Calibre - e-Book (Personal Library/Document) Management - Mini-Review

[app103]

So I'll need to buy another hard drive just for Calibre? 
Does it at least give you the option not to put all of that on your OS drive?

-app103 (February 15, 2012, 10:13 AM)

eBooks aren't all that big, so it's a reasonable choice to take a copy of them into it's library tree, rather than try & track changes that would occur if it just tried to reference them 'outside'.  I've currently only got just over 1000 books in mine, and the library around 912MB  (Mostly ePub, rather than PDF though).

One advantage not mentioned is that using Stanza on the iPad or the browser on a Kindle, I can access them wirelessly via Calibre's server & WiFi!

It does allow you to choose where to place the library (and to have more than 1 if desired), including moving an existing library tree around.

-gwynevans (February 15, 2012, 02:09 PM)

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so maybe this will explain why I don't want my books moved or copied anywhere else other than where they already are.

[iphigenie]

Calibre does make its own tree and it organises it in folders by author.
I find it makes it hard for finding the files via other tools and programs. I think it's so it can arrange its meta data files etc. but it is a very annoying choice especially around ebooks or electronic documents (and alas so common)

I use Calibre nonetheless and donated last year to it to (never got a thank you email, though, so won't be all that in a hurry to redonate) but that aspect makes me a)hesitate to put all metadata in since i might lose it on move and b)think that one day I'll find an alternative that is more open to playing well with others and move.

I dislike software that decides it is the only one you use to manage something

[IainB]

I have switched to the 64-bit version of Calibre, which was introduced at version 0.9.9.

calibre now has a 64 bit version for windows, available at: http://calibre-ebook...m/download_windows64 The 64bit build is not limited to using only 3GB of RAM when converting large/complex documents. It may also be slightly faster for some tasks. You can have both the 32 bit and the 64 bit build installed at the same time, they will use the same libraries, plugins and settings.

There have been several updates since, with bug fixes, and new features added.
Here are the details of the new features from the most recent updates (latest first):

calibre 0.9.16 - New Features (2013-01-25)

• News download: Add support for logging in to sites that require javascript for their logins.
• News download: Do not convert all downloaded images to JPG format. This fixes the problem of PNG images with transparent backgrounds being rendered with black backgrounds
• CHM Input: Support hierarchical table of contents. Do not generate an inline table of contents when a metadata table of contents is present. Also correctly decode the text in the table of contents
• Get Books: Add the beam-ebooks.de store
• Make custom yes/no columns using icons put text values under the icons.
• Driver for LG E400 and SayCoolA710
• Speed up device connection when there are lots of books on the device by not generating cover thumbnails unless they are actually needed.
• Have the metadata download dialog remember its last used size.

calibre 0.9.15 - New Features (2013-01-18)

• Linux MTP driver: Detect devices that have MTP interfaces even if their USB ids are not known
• Content server: Allow picking a random book by clicking the 'Random book' link on the start page. You can also refresh the random book page to get a new random book
• E-book viewer: Add an option to hide the toolbars in the viewer window (Preferences->Miscellaneous->Show controls in the viewr preferences). You can unhide them by right clicking in the viewer window.
• Kobo driver: Speedup initial connect by avoiding unnecessary update of series metadata in some situations.
• Get Books: Allow the store plugins to be dynamically loaded so that future website changes of a store dont require a calibre update to fix Get Books.
• Wireless driver: Always replace file when resending a previously sent book to the device, even if the title/author have changed.
• Add PocketBook Pro 912 driver.
• When creating/exporting epub and mobi files, add the calibre book identifier as a special field in the book's metadata. This allows third party tools to identify the book record in calibre to which the file belongs.
• Wireless driver: Add support for using the book uuid as the filename
• Remove the experimental tag from the subset fonts feature, since there has been only one reported problem (now fixed) with it in the two months since it was released

calibre 0.9.14 - New Features (2013-01-12)

• When adding multiple books and duplicates are found, allow the user to select which of the duplicate books will be added anyway.
• Device drivers for Kobo Arc on linux, Polaroid Android tablet
• When sorting by series, use the language of the book to decide what leading articles to remove, just as is done for sorting by title

calibre 0.9.13 - New Features (2013-01-04)

• Complete rewrite of the PDF Output engine, to support links and fix various bugs
• Show disabled device plugins in Preferences->Ignored Devices
• Get Books: Fix Smashwords, Google books and B&N stores. Add Nook UK store
• Allow series numbers lower than -100 for custom series columns.
• Add mass storage driver for rockhip based android smart phones
• Add a clear ratings button to the edit metadata dialog

[dspelley]

A couple of months ago I won a Nook Simple Touch as a door prize at an event where I work. I downloaded a few books from Barnes & Noble using the Nook's built-in WiFi. Using a USB cable, I also copied some other ePUB files I obtained from other sources - Project Gutenberg, etc.

