Kindle Fire .mobi issues

[willthethrill521]

1). "cover not specified"...
where do I specify the cover img? I have all my imgs specified in the OPF but do I need a <reference> tag to get the cover img to show up on the device?

2). When i upload the .mobi to the device it shows up under Docs, not Books like it is supposed to. Is this due to my .mobi having warnings?

please and thank you =]

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by willthethrill521

1). "cover not specified"...
where do I specify the cover img? I have all my imgs specified in the OPF but do I need a <reference> tag to get the cover img to show up on the device?

2). When i upload the .mobi to the device it shows up under Docs, not Books like it is supposed to. Is this due to my .mobi having warnings?

please and thank you =]

Throw the book into Calibre and choose your cover then you sideload it onto the Fire. If you want it to show in books you will need to do a mobi to mobi conversion removing pdoc tag in the mobi options so KF will see it as a book.

[wallcraft]

If you send your MOBI to the Fire via Amazon's e-mail service it will show up under Docs. If you side-load the MOBI via USB, into either the Books or the Documents folder, it might show up under Books or under Docs. This depends on whether the MOBI has the PDOC metadata tag or not.

For a cover to show up you need a cover entry in the OPF file. How this is specified depends on which tool you use to generate the MOBI.

I find Calibre to be the easiest way to manage ebooks. If you started from HTML or an ePub, you could import this into Calibre and have it convert to MOBI for you (after selecting a cover and getting the metadata right). If you only have a MOBI, import that and do a MOBI to MOBI conversion. Then connect your Fire by USB and Calibre will detect it and give you an opportunity to copy whichever ebooks you want to the Fire. You may want to blank out the "Personal Doc tag" under Preferences -> Output Options -> MOBI, but I have not found this to be necessary.

[Skydog]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

If you send your MOBI to the Fire via Amazon's e-mail service it will show up under Docs. If you side-load the MOBI via USB, into either the Books or the Documents folder, it might show up under Books or under Docs. This depends on whether the MOBI has the PDOC metadata tag or not.

For a cover to show up you need a cover entry in the OPF file. How this is specified depends on which tool you use to generate the MOBI.

I find Calibre to be the easiest way to manage ebooks. If you started from HTML or an ePub, you could import this into Calibre and have it convert to MOBI for you (after selecting a cover and getting the metadata right). If you only have a MOBI, import that and do a MOBI to MOBI conversion. Then connect your Fire by USB and Calibre will detect it and give you an opportunity to copy whichever ebooks you want to the Fire. You may want to blank out the "Personal Doc tag" under Preferences -> Output Options -> MOBI, but I have not found this to be necessary.

I have always left the Calibre default of [PDOC] in the tag(s) and my converted .mobis always show up on the bookshelf-- on my Fire, my Xoom and phone. They have never appeared under Documents.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Skydog

I have always left the Calibre default of [PDOC] in the tag(s) and my converted .mobis always show up on the bookshelf-- on my Fire, my Xoom and phone. They have never appeared under Documents.

If you use a non Kindle Profile then it doesn't add the pdoc tag.

[willthethrill521]

I am building my ebooks from scratch. I make the epub (attempt to make the epub mobi convert ready) then use kindlegen to get the mobi. I am trying to make converting to mobi a streamline process without many steps because I have a large amount of files that I have to convert. I have tried using calibre and it doesnt get the job done as well as when i use the kindlegen alone.

When is the PDOC tag generated into the mobi?
Can I put a prevention tag in my epub's opf to negate the PDOC tag from being created?

@wallcraft-
where and what type of tag would i have to to insert into the opf to get the cover img to show up?
an example of an opf would be awesome if you could provide =]

ty

[Skydog]

Originally Posted by Blossom

If you use a non Kindle Profile then it doesn't add the pdoc tag.

My point is that with a [PDOC] tag, and Kindle DX selected as the profile, my .mobi books display on the bookshelf as they should -- they do not display in documents.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Skydog

My point is that with a [PDOC] tag, and Kindle DX selected as the profile, my .mobi books display on the bookshelf as they should -- they do not display in documents.

