into the im reading page" along with all the other painful stuff that goes with syncing via the Kobo desktop application (cover artwork suddenly missing, moving bookmarks, read books suddenly unread etc etc).
I intend to reset the Kobo and start from scratch with Calibre.

I was hoping someone would be able to give me a bit of a dummies guide to getting started with Calibre and the Kobo?
I've tried it a couple of times but i get some weird error whenever i try and do something with the kobo attached... may be a DRM thing?

If anyone is willing to post here a bit of a dummies initial setup for Calibre and the Kobo, i'd much appreciate it.
Also, if the DRM thing is an issue, please feel free to message me or email me about what i need to do to get my purchased books freely usable in Calibre.

:thanks:

Seems like a good plan.

I have no experience with Kobo but I think watching the demo and checking out the FAQ or the manual might be a good place to start.

Weird error isn't very descriptive. You'll have to be more specific if you wish help with this weird error. DRM books can be managed by calibre they just can't be converted to another format or viewed in calibre's viewer.

Watch the video above and maybe someone who has a Kobo can jump in and let you know what they found unique or odd when they started using calibre.

Also, you might want to look through some of the old posts in the Kobo forum and see if anything looks relevant. Most calibre+reader questions come here, but some land in the specific reader forums instead, so it's always worth a look.

seem to be up and running now, apart from this error:
ERROR: ERROR: Unhandled exception: <b>TypeError</b>:smart_update() got an unexpected keyword argument 'replace_metadata'

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site-packages\calibre\gui2\__init__.py", line 260, in dispatch
File "site-packages\calibre\gui2\device.py", line 1281, in books_uploaded
File "site-packages\calibre\gui2\device.py", line 344, in add_books_to_metadata
File "site-packages\calibre\devices\kobo\driver.py", line 312, in add_books_to_metadata
File "site-packages\calibre\devices\usbms\books.py", line 119, in add_book
TypeError: smart_update() got an unexpected keyword argument 'replace_metadata'

any ideas?

That's a bug in the Kobo driver, will be fixed in the next release.

Thanks for the info

I have calibre up and running sweet apart from that error on some files. I also can't seem to force the picture i change in the metadata onto the kobo device, which i find weird.

Also, stripping the DRM (if someone was to do that) seems (allegedly) to have effected the text font and size of the books as well.

Changing the cover of a book in calibre will only be applied to the book and seen on a reader by converting the book with that cover selected. Even an epub - epub conversion will add the cover to the book. DRM files though can't be converted with calibre.

I never noticed the font size changing when removing DRM, but I usually run any book I strip of DRM through a conversion to epub using the font sizes I choose in calibre.

Good info
I have to learn how to reconvert my epubs for wider margins, text sizes and different covers.

hi,

I'm new to both this forum and e-reading.

Bought a kobo few weeks ago, but like digital_steve am over managing it through the borders software. I downloaded calibre 0.7.18 and uninstalled the borders program but when i plug my kobo in, calibre doesn't seem to open the kobo library at all. Calibre recognises that the kobo is there, (says at the bottom "... connected to Kobo reader.") but won't bring up any of my books, either what i'm currently reading or that is just in my library. And i have both the 100 free books as well as a couple i've bought.

Have tried all the usual options of re-starting computer, plugging and unplugging kobo etc... but still to no avail. Have spent all morning and arvo googling answers but haven't found anything, so apologies if this has already been covered.

Am i doing something wrong???

Many thanks if you're able to help.

Hi

Are you seeing any error messages? It is possible that you are getting hit by a bug that I fixed last night and will be fixed in 0.7.19. If you want I can package a plugin version that you can use instead of the built in driver.

Tim

Also, I am assuming that you have clicked on the device icon to show the device's books...

Tim

no, no error message. It just won't show my library - i didn't realise it could until i watched one of the demo videos and the demo e-reader had a list of books.

And yes, i've clicked on arrow on the 'reader' button in the top row that says 'show books in the main memory of the device'

I am attaching a new version of the driver that should work for you. Do the following:

Click Preferences
Under Advanced - Click Plugins
Expand Device Interface Plugins
Select the current kobo drive and click disable
Browse to the location that you saved this driver
select the file
click add
restart calibre

Note that this is very new code so let me know if you seen any issues. It should however keep you going until you get the new release next week. BTW, you must not have any epubs. the kobo books cannot currently be managed by the driver (other than listed and deleted that is)... If you had epubs they should have been displayed but the kobo drivers would not be.

Tim

wow - thanks so much. I've got to go out in a minute but i'll give it a try in a few hours and report back!

ok, have had a busy week and only just managed to sit down with this again. Calibre asked me to download the new version when i opened it up, which i did, and when i plugged my kobo in it worked straight away - all of the books on my kobo showed up in the calibre screen. Thanks so much timlegge for your response though.