Shelf Management Suggestions?

[sangahm]

I'm trying to organize my 600 books both on Calibre and my Nook. I am please that there doesn't seem to be a 5G limitation for sideloaded books on this version (I have loaded over 20G at this point).

My question is how best to manage the Shelves. I was disappointed to learn that I cannot use Calibre tags and must manually assign to shelves within the Nook. Now I'm just trying to figure out the best way.

I'm able to create a shelf and then check off all the books in that category. I can also add books to existing shelves by checking them. However, I can't seem to find a way to look at books that have no shelf assignments. That makes it difficult to find out if there are orphans that I overlooked in assigning the books to shelves.

How do others handle this task?

[sangahm]

Still trying to figure out the best way, but I found a bug in the current shelf system. If you create a shelf and assign only sideloaded books, then when it syncs to BN's systems, it will delete the shelf (not the books, but just the shelf). Although it may only do that when synced to another device or BN app.

Here's what I did:
1) Create shelf and assign only sideloaded books on Nook GL Plus 4
2) Sync
3) From ipad with BN app, sync.
4) Back on Nook, shelves with only sideloaded book assigned are deleted.

[Sirtel]

Yes, Nook shelves don't really work with sideloaded books. When I used a Nook, I just ditched shelves and instead used a sideloaded Calibre catalog for browsing my books.

[issybird]

Huh. Useful intel here.

I’ve toyed with the idea of getting a Nook when my Aura One gives up the ghost. Not being able to use Calibre to create shelves would be a nuisance, but one I could live with. However, since my library would be sideloaded, having the shelves deleted would be a dealbreaker. I keep 200-250 books on a reader which I know is a paltry amount compared to many here, but I do rely on my shelves to drill down to my next read.

[sangahm]

Here's what I came up with as a workaround to the shelf deletion:
1) When I want to create a new shelf, the first assignment is from a B&N "purchased" book.
2) If I don't have an already purchased book, then I will "buy" a new one. What I do for these, is only buy a free book on that topic. So far, I've been able to find free relevant ones.
3) Then all other books, both purchased and sideloaded, can be assigned.

After this process, shelves are not deleted. On the other devices without sideloads, it will only show the "purchased" books, and on the Nook it will show both "purchased" and sideloaded.