Sony Reader, DRM and Calibre

[R Grosvenor]

I have a Sony Reader 950 and use the Sony Reader library software. I download many free library books that use DRM to limit your reading time to 21 days. This works ok. Two things I want to be able to do.

Add a tag or something to be able to tell a book has been read. I want to keep all my read books in my library, even if my usage has expired so that I can tell I have read that book

Edit Megadata, particularly to add covers.

I created a collection for read books with sony software, but it starts showing errors when a book usage period expires and sync tries to occur.

Am i missing an easy way to keep up with read books on the reader or the reader software on the desktop?

Will Calibre handle legal DRM management of usage time? I am not trying to remove DRM. But Calibre allows adding user created tags and updating of metadata, I think.

Thank You!

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by R Grosvenor

Two things I want to be able to do.
Add a tag or something to be able to tell a book has been read. I want to keep all my read books in my library, even if my usage has expired so that I can tell I have read that book

Yes, you can do this. Just add the tag.

Edit Megadata, particularly to add covers.

You can do this, too.

Will Calibre handle legal DRM management of usage time?

Not directly, but you can put the date you get the book in, e.g. #loan_date, and compare that date to today. There are various ways to do this, but a simple one would be to search the #loan_date field like this:
#loan_date:>21daysago
to see all where that date is more recent than 3 weeks

[R Grosvenor]

So will Calibre catalog and download a library book if Adobe Digital is installed and authorizing in the same manner as it does with the Sony Library?

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by R Grosvenor

So will Calibre catalog and download a library book if Adobe Digital is installed and authorizing in the same manner as it does with the Sony Library?

I'm not a Sony expert and there are many of them here, but if you give a DRM book to Calibre, Calibre will send it to your Sony and track it and let you catalog it and tag it and add a cover to the Calibre database. You just can't change the book at all. You need to give Calibre the actual DRM book after you've downloaded it from the source, not just a link to the book.

[itimpi]

Calibre will not handle downloading a library book.

If you want to use Calibre you have to first download the book using either the Sony Software or the Adobe ADE software. Having downloaded it you can add it to the Calibre library and use Calibre to transfer it to the Sony.

[Manichean]

Originally Posted by R Grosvenor

Edit Megadata, particularly to add covers.

You can't do that with DRM protected books, I believe.

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by Manichean

You can't do that with DRM protected books, I believe.

For my own edification - I thought you could change the metadata in the Calibre metadata.db database (which is associated with the DRM book and appears in the Calibre GUI), but that wouldn't change the metadata in the DRM book itself (which may appear in your ereader. Was I wrong or were we just talking about different "Megadata" - books versus Calibre db?

[Manichean]

Originally Posted by Starson17

For my own edification - I thought you could change the metadata in the Calibre metadata.db database (which is associated with the DRM book and appears in the Calibre GUI), but that wouldn't change the metadata in the DRM book itself (which may appear in your ereader. Was I wrong or were we just talking about different "Megadata" - books versus Calibre db?

No, I should've clarified- as far as I know, you can change the metadata in Calibre' database as much as you want, but it won't stick to the book if it's DRMed.

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by Manichean

No, I should've clarified- as far as I know, you can change the metadata in Calibre' database as much as you want, but it won't stick to the book if it's DRMed.

Thanks. It's as I thought. Like others, I find DRM highly annoying, so I don't have any books with that "feature" in Calibre and haven't paid much attention to how Calibre behaves when it has to deal with such a book.

[kovidgoyal]

covers cannot be changed in DRMed books, but metadata like title/authors/comments etc. can be changed in DRMed epub and mobi. This is because covers are not treated as metadata inside these ebook formats.

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

covers cannot be changed in DRMed books, but metadata like title/authors/comments etc. can be changed in DRMed epub and mobi. This is because covers are not treated as metadata inside these ebook formats.

Let me make sure I've got this: Title/author etc. metadata is not encrypted and is not part of the DRM scheme for EPUB and MOBI and therefore you can change it without disturbing the DRM? (and the corollary is that the cover is part of the encrypted DRM book and therefore cannot be changed?)

Are you also saying that Calibre does this (updates this metadata for a Send or Save), but does not update covers?

Did I get that right?

[kovidgoyal]

Yes . I dont recall if it does it for DRMed MOBI or not with 100% accuracy, but definitely for DMRed EPUB

[Starson17]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Yes . I dont recall if it does it for DRMed MOBI or not with 100% accuracy, but definitely for DMRed EPUB

Thanks.

[Manichean]

Thanks for explaining.