Can I Kill Collection Creation in Calibre?

[rhadin]

I noticed the other day that my Sony 950 suddenly had 120 collections, none of which I created and many of which were absurd. So I followed the instructions Sony provides and deleted them. All was fine until yesterday when I used Calibre to add some ebooks to my 950. Afterwards, I noticed I now had 91 new collections.

I checked my preferences in Calibre and note that the collections are set for manual. But reading the description of the 3 choices indicates that Calibre will create collections regardless of which I choose.

Is there a way to permanently prevent Calibre from creating collections?

If not, this would be an option I would like to see in an update.

[jackie_w]

Have you tried going to Preferences - Plugins - Device Interface - Sony - Customize and clearing the Collections box (I think the default is series, tags).

I think you would also need to set Preferences - Sending Books to devices - Metadata management to Automatic. Then connect your reader to calibre, let it do its stuff, then disconnect. The collections should be gone.

[rhadin]

Thanks. I had no idea about the plugins/device interface settings. I have made the changes you suggested.

[chaley]

Note that if you set metadata management to automatic, calibre will delete all collections that it doesn't create. With the settings you have, it now creates no collections, so it will delete all of them. My guess is that you don't want that.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by rhadin

So I followed the instructions Sony provides and deleted them. All was fine until yesterday when I used Calibre to add some ebooks to my 950. Afterwards, I noticed I now had 91 new collections.

If you are using calibre you might want to stop using Sony software. The two have a habit of stepping on each other.

Originally Posted by rhadin

Is there a way to permanently prevent Calibre from creating collections?

When your Sony decides to hiccup and kill your collections (and it will) you might wish you used calibre for collections. Your best bet might be to create a custom column in calibre called collections then fill in for each book what collection you wish the book to be included in. Then add this column to the plugin as #collections so collections will be automatic in the future and recovered virtually seamlessly. If I did that my plugin would appear as attached.

Automatic collection management with Sony devices is one of the big advantages of using calibre with Sony devices.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by chaley

Note that if you set metadata management to automatic, calibre will delete all collections that it doesn't create. With the settings you have, it now creates no collections, so it will delete all of them. My guess is that you don't want that.

No, I don't want Calibre deleting any collections I create (not that I have created any) so I have set it back to Manual. Thanks.

[rhadin]

@dwanthny --

Thanks for the suggestion but I don't use collections as permanent items. Once I read a book on my device, I delete it from the device (I do keep copies on my hard drive and back them up). If I get a book series, I create a temporary collection for the series. Once I have finished the last book in the series, it and the collection are deleted.

I primarily read fiction on my device and I consider fiction read-once-then-throwaway material.

[jackie_w]

Ignore this if you wish, but if you're creating Collections for each Series, why not let Calibre create/manage them for you using the Series metadata you have in Calibre?

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Ignore this if you wish, but if you're creating Collections for each Series, why not let Calibre create/manage them for you using the Series metadata you have in Calibre?

I don't adjust the metadata; I simply use Calibre to either transfer books from non-Sony ebookstores (such as Smashwords) to my device or to convert a format. Virtually all of my ebooks are throwaways (maybe a dozen exceptions out of 1100 ebooks).

As a result of not finetuning the metadata, Calibre creates collections such as aab, Egypt, mystery, fine -- 94 of such collections for 4 ebooks that I sent to my device.

I do not keep read books on my Sony. I don't really have anything that I want or need managed. When I bought Elizabeth Moons' Vatta series of 5 ebooks, I put them all into a collection to make them easy to find as I read them in order. Once I finished reading them, both the books and the collection were deleted.