Annotation help please.

[Lyn2012]

I'm currently reading a scanned book that has many errors, so I am highlighting them for correction later. When I look at the highlights I have created, what order are they listed in? It doesn't appear to be in creation date/time order, where it appears in the book, or anything obvious to me. I am used to them appearing in the same order as I created them which makes it easy to go through the list correcting errors but this randomness makes the job far more difficult than it needs to be.

Also, as I delete the highlight after I have made changes, the list of annotations seems to change order yet again. Has anybody else had this problem, is there a way to have the annotations listed in the order in which they were created, and not shift about? In addition, at one point all the highlights in my book disappeared completely and there was no way to find them again, does this happen often?

I am using a new Aura by the way.

[vice-versa]

and why not add in your annotation the page and line numbers ? It would a help I think, though I have never practices that kind of thing.

[Lyn2012]

Originally Posted by vice-versa

and why not add in your annotation the page and line numbers ? It would a help I think, though I have never practices that kind of thing.

Thanks for the idea, although unfortunately it won't work as firstly I'm only highlighting not adding comments. Also, when editing in Sigil, page or line numbers don't correspond at all.

[davidfor]

I have done exactly the same thing a lot of times. And I have never worked out the sort order. I have looked in the database were it is stored and it doesn't match anything I can find.

The bookmark/annotation handling has a few bugs. See https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...39#post2494439 for details.

Because of the what you are seeing, I assume you are reading an epub that is in the main memory of the device. Most of the problems come down to the fact that for epubs in the main memory, the annotations are stored in two places; the database and a file. When you reopen an epub, the file is read and replaces the annotations in the database. This doesn't work properly.

The simplest workaround for most of these problems is to put the book on a micro SD card. For epubs on the SD card, the file for annotations is not created. Hence the annotations aren't messed up when the book is reopened. The sorting still gets messed up, but, the annotations are grouped within chapters so it isn't as bad.

Another way might be to use the extended driver in calibre to send the book to the device as kepub. I haven't played with annotations in kepubs to know if this works better.

As to complete loss of annotations, I don't know. There have been some reports here, but it hasn't happened to me. i have come back to the annotation list with the feeling that some were missing, but it hasn't happened often enough to find a pattern or even prove to myself that I only thought about adding the annotation.

[Ripplinger]

How it lists them has always bugged me too. It also doesn't help that the reader ignores your date/time settings and uses its "universal" system setting, whatever that is based on. I bookmark errors to correct and they're dated the next day (yes, my date/time setting is correct for my time zone).

[Lyn2012]

Davidfor, thank you for the explanation and suggestions. As I really dislike the wasted space at the top of the screen, using kepubs isn't an option. I will try using a SD card though. I've never used one before as I always seem to read about people having more problems when using them rather than main memory, but it is definitely worth a try. It is totally ridiculous that you lose your place in the book as well. I am finally starting to appreciate the Paperwhite (now I no longer have it), which is something I never thought I'd do!

[davidfor]

How are you losing your place? Or maybe when? There are a few reasons it can happen. Some are bugs, others to do with how the device works.

[Lyn2012]

Originally Posted by davidfor

How are you losing your place? Or maybe when? There are a few reasons it can happen. Some are bugs, others to do with how the device works.

It has happened quite a few times when I've been going through the highlights, checking them and removing them. I've just tried again and it seems that if I go to "Show on page" then it loses the page I'm currently reading and remembers the one with the highlight instead - which is totally crazy and very annoying!

I do know that when I deleted my current book on the PW and then reloaded the corrected version, my current position in the book was still remembered. This doesn't happen with the Kobo, but I am assuming this is just how it is meant to be.

Anyway, thank you for taking the time to help, or at least explain, some of the Kobo weirdness.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Lyn2012

It has happened quite a few times when I've been going through the highlights, checking them and removing them. I've just tried again and it seems that if I go to "Show on page" then it loses the page I'm currently reading and remembers the one with the highlight instead - which is totally crazy and very annoying!

Hmm, I've never that that was wrong. I usually add a bookmark for my current page before doing anything with the annotations.

I do know that when I deleted my current book on the PW and then reloaded the corrected version, my current position in the book was still remembered. This doesn't happen with the Kobo, but I am assuming this is just how it is meant to be.

That is how it works. When you first put a book on a Kobo device, it is processed and added to the internal database. The details stored are metadata and the TOC. If you replace the book and the size changes, the details get removed from the database and the book is added as a new book. They do this because if the structure of the book changes, the TOC doesn't match and navigation doesn't work. But, if you use calibre, when sending a new copy, the database is changed so that the book won't get changed. But, it doesn't fix the TOC. This is safe so long as you don't change the structure of the book.

[Uschiekid]

Originally Posted by Lyn2012

I will try using a SD card though. I've never used one before as I always seem to read about people having more problems when using them rather than main memory, but it is definitely worth a try.

Definitely give it a go with an SD card! That's the only reason (annotations/bookmarks) I decided to change my epubs over to an SD card, and I have to say, haven't regretted it at all. It works perfectly, and I only wish I could put my ADE library books on my SD card as well!

The only problem I have on 2.8.1 with using an SD card is that turning on from powered off state takes longer (about 3 minutes) and whatever books from the SD card were on the homescreen disappear until I reopen them (they keep their place in the "recently read" in the library.)

I rarely need to power off my device, so this isn't really an issue for me (except when I was testing a bunch of fonts...which lead to me testing this issue )...I just keep my kobo in sleep mode all the time. If you do power off, you might consider using sleep mode instead. Then I think your SD card experience will be seamless!