Calibre Companion minor issues - content server, micro sd card...

[TheoGeek]

I really love Calibre Companion (CC), and it would be pretty much perfect...if...

Issue #1:
I'm totally willing to accept that I'm just not setting something up correctly, but for the life of me, I can't figure out how to set up CC with Calibre's content server to download books to a folder structure that is like this:

{authors}/{series}/{series}-{series_index:0>2s}-{title}

I have the Android plugin set to use the folder "/mnt/extSdCard/eBooks" and I have the "save template" set to the string above. But, whenever I connect my Android phone via CC to the content server, all downloaded books go to "/mnt/extSdCard/eBooks" and not to a folder structure specified by the "save template".

Am I putting the template in the wrong place or am I trying to do something impossible?

Issue #2:
Given my setup in issue #1, I am able to use Calibre to send books to my Android phone when it is connected as a wireless device. That works awesome, except that I want to use my micro SD card and the Calibre option "Send to storage card A" is grayed out. It works fine when I connect via the USB cable.

I got around this by setting the path in the Android plugin for "main memory" to "/mnt/extSdCard/eBooks" which basically forces it to look on the SD card. The only issue is that all the books show up in Calibre as being loaded to "Main" memory when actually they are on the SD card.

Whew!

Thanks for any help!
Jeff

[DoctorOhh]

Welcome to Mobileread.

Originally Posted by TheoGeek

Issue #1:
I'm totally willing to accept that I'm just not setting something up correctly, but for the life of me, I can't figure out how to set up CC with Calibre's content server to download books to a folder structure that is like this
...~~~...
Am I putting the template in the wrong place or am I trying to do something impossible?

I'm afraid you are trying to do something impossible.

I may be wrong, but I'm relatively sure that there is no Save template for the Content server. Any app or browser will simply download the file to wherever you tell it to.

Originally Posted by TheoGeek

Issue #2:
Given my setup in issue #1, I am able to use Calibre to send books to my Android phone when it is connected as a wireless device. That works awesome, except that I want to use my micro SD card and the Calibre option "Send to storage card A" is grayed out. It works fine when I connect via the USB cable.

The option of where to send the books is within Calibre Companion. While in the App if you go to Preferences (3 dots) - Settings - Book formats and folders it allows you to specify exactly where a given book format will be placed. The Calibre Companion FAQ has a section on how to designate where books will be placed on your device. At the end of the section there is a description of how to point to the SD card.

[TheoGeek]

I'm afraid you are trying to do something impossible.

Yeah, that's what I thought. Bummer, but nothing I can't work around.

The option of where to send the books is within Calibre Companion. While in the App if you go to Preferences (3 dots) - Settings - Book formats and folders it allows you to specify exactly where a given book format will be placed. The Calibre Companion FAQ has a section on how to designate where books will be placed on your device. At the end of the section there is a description of how to point to the SD card.

Yeah, the files are getting sent to the SD card exactly as I want, but they show up in Calibre's "Device" column as being in "Main". Again, not a big deal because they are where I want them on my SD card, and the fact that Calibre shows that they are on my device is really what matters. The OCD engineer in me wants it to say "Storage A" though...

Thanks for the help! I changed the "Android" plugin back to have Main storage actually be the main storage. Given what you said, it evidently wasn't even using that setting.

Thanks again!
Jeff.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by TheoGeek

Yeah, that's what I thought. Bummer, but nothing I can't work around.



Yeah, the files are getting sent to the SD card exactly as I want, but they show up in Calibre's "Device" column as being in "Main". Again, not a big deal because they are where I want them on my SD card, and the fact that Calibre shows that they are on my device is really what matters. The OCD engineer in me wants it to say "Storage A" though...

Thanks for the help! I changed the "Android" plugin back to have Main storage actually be the main storage. Given what you said, it evidently wasn't even using that setting.

Thanks again!
Jeff.

CC only has 1 place called Main, no matter where it is

[chaley]

Originally Posted by DoctorOhh

I'm afraid you are trying to do something impossible.

I may be wrong, but I'm relatively sure that there is no Save template for the Content server. Any app or browser will simply download the file to wherever you tell it to.

You are not wrong.

The content server tells any client (including CC) the name of the file containing the book and its "type" (format). It is up to the client to work out what to do with that information. Most browsers ask for a destination file name. Because CC has the book's metadata (it gets this in a separate request), it can construct a file name that makes sense for the book, specifically "title - author.format" and avoid bothering the user. It them goes through a pass to be sure that there isn't already a different book with that name on the device.

I have considered changing calibre's content server to evaluate a template and provide that result along with the book's metadata. The template would be defined in one of the preferences screens. The problem here is that CC would be the only client to use it, which would create no end of confusion for non-CC users. Confusion leads to bug reports and chatter. I considered making it a tweak, but then no one would find it and it would be wasted effort. The only thing I have thought of that avoids all of this is to enter the template in CC and pass it to the content server, but then errors in the template would be almost impossible to debug. Sigh.

FWIW: I actually go the other way and use the "use the book's ID as the filename" option. The filenames are unrelated to the book (a string of digits), but I don't care because CC knows what they are. Using this option lets Moon+ sync my reading position across all 4 of my devices, no matter how the book gets to the device (wireless device or content server). It is so nice to turn on my phone when on a bus and have it automatically go to the page I was last reading on my N7.

[TheoGeek]

Because CC has the book's metadata (it gets this in a separate request), it can construct a file name that makes sense for the book, specifically "title - author.format" and avoid bothering the user.

So, could CC have an option like using "/author/title/series/some_book_title"? I hadn't really thought of using the book's ID as a filename - that would pretty much take care of it. I just have to get over my mild OCD of needing everything sorted like I want. I should just start using Calibre Companion as the organizer and forget about needing the files on the SD card being sorted as if I didn't have a database.

Especially seeing as how every reader I use integrates with CC.

Thanks guys for the help!
Jeff.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by TheoGeek

So, could CC have an option like using "/author/title/series/some_book_title"?

Yes, but why that one other than it is the one you want? Why not "series/author/title"? or "author/series/title"? Or "#genre/author/title". Or ...

Very quickly we would need calibre's template and file path generation systems, which aren't something that I want to port to CC.

Thanks guys for the help!
Jeff.

You are welcome.