Incorrect Page Numbers in Calibre's E-book Viewer?

[Darkenmal]

Hello,

I have been looking everywhere but I cannot find how I can implement the correct page numbers in the E-book viewer. For instance, I have a book that is around 663 pages, like this:

.

However, in the viewer it describes the book page number as this:



Is there anyway to fix this? Thanks.

[theducks]

It ain't broken.
The viewer reflows depending on font size, line-height and margins.

Remember These books are not printed with unchangable type.
Add into the mix, different render agents count words and pages differently.
The count pages plugin has options it uses to populate the Page and word counts. Calibre viewer has its method.
None are wrong. They are estimates, just like 'Reading Times' some devices show.

[Darkenmal]

Originally Posted by theducks

It ain't broken.
The viewer reflows depending on font size, line-height and margins.

Remember These books are not printed with unchangable type.
Add into the mix, different render agents count words and pages differently.
The count pages plugin has options it uses to populate the Page and word counts. Calibre viewer has its method.
None are wrong. They are estimates, just like 'Reading Times' some devices show.

Thanks for the response.

Is there any way I can edit the page numbers so that the accurate amount is shown no matter how much I edit the font size, line-height, and margins? I'm reading a book for an essay and I would like to have accurate page numbers when I'm citing quotations.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

Thanks for the response.

Is there any way I can edit the page numbers so that the accurate amount is shown no matter how much I edit the font size, line-height, and margins? I'm reading a book for an essay and I would like to have accurate page numbers when I'm citing quotations.

No.
IMHO Chapter n, Paragraph y is almost reflow fool proof
Reference mode (the paint brush icon) shows where the cursor is

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

Thanks for the response.

Is there any way I can edit the page numbers so that the accurate amount is shown no matter how much I edit the font size, line-height, and margins? I'm reading a book for an essay and I would like to have accurate page numbers when I'm citing quotations.

Which accurate amount? Are you using a paperback, trade paperback, hardcover, etc. as the source for your reference page numbers? In an epub, there are ways of setting page numbers that match a physical book but either Adobe's page-map or the epub3 page-list are, IMHO, pretty useless since they would only match a specific edition of a physical book and require manual generation and quite a few renderers do not support either of them.

I would go with theducks chapter/paragraph method of citing quotations.

[Darkenmal]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Which accurate amount? Are you using a paperback, trade paperback, hardcover, etc. as the source for your reference page numbers? In an epub, there are ways of setting page numbers that match a physical book but either Adobe's page-map or the epub3 page-list are, IMHO, pretty useless since they would only match a specific edition of a physical book and require manual generation and quite a few renderers do not support either of them.

I would go with theducks chapter/paragraph method of citing quotations.

I would be referring to Goodreads, which I already used to port their page numbers in a custom column in Calibre. I thought there might be a method of somehow overwriting the page count in the viewer to a more official page count, but I guess not.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

I would be referring to Goodreads, which I already used to port their page numbers in a custom column in Calibre. I thought there might be a method of somehow overwriting the page count in the viewer to a more official page count, but I guess not.

Which does come back to DNSB's question of which edition. There is a significant difference between paperback and hardcover editions. And even between different paperback editions.

But, there is no way to do it in the viewer. And even if you did, the page numbering would probably be wrong. At the best, the viewer could count something (probably words or characters) in the book and divide that by your page number and then declaring a new page at every count of those things. Apart from the start of the first and end of the last pages, they probably won't line up with the paper book.

Note: The viewers page calculation is "number of significant characters/1000". And a significant character is a non-whitespace character. It is very simple, and just as likely to be "right" as any of the other calculations I have seen.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

I would be referring to Goodreads, which I already used to port their page numbers in a custom column in Calibre. I thought there might be a method of somehow overwriting the page count in the viewer to a more official page count, but I guess not.

I'm tempted to ask where Goodreads gets those number and what makes them anymore correct than any other method of synthesizing page numbers. For epub ebooks, page-map or page-list are the only ways to match page numbers to a specific edition of a dead tree book. Personally, I prefer the Adobe synthetic page numbers since they are consistent for all Adobe renderers regardless of how much data you display on each screen.

[GrannyGrump]

After checking Goodreads, I see that the page number supplied (663) is for the Hardback paper book. This is possibly true for all the books they list.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by GrannyGrump

After checking Goodreads, I see that the page number supplied (663) is for the Hardback paper book. This is possibly true for all the books they list.

Goodreads can have page counts for each edition. It isn't always a hardback that is used as the default edition.

[auspex]

In any case, Goodreads numbers are only sometimes initially set from publisher's information, and always modifiable by GR librarians (and practically anybody can become a librarian). Which makes the numbers about as reliable as the Calibre viewer's count.

[Darkenmal]

Originally Posted by auspex

In any case, Goodreads numbers are only sometimes initially set from publisher's information, and always modifiable by GR librarians (and practically anybody can become a librarian). Which makes the numbers about as reliable as the Calibre viewer's count.

It doesn't even have to be Goodreads--just a source that provides an official number, rather then the random number I get from Calibre.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

It doesn't even have to be Goodreads--just a source that provides an official number, rather then the random number I get from Calibre.

You are not getting it ,
There are many official numbers... and they are correct.
The numbers only apply to the (editions) PRINTING.
A reprint may even use a different plate generation, which will cause a page number deviation.
You have noticed these words near the bottom of the copyright page?

Printing      3456789

That makes it a 3rd printing
and that starts over for newer editions that get updated on a schedule
eg Chemical Rubber Handbook 17th edition

[Darkenmal]

Originally Posted by theducks

You are not getting it ,
There are many official numbers... and they are correct.
The numbers only apply to the (editions) PRINTING.
A reprint may even use a different plate generation, which will cause a page number deviation.
You have noticed these words near the bottom of the copyright page?

Printing      3456789

That makes it a 3rd printing
and that starts over for newer editions that get updated on a schedule
eg Chemical Rubber Handbook 17th edition

You aren't getting it either. I wanted something official I could assign to the book, rather then the random numbers I get. That's it. Apparently it can't be done, so that's that.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Darkenmal

You aren't getting it either. I wanted something official I could assign to the book, rather then the random numbers I get. That's it. Apparently it can't be done, so that's that.

And you aren't getting it. There are several problems with what you are asking.

Firstly, what does "official" mean. As stated above, the page count depends on the edition. Each will be different.

And yes, it isn't possible at the moment. If you are interested, make an official request. It might get done. But, if you can do it yourself and submit the change, it is much more likely to happen.

But, it won't actually be useful for what you ask, citing quotations. As well as setting the page count, you also need to specify where each page starts. If you don't all you are setting is what page the first word is on, and what page the last word is on. The words in between are going to allocated by some method and that won't match your "official" version.

Of course, there is actually no reason that the calibre page numbering isn't the official one. If you state this in you essay, you should be able to do it. If you were using a paper book, you would already be stating the edition the page numbers refer to. With this, you need to state the ebook edition being used and that the page numbers come from the calibre viewer.

And the viewer does have a reference mode. That shows a paragraph reference. This is more likely to be useful on multiple editions than a page reference.