[GUI Plugin] Kindle Collections (old) - Page 93

meme · 11-15-2011, 04:40 PM

Well, its always possible the Kindle Touch doesn't use the same collection system as the K4 non-touch or K3, in which case this plugin won't work.

If the Kindle Touch doesn't use a file in the filesystem to store collections and read from it, then it will be very difficult to get this plugin to work.

@haroldgh - creating collections manually on the Kindle and then looking for the file in the system directory or elsewhere is exactly what I was going to suggest. It may have a different name or be in a different location. Or the directory or file might be set to hidden and you need to set Windows explorer to show hidden files. Or it might require a Restart. But its possible its being stored in a way that can only be seen on the Kindle...

abookreader · 11-15-2011, 04:46 PM

I can't find a thing.

I did a reset to factory default and wiped it clean
Then I downloaded the collections from my old K2 to the new Kindle via Amazon Whispersync
Then I restarted
The collections are on the Kindle Touch Screen

But when I plug it in and open up Windows Exporer there is no collections.json file anywhere that I can find --- and I can't find any other likely suspect of a file other.

haroldgh · 11-15-2011, 05:09 PM

Yep, I couldn't find it anywhere.

Can't you create collections in the kindle windows application and then sync those over now? That would work fine too.

And again, worst case scenario, creating collections on the kindle touch is infinitely less painful than the kindle keyboard or kindle4 non-touch. I imagine the kindle4 non-touch would be particularly painful, but it works with the plug-in so it's all good.

nynaevelan · 11-15-2011, 05:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by haroldgh

Can't you create collections in the kindle windows application and then sync those over now? That would work fine too.

Doesn't this only work if the books were purchased from Amazon? I have A LOT of books which I did not purchase from Amazon.

nynaevelan · 11-15-2011, 05:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by abookreader

I can't find a thing.

I did a reset to factory default and wiped it clean
Then I downloaded the collections from my old K2 to the new Kindle via Amazon Whispersync
Then I restarted
The collections are on the Kindle Touch Screen

But when I plug it in and open up Windows Exporer there is no collections.json file anywhere that I can find --- and I can't find any other likely suspect of a file other.

I wonder if Amazon has done for the Touch like it did for the K4pc app, where the actual collections file is nowhere to be found on the local computer.

haroldgh · 11-15-2011, 05:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nynaevelan

Doesn't this only work if the books were purchased from Amazon? I have A LOT of books which I did not purchase from Amazon.

Excellent question. Maybe try sending them to your "personal documents"? Books in personal documents act pretty much like they were purchased from Amazon. Whispersync works, you can redownload from the cloud at will, etc.

nynaevelan · 11-15-2011, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by haroldgh

Excellent question. Maybe try sending them to your "personal documents"? Books in personal documents act pretty much like they were purchased from Amazon. Whispersync works, you can redownload from the cloud at will, etc.

Nice idea but I don't think Amazon will like it if I sent over 300 books to my Cloud nor do I like having my non-Amazon books on the Cloud, I am not too sure how much I trust Big Brother with my non-Amazon books yet.

EDIT: Make that 477 instead of 300.

haroldgh · 11-15-2011, 05:45 PM

They give you 5GB of storage, which is incredibly generous. I don't think they care.

MamaSylvia · 11-16-2011, 10:22 AM

> I'm guessing you really do want to use calibre to manage your Kindle collections, but just want to enter specific collection names and not create them based on author or series, etc.

Right. I didn't realize the plugin used "edit manually" differently than I did.

> So if you've already imported your collections from the kindle to calibre and made changes to the column, what you need to do now is use the Customize Plugin option to select 'Create' next to your column name so that the plugin knows which column to use.

I have Calibre/customize plugin open in another window as I type, and I am confused. There is a "Create" option by every entry!

I don't have my Amazon books in Calibre, and would prefer not to mess with doing so. I would like to leave the Amazon books in the collections they are in but just be able to add books from Calibre to the collections WITHOUT removing the Amazon books already there. Failing that, I could set up a special collection for the books I'm adding from Calibre if your plugin could set up that collection and add the Calibre books without disturbing books in the other collections.

meme · 11-16-2011, 10:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MamaSylvia

> I'm guessing you really do want to use calibre to manage your Kindle collections, but just want to enter specific collection names and not create them based on author or series, etc.

Right. I didn't realize the plugin used "edit manually" differently than I did.

> So if you've already imported your collections from the kindle to calibre and made changes to the column, what you need to do now is use the Customize Plugin option to select 'Create' next to your column name so that the plugin knows which column to use.

