Best Practice

[tamhas]

I am curious about best practice with regard to books I am not going to read. In Calibre, I have all books that I have acquired. I have a custom column for status including Read, Reference, Cookbook, Skip, etc. If a book is Read, I then delete it from my Kindle. Likewise for Skip, i.e., I'm never going to read it because it is a book my wife is interested in and I am not.

Note that I have Kindle for Android on the phone which I use on the rare occasions when I want to read there. It appears that, if I want to read something, I have to download it with Kindle for Android.

So, if I have deleted a book from the Kindle, would you delete it from Calibre Companion?

Also, when I connect and it automatically does the sync of metadata, is it just updating any changes in the books it already has? So that to get a new book to show up in Calibre Companion at all, I have to push it from Calibre to the device? How much is it actually pushing? Just the metadata?

FWIW, 90% of my use of Calibre Companion is looking at books with the blank status and reading the summary. Occasionally I will look for books by a specific author, e.g., when I have recently read that author and know I have more than one.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

I am curious about best practice with regard to books I am not going to read. In Calibre, I have all books that I have acquired. I have a custom column for status including Read, Reference, Cookbook, Skip, etc. If a book is Read, I then delete it from my Kindle. Likewise for Skip, i.e., I'm never going to read it because it is a book my wife is interested in and I am not.

Note that I have Kindle for Android on the phone which I use on the rare occasions when I want to read there. It appears that, if I want to read something, I have to download it with Kindle for Android.

So, if I have deleted a book from the Kindle, would you delete it from Calibre Companion?

Most of this is personal preference. I am not going to go there.

Also, when I connect and it automatically does the sync of metadata, is it just updating any changes in the books it already has?

Yes

So that to get a new book to show up in Calibre Companion at all, I have to push it from Calibre to the device? How much is it actually pushing? Just the metadata?

Yes. That said, there are at least two methods for automating this process.

1. Use the Reading List plugin. This plugin can auto-send books to CC as long as you have set it up to do so.
2. Use the SmartEject plugin. When you disconnect, this plugin can tell you which books are not currently on your device.

When you send a book from calibre to CC, it sends the metadata and the highest-priority book file.

[tamhas]

The plugins might be handy, but frankly it isn't much of a problem now compared with the other stuff I have to go through with each new book to handle the DeDRM. I was just concerned that pushing the book to Calibre Companion was pushing the whole book there, which could result in a lot of extra.

So, if it is only pushing the metadata and I have appropriately changed the status to take it out of my current list, it sounds like I could easily have every book in CC that I have in Calibre as a portable reference.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

So, if it is only pushing the metadata and I have appropriately changed the status to take it out of my current list, it sounds like I could easily have every book in CC that I have in Calibre as a portable reference.

I think there is a misunderstanding.

CC contains records for books. It cannot contain metadata-only records. There must be a book file.

Some people send empty txt files so that they can have a record in CC for a book.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

[tamhas]

I have just under 1000 books in Calibre at this point. A little over half of those are unread and are candidates for current reading. I see no point in having all those other books on my Kindle where there is no good organization tool. I see no point in having the full text for those books on my phone since it is rare that I read there and it seems that I have to download the book to Kindle for Android if I want to read anyway. I don't mind having information on all books on the phone because the combination of features in Calibre Companion makes it as easy as it can be to deal with that volume (thank you!).

Does that make it clear what I want to do?

BTW, I have no idea how I would download empty text files.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

I have just under 1000 books in Calibre at this point. A little over half of those are unread and are candidates for current reading. I see no point in having all those other books on my Kindle where there is no good organization tool. I see no point in having the full text for those books on my phone since it is rare that I read there and it seems that I have to download the book to Kindle for Android if I want to read anyway. I don't mind having information on all books on the phone because the combination of features in Calibre Companion makes it as easy as it can be to deal with that volume (thank you!).

Does that make it clear what I want to do?

BTW, I have no idea how I would download empty text files.

