Preference to disallow connecting to ereader

[zardoxnet]

What configuration or preference in calibre can prevent attempts to connect when plugging in the usb cable from my Kobo ereader. I do not want to connect ever. I have way too many books to put on the ereader and I want only to open the Kobo as an external drive and manually add or delete files. However, if I have Calibre open it does this confusing dance moving icons on the menu around and attempting to connect. I do not want Calibre to take any action. How can I just turn it off? I a message is displayed "Error communicating with device" WTF I do not want it to communicate AT ALL?!

[Sirtel]

Preferences -> Ignored devices

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by zardoxnet

What configuration or preference in calibre can prevent attempts to connect when plugging in the usb cable from my Kobo ereader. I do not want to connect ever. I have way too many books to put on the ereader and I want only to open the Kobo as an external drive and manually add or delete files. However, if I have Calibre open it does this confusing dance moving icons on the menu around and attempting to connect. I do not want Calibre to take any action. How can I just turn it off? I a message is displayed "Error communicating with device" WTF I do not want it to communicate AT ALL?!

Given the error message, you really should look into why you are getting an error. You could find out that whatever is causing the error could cause a problem when you least expect it and you are not at home.

[PeterT]

Originally Posted by zardoxnet

However, if I have Calibre open it does this confusing dance moving icons on the menu around and attempting to connect.

The icons changing is caused by calibre having multiple configurable toolbars; one for no device connected and a different one for when a device is connected.

Just reconfigure the device connected toolbars to have the same options as the non connected one.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

[theducks]

The 'dance' is 100% expected. That is the 'Connected' set of Icons.
You gain those that are relevant to having that device connected.
Preferences: Toolbars: Main Toolbar when device connected:
Location Manager is the AUTO SPECIFIC TO DEVICE relevant Icons.
You can customize the rest, just like the others.

I only include those 1)I use 2)relevant to the Library as I use the Secondary Menu for Book activities (I also use the Iconless Menubar for Preferences, Help and Fetch News). I maximize the use of Icons that a relevant to the mode Calibre is in since I have a 20" monitor.

[JSWolf]

I think it's much more important for @zardoxnet to fix "error communicating with device" then it is to configure Calibre.

[BetterRed]

Which word in @zardoxnet's "I do not want to connect ever." do PeterT, theducks, and JSWolf not understand.

BR

[PeterT]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Which word in @zardoxnet's "I do not want to connect ever." do PeterT, theducks, and JSWolf not understand.

BR

I understood perfectly. Unfortunately there was NO reason given as to why they did not want to connect apart from a complaint about menus changing when the device was connected. So all I was doing was to educate as to WHY the menus changed.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Which word in @zardoxnet's "I do not want to connect ever." do PeterT, theducks, and JSWolf not understand.

I think the problem is that the error at the end is the real reason that @zardoxnet does not want to connect. As they have not worked out how to fix this problem, they are now stating they don't want to connect to the Kobo device. I might be wrong about that (just ask my wife) but it seems a likely conclusion. If I am right, then I would suggest that @zardoxnet would search for the, unfortunately, many times this error has been discussed.

If I am wrong...

@zardoxnet, disable the KoboTouch driver on the Plugin page of the preferences. And, just in case, delete the KoboTouchExtended driver.

I think that @Sirtel's suggestion does not work as there is no way to add an individual Kobo device to the list of ignored devices. Or at least, I can't find one. I think it is only available for MTP connected devices.

And, if I was not going to use the device specific driver, I would use the User Defined USB driver to connect the device. Or "Connect for folder". Both of these let calibre see the device and the books on them and use the very good functions available for sending the books to the device. This is especially good for maintaining a subset of the books on the device as you can see what is on there now, delete them as needed and send the next batch to be read to the device. Of course, I would not do this because there are far to many good things about the device specific drivers for managing books on the devices. Especially, in my definitely prejudiced opinion, for Kobo devices.

[Sirtel]

Yes, I had no idea that Ignore Devices would not work for ereaders.

For myself, Calibre integration is one of the biggest advantages of Kobo readers. It does so much more than just putting the files on the device. And you don't need to put your whole library on your Kobo, you can easily send over only as many books as you want. It's still easier than to do it via the file explorer, IMO.

[Comfy.n]

Originally Posted by zardoxnet

What configuration or preference in calibre can prevent attempts to connect when plugging in the usb cable from my Kobo ereader. I do not want to connect ever. I have way too many books to put on the ereader and I want only to open the Kobo as an external drive and manually add or delete files. However, if I have Calibre open it does this confusing dance moving icons on the menu around and attempting to connect. I do not want Calibre to take any action. How can I just turn it off? I a message is displayed "Error communicating with device" WTF I do not want it to communicate AT ALL?!

In the past I needed that setting and this plugin would work very well: Unplugged

[ownedbycats]

Alas, that plugin doesn't seem to been updated in years. It won't work on newer Calibre.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by zardoxnet

What configuration or preference in calibre can prevent attempts to connect when plugging in the usb cable from my Kobo ereader. I do not want to connect ever. I have way too many books to put on the ereader and I want only to open the Kobo as an external drive and manually add or delete files. However, if I have Calibre open it does this confusing dance moving icons on the menu around and attempting to connect. I do not want Calibre to take any action. How can I just turn it off? I a message is displayed "Error communicating with device" WTF I do not want it to communicate AT ALL?!

When I read the opening post my reaction was 'Ah-hah, a fellow minimalist'. I regarded everything following "However, ..." as the OP having a bit of a rant. And the initial reply Sirtel provided was what I thought was the correct response, and in essence I still think that.

Within a couple of days of installing calibre in 2012, I decided the device connect feature was too bothersome for me, so I disabled the drivers for Android & Kindle. I thought I did that via Prefs->Ignore devices, but I see now I must have done it via Prefs->Plugins, but it shows up in Prefs-Ignore devices.

I only keep what I'm currently reading on my devices - Android phone, Surface GO, and an old Kindle. Because I mainly read histories and biographies, they can take me weeks to read, so its no hardship to add and delete an occasional file manually. I often extract back matter into a separate file so that I can read the body on the GO and use the phone to refer to footnotes, references etc.

BR

[Comfy.n]

I think my use case for the Unplugged PI, IIRC, was to keep the Kindle connected to the usb port while preparing the books for sideloading, like... for instance

- convert to KFX;
- transfer to device;
- see if conversion went ok, opening the title on Kindle

Those steps were so frequent that it became more comfy to just click the Unplugged icon, instead of disconnecting and reconnecting the USB cable...

Well, it's been a long time I used it, so I really can't remember how to explain why exactly the PI was needed

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

When I read the opening post my reaction was 'Ah-hah, a fellow minimalist'. I regarded everything following "However, ..." as the OP having a bit of a rant. And the initial reply Sirtel provided was what I thought was the correct response, and in essence I still think that.

Within a couple of days of installing calibre in 2012, I decided the device connect feature was too bothersome for me, so I disabled the drivers for Android & Kindle. I thought I did that via Prefs->Ignore devices, but I see now I must have done it via Prefs->Plugins, but it shows up in Prefs-Ignore devices.

I only keep what I'm currently reading on my devices - Android phone, Surface GO, and an old Kindle. Because I mainly read histories and biographies, they can take me weeks to read, so its no hardship to add and delete an occasional file manually. I often extract back matter into a separate file so that I can read the body on the GO and use the phone to refer to footnotes, references etc.

BR

When I read the OP's post, I was thinking that he wanted the Kobo not to connect to Calibre because of the error he was getting. And that's an error that really should be solved.