Alternatives to Calibre?

[kacir]

Originally Posted by joblack

I have to agree. The user interface is one of the worst I have seen so far.

Calibre interface was one of things that held me back from using it for other things than conversion and sending books to PRS-500 for quite a long time. Fortunatelly, today you can replace that icon bar at the top with a menu, so I can customize it to my liking

Originally Posted by joblack

I'm still not able to control Calibre (e.g. Calibre still wants to sync everything to an E-Book Reader connected with an USB cable).

The solution is very easy.
Go to the Preferences, Plugins, Device Interface Plugins and disable all the plugins you see there.

I asked our local Calibre gurus some time ago, how to prevent Calibre from connecting to my reader every time I connect it and somebody pointed me there. I was very happy ... You see, I like to organize books on my reader the way *I* like it, using custom templates and 'save to disk'. I know, I know there are plugboards that I could use when connecting to device that haven't fully utilized yet.

By the way, have a look at plugins. If you disable the html2zip plugin, Calibre will not try to convert a single html file to a html.zip file when adding a book.
Then there are interesting plugins you can istall.

Calibre is *very* modular, so you can tweak, enable, disable or easily change [by editing a python script for plugin somewhere] quite a few things.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by kacir

Opps ... right.
You would have to go into the directory manually, remove the copied file and replace it with a symlink. Sigh ...

The symlink wont survive any changes via modify, polish, tweak, sigil, PDF annotations etc etc

Turn the idea on its head - link calibres folder schema into your folder schema.

BR

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Mex5150

So I have three options the way I see it:
1) Wait for Calibre to come out on Android.
2) Sift through an increadly badly designed file structure every time I need to find something.

In my early post I gave you ways of mimicking the exact file structure you want for use in Dropbox on your phone because that is what you were directly asking for. However if your concern is quickly and easily finding something on your phone to read then I should have suggested Calibre Companion as an alternative to crudely navigating any file structure to find what you are looking for on your Android phone.

I have 2112 books on my Android tablet and have only a vague idea of the file structure they are in. I use Calibre Companion to quickly find and launch (using the reader app of my choosing) any book in my library. Much easier than stumbling through a file structure on the small screen device.



** The rest of this post is Off Topic **

...... ...... ......

Originally Posted by joblack

I have to agree. The user interface is one of the worst I have seen so far.

Who the heck are you agreeing with? No one in this entire thread has discussed the merits of the UI. Certainly not the person you quoted. This thread is talking about file structure, book location and alternative software or methods to achieve the OP's goals. We do not need someone coming in and trolling on a completely off topic subject.

If you have anything constructive to say about the UI then start a new thread.

Originally Posted by joblack

I'm still not able to control Calibre (e.g. Calibre still wants to sync everything to an E-Book Reader connected with an USB cable).

I'm not sure what point you are trying to make, but as an old commercial used to state "there's an App for that" in this case Android App Calibre Companion. I haven't connected my tablet to calibre via a USB cable since I bought it last August.

Any further off topic discussion will have to take place in a new thread.

[iamosam]

Slightly OFFTOPIC:

Originally Posted by HFC3

"Monopoly" - Calibre doesn't have a monopoly. No-one else has written anything close to accomplishing what Calibre does. How can it t be a monopoly if it's the only product of it's kind available?

May be time for a 'basic economics' crash course?

"A monopoly is an enterprise that is the only seller of a good or service."

Calibre is a monopoly if and only if it is the only product of its kind available. If there were any other products available, it wouldn't really be a monopoly.

Also, a monopoly is a monopoly irrespective of the way the enterprise achieve or maintain it (i.e. their competitive attitude/practices). So irrespective of the good/bad intentions or encouragement of its developers for forking/developing alternative products, calibre is still a monopoly.

And to all those who said "No one is forcing you to use calibre", well (unfortunately) a monopoly 'effectively' does just that. They control the market and they detect the terms, irrespective of market sentiments.

Unless and until an alternative product comes into the picture, no one really knows how bad the market needs really are.

[Adoby]

Originally Posted by iamosam

Slightly OFFTOPIC:
"A monopoly is an enterprise that is the only seller of a good or service."

Since calibre/Kovid isn't a seller of a good or service, but give calibre away freely, and even allow anyone to also copy and modify calbre and give it again, can that definition of monopoly really be said to be relevant?

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by iamosam

Slightly OFFTOPIC:



May be time for a 'basic economics' crash course?

"A monopoly is an enterprise that is the only seller of a good or service."

