Confused.. Difference between a Calibre Library & Save to Disk

[ipsofacto]

Hello there...

I just bought me a Nook Simple Touch and I've read a lot of people mention Calibre as an ebook converter.

I assumed it was real simple.... I just add a bunch of pdf's or mobi's that I have into Calibre and create ePub versions. OK, thats fine... its apparently doing that it seems.

A few things. I noticed that a pdf may have a title, but when converted the title might be named something else totally. I found that I can go into edit metadata and simply rename the book with its rightful title. However that'd be a pain on many.

But right now this is very confusing... this 'save to disk'. Because, I don't understand whats the difference between that and a Calibre Library.

I was under the impression that all I needed to do was create a calibre library, then add whatever books I wanted to in that library...and if some needed to be converted to epub as well, I'd do that and the epub conversion gets added to the library as well.

So I was thinking, well, I'd really like to put books into categories or genres... like fiction, science, etc... so I figured out that I can create new calibre libraries with the name of whatever genre, then add books of that genre into that particular library and then I can simply switch between whichever library I want to look at.

I'm all correct so far in this assumption?

But then I saw this 'save to disk' thing in the toolbar...and I'm thinking...what the heck do you use that for if the calibre libraries already contained and saved my books?

Then I searched this forum and found the thread about "Managing subgroups of books, for example "genre" (long post)" and it just made my eyeballs spin!

Bottom line.... I'm no techie. I just want to create my libraries with different categories, add/convert books into them and then load them into my Nook. If its going to be more complicated than that, I'm shot!

Thanks!

[theducks]

Originally Posted by ipsofacto

Hello there...

I just bought me a Nook Simple Touch and I've read a lot of people mention Calibre as an ebook converter.

I assumed it was real simple.... I just add a bunch of pdf's or mobi's that I have into Calibre and create ePub versions. OK, thats fine... its apparently doing that it seems.

A few things. I noticed that a pdf may have a title, but when converted the title might be named something else totally. I found that I can go into edit metadata and simply rename the book with its rightful title. However that'd be a pain on many.

But right now this is very confusing... this 'save to disk'. Because, I don't understand whats the difference between that and a Calibre Library.

I was under the impression that all I needed to do was create a calibre library, then add whatever books I wanted to in that library...and if some needed to be converted to epub as well, I'd do that and the epub conversion gets added to the library as well.

So I was thinking, well, I'd really like to put books into categories or genres... like fiction, science, etc... so I figured out that I can create new calibre libraries with the name of whatever genre, then add books of that genre into that particular library and then I can simply switch between whichever library I want to look at.

I'm all correct so far in this assumption?

But then I saw this 'save to disk' thing in the toolbar...and I'm thinking...what the heck do you use that for if the calibre libraries already contained and saved my books?

Then I searched this forum and found the thread about "Managing subgroups of books, for example "genre" (long post)" and it just made my eyeballs spin!

Bottom line.... I'm no techie. I just want to create my libraries with different categories, add/convert books into them and then load them into my Nook. If its going to be more complicated than that, I'm shot!

Thanks!

Save to Disk = Export to a external (to the Library) Disk Drive (or a device that appears to be a disk to your OS)
Add to Library is autosaved.
Add Format (inside Metadata editor) is not saved until you accept (not Cancel) the current book details
I learned this by moving the file from MY to be added folder to MY done folder, before I exited the metadata... I got to see a nice missing file error message

[ipsofacto]

Originally Posted by theducks

Save to Disk = Export to a external (to the Library) Disk Drive (or a device that appears to be a disk to your OS)
Add to Library is autosaved.
Add Format (inside Metadata editor) is not saved until you accept (not Cancel) the current book details
I learned this by moving the file from MY to be added folder to MY done folder, before I exited the metadata... I got to see a nice missing file error message

Hi, thanks.

Lets see if I understand you correctly. Creating a library and then adding books to that, Calibre is automatically saving everything to that library.

Saving to disk is, uh, hmmmm, if you want to save books selected in your library somewhere else... as a backup or something? Or maybe if you're converting a pdf to an epub, then you can save the original pdf elsewhere just in case you ever need it?

Add format... I haven't the slightest idea .. lol.

I did read the manual about 'save to disk'. The problem is, to me, it just is describing the function and not giving an example for what and when to use it for. Examples in manuals would really help.

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by ipsofacto

So I was thinking, well, I'd really like to put books into categories or genres... like fiction, science, etc... so I figured out that I can create new calibre libraries with the name of whatever genre, then add books of that genre into that particular library and then I can simply switch between whichever library I want to look at.

There is no need for separate Calibre libraries, just add tags for your categories and you can select a tag from the panel on the left to just display books with that tag. The advantage of tags is that the same ebook can have multiple tags.

As theducks said, there is usually no need to use 'save to disk'. When you add an ebook to Calibre it makes a copy of the original. There is usually no need to look under the hood at Calibre's copy, but if you do want another copy (a 3rd copy) on your PC then 'save to disk' is the way to do this. Usually, you just connect your reading device via USB and Calibre will use its device-specific method to copy ebooks to and from the device. With a few device types, you might have to use 'save to disk' instead with the 'disk' being a USB connected device.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

Usually, you just connect your reading device via USB and Calibre will use its device-specific method to copy ebooks to and from the device. With a few device types, you might have to use 'save to disk' instead with the 'disk' being a USB connected device.

And in those cases, it's still often better to use 'Connect to Folder' instead; it treats the directory to save to in a more 'device-like' way.

[ipsofacto]

Ah, thanks wallcraft & mbovenka... the picture is clearer.