I have Calibre/customize plugin open in another window as I type, and I am confused. There is a "Create" option by every entry!

I don't have my Amazon books in Calibre, and would prefer not to mess with doing so. I would like to leave the Amazon books in the collections they are in but just be able to add books from Calibre to the collections WITHOUT removing the Amazon books already there. Failing that, I could set up a special collection for the books I'm adding from Calibre if your plugin could set up that collection and add the Calibre books without disturbing books in the other collections.

Hopefully you aren't using a Kindle Touch - as the plugin apparently won't work with the Touch version

If you click on the plugins Customize Plugin option, you will see a list of calibre column names. Next to each name is the Action column. This column should be blank for every column name by default. You can select Create, Delete, or 'blank' for each name. You should select 'Create' only for your column

You CANNOT mix calibre books with kindle-only books in a collection. A collection must contain only books that are only on the Kindle, or books that are in Calibre and on the Kindle. Not both. So if you have existing collections on your Kindle with Amazon books in them that you don't want touched, you must not use that collection name in your collection column. Assign different names to your calibre books, or rename your Amazon/Kindle-only collections. I'd also recommend editing the Customize screen to add the collection names you don't want touched to the 'Never delete or modify' text box, so that if you accidentally use the same name it won't actually get overwritten.

eddyj · 11-17-2011, 09:36 AM

I just got my new Touch and the first thing I did was fire up Calibre and get all my books and collections on it. Well, just the books, it seems. I will be extraordinarily bummed out if I cannot get the collections on the Touch. Enough that I might have to give the shiny new Touch to my wife, and keep the K3. But I really don't want to have to do that.

meme · 11-17-2011, 10:32 AM

So far that's the way it looks. It seems Amazon changed the way they manage collections on the Touch, removing the storing/reading of collection info from the visible filesystem probably into an internal storage mechanism. Maybe it makes it easier to maintain for them, or work with their cloud, or just to be standard with something. Its unlikely they were at all concerned about removing the ability for users to modify collections themselves.

There's always some hope they might make an update that allows it again. It seems very unlikely, but you could always email and ask them nicely

Davey101 · 11-17-2011, 03:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by meme

The only collection file the Kindle knows about is collections.json. Anything else is just a backup or temporary file from the plugin.

You say collections on the Kindle are not getting deleted? If you use Show Details when the plugin is done, does it list which collections are deleted/replaced correctly? If so, are you doing a Restart (not just a power off/on)?

Have you set the customization option to uncheck the box to preserve Kindle-Only collections? It might help to show your settings (in the Show Details report).

Thanks for the reply!

I had reason to delete my kindle library and start again today, so I used the plugin again with just one book copied to the device.

I didn't touch the plugin settings and I restarted the Kindle, as I had every time before, and this time it seemed to genuinely delete the empty collections. I don't know why it seemed it hadn't worked before.

Thanks again.

narflet · 11-19-2011, 01:07 PM

Just wanted to say a massive thanks for this plugin.

My kindle had been getting really slow recently and after some googling I came across a tip that said to use this plugin to edit kindle collections manually and remove any entries from collections that showed up as "book with no file". Am pleased to say it worked, and my kindle is back to operating at normal speed without needing to back-up all books, restore to factory settings, and then re-copy all books back on to my kindle & recreate my collections (as other suggestions online said to do).

It might not be what others use the plugin for, but it saved me hours of bother so thanks, and thanks again.

nynaevelan · 11-19-2011, 06:54 PM

Meme:

I know this doesn't help you with the plugin but I just read something on the Amazon plugins that state the collections info is saved in the Documents folder on the Touch. When looking in the Documents folder I noticed each book in a collection now has a sub-directory that is the name of the collection and then another sub-directory with the name of the book and an .sdr extension. For example: \Documents\Fantasy - Series\Against All Things Ending - Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, The - 03 -.sdr Now if only you can take your genius and create a Touch Collections plugin....

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11-15-2011, 04:40 PM	#1381
meme Sigil developer Posts: 1,274 Karma: 1101600 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: UK Device: Kindle PW, K4 NT, K3, Kobo Touch	Well, its always possible the Kindle Touch doesn't use the same collection system as the K4 non-touch or K3, in which case this plugin won't work. If the Kindle Touch doesn't use a file in the filesystem to store collections and read from it, then it will be very difficult to get this plugin to work. @haroldgh - creating collections manually on the Kindle and then looking for the file in the system directory or elsewhere is exactly what I was going to suggest. It may have a different name or be in a different location. Or the directory or file might be set to hidden and you need to set Windows explorer to show hidden files. Or it might require a Restart. But its possible its being stored in a way that can only be seen on the Kindle...