Calibre is a monopoly if and only if it is the only product of its kind available. If there were any other products available, it wouldn't really be a monopoly.

Also, a monopoly is a monopoly irrespective of the way the enterprise achieve or maintain it (i.e. their competitive attitude/practices). So irrespective of the good/bad intentions or encouragement of its developers for forking/developing alternative products, calibre is still a monopoly.

And to all those who said "No one is forcing you to use calibre", well (unfortunately) a monopoly 'effectively' does just that. They control the market and they detect the terms, irrespective of market sentiments.

Unless and until an alternative product comes into the picture, no one really knows how bad the market needs really are.

But there are other products, they are listed in an earlier post.

The fact that a product has a dominant position an open market does not make it a monopoly, and achieving market dominance by offering a superior product and/or services is not a crime or malfeasance. Indeed it is a cornerstone of capitalism and free markets. And it's those forces that have lifted more people out of poverty in the last 25 years than anything in the prior 5,000 years.

However, you are also free make a complaint to Eric Holder at the US DoJ or Joaquín Almunia at the EUC or the anti-trust authorities in a country or province of your choosing - good luck with that; watch out for the laws regarding making frivolous claims.

BR

My preferred Definition of a Monopoly

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by iamosam

May be time for a 'basic economics' crash course?

"A monopoly is an enterprise that is the only seller of a good or service."

Calibre is a monopoly if and only if it is the only product of its kind available. If there were any other products available, it wouldn't really be a monopoly.

Dude.. You need to go back to school, because you have *no* idea what a monopoly is.

exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices.

Just because calibre is the best product in it's slot doesn't make it a monopoly.

[iamosam]

Originally Posted by Adoby

Since calibre/Kovid isn't a seller of a good or service, but give calibre away freely, and even allow anyone to also copy and modify calbre and give it again, can that definition of monopoly really be said to be relevant?

A seller has a broad meaning in this context. It is the 'provider' of the product or service. A charity can be a monopoly.

Originally Posted by BetterRed

But there are other products, they are listed in an earlier post.

If there are other products, it isn't a 'pure' monopoly, but nevertheless a monopoly as long as it controls the majority of the market (and in calibre's case almost all of it). Microsoft was declared a monopoly when Apple, linux and unix systems were available in the market.

Originally Posted by BetterRed

The fact that a product has a dominant position an open market does not make it a monopoly...

Sure it does. "a product for which there are no close substitutes and in which significant barriers to entry prevent other firms from entering the market". Remember Microsoft? That was in an open market. Others could have built better OSes (actually some did) but it is still a monopoly.

Originally Posted by BetterRed

...and achieving market dominance by offering a superior product and/or services is not a crime or malfeasance...

I never said so, anywhere in my post. As long as you accept it is a monopoly, I am fine.

Originally Posted by BetterRed

However, you are also free make a complaint to Eric Holder at the US DoJ or Joaquín Almunia at the EUC or the anti-trust authorities in a country or province of your choosing - good luck with that; watch out for the laws regarding making frivolous claims.

That was just stupid/silly of you to end your comment with that, after making a good attempt at (what I thought) a genuine debate. No comments.

Calibre has complete control of the market and it is a monopoly in every sense of the word.

[kovidgoyal]

What utter crap, quoting you:

If there are other products, it isn't a 'pure' monopoly, but nevertheless a monopoly as long as it controls the majority of the market

Calibre has complete control of the market and it is a monopoly in every sense of the word.

"a product for which there are no close substitutes and in which significant barriers to entry prevent other firms from entering the market"

Make up your mind. Which is it? Does it have pure monopoly, a majority monopoly or a monopoly because there are "significant" (and I might add imaginary) barriers to entry. Feel free to keep defining monopoly to mean whatever you want it to mean, I will feel just as free to do the same.

[chaley]

@iamosam:

Re monopoly:

1. Calibre is a product ("good or service" in economic terms), not a provider of a product. There is no definition of monopoly that I know of where the good or service is the monopoly. It is the provider of the good or service that is the monopolist, having the monopoly on the good or service being provided.

2. Given the above, one must argue that Kovid is a monopolist. That would be fallacious, because to be a monopolist he must have exclusive control over the product (amongst other things), and he does not because he voluntarily gave it away. Anyone who wants to "produce" and "distribute" the "calibre product" is free to do so. Further, such a person can distribute it with or without modification and with or without the calibre name, meaning that the only barriers to entry are getting known and accepting the GPL license.