Maybe DX doesn't use that tag? It's a Kindle 2. I don't have a Kindle 2 so I don't know if Personal documents are the same on the 2 as the 3, 4, 5 and 6. Maybe DD would know? Or maybe Calibre only adds the tag starting at Kindle 3.

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by willthethrill521

where and what type of tag would i have to to insert into the opf to get the cover img to show up?

For kindlegen, Amazon has the following recommendation (from their Publishing forum)

Kindlegen does not have a way to distinguish a image at the front from a normal image in the book, and does not treat the same as a cover image. If you want a particular image to be treated as a cover image, please use the syntax, within the head of the HTML file

<meta name="cover" content="<url>">

Here's <url> is the location of the image with respect to the HTML file.
Kindlegen will uniquely recognize the image as a cover image, and function accordingly

For the .opf approach, see The Cover Page from mobipocket's documentaion for prcgen - which presumably still works with kindlegen.

[willthethrill521]

I have inserted the cover meta tag into the opf and i keep getting:
"Warning(prcgen):W14016: Cover not specified"

I downloaded the Amazon Kindle Procedure Guidelines pdf and followed their direction.
I am hoping that when I get the cover image working that the mobi will show up in the 'books' tab on the Fire. It is the only warning i have after the conversion.
Take a look at my opf and tell me what you guys think:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<package xmlns="http://www.idpf.org/2007/opf" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" unique-identifier="bookid" version="2.0">
<metadata>

<meta name="cover" content="images/cover.jpeg" />

<dc:title>Document Title</dc:title>
<dc:creator>Author</dc:creator>
<dc:subject>Keywaords</dc:subject>
<dc:description>Description</dc:description>
<dcublisher>Add Publisher Entry</dcublisher>
<dc:date/>
<dc:source/>
<dc:relation/>
<dc:coverage/>
<dc:rights>Copyright Notice</dc:rights>
<dc:identifier id="bookid">urn:uuid:b54b68dd-6192-0aa0-2309-237e3ab3e059</dc:identifier>
<dc:language>en</dc:language>
</metadata>
<manifest>



<!-- Content Documents -->
<item id="cover" href="cover.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-001" href="section-001.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-002" href="section-002.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-003" href="section-003.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-004" href="section-004.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-005" href="section-005.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-006" href="section-006.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-007" href="section-007.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-008" href="section-008.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-009" href="section-009.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-010" href="section-010.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-011" href="section-011.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-012" href="section-012.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-013" href="section-013.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-014" href="section-014.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-015" href="section-015.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-016" href="section-016.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>
<item id="section-017" href="section-017.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml"/>

<!-- CSS -->
<item id="css" href="ah1.css" media-type="text/css"/>


<!-- NCX -->
<item id="ncx" href="toc.ncx" media-type="application/x-dtbncx+xml"/>

<!-- TOC -->
<item id="toc" href="toc.html" media-type="text/html"/>

<!-- Cover -->
<item id="cover.xhtml" href="cover.xhtml" media-type="application/xhtml+xml" />

<!-- Images -->
<item id="FD000001-1.jpeg" href="images/FD000001-1.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="cover.jpeg" href="images/cover.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header1.jpeg" href="images/header1.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header2.jpeg" href="images/header2.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header3.jpeg" href="images/header3.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header4.jpeg" href="images/header4.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header5.jpeg" href="images/header5.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header6.jpeg" href="images/header6.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header7.jpeg" href="images/header7.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header8.jpeg" href="images/header8.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header9.jpeg" href="images/header9.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header10.jpeg" href="images/header10.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header11.jpeg" href="images/header11.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header12.jpeg" href="images/header12.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header13.jpeg" href="images/header13.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header14.jpeg" href="images/header14.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header15.jpeg" href="images/header15.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header16.jpeg" href="images/header16.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>
<item id="header17.jpeg" href="images/header17.jpeg" media-type="image/jpeg"/>

