Finished List

[Montol]

I've been using Calibre to sync my eBook library to my Kobo Glo. After some firmware issues and unloading/reloading all books to get the KoboTouchExtended add-on to work fully, I've lost the collection of Finished books I've read over the past year. Is there any way (going either forward or back) to generate an accumulating list of which books I've read on my eReader? I'd love to be able to see some sort of listing by date, or pages, or whatever of all the books I've run through. The KoboUtilities was looking promising, but it doesn't seem to actually bring over the PercentRead or LastRead information back from the Kobo into Calibre quite the way it seemed to promise (as in, it never has for me).

Thanks!

[PeterT]

I for one use the Utilities and some custom columns / shelf definition to automate the creation of shelves called Reading and Finished. I'll try to find the post where I describe what I do.

See https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...8&postcount=13

This custom column seems to work for adding a book to either a Reading or Finished shelf based on the pct read.

Lookup name:    readstatus
Column Heading: Reading Status
Column Type:    Column built from other columns
Template:       {#koboreadpct:'cmp($, 100, cmp($, 0, '', '', 'Reading'), 'Finished', '')'}

with of course the corresponding change to add #readstatus to the list of fields used for shelving in either the Kobo or ExtendedKobo drivers. (I tend to update them both even though the Extended driver is normally disabled on my system).

In effect this is saying if the Pct Read is 100, the book is Finished, else if it's greater than 0, then the status is Reading.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Montol

I've been using Calibre to sync my eBook library to my Kobo Glo. After some firmware issues and unloading/reloading all books to get the KoboTouchExtended add-on to work fully, I've lost the collection of Finished books I've read over the past year. Is there any way (going either forward or back) to generate an accumulating list of which books I've read on my eReader? I'd love to be able to see some sort of listing by date, or pages, or whatever of all the books I've run through. The KoboUtilities was looking promising, but it doesn't seem to actually bring over the PercentRead or LastRead information back from the Kobo into Calibre quite the way it seemed to promise (as in, it never has for me).

What goes wrong or how is it not right for you? I created the store/restore to allow me to both record in calibre what I had read and to allow a factory reset and then get the status of the books on the device back. I had the chance to test this on the weekend, and it worked very well.

If you can tell me what the problems are, I can either fix them, or explain how to do it.

[Montol]

Ah ha, so I followed through with your walkthrough PeterT, and the add-in Column you created was quite handy. That's helped sort through the list on my Calibre library. Unfortunately 95% manually, since I've been taking books off the device as I've been finishing them, and had a few factory resets to boot. Between that in Calibre as a 'permanent' log, and the new features introduced on the Kobo with FW3.0.0, this is really helping my OCD of library-management, hah!

Anyways, this solved most of what I had been hoping for, and as the last read dates in particular flow through to Calibre over time, it'll be great to see just how quick I'm tearing through novels. Too bad I hadn't learned how to do this sooner!

More questions this has spawned:

1) With the new columns of Percent Read and Read Status, is there any quick way to tell Calibre to hide anything with the 100% / Finished status? Sorting works, of course, but if I could just hide the ones I've gotten through, then I could have a cleaner Author/Series sort. Definitely not a big deal, but I'm just curious.

2) Is KoboUtilities supposed to do the Store/Restore thing automatically for all of the Custom Columns? I'd love if I could plug my Kobo in and it just flowed that info through to Calibre, that'd be great.

3) Is there any way to do this for books downloaded from the Kobo Storefront? I downloaded a bunch of free classics that I'd love to have marked 'Finished' in this manner to maintain this database of completed books I'd like to build up over time, but, while Calibre recognizes them on the device, it does not keep anything for them in Calibre, as they are 'virtual' books. Would the only real way of doing it to simply replace those Kobo-obtained free books with copies from, say, Project Gutenberg instead?

Thanks! Its amazing what you all have done with these add-ins and Calibre itself to make the Kobo even better.

[speakingtohe]

There is a function to match books in the library with those on the device in the Kobo utilities plugin. Not 100% it would do as you ask but I think it would, or you could copy the books from your device to your library.

Helen

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Montol

More questions this has spawned:

1) With the new columns of Percent Read and Read Status, is there any quick way to tell Calibre to hide anything with the 100% / Finished status? Sorting works, of course, but if I could just hide the ones I've gotten through, then I could have a cleaner Author/Series sort. Definitely not a big deal, but I'm just curious.

You can create a virtual library. These are based on searches. The search "#kobo_percentread:<100" shows all the books in my library that have the percent read set and is less than 100. Basically everything in progress. Or, "not #kobo_percentread:100" shows everything that does not have a percent read of 100. Then, create a virtual library from this by click the "Virtual Library" button, choosing "Create Virtual Library", entering a name and pressing OK. This will then be added to the list of virtual libraries. Calibre can open each in tab that you can click between.

2) Is KoboUtilities supposed to do the Store/Restore thing automatically for all of the Custom Columns? I'd love if I could plug my Kobo in and it just flowed that info through to Calibre, that'd be great.

No, it doesn't run automatically. It something I started looking at a while ago, but got distracted. It's about time to revisit it.

3) Is there any way to do this for books downloaded from the Kobo Storefront? I downloaded a bunch of free classics that I'd love to have marked 'Finished' in this manner to maintain this database of completed books I'd like to build up over time, but, while Calibre recognizes them on the device, it does not keep anything for them in Calibre, as they are 'virtual' books. Would the only real way of doing it to simply replace those Kobo-obtained free books with copies from, say, Project Gutenberg instead?

I assume these are kepubs downloaded directly to the device. If so, there are two choices. One is to download the epub version and add it to the calibre library. I usually do this when I buy a book. But, depending on the formatting, I might edit the epub and read that instead of the kepub.

You can also add an empty book in calibre. Right-click on the "Add books" button and select "Add an empty book". Calibre will prompt for some details and then add the book without a format. Then you can set the rest of the metadata for the book.

Also, if you are after public domain books, have a look in the library here at MR. The versions here tend to be very good.

I was just about to post when I noticed Helen's post. I always forget about that. Calibre does a good job of matching between the library and the device, but with that, it means you can fix that don't match.

[Montol]

Thank you Helen and David! Each one of those answers was helpful. I always wondered what that Virtual Library button did, so now I know! I think I'll take a good long browse through that MR library for the public domain books... That'll satisfy what I'm looking for a bit better I think - and chances are the book lovers here may have some better curated copies then other public domain sources too!

David, I already think your add-ins are fantastic, and if you wind up upgrading that KoboUtilities to allow an automatic sync I would be in your debt!

Thanks for helping everyone!