Sorting content

[rleguillow]

I have been researching the two Astak EZ Readers. I'm thinking when my Sony PRS-700 dies, which I'm expecting it to do due to parts of it coming off, that perhaps the Astak will be the replacement. Don't know which - if the primary purpose is to read books, additional gray scales don't make up for a 5" screen, but what about that speed of page-turning, and so forth?

At any rate I came across something on one of the reviews that really has me puzzled. They said you can sort books by title, date (I assume that means date loaded), and type (meaning format?). What about sorting by author?

One of the things that I DON'T like about the 700 is that, though it has an author sort, it sorts by first name and then last name. Never went to a library or book store that sorts that way. Its just weird. But at least it has the ability to sort by author. I used Calibre to change the metadata on my ebooks and fake it into sorting on last name then first name - works for all but the books I got from the Sony store.

But to have no ability to sort by author at all... RobertB, is that true? That just doesn't seem right.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by rleguillow

I have been researching the two Astak EZ Readers. I'm thinking when my Sony PRS-700 dies, which I'm expecting it to do due to parts of it coming off, that perhaps the Astak will be the replacement. Don't know which - if the primary purpose is to read books, additional gray scales don't make up for a 5" screen, but what about that speed of page-turning, and so forth?

At any rate I came across something on one of the reviews that really has me puzzled. They said you can sort books by title, date (I assume that means date loaded), and type (meaning format?). What about sorting by author?

One of the things that I DON'T like about the 700 is that, though it has an author sort, it sorts by first name and then last name. Never went to a library or book store that sorts that way. Its just weird. But at least it has the ability to sort by author. I used Calibre to change the metadata on my ebooks and fake it into sorting on last name then first name - works for all but the books I got from the Sony store.

But to have no ability to sort by author at all... RobertB, is that true? That just doesn't seem right.

The sorts are file system sorts.

The PEz uses a simple file system, No Meta-Data sorting

If you want to sort by Author, then you need a Author folder
or the file name has to start with the authors name.
Smith, John < sorts with the Esses
John_Smith < Sorts with the Jays
Note: the use of underscore instead of spaces to prevent bookmarking issues.

The file type sort is just that: by file extension (ala DOS/Win)
Date sort is the creation date (not necessarily the copy to date) for the file or folder.

Does this help

I use Calibre with the Save to Disk template set to:

{series}/{series_index}-{title}_{id}/{title}-{authors}/

[rleguillow]

Ducks, what does that look like displaying on the reader?

and (I'm new with Calibre) is this something you need to do to each book as you bring it into Calibre, or is this just a setting that affects how it loads to the reader?

[Stormchild]

Not quite true Ducks. The Mobi format uses metadata. It uses the Title field.

[Davimee]

I'm not sure if this question goes right here, but talking about Calibre made me think of it... if all I'm going to read are books that are already formated as epubs, do I need to use calibre? Thanks.

[jusmee]

Originally Posted by Davimee

I'm not sure if this question goes right here, but talking about Calibre made me think of it... if all I'm going to read are books that are already formated as epubs, do I need to use calibre? Thanks.