Romance Lovers for the Challenge-Impaired discussion

In the coming weeks/months, I'll be adding some tutorials and videos (or possibly video links - still trying to work out how I can do this through Goodreads) on how I use calibre .

I'd love to know what specific questions you have so I can tailor my tutorials to what our members are needing.

So far, the tutorials I'm working on are:

*General intro and calibre look and feel.
*Adding books - single, multiple formats (including paper), multiple folders.
*Columns - adding, searching, colours etc.
*Setting up and managing your tags.
*How to set up so your book uploads to your device by Series Name.

This should keep me busy for a little while, but if you don't see what you're after, request a tutorial below.

Thanks, CaroB! I know nothing, so it is all good for me. ☺

Thanks, Carob!

I have a question. I'm a new member and I don't know if ya'll have a place for questions like this or not. I am on a quest to find all the books I have ever read. I have a book in my memory, but can't remember any of the characters/title/author. I can however, remember the plot.

Joani, if it's a romance novel, then I think if you put what you remember in a new thread under this thread linked here you'll get a bunch of people willing to help.

If you still can't find exactly the book you were after, I would suggest writing an email to Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches Trashy Books blog. They have a segment called Help a Bitch Out, which is where someone writes in with the plot of a story and all the blog followers try to recommend which book they think it is.

I've been asking this question in every calibre thread with no luck! I vaguely remember reading about a way to add a cover (not replace the current cover) using the "covert books" button but don't remember how to do it.

Willaful, just to clarify:

You want to have two covers under one book's metadata?

CaroB wrote: "Willaful, just to clarify:

You want to have two covers under one book's metadata?"

I don't need them both to be considered covers in the metadata -- basically I want to add a page (which happens to be a different cover.)

I'm confused. You want to see one cover on the calibre browser and a different cover when you open the ebook?

Jenny wrote: "I'm looking forward to your tutorials, CaroB. I'm still a bit perplexed about is backing up to a site such as dropbox. It was mentioned when I posted my questions, but I'm not entirely sure how to ..."

Jenny: Does THIS help? Let me know if there's something else specifically that needs clarification.

Gisela wrote: "I'm confused. You want to see one cover on the calibre browser and a different cover when you open the ebook?"

No, I just want to add a favorite cover without removing the one that actually "belongs" to the book.

I have another question -- how do I edit tags? I have a book with dozens of tags, many of which are wrong, and I can't find a way to get to the wrong ones.

willaful wrote: "Gisela wrote: "I'm confused. You want to see one cover on the calibre browser and a different cover when you open the ebook?"

No, I just want to add a favorite cover without removing the one that ..."


Willa, I have been going crazy trying to find a solution for you, but no amount of research and trying and testing this myself has resulted in anything but exchanging one cover for another. I think you'll have to get an epub editor (there is a plugin for this through calibre, but I've not got it myself) that will allow adding of pages, so you might get an image in as an extra page... My suggestion from here would be to post the question on Mobilereads on one of the Calibre threads. Sorry I couldn't be more help :-(

right click on the tags menu on the left hand side! Hang on, I've got pictures that will help.

Thanks for trying, Carol. I wish I could remember what I had read that sounded like it would work. I did manage to get the tags thing figured out. :-)

CaroB wrote: "willaful wrote: "Gisela wrote: "I'm confused. You want to see one cover on the calibre browser and a different cover when you open the ebook?"

No, I just want to add a favorite cover without remov..."

This adding page thing - does this mean that you append a page to an epub so that when you open up the epub in an ereader, it is part of the epub? There's a plugin for that? Do you know what it's called?

You could possibly use the Tweak ePub feature in calibre, or get the Modify ePub plugin.

willaful wrote: "I have another question -- how do I edit tags? I have a book with dozens of tags, many of which are wrong, and I can't find a way to get to the wrong ones."

You can remove/change tags in the metadata.
1) Select the book you want to change.
2) Click on metadata in the menu at the top.
3) Change the tag data in the box under ratings.
4) Press OK at the bottom.

Hope this helps.

CaroB wrote: "You could possibly use the Tweak ePub feature in calibre, or get the
Modify ePub
plugin."

Thanks, CaroB. I think I might have one of the two. I installed all these plugins and don't know/use more than half of them! lol

Could you tell me how to do it, Jenny? I was just wondering.

How do you get to the tags to select them?

There's something weird with my tags. When I click the arrow I get numbers and letters, not the names of tags.

You can have Calibre download the metadata for your books. You click on the little arrow next to the edit metadata button, and choose download metadata. Then you can go over the tags and edit them to your preference. You can also edit the tags in bulk.

willaful wrote: "There's something weird with my tags. When I click the arrow I get numbers and letters, not the names of tags."

willaful:
* you'll find when you right-click on Tags in the Tag Browser, there should be an option box open, with the last item in the box saying Change sub-categorization scheme, and a little arrow pointing out of the box.
*When you hold your mouse over the arrow, it'll show three more options:
Disable
By first letter and
Partition

I have mine set to partition, but from the sounds of things, yours is set to the second option.
*Just click on Disable, restart calibre and you should no longer have that problem.

Hope that helps!

That did it. Thanks Carol!

Is there a way to mark books READ on Calibre? That way I'll know not to put it back on the Kindle and attempt to read it again LOL

Yes Susan. Do you have the Goodreads plug-in on your calibre?

I made a custom column which is a yes/no button to keep track of what I've read. If there's an easier way, I'd like to know! I do have the plug-in.

I have it. I just don't know how to do anything with it LOL

**hee hee** No comment.

Sorry, Susan, I misunderstood your question and somehow thought you meant if there was a way to mark your books as READ on goodreads when you mar your books as read on calibre, which you need the goodreads plugin for.

There are a few ways to mark your items as READ on calibre, it just depends on which way you'll find the most useful. You can add a custom column with a tick/cross function as will suggested above. You can add a Finish date. You can add a status column, and mark your books as Read, 2BR, DNF, 4Challenge, OnDeck (for when I add a bunch to my kindle) etc. You can even use the colours for when you finish a book.

How do I update my reading challenge? On group page it say 132. I have read 175 How do I fix?

Vicki wrote: "How do I update my reading challenge? On group page it say 132. I have read 175 How do I fix?"

Off to the right, where your entry is, there should be a link that says "update my entry". Click on that and put in your new goal, and make sure you re-enter the shelf that you did at the beginning of the year so that it keeps tracking what you had done in the past. Click on save to close it out, and you should be good!