If the books still have their DRM them you cannot download them from calibre to any device and expect to read them because Amazon DRM is device specific.

If you have stripped the DRM (as I do immediately after "buying" a book from Amazon) then you can download them to any device you want and read them with any reader that supports the format (mobi or azw3).

If you want to have a "catalog" of your books in CC without the book files then that is possible. See the thread Using Calibre Companion as a Catalogue for some discussion about this. Specifically, calibre has a function that lets you add near-to-zero-length TXT book files to you calibre library. You would tell CC that TXT files are acceptable using CC's Formats and Folders setting. You would then "send to device" the TXT formats for books you want on the device without the real books files. Of course, choosing whether you want the "empty" TXT file or the "real" book file is complicated.

I am not convinced that what I am suggesting satisfies your needs. In particular, you mention 1000 books in your library, which is not many for CC. It seems to me that you might be looking for a complex solution to a simple problem. Just download all the books and "job done".

[tamhas]

Pretty much all of the books are there in two formats, one Kindle and one mobi. What is Calibre going to send to Calibre Companion? I have Kindle for Android on the phone, but as I say, I seem to have to do a fresh download from Amazon if I want to read a book there.

I did look at the amount of memory being consumed and you are right that this doesn't seem to be a concern. It certainly isn't worth creating a separate catalog and having to maintain it.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

Pretty much all of the books are there in two formats, one Kindle and one mobi. What is Calibre going to send to Calibre Companion?

By default calibre sends CC the "highest precedence" format, where precedence is defined by the order of the formats in CC's Formats and Folders setting. Of course you can override that precedence and tell calibre to send whatever format you want.

The cloud connection does something similar. If you long-press a book to download it you get the highest precedence. If you go to book details then the download menu is ordered from highest to lowest. You can pick the one you want.

[tamhas]

OK, found that. Is there any possibility to point CC so that it downloads files ready for reading by Kindle for PC ... or is this one of those things where clever Amazon is using magic memory that one can't get to? Or, if I download an azw and click on it in CC, is it going to open in Kindle for PC?

I presume that Kindle for PC is going to use azw and related formats. This is not one of the formats which was checked for download, so basically I have now downloaded everything I don't need and nothing of what I do need. If I change the selections now, will CC clean up the former formats and replace with the new ones or do I have to do something to clean up.

What happens if no formats are checked?

You provide amazing support, especially considering it is nearly midnight in France!

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

OK, found that. Is there any possibility to point CC so that it downloads files ready for reading by Kindle for PC ... or is this one of those things where clever Amazon is using magic memory that one can't get to? Or, if I download an azw and click on it in CC, is it going to open in Kindle for PC?

I have revisited/updated our FAQ on this topic: Using Kindle for Android with Calibre Companion. It should answer this and similar questions.

I presume that Kindle for PC is going to use azw and related formats. This is not one of the formats which was checked for download, so basically I have now downloaded everything I don't need and nothing of what I do need. If I change the selections now, will CC clean up the former formats and replace with the new ones or do I have to do something to clean up.

No. Unchecking a format has no effect on the books in the library, and checking a format does not automatically download books of that format.

Why not use a different reader app for the formats you have already downloaded?

If you really want to get rid of these non-Amazon formats then the easiest/fastest way is to delete the book files with some file manager, open CC's menu and choose Books with missing files, then Delete All. This operation will remove all the books from CC with a book file you manually deleted. The FAQ How do I reinitialize CC without reinstalling the app? might help.

What happens if no formats are checked?

CC won't let you do that. If it did, the results probably wouldn't be good.

You provide amazing support, especially considering it is nearly midnight in France!

Thanks. I appreciate the good words.

[tamhas]

OK, I will try to work my way through this and see where I get.

[tamhas]

It took me a while to get around to trying any of this ... tax time ... and I mostly am fine, but not quite. I did just fine getting rid of the other formats and picking what formats I wanted, and downloading a fresh set, and including only the books I want. But, I am left with two questions.

