Transferring Bookmarks from Individual Books

Prestidigitweeze · 03-13-2015, 11:56 AM

Forgive me if people have asked about this before, but my inability to copy my reading progress from individual books on different devices to a central library is the one thing that keeps me from useful convergence.

Is there a way to transfer bookmarks from individual books on different devices? I often find that I read more of a particular book on a tablet than an e-reader, and annotate more books on my smartphone (when I'm stuck with it on mass transit) than any of the above.

Is there a way to consolidate the progress and bookmarks from my various toys into the calibre library maintained on my laptop and backed up on a separate SSD?

eschwartz · 03-13-2015, 06:46 PM

That would require some sort of standard for annotations, sadly.

You can of course backup the data (often requires hackish stuff) but it isn't terribly useful without some way of telling a different app/device how to read it. So far no AI has been developed to recognize that on context alone.

This would be a good time for the IDPF to have actually focused on some sot of useful progress.

theducks · 03-13-2015, 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

This would be a good time for the IDPF to have actually focused on some sot of useful progress.

Hear Hear
We can't even get a uniform reading progress Location

MY ADE (MRSDK) has a PN file for each book that has been opened, but I have no clue how to decode. Then we would still need need to transliterate it to a different system.

FWIW, my device templates all include {id} (Library specific

) at the end, just before the extension, which might help if only using a single Library

BetterRed · 03-13-2015, 08:52 PM

Whilst ever the walled gardens of the Silicone Valley regime prevails it won't change, if anything it'll worsen. Just like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar's reign - the Hittites overthrew the Babylonians and sacked their gardens.

BR

davidfor · 03-14-2015, 09:56 AM

Too add my two cents worth as someone who has looked at this...

As he others have said, there is no universal solution as there is no universal standard. Converting the bookmark position in one format to another format would be very hard.

For like formats and devices, it is a different matter. My Kobo Utilities plugin will pull the reading position from a book on the ereader and restore it later or to a different Kobo ereader. But, it can't handle other types of devices.

There are some similarities across devices and apps.

The Kobo and Sony's both use RMSDK for epubs. I have looked at the position references in the database from a Sony ereader, and it is similar enough to that used by Kobo for epubs that they should be convertible. That should be transferable to ADE as well. The calibre viewer uses a similar method epubs, and I have manually converted the position from my Kobo to it.

For bookmarks and annotations, Kobo stores them in both a database and the RMSDK annotation file. This is the same format as that used by ADE. I have copied them from the ereader to ADE in the past successfully but I had to change an identifier of some sort.

These methods need identical epubs. The positions are done by counting tags at each level of nesting plus a character offset within the last tag. If the formatting is changed, that will probably change the counts or nesting level and hence the position won't map across to the other version.

eschwartz · 03-15-2015, 12:06 AM

For bonus points I want a standard that converts to and from mobi7/8.

davidfor · 03-15-2015, 01:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

For bonus points I want a standard that converts to and from mobi7/8.

I was thinking about that when I was writing my post yesterday. I'm not volunteering to do it.

kovidgoyal · 03-15-2015, 01:58 AM

The way to do it is like the calibre conversion system. Define a base annotations format that uses the EPUB 3 CFI spec for locations and specifies various types of annotations: text, image, svg, highlight, bookmark.

Then implement a system of input and output plugins that map to/from this base format.

That is the theory, actually implementing it is a ton of work.

03-13-2015, 11:56 AM	#1
Prestidigitweeze Fledgling Demagogue Posts: 2,384 Karma: 31132263 Join Date: Feb 2011 Location: White Plains Device: Clara HD; Oasis 2; Aura HD; iPad Air; PRS-350; Galaxy S7.	Transferring Bookmarks from Individual Books Forgive me if people have asked about this before, but my inability to copy my reading progress from individual books on different devices to a central library is the one thing that keeps me from useful convergence. Is there a way to transfer bookmarks from individual books on different devices? I often find that I read more of a particular book on a tablet than an e-reader, and annotate more books on my smartphone (when I'm stuck with it on mass transit) than any of the above. Is there a way to consolidate the progress and bookmarks from my various toys into the calibre library maintained on my laptop and backed up on a separate SSD? Last edited by Prestidigitweeze; 03-19-2015 at 05:39 AM.

03-13-2015, 08:52 PM	#4
BetterRed null operator (he/him) Posts: 21,645 Karma: 29710510 Join Date: Mar 2012 Location: Sydney Australia Device: none	Whilst ever the walled gardens of the Silicone Valley regime prevails it won't change, if anything it'll worsen. Just like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar's reign - the Hittites overthrew the Babylonians and sacked their gardens. BR Last edited by BetterRed; 03-13-2015 at 08:59 PM.

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03-13-2015, 06:46 PM	#2
eschwartz Ex-Helpdesk Junkie Posts: 19,421 Karma: 85400180 Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)	That would require some sort of standard for annotations, sadly. You can of course backup the data (often requires hackish stuff) but it isn't terribly useful without some way of telling a different app/device how to read it. So far no AI has been developed to recognize that on context alone. This would be a good time for the IDPF to have actually focused on some sot of useful progress.

03-14-2015, 09:56 AM	#5
davidfor Grand Sorcerer Posts: 24,905 Karma: 47303824 Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: Sydney, Australia Device: Kobo:Touch,Glo, AuraH2O, GloHD,AuraONE, ClaraHD, Libra H2O; tolinoepos	Too add my two cents worth as someone who has looked at this... As he others have said, there is no universal solution as there is no universal standard. Converting the bookmark position in one format to another format would be very hard. For like formats and devices, it is a different matter. My Kobo Utilities plugin will pull the reading position from a book on the ereader and restore it later or to a different Kobo ereader. But, it can't handle other types of devices. There are some similarities across devices and apps. The Kobo and Sony's both use RMSDK for epubs. I have looked at the position references in the database from a Sony ereader, and it is similar enough to that used by Kobo for epubs that they should be convertible. That should be transferable to ADE as well. The calibre viewer uses a similar method epubs, and I have manually converted the position from my Kobo to it. For bookmarks and annotations, Kobo stores them in both a database and the RMSDK annotation file. This is the same format as that used by ADE. I have copied them from the ereader to ADE in the past successfully but I had to change an identifier of some sort. These methods need identical epubs. The positions are done by counting tags at each level of nesting plus a character offset within the last tag. If the formatting is changed, that will probably change the counts or nesting level and hence the position won't map across to the other version.

03-15-2015, 12:06 AM	#6
eschwartz Ex-Helpdesk Junkie Posts: 19,421 Karma: 85400180 Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: The Beaten Path, USA, Roundworld, This Side of Infinity Device: Kindle Touch fw5.3.7 (Wifi only)	For bonus points I want a standard that converts to and from mobi7/8.

03-15-2015, 01:58 AM	#8
kovidgoyal creator of calibre Posts: 45,225 Karma: 27110894 Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Mumbai, India Device: Various	The way to do it is like the calibre conversion system. Define a base annotations format that uses the EPUB 3 CFI spec for locations and specifies various types of annotations: text, image, svg, highlight, bookmark. Then implement a system of input and output plugins that map to/from this base format. That is the theory, actually implementing it is a ton of work.

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