Aura HD Series information ?

[svda]

My Kobo Aura HD has firmware 3.12.0 (03-12-14)

I use calibre 3.15 and I use the Kobo plug-in(s).
I have series with correct numbering, but when I transfer the book in Calibre to my device it does not show, not even when I check the book details (long tap on cover). Same when I just copy a file from my calibre db manually to the device.

How do you people make it work so that you can see the correct order of books from a series when you list the books on your Aura HD?

PS I do not enter the sequence number in the booktitle, just in the series information.

[PeterT]

Two things

• I'm a long time believer in Metadata plugboards and use them to automatically "adjust" titles as books are sent via calibre to my Kobo to include series name and sequence in the title. I use
  

  Format: ePub
  Device: KOBOTOUCH
  Source Template: {series:re(([^\s])[^\s]+(\s|$),\1)}{series_index:0>2s| - | - }{title}
  Destination Field: title

  to change the title to start with an abbreviated version of the Series name and the sequence number (ie HP - 01 - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone)
• What option do you have set for Metadata Management in Sending books to devices? I believe that with Automatic that the calibre Kobo driver will add the series data to the book's database record on the Kobo connections AFTER the book has been sent to the device. (Can't do it on the initial send as the database row that needs to be updated does not yet exist).

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by svda

My Kobo Aura HD has firmware 3.12.0 (03-12-14)

I use calibre 3.15 and I use the Kobo plug-in(s).
I have series with correct numbering, but when I transfer the book in Calibre to my device it does not show, not even when I check the book details (long tap on cover). Same when I just copy a file from my calibre db manually to the device.

How do you people make it work so that you can see the correct order of books from a series when you list the books on your Aura HD?

PS I do not enter the sequence number in the booktitle, just in the series information.

I use davidfor's Kobo Utilities to send the series information. You need to have the book in the database on your Kobo before the series information can be added to the database. So my process is to have Calibre send the ebooks, disconnect and let the Kobo process them, reconnect and use Kobo Utilities to update the metadata for those ebooks, disconnect and the information should be there.You can also do a manual or automatic update of the metadata when you reconnect your Kobo but I find Kobo Utilities to be a better fit to my workflow.

As for the correct order, I used to add a series abbreviation and number to the book title when sending it to my Kobo. I haven't bothered with that since I have few series that are long enough that I need more than a couple of pages to list the series after a search and searching is how I currently look for books.

[svda]

Yes, you're right. I needed to select the books on the device and then update the device metadata for those records. I can now see all the series information. Thank you guys!

[fxp33]

Thank you for this very helpful thread guys.

(I hadn't used this feature for a long, long time)

Indeed, the process has to be done in two waves: 1) the book, 2) the data

Actually, instead of using the "update metadata" (which ended up in database corruption in the old days for me, happy to see it is flowless now folks!) you can also just re-send the books to the device.

Hope this helps.

Sincerly

François

[howyoudoin]

I'd like some clarification here too. I use the two step process to update series information on my H2O too. But while I can see the series information in my collections, I can't find a way for the device to order the books serial numberwise without prefixing the numbers to the titles (01 Philosopher's stoned, 02 Chamber of cigarettes etc...). Is there a way to get the device to order the books appropriately off the metadata without having to prefix those numbers (either manually or via metadata plugboards - doesn't matter)?

[PeterT]

At one time in the distant past, Kobo had a version of the firmware that DID look at the series data, and when a sort was done would display the books in series order.

Unfortunately, that feature was removed, so the only viable approach is to use a plugboard to "massage" the title as it is transferred to the device.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by fxp33

Thank you for this very helpful thread guys.

(I hadn't used this feature for a long, long time)

Indeed, the process has to be done in two waves: 1) the book, 2) the data

Actually, instead of using the "update metadata" (which ended up in database corruption in the old days for me, happy to see it is flowless now folks!) you can also just re-send the books to the device.

Just resending the books doesn't actually do anything. The firmware doesn't extract the series info from the books and it doesn't reprocess books that have been resent by calibre. The simplest way for the series info to be updated is with the appropriate options in calibre and the KoboTouch driver. When connected, the series info is check for all books and any that does not match the calibre library are updated in the database on the device. This doesn't touch the book files and only works for books that have been processed into the database on the device and in the calibre library.

[fxp33]

Originally Posted by davidfor

When connected, the series info is check for all books and any that does not match the calibre library are updated in the database on the device. This doesn't touch the book files and only works for books that have been processed into the database on the device and in the calibre library.

Oh, so just connecting again the device is enough for the series to be added?
This is even better!

Thank you David for the correction.

Regards
François