[Starson17]

Originally Posted by travger

If I enter folder 'Asimov' into Calibre, then it copies all the files from that folder, one of every format, yes?

Yes, although what it does with them varies depending on your settings.

So if I have (for example) same book in mobi, rtf, and 3 x pdf; it copies them and keeps them somewhere I'm not supposed to look into. (I suppose I can make a note or use rating coloumn to mark multiple pdf-s).

You normally don't need to look in the library, but you won't get arrested if you do. There's even a convenient button on the main screen that will take you directly there.

But - how then will I locate .mobi for tranferring onto SD? Must I always fire up Calibre?

Most of us keep it fired up. Calibre has very easy and powerful ways to find the book you want. You just plug in your device or SD card and tell C to Save or Send the book you want. It will update the metadata, convert it to the right format, rename the file correctly for your device, inform your device of the new file and make your coffee. (OK I exaggerated the last one.)

(I have and will not have dedicated reader). Same for rtf - if I see a need to edit a mistake, where is the file?

In the library. I tell Calibre to open my rtf files with an editor, so just hitting "V" to view it opens it for reading and editing.

If I'm at last happy with my .mobi, how to delete all others (should I?)?

never delete.

I have more than 20 GB of books, so I really need some organizer (especially I am lured by bulk downloading metadata), but you can see why I'm not overjoyed about copying them all.

I had the same problem. Yes, it took me a while, but mostly because I wrote more code to make it easier for me to do (Merge books, and automated sorting of new books into existing records are the two larger bits.) I'm glad I moved it all to C. You will be too.

If I already have Foundation.pdf in Calibre, and I add a 'mixed books' folder containing file Asimov-Found.1.pdf - what happens?

C will create two book entries. You can view them both.

Can I compare them to decide?

Yes. When you decide which is the better, you can merge the records and have only one.

What if both .pdf-s are in same folder?

It depends on your settings. Assuming you do not have my automated sorting option turned on, it will make two separate records.

Or maybe I should enter into Calibre only read and approved files? -though it seems somewhat...less than optimal. After all, I hope that with it I can not only keep track of what I have, but also where I have it and in which formats.

It's your choice. I decided to do a bit of both. Initially most of the books were added before I wrote the automatic sorting option and the merge function. That gave me one record for every book format. It was very tedious, but forced me to look at the books. Later I wrote the merge function to combine the pdf copy of a book with the txt and epub versions into a single record.

Finally I wrote the automatic sort option and turned that on so that I could drag big groups of files into the GUI and get them added as new (if they were a new book) or be sorted into the matching record (if they were just a new format of an existing book).

I hope that helps a bit.