Author sent on send to Kindle & email to Kindle

[MSWallack]

I know that I've seen some threads on the subject before, but my quick search (note: first thing in the morning, before copious amounts of caffeine, after my wife woke me in the middle of the night … for no real apparent reason) found nothing.

I send books to my Kindle in two ways (depending on number of books and amount of time that I have). Sometimes I attach the device and copy the books directly. More often, when just sending a few books, I'll email them to the Kindle.

In Calibre I spend a lot of time working to get my metadata just the way I like it, in particular making sure that author names are displayed Firstname Lastname and the sort name as Lastname, Firstname. But on the Kindle, all the books are displayed Firstname Lastname. I seem to recall that the Kindle only looks at the author name, not the sort name, but I also seem to recall someone mentioning the use of a plugboard (or something similar) to adjust the author name when sending a book to a Kindle.

Can anyone provide suggestions on how to do this?

Thanks!

---Michael

[Divingduck]

@Kovid

For me it looks like there is something broken.

original:

<dc:title>Der Attentäter</dc:title>
<dc:creator>Justin Scott</dc:creator>

save to disk with template {author_sort} to {authors}

<dc:title>- Isaac Bell 08 - Der Attentäter - Thriller - deu - 2017</dc:title>
<dc:creator opf:role="aut" opf:file-as="Cussler, Clive &amp; Scott, Justin">Clive Cussler</dc:creator>
<dc:creator opf:role="aut">Justin Scott</dc:creator>

[kovidgoyal]

You dont need a plugboard for that, you can use Preferences->Output options->MOBI output->Use author sort for author

Indeed, IIRC, a plugboard will not work with multiple authors, because amazon does not use & as the separator.

[kovidgoyal]

@DD as far as I know nothing has changed in plugboards in calibre ina very long time, but I am not an expert on them, you'd have to ask chaley. From your post it looks like your book has the author sort value clive cussler & scott justin and you are trying to copy the author_sort value to authors, which reults in two authors, clive cussler and justin scott, as expected.

[Divingduck]

Yes this book have two authors. But for me it should copy the author_sort values (Cussler, Clive and Scott, Justin) as text string into the two "aut" roles like

<dc:creator opf:role="aut" opf:file-as="Cussler, Clive &amp; Scott, Justin">Cussler, Clive</dc:creator>
<dc:creator opf:role="aut">Scott, Justin</dc:creator>

More or less in the same behavior like I use it as template for generating file names
like "Cussler, Clive & Scott, Justin - Isaac Bell 08 - Der Attentäter (Thriller, deu, 2017).epub"

But to be honest, I do not remember if this behavior had change some when in the past as I use it mainly for filename creation and there it works like I expect it to work.

I recognize also today that there exist this [opf:file-as="Cussler, Clive &amp; Scott, Justin"] if I made a export. Is this intent as a kind of reference information?

Nerveless, it is maybe a good point to ask @chaley if he can find someday a bit spare time to look at.

[MSWallack]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

You dont need a plugboard for that, you can use Preferences->Output options->MOBI output->Use author sort for author

Indeed, IIRC, a plugboard will not work with multiple authors, because amazon does not use & as the separator.

Do I need to reconvert books that are already in .mobi? Will this preference setting work if I just email books from Calibre to my Kindle?

[kovidgoyal]

The preference setting is applied anytime you export books from calibre (i.e. when the metadata is updated in them).