Displaying the collections in book lists

[maddz]

Is there anyway to display the collections a book is in? I'm doing some collection management and searching author names to come up with books by that author. What I'd like is to be able to see which collection(s) a book is in without tapping the 3 dots and selecting add book to collection.

Obviously, I can see books in a collection by selecting the collection to get the list of books, but what I'm after is the reverse - see a summary of the collections selected for each book without going down levels of details.

[meeera]

If you're doing all collection management directly on the device: I get that this isn't an immediate solution to your question, but I can't recommend strongly enough doing the collections management in Calibre instead.

(Once set up of course you can easily do what you want to do re: this question, in Calibre.)

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by meeera

(Once set up of course you can easily do what you want to do re: this question, in Calibre.)

The way I would do it is to set up a collections column and then assign that as a subtitle.

[MGlitch]

Thirding using Calibre to do this. I don’t expect kobo to match Calibre in this any time soon.

[maddz]

I am managing my collections in Calibre - it's when I'm looking on the Forma I want to see which collections a specific book is in. I've got books missing from collections that should be there because when they were uploaded the collection wasn't set.

It's managing a secondary collection is what I am after; they've all got primary collections but some books also have secondary collections (anthologies/short fiction, reviewer collections). It's those secondary collections that don't always get set.

[PeterT]

As long as calibre is set to Automatic Metadata management, all defined collections are transferred to the Kobo.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

[maddz]

I'm sorry, but you're still missing the point. I'm asking if there is a way to display on the Kobo the collections a book has in the same way you can see the series a book is in.

It's a pain to hook up the Kobo to a computer (if I'm at home) to manage collections for a couple of books that may have missed a secondary collection (there's one I'm prone to missing). This involves finding the cable (which may have been 'borrowed' for a different Kobo), switching from a power plug to the hub, firing up Calibre and waiting 5 minutes for the library jobs to complete.

This is opposed to searching the book/author on the Kobo and seeing at a glance whether it's in a specific collection or not. Yes, I can use the collection list on the Kobo, but some collections have several hundred books and I'd rather not have to tab through multiple pages to see if that book is in the specific collection...

If I'm not at home, I haven't got access to a computer let alone Calibre.

[ownedbycats]

I'd go to the metadata section in the KoboTouch/KoboTouchExtended driver settings and add your {#kobocoll} column to the subtitles. It'll show up under the title, but will only update when you plug into the computer.

It might be possible to plugboard your column into the description or something but that'll only work for sideloaded as Kobo likes overriding with the store descriptions.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by maddz

I'm sorry, but you're still missing the point. I'm asking if there is a way to display on the Kobo the collections a book has in the same way you can see the series a book is in.

Most of the comments are trying to work out what you are doing and why. Plus the fact that the only way to see what collections a book is in is by using "Add to collection" for the book". Or actually looking at the collection.

It's a pain to hook up the Kobo to a computer (if I'm at home) to manage collections for a couple of books that may have missed a secondary collection (there's one I'm prone to missing). This involves finding the cable (which may have been 'borrowed' for a different Kobo), switching from a power plug to the hub, firing up Calibre and waiting 5 minutes for the library jobs to complete.

This is opposed to searching the book/author on the Kobo and seeing at a glance whether it's in a specific collection or not. Yes, I can use the collection list on the Kobo, but some collections have several hundred books and I'd rather not have to tab through multiple pages to see if that book is in the specific collection...

If I'm not at home, I haven't got access to a computer let alone Calibre.

Unfortunately, that is what you are going to have to do. As you are doing collection management via calibre, also doing it on the device is pointless. When you connect, the collections for a book are changed to match what the calibre library say it should be. That means that any book you add to a collection on the device and do not update the metadata in the library, will be removed from the collection. The simplest way to do this, will be with the device connected from the device list. You can search for the collection name and check the books there.

This has come up before in some manner. I might think about adding something to the Kobo Utilities plugin to show what the collections a book is in. It shouldn't be to hard to get that from the driver even if the device isn't connected. That isn't going to happen quickly as there are some other things I need to do.

[maddz]

Thank you David, that is the answer I am looking for. 99% of my books are side-loaded as I tend not to purchase from Kobo.

It would be useful to add it in as a firmware add-on in the future although I suspect I will have to bite the bullet and upgrade MacOS and Calibre (still running High Sierra and last version of Calibre to run on High Sierra - 3.7 something). In some ways it would also be useful to be able to compare the metadata on the device to the metadata in Calibre with the option of over-writing one with the other.

It's a rare occasion when I need to do this - it's managing my review copies so I read them first, and I don't always have the correct metadata in Calibre so they are missing from the review collection. If I find an issue when I am out and about, I make a note and slip it in the book bag with the Kobo, so I can update the Calibre metadata as well.

The reason I'm asking now is that I am finally catching up on review copies from LibraryThing (I had a massive reading slump over the past 2 years) and the list of unreviewed books on LT didn't match what I had on the Kobo. 2 I know I never received copies, one is a work book, and the rest are fiction which I am trying to get through (I've read at least 10 since the start of the month).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

The way I would do it is to set up a collections column and then assign that as a subtitle.

The Tags column works very well as a collections column.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The Tags column works very well as a collections column.

What does that have to do with what I said in my post?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

What does that have to do with what I said in my post?

The way you said it, it read as setting up a custom column when there may be no need.

[ZodWallop]

It would be nice to have tags or collections show up on the book details along with publisher, ISBN, etc.

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

It would be nice to have tags or collections show up on the book details along with publisher, ISBN, etc.

You can do it with composite columns and metadata plugboard. Perhaps difficult the first time, but it's automatic since that moment.