One is with respect to the use of the Kindle app on my Android phone. I read the instructions about changing the download folder and I think I understand how to do that (means deleting and downloading all over again, of course), but when I look in the file manager at the kindle folder ... which sounds like where you are suggesting I point CC for the download ... there is nothing in it. There is also a Books folder, which is empty, and an amazon folder which has a nest of directories shared_test_data/font_config/cachedir and a bunch of files with what look like hex names. If kindle is the right folder and I have downloaded a book in the Kindle app, shouldn't I see something there?

The other question is maintenance. Currently, I do not have read books downloaded. As I read books that are already downloaded and sync, there is a status field which will get updated to take these books out of the to be read pile. But, is there a straightforward operation by which I could then delete these books from CC.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

One is with respect to the use of the Kindle app on my Android phone. I read the instructions about changing the download folder and I think I understand how to do that (means deleting and downloading all over again, of course), but when I look in the file manager at the kindle folder ... which sounds like where you are suggesting I point CC for the download ... there is nothing in it. There is also a Books folder, which is empty, and an amazon folder which has a nest of directories shared_test_data/font_config/cachedir and a bunch of files with what look like hex names. If kindle is the right folder and I have downloaded a book in the Kindle app, shouldn't I see something there?

I am confused. If you tell CC using Settings / Formats and Folders to put Amazon-format books (mobi, azw*) in some folder AABBCC then CC will move those books to that folder. There is no need to re-download them. If after you tell CC that the folder for amazon formats is AABBCC then downloaded books will be put in AABBCC. On the other hand, if you have downloaded non-Amazon formats such as epub then you must indeed re-download the Amazon format.

You seem to be saying that the above isn't happening, which implies to me that you are doing something unexpected. What, I don't know.

The other question is maintenance. Currently, I do not have read books downloaded. As I read books that are already downloaded and sync, there is a status field which will get updated to take these books out of the to be read pile. But, is there a straightforward operation by which I could then delete these books from CC.

If you are using CC's "Read" field then you can select these books in the grouping drawer. You can then delete those books, admittedly one by one.

You can also sync CC's "Read" field back to calibre. If you do this then in calibre when you connect as a wireless device you can do searches on that field and delete books from CC in bulk.

Bottom line: you need to tell us exactly what you want to do and what you have done so we can help you do that. Or tell you that you can't do it.

[tamhas]

On the first point, my issue is that I can find no folder that has Kindle books in it, even though I have downloaded some with the K4A app. If I can't see those, I am wondering if I know the right folder to point CC at. I have not yet tried pointing CC at a different folder.

On the second one, no, I am not using CCs read field. I am using a status field which can have half a dozen different values. CC read is not really useful since 99.99% of the time I am reading the book on the Kindle and moving the read books into a folder there.

One by one isn't a lot of fun, but I suppose it could be managed.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

On the first point, my issue is that I can find no folder that has Kindle books in it, even though I have downloaded some with the K4A app. If I can't see those, I am wondering if I know the right folder to point CC at. I have not yet tried pointing CC at a different folder.

K4A downloads books in some strange Amazon-proprietary KFX format (not mobi or azw*) to someplace like Android/data/com.amazon.whathaveyou/whoknowswhat. There is no way that calibre or CC can handle these downloads. Basically, you can't intermix downloading from Amazon and downloading from calibre and expect to have an acceptable result.

If you are interested in this issue search for (for example) "calibre kfx import". You will find that lots and lots of people are unhappy.

(opinion)Amazon does not like calibre and does not want users to use it. Calibre is a key that opens Amazon's walled garden.(/opinion)

On the second one, no, I am not using CCs read field. I am using a status field which can have half a dozen different values. CC read is not really useful since 99.99% of the time I am reading the book on the Kindle and moving the read books into a folder there.

One by one isn't a lot of fun, but I suppose it could be managed.

Then make a custom column with your half dozen results and add that custom column to the grouping drawer. You can't modify that column from CC but you can certainly access it.

There is no easy way to integrate what you do on a kindle with calibre, therefore with CC.