Why do books sometimes re-appear in collections after being removed from it?

[ownedbycats]

On both my old Aura HD and my current Libra H2O, I've noticed that store-loaded books removed from a collection with the KoboTouch driver will usually reappear after a later sync. It often makes a mess of my To Be Read collection when half a dozen finished books suddenly pop back up.

In order to prevent this, I have to remove the book from the collection on the device itself. Deleting the collection entirely and letting KoboTouch recreate it also seems to work.

But why does this happen?

[DNSB]

Collections and Kobo store bought and synced books are synchronized to Kobo's servers. So if you do not delete the collections from the Kobo side, they will be recreated on a sync. This was discussed to death years back. The Kobo Utilities had the Fix Duplicate Shelves under the Database item which may help.

[ownedbycats]

What exactly is the difference between KoboTouch modifying the collections and manually editing the collections on the device though?

[DNSB]

That is an interesting question. The answers got a bit complicated but what I remember is that the books have to be removed from the collection on the Kobo and then the collection deleted but not purged before the sync. The solution that I used back then and is still in my Kobo eReader.conf file was adding under the [ApplicationPreferences] header:

SyncShelves=false

[bluepeter]

I don't know if it's any use to you, but my solution is to control allocation to collections with Calibre. Although syncing with Kobo will generate the problem that you identify, resyncing with Calibre corrects it.

[John Hopper]

Originally Posted by bluepeter

I don't know if it's any use to you, but my solution is to control allocation to collections with Calibre. Although syncing with Kobo will generate the problem that you identify, resyncing with Calibre corrects it.

Yes I control all my ebooks through Calibre. So when I buy a book from Kobo, I still sideload it from Calibre and next time I go online on the Kobo, I delete the downloaded version.

Sent from my Pixel Fold using Tapatalk

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by bluepeter

I don't know if it's any use to you, but my solution is to control allocation to collections with Calibre. Although syncing with Kobo will generate the problem that you identify, resyncing with Calibre corrects it.

That only helps temporarily; Kobo will restore the book to the collection after a future sync.

Originally Posted by John Hopper

Yes I control all my ebooks through Calibre. So when I buy a book from Kobo, I still sideload it from Calibre and next time I go online on the Kobo, I delete the downloaded version.

Sent from my Pixel Fold using Tapatalk

The problem doesn't even affect sideloaded books, only store-loaded.

[bluepeter]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

That only helps temporarily; Kobo will restore the book to the collection after a future sync.

Yes. But, as I said earlier, "resyncing with Calibre corrects it.".

So "temporarily" means "the period between syncing with Kobo and resyncing with Calibre". In my case, that's usually a only short time, and one with which I can live. IMO, it's simpler than going through correcting every Kobo-created error on the device.

As I also said, "I don't know if it's any use to you"; I'm sorry that you don't like my approach.

[bluepeter]

Originally Posted by John Hopper

So when I buy a book from Kobo, I still sideload it from Calibre and next time I go online on the Kobo, I delete the downloaded version.

I can see the benefit of this approach, and could (mostly) use it myself. However, I like the convenience of being able to download directly from Kobo by wifi. I'm also reluctant (for entirely emotional, not logical, reasons) to delete copies from anywhere. Although I back up downloaded books, I feel happier leaving the source in place, just in case.

I say "mostly" because there are a couple of books that I've bought from Kobo that I'm unable to download to Calibre (see this thread).

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by bluepeter

I can see the benefit of this approach, and could (mostly) use it myself. However, I like the convenience of being able to download directly from Kobo by wifi. I'm also reluctant (for entirely emotional, not logical, reasons) to delete copies from anywhere. Although I back up downloaded books, I feel happier leaving the source in place, just in case.

I say "mostly" because there are a couple of books that I've bought from Kobo that I'm unable to download to Calibre (see this thread).

I also sideload all my Kobo purchases, but I don't delete them from my Kobo account - I just archive them. This will prevent them from downloading to my Kobos in those rare cases I switch wifi on.

[bluepeter]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I also sideload all my Kobo purchases, but I don't delete them from my Kobo account - I just archive them. This will prevent them from downloading to my Kobos in those rare cases I switch wifi on.

Ah, yes. I've never used the archive option, and had forgotten it. Thanks for the reminder. That'd work. I'll think about it.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by bluepeter

Ah, yes. I've never used the archive option, and had forgotten it. Thanks for the reminder. That'd work. I'll think about it.

For what it may be worth, most of the books I have in the live section of my Kobo account are Kobo Plus books. I tend to download any others and then archive them. If I ever need to, I can go into the archive section and move them back to the live library but haven't needed to do so recently.

[ownedbycats]

I use archive for DNF'd books and the books that require editing to properly read but that's it.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

I use archive for DNF'd books and the books that require editing to properly read but that's it.

IMNSHO all books require editing to be properly read. Every single one of them. But then I'm fussy.

[ownedbycats]

Another point to note that is that adding a book via KoboTouch's collection management works fine; they don't disappear after a sync. I wonder what the difference is there.