11-15-2011, 04:46 PM	#1382
abookreader Wizard Posts: 1,516 Karma: 2567610 Join Date: Oct 2009 Device: Kindles - Keyboard, Fire, 2-US, iPhone, iPAD	I can't find a thing. I did a reset to factory default and wiped it clean Then I downloaded the collections from my old K2 to the new Kindle via Amazon Whispersync Then I restarted The collections are on the Kindle Touch Screen But when I plug it in and open up Windows Exporer there is no collections.json file anywhere that I can find --- and I can't find any other likely suspect of a file other.

11-15-2011, 05:09 PM	#1383
haroldgh Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: kindle3	Yep, I couldn't find it anywhere. Can't you create collections in the kindle windows application and then sync those over now? That would work fine too. And again, worst case scenario, creating collections on the kindle touch is infinitely less painful than the kindle keyboard or kindle4 non-touch. I imagine the kindle4 non-touch would be particularly painful, but it works with the plug-in so it's all good.

11-15-2011, 05:45 PM	#1388
haroldgh Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: kindle3	They give you 5GB of storage, which is incredibly generous. I don't think they care.

11-16-2011, 10:22 AM	#1389
MamaSylvia Enthusiast Posts: 27 Karma: 124 Join Date: Mar 2011 Device: Droid 1, Kindle 3	> I'm guessing you really do want to use calibre to manage your Kindle collections, but just want to enter specific collection names and not create them based on author or series, etc. Right. I didn't realize the plugin used "edit manually" differently than I did. > So if you've already imported your collections from the kindle to calibre and made changes to the column, what you need to do now is use the Customize Plugin option to select 'Create' next to your column name so that the plugin knows which column to use. I have Calibre/customize plugin open in another window as I type, and I am confused. There is a "Create" option by every entry! I don't have my Amazon books in Calibre, and would prefer not to mess with doing so. I would like to leave the Amazon books in the collections they are in but just be able to add books from Calibre to the collections WITHOUT removing the Amazon books already there. Failing that, I could set up a special collection for the books I'm adding from Calibre if your plugin could set up that collection and add the Calibre books without disturbing books in the other collections.

11-17-2011, 09:36 AM	#1391
eddyj Junior Member Posts: 8 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2007 Device: Sony Reader 505, Kindle 2, 3, Touch	I just got my new Touch and the first thing I did was fire up Calibre and get all my books and collections on it. Well, just the books, it seems. I will be extraordinarily bummed out if I cannot get the collections on the Touch. Enough that I might have to give the shiny new Touch to my wife, and keep the K3. But I really don't want to have to do that.

11-17-2011, 10:32 AM	#1392
meme Sigil developer Posts: 1,274 Karma: 1101600 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: UK Device: Kindle PW, K4 NT, K3, Kobo Touch	So far that's the way it looks. It seems Amazon changed the way they manage collections on the Touch, removing the storing/reading of collection info from the visible filesystem probably into an internal storage mechanism. Maybe it makes it easier to maintain for them, or work with their cloud, or just to be standard with something. Its unlikely they were at all concerned about removing the ability for users to modify collections themselves. There's always some hope they might make an update that allows it again. It seems very unlikely, but you could always email and ask them nicely

11-19-2011, 01:07 PM	#1394
narflet Member Posts: 22 Karma: 20000 Join Date: Jun 2011 Device: Kindle Voyage, Kindle 3	Just wanted to say a massive thanks for this plugin. My kindle had been getting really slow recently and after some googling I came across a tip that said to use this plugin to edit kindle collections manually and remove any entries from collections that showed up as "book with no file". Am pleased to say it worked, and my kindle is back to operating at normal speed without needing to back-up all books, restore to factory settings, and then re-copy all books back on to my kindle & recreate my collections (as other suggestions online said to do). It might not be what others use the plugin for, but it saved me hours of bother so thanks, and thanks again.

11-19-2011, 06:54 PM	#1395
nynaevelan eBook Junkie Posts: 1,526 Karma: 1464018 Join Date: May 2010 Location: USA Device: Kindle Fire 2020, Kindle PW2	Meme: I know this doesn't help you with the plugin but I just read something on the Amazon plugins that state the collections info is saved in the Documents folder on the Touch. When looking in the Documents folder I noticed each book in a collection now has a sub-directory that is the name of the collection and then another sub-directory with the name of the book and an .sdr extension. For example: \Documents\Fantasy - Series\Against All Things Ending - Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, The - 03 -.sdr Now if only you can take your genius and create a Touch Collections plugin....