After installing Calibre and connecting my Nook, I find that Calbre sees the books I copied using the USB cable, but does not see any books downloaded over the WiFi. I posted a question about this on the Calibre User Forum and received a reply saying that it's true that the Nook "hides" these files from being displayed or managed. When I asked why B&N would do that, the reply I got was, "Think like a salesman, not like a customer."

Do other eBook readers "hide" files depending on how they were acquired? Any idea why these books would be hidden? Is it a DRM issue? (several of the files downloaded over WiFi were free)

[CWuestefeld]

Do other eBook readers "hide" files depending on how they were acquired?

-dspelley (February 04, 2013, 07:46 AM)

On my 3rd generation Kindle, nothing is hidden. If you connect the device to your PC by USB, it just looks like a flash drive.

Of course, the file names are inscrutable. But you can figure it out by opening on the device the book you're looking for. This causes its bookmark file to be re-written, which gives it the newest timestamp in the directory. And if there's DRM on the bok, being able to see the file may not help you.

[IainB]

Do other eBook readers "hide" files depending on how they were acquired? Any idea why these books would be hidden?

-dspelley (February 04, 2013, 07:46 AM)

Not sure I entirely understand this. The Windows system cannot "hide" files unless you have that set as an option/default in your file manager.
Got to Windows Explorer |Tools|Folder Options|View and scroll down to this bit (see image below) and check whether your settings are the same/similar. The idea is to make sure that the system is only "hiding" what you might not be interested in seeing on a day-to-day basis.



Can you see the files in Windows Explorer? (Whether downloaded by WiFi or USB?)

The only suggestion I can make, if you have full visibility of all the files, is that maybe Calibre is looking in the "wrong" directory/folder for where the files are. The files themselves may have obscure names unrelated to their content, but a recognisable file extension is what Calibre would be looking for.
Otherwise, maybe they are somehow being given a file extension that Calibre does not recognise.

[dspelley]

Thanks for the input.  I'll have to dig around more in the Nook file system when I get home. But as I recall when I last looked, I found a folder that has all of the ePub files that I transferred to the Nook using my USB cable, but none of the files that were downloaded directly to the Nook using the built-in WiFi.  I looked in the other folders, but don't remember seeing any other files that looked like ebook files. 

When asking about this on the Calibre User Forum I also got this reply. 

No. The nook does not make any files downloaded from B&N visible via the USB connection.

I'm not exactly sure what is meant by "Visible" in this context. Are they hidden (in the sense of a file attribute being set)? Are they in a location Cailbre (or Windows Explorer) cannot access? Are they in some other format?

When I connect my Nook via the USB cable, two new icons appear on the Calibre menu bar. One is an icon for my Nook, the other is an icon for an SD card that is in my Nook.

If I click on the SD card icon, I see the ePub files that are stored there. If I click on the Nook icon, I see the books that I transferred there via USB cable, but I do not see any books that were downloaded via WiFi.

Sorry - didn't mean to make this into a Cailbre/Nook "how to" forum.

[wraith808]

From what I understand from my Nook, the Nook has three separate locations- the area where it stores its own files and the files from its store, the space for sideloaded documents in its internal memory, and the SD card area.  It is possible that the two areas in its internal memory are partitioned or in some other way segregated so that Windows can mount one area, but the other is not visible to the OS as a mountable partition.

[40hz]

Did you try looking at it using Linux? Many times that will reveal things hidden from Windows. Especially if your gadget uses a non-Windows format (like ext3 or ext4) for its directories/disk.

Just be forewarned, I did a little snooping in my iPhone that way - and just copying photos off it onto my drive made them unreadable on my iPhone afterwards. Had to delete them all and then put the ones I wanted back on.

