Some newbie questions

[Lunaaa]

Hi

I just bought a Kobo Aura H2O 2nd edition and I don't understand much.

tl;dr: I want a hierarchical file structure on my Kobo device with the file names showing up like on my PC and I want a tagging system and search for tags on my Kobo within that file structure.

Long version:
It told me to download a desktop app for my PC, did that and now what?
I don't want to buy any of those books there. I just want to copy my existing file structure from my Windows PC to the reader. But this app doesn't allow me to drag and drop stuff. So I just copied my A:/ partition, which contains a well organized structure whit many subfolders, to the Kobo device when plugged in. I just opened Kobo in the explorer when the device is plugged in and copied everything in there. To me that seems a bit dilettanthish and not the way it should be done(?) Anyway, the documents show up on the reader after that, but there is no file structure on my ereader and the names of the files do not correspond with the names on my PC all the time. Seems like it's using some metadata to choose the filename on the reader and not the name I gave to the file in the explorer.

I tried Calibre, but I don't see the point of that programm. Yes, it let's me rename the book and the author and will be shown on the ereader just like that, but it copies every book into it's own files with no hierarchy at all. If I used it, then I would have my own A:/ partition and a separate Calibre direction with the same data, but no hierarchy. Just a waste of space. (I know I must be wrong judging Calibre as useless, but so far I don't get the benefits of that programm).

I heard of koreader, but in the forum it said that I have to install Kobo Start Menu 09 first and that is not available for my reader (yet?) (see here https://github.com/koreader/koreader...n-Kobo-devices and then here https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=293804 in the first post). Might that solve my problems? Again, I just want my file structure and my file names displayed on the reader. Basically, my reader should look like the Windows Explorer.

An additional benefit would be a tagging system. I have seen that in Calibre, but when I transfer the books with Calibre on my reader, I don't see how that tagging is useful. I can't search for tags, only title, author or series (whatever the last one is).

I've seen this article (https://manual.calibre-ebook.com/sub_groups.html). But I'm too dumb to understand it.

[boriar]

@Lunaaa
Sorry but Kobo software haven't any file structure to show the books, and also no filename is show in any way. You can consider "collections" in your kobo library like tags because you can put any books in all the collections you want (i.e. "Terror", "SiFi", "Asimov",...) and search through they or apply a filter. For this job you can use Calibre on your PC (more easy than in Kobo device).

About KOReader and KSM09, last one work well in H2O2 v1 but not in v2 (you must see that).
Alternatively, you can install KFmon to use KOReader from Kobo software.

[Mrs_Often]

Congrats on your new Aura H2O2!

Kobo firmware ignores any file structure, as you’ve discovered. The Series you can search for means book series, e.g. Harry Potter 1/7; Harry Potter 2/7 etc. Calibre is very useful in adding series information to the book metadata and having it displayed on the Kobo device.

There is another sorting/structuring option: a “shelves” system that used to be called shelves but is now called “Collections”. You can either manually add books to Collections on the device, or have Calibre automatically assign books to Collections in the device in several different ways. (E.g. you can make a custom column in Calibre and have that be the Collections column where you enter the column name you want; or you can have Calibre make a column based on book genre or from data from other pre-existing column etc.)

As I see it, you have two options:

1. You keep your file structure and use KOReader (I don’t know about incompatibility, but I can’t imagine there’s not a version that would work with H2O2.)

2. You spend a little time with Calibre and set up Collections instead of using your file structure


I strongly recommend the latter, Calibre is very powerful in all sorts of ways and as your library grows, Calibre will be much easier to work with than Windows Explorer and a file structure with ever growing file paths...


EDIT: Ah I see boriar beat me to it... oh yes and just to add: you don’t need the Kobo Desktop software indeed, unless you don’t want to use WiFi for updates.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

I just bought a Kobo Aura H2O 2nd edition and I don't understand much.

tl;dr: I want a hierarchical file structure on my Kobo device with the file names showing up like on my PC and I want a tagging system and search for tags on my Kobo within that file structure.

Why bother worrying about a file structure? It's just so 20th century. Even under Linux and using symlinks * , search on the PC using calibre or on the Kobo using it's search functionality was a lot faster than clicking/tapping my way through a directory tree. Koreader will use the calibre metadata files stored on your Kobo for searching but under than trying it a few times for .pdf files, I find no real advantage for me in not using the default Kobo software.