</manifest>
<spine toc="ncx">
<itemref idref="cover" linear="no"/>
<itemref idref="toc" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-001" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-002" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-003" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-004" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-005" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-006" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-007" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-008" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-009" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-010" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-011" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-012" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-013" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-014" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-015" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-016" linear="yes"/>
<itemref idref="section-017" linear="yes"/>

</spine>

<guide>
<reference type="toc" title="Table of Contents" href="toc.html"/>
<reference type="cover" title="Cover Image" href="cover.xhtml" />
</guide>

</package>

[salsaguy]

I just got my son a Kindle Touch and I was using Calibre to add covers to change out the ugly default ones from the Project Guttenberg ones.
But I noticed after I sent the Kindle mobi file to the Touch thru Calibre, the cover was still the old one on SOME of the books

Any idea why it didnt work all the time?

[st_albert]

Originally Posted by willthethrill521

I have inserted the cover meta tag into the opf and i keep getting:
"Warning(prcgen):W14016: Cover not specified"

I downloaded the Amazon Kindle Procedure Guidelines pdf and followed their direction.
I am hoping that when I get the cover image working that the mobi will show up in the 'books' tab on the Fire. It is the only warning i have after the conversion.
Take a look at my opf and tell me what you guys think:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<package xmlns="http://www.idpf.org/2007/opf" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" unique-identifier="bookid" version="2.0">
<metadata>

<meta name="cover" content="images/cover.jpeg" />

<dc:title>Document Title</dc:title>
<dc:creator>Author</dc:creator>

[snip]

<guide>
<reference type="toc" title="Table of Contents" href="toc.html"/>
<reference type="cover" title="Cover Image" href="cover.xhtml" />
</guide>

</package>

Based on the <meta name="cover" entry, shouldn't the <guide> item read:

<reference type="cover" title="Cover Image" href="images/cover.jpg" /> ?

if you also have a cover.xhtml file, remove it. Otherwise you'll get two cover images in your mobi file.

[willthethrill521]

@st_albert
That was it! THANK YOU
I have the cover image working and my mobi's are being made with no warnings =]

The only concern I have left now is that my mobi's dont show up in the books tab on the device. I do know that it is because of the [PDOC] tag. Whenever I use Calibre to remove it my mobi goes to books like it is supposed to, BUT Calibre destroys the layout of the book and makes it unreadable...
So, I am looking for a way to remove the [PDOC] tag WITHOUT using Calibre.
Is that possible?

[Skydog]

Originally Posted by willthethrill521

@st_albert
That was it! THANK YOU
I have the cover image working and my mobi's are being made with no warnings =]

The only concern I have left now is that my mobi's dont show up in the books tab on the device. I do know that it is because of the [PDOC] tag. Whenever I use Calibre to remove it my mobi goes to books like it is supposed to, BUT Calibre destroys the layout of the book and makes it unreadable...
So, I am looking for a way to remove the [PDOC] tag
WITHOUT using Calibre.
Is that possible?

I have never removed the [PDOC] tag prior to conversion and my mobi files always appear on the bookshelf. The only changes I have made are: Convert -> Page Setup -> Output format = Kindle DX (Input format = Default Input Profile).

Try it and see if it works for you.

[st_albert]

Originally Posted by willthethrill521

@st_albert
That was it! THANK YOU
I have the cover image working and my mobi's are being made with no warnings =]

The only concern I have left now is that my mobi's dont show up in the books tab on the device. I do know that it is because of the [PDOC] tag. Whenever I use Calibre to remove it my mobi goes to books like it is supposed to, BUT Calibre destroys the layout of the book and makes it unreadable...
So, I am looking for a way to remove the [PDOC] tag WITHOUT using Calibre.
Is that possible?

I don't know what to say about the PDOC tag. I create my mobi's via kindlegen, and they side-load into the kindle (A K3, btw) just like any book. Maybe you can get more knowledgeable help in the Calibre forum, though.

If you really want to get down-and-dirty with the mobi format, check out "mobiunpack" in the mobi forum. It's a python script that lets you unpack the mobi file so you can see what's in it and modify it if desired.