[dspelley]

I think wraith808 must be right about the downloaded data being in some other partition.  I've looked through the Nook folder structure in Explorer (with hidden files and folders displayed) and can only find a "Books" folder containing my sideloaded ePub files - no WiFi-downloaded files. The other folders contain .jpg files of the book covers, or annotation files.

The B&N website will put the WiFi-downloaded files into an online library. From there I can download them to a folder on my PC, and then import them into the Calibre library. In Calibre, the library will mark those files that are also on the reader, but since it can't see all of the books on the reader it doesn't mark all of them.

I've also tried using Adobe Digital Editions, and even the Nook desktop reader software. Neither of them show the WiFi-downloaded files.

Thanks to all for your ideas and suggestions!

[IainB]

@dspelley: As you get your eBooks onto your local PC disk, I suggest you one-way mirror them in real-time to a backup folder. I use RealTimeSync for this - it is a discrete part of FreeFileSync (see FreeFileSync - automated backup - Mini-Review).

I do this because I have Amazon's PC-Kindle software (as well as a Kindle), which holds the eBooks in a folder. The folder (library) is automatically updated simultaneously by any changes made to my Amazon cloud-based Kindle eBook library account and the same changes are automatically replicated/updated simultaneously to my Kindle device via "Whisper" updates. Thus, if Amazon should (say) decide to erase one of my Kindle DRM eBook titles, then it will disappear simultaneously from all 3 places:

• the Amazon cloud-based Kindle eBook library account.
• the Kindle device.
• the PC-Kindle library.

- and there's little I can do to stop it or control it.

Using RealTimeSync in the way described above means that I have a secure backup copy of every single file and update  made to the PC-Kindle library. This backup thus becomes my Primary library, and the 3 Kindle stores become Secondary (and expendable) libraries - expendable because they can always be restored from the Primary library.
Calibre can be set to de-DRM those eBooks (including Kindle titles) in the Primary library/backup, so I could read any of my Kindle titles (including any that have been auto-deleted by Amazon) with other eBook reading devices/software, if I wished. This would not necessitate any reliance on, or changes to the 3 "Secondary" libraries/places mentioned above.

The trick is to remember to always have RealTimeSync running when you operate the the PC-Kindle library reader.

I presume the same approach would work for any brand of eBook reader where there is proprietary DRM-enforcement.

[IainB]

Calibre has been progressively updated to v0.9.24.
I have put the updated/new features into the Opening Post.

[xtabber]

I think wraith808 must be right about the downloaded data being in some other partition.  I've looked through the Nook folder structure in Explorer (with hidden files and folders displayed) and can only find a "Books" folder containing my sideloaded ePub files - no WiFi-downloaded files. The other folders contain .jpg files of the book covers, or annotation files.

The B&N website will put the WiFi-downloaded files into an online library. From there I can download them to a folder on my PC, and then import them into the Calibre library. In Calibre, the library will mark those files that are also on the reader, but since it can't see all of the books on the reader it doesn't mark all of them.

I've also tried using Adobe Digital Editions, and even the Nook desktop reader software. Neither of them show the WiFi-downloaded files.

Thanks to all for your ideas and suggestions!

-dspelley (February 04, 2013, 06:07 PM)

On a Nook reader or tablet, there is indeed a separate partition for downloaded B&N content. You cannot access it unless you root the Nook device.

On a PC, any book you open to read in Nook for PC is downloaded to \My Documents\My Barnes & Noble eBooks\[Your_B&N_Login_Name].

[IainB]

Updated 2013-06-29: Changes to opening post aligned with latest version 0.9.37.
See details of changes in the link to the Change Log in the table.

[IainB]

Update 2013-12-21:
Added note for v1.16 (latest).

See list of new features by version: http://calibre-ebook.com/whats-new

Some potentially very useful new features, Still exploring them.

[IainB]

Update 2014-04-11:
Added note for Calibre v1.32  (latest).
Calibre now seems close to a Nirvana state in terms of breadth and scope of document library and reference management, and support for reading/viewing on various different reading devices.
The automation of document meta-data collection from across the Internet is superb.

See the list of new features by version: http://calibre-ebook.com/whats-new
This information is split into:

• Changelog
• Major new features

___________________
The full list of changes to Calibre is available here.
There is an excellent demo/video of Calibre in action - Calibre grand tour. (This is well worth watching.)