* I played with symlinks to allow multiple links to a single book by series, multiple authors and genres without needing duplicate files. Basically, it wasn't worth the effort.

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

Long version:
So I just copied my A:/ partition, which contains a well organized structure whit many subfolders, to the Kobo device when plugged in. I just opened Kobo in the explorer when the device is plugged in and copied everything in there. To me that seems a bit dilettanthish and not the way it should be done(?) Anyway, the documents show up on the reader after that, but there is no file structure on my ereader and the names of the files do not correspond with the names on my PC all the time. Seems like it's using some metadata to choose the filename on the reader and not the name I gave to the file in the explorer.

Your Kobo uses the metadata embedded in the file unless there is none so renaming your files does little good. Calibre lets you modify that metadata, add series information, update the covers, etc. After getting good metadata, either Polish (builtin calibre function) or use the Modify Epub plugin to update the metadata in the books. Then copy the ebooks to your Kobo and be a happy reader. It takes a while to go through your initial collection but once that is over, updating the metadata is just part of my workflow.

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

I tried Calibre, but I don't see the point of that programm. Yes, it let's me rename the book and the author and will be shown on the ereader just like that, but it copies every book into it's own files with no hierarchy at all. If I used it, then I would have my own A:/ partition and a separate Calibre direction with the same data, but no hierarchy. Just a waste of space. (I know I must be wrong judging Calibre as useless, but so far I don't get the benefits of that programm).

Given the capabilities of calibre when it comes to managing your ebooks, I am quite happy to live with it's directory schema. Why worry about a pretty but essentially useless directory structure when, for instance, I want to pull up every book in David Weber's Honorverse. Enter the search term in calibre and the results are there (I do have a custom column for hierarchial series). Try doing this with a directory structure considering that that set of books encompasses 5 series, 12 authors and 35 books plus several short stories/novellas.

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

I heard of koreader, but in the forum it said that I have to install Kobo Start Menu 09 first and that is not available for my reader (yet?) (see here https://github.com/koreader/koreader...n-Kobo-devices and then here https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=293804 in the first post). Might that solve my problems? Again, I just want my file structure and my file names displayed on the reader. Basically, my reader should look like the Windows Explorer.

You could try Kute File Monitor: A smarter file-trigger based launcher as an alternative to KSM 09. Personally, I no longer see any benefit to having a file structure when search is easier and faster while not requiring hopeless complexity to try to cover all possibilities.

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

An additional benefit would be a tagging system. I have seen that in Calibre, but when I transfer the books with Calibre on my reader, I don't see how that tagging is useful. I can't search for tags, only title, author or series (whatever the last one is).

You can use tags to create collections on your Kobo. A collection for an author, a collection for a series, etc. No issues with placing books in multiple collections. As for series? It's hard to understand anyone who has read any books in the last 50+ years not knowing about series. You know, when authors write multiple books in a set or publishers generate a set of books based on a common theme.

Multiple series wrapped in spoiler tags to cut down the need to read:

Spoiler:

These are series which I have read one or more books in the last 4 months:

J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.
E. E. "Doc" Smith's Lensman and Skylark of Space.
Eric Flint's Ring of Fire series (what is the word for a series with 35 books in it? trigintaquintology?).
J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter.
J. D. Robb's In Death.
Robert Heinlein's Future History and Lazarus Long.
Terry Pratchett's Discworld.
Winston Churchill's The Second World War.
C. S. Lewis' Narnia.
Isaac Asimov's Foundation and Robot.
Anne McCaffrey The Dragonriders of Pern.
George R. R. Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice.
Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire aka Sookie Stackhouse aka True Blood.
David Eddings' Belgariad and Malloreon.
Douglas Adam's A Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

And two series I haven't read in quite a while but have the dead tree books in a box ready to donate to a local daycare.
Stan and Jan Berenstain's Berenstain Bears.
Paulette Bourgeois' Franklin the Turtle.
My kids loved those series before they got old enough for Goosebumps (yet another series).

Once again, calibre will allow you to add that metadata to your books and transfer it to your Kobo ereader.

Originally Posted by Lunaaa

I've seen this article (https://manual.calibre-ebook.com/sub_groups.html). But I'm too dumb to understand it.

Start using calibre, get some experience with it and refer to the manual once you've had that experience. Much of the manual needs that hands on experience to be able to understand what the author was trying to say.

Just don't muck around in the calibre library structure. It's designed that way for good reasons and I suspect few people in these forums are up to arguing with Kovid Goyal about his design decisions.