3. Calibre is not alone in the ebook management market. Some competing products were provided above. I suspect that neither Apple nor Amazon would agree that calibre has a monopoly on ebook management software, and their millions of users who have no idea that calibre exists would agree.

[EowynCarter]

Do be honest I did try to find an other software, couldn't find anything worthwhile, at least on Linux.

If someone have clues there, i'll gladly take them.

[Ravensknight]

Wow, what a trollolicious thread!

What I don't understand is the attitude of "I don't like this, YOU should fix it and make it work the way I want it to" but they won't lift a finger to help, either programming or money wise...

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by Ravensknight

Wow, what a trollolicious thread!

What I don't understand is the attitude of "I don't like this, YOU should fix it and make it work the way I want it to" but they won't lift a finger to help, either programming or money wise...

For once we where able to have some real discussion en the topic. Please...

[kaleissin]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

One drawback with symlinks is - if the target path changes then the link is broken - I don't know of anything that will jump in and repair the link for you. There are utilities that will find and report broken links and others that will allow you to define a new target to effect a repair.

Use hardlinks, when possible (on the same partition, that is). When renaming an author or book, calibre could:

1) Make new dir
2) Hardlink file, which now exists simultaneously in two places
3) Delete original dir

If you want to have the same book in two places, do the same: make a hardlink to the book from the new, better place (on the same partition). Even better: use inotify to automatically create the hardlinks whenever something changes in the calibre dir.

Now of course, your OS might not have either hardlinks or inotify, but that's what I would do if I did care about the looks of the database.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by kaleissin

Use hardlinks, when possible (on the same partition, that is). When renaming an author or book, calibre could:

1) Make new dir
2) Hardlink file, which now exists simultaneously in two places
3) Delete original dir

Pretty sure that is what calibre does on NTFS and EXT4, and I assume HFS+. IIRC when you rename an NTFS folder that's what it does - you have to go out of your way to get it do anything other than that. And I would bet that EXT4 and HFS+ are similar - given they all share a common heritage.

Originally Posted by kaleissin

If you want to have the same book in two places, do the same: make a hardlink to the book from the new, better place (on the same partition). Even better: use inotify to automatically create the hardlinks whenever something changes in the calibre dir.

Now of course, your OS might not have either hardlinks or inotify, but that's what I would do if I did care about the looks of the database.

Actually, I am not one of those who wants to access the book files in two places.

I have no technical, emotional, philosophical or ideological hangups about accessing the files via means other than the Calibre GUI in the Calibre folder hierarchy as it exists. And I have no problems ignoring those who say it shouldn't be done - although I do sometimes get a sore tongue, from biting it

The points I made about symlinks were in response to kacir's suggestion that Calibre could have symlinks to the books in the users preferred folder structure. And when I wrote in a later post than the one you quoted...

Turn the idea on its head - link calibres folder schema into your folder schema.

... I had in mind the creation of hardlink clones of Calibres folders in the preferred folder hierarchy. I also had in mind the proverb "Tell me and I’ll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I’ll understand." My hope was that kacir will come up with the idea of his own accord.

I'm not sure that Calibre data is 'busy' enough to warrant the use of iNotify, besides if I were to use such a scheme I would prefer to control the synchronisation on the basis of a 'logical transaction' rather than 'file system events' - eg I have a sequence of operations that I often perform

1. Edit existing format A in an editor,
2. Save as Format A in the calibre folder (overwrite),
3. Save as Format B in the calibre folder (new file),
4. Close the file in the editor,
5. Open the calibre book folder,
6. Drag/drop the format B file in the book folder onto book details ,
7. Close the calibre book folder,
8. Convert format B file to EPUB,
9. Count Pages,
10. Modify,
11. Eyeball check the EPUB in Calibre Viewer,
12. If Eyeball check OK remove Format A and update Book Status and Last Change custom columns
13. Otherwise edit Format B and repeat Convert, Count, Modify and Eyeball until OK

Would I really want all those micro changes being reflected in the 'other' folder, I don't think so. I would want to click a Commit button after the last step. Commit would trash whatever is in the 'other' folder and create a fresh set of hardlinks in the 'other' folder, and that's not as easy as it sounds either. Why 'trash' because a hardlink in the recycle bin will still show up in the file reference count - a reference count of 3 would confuse me.

But for me its all moot anyway, as I'm happy to use Calibre's folder structure as it is, and in whatever way I choose to do so

BR

PS - a lot of people keep their libraries on FAT thumbs, no hardlinks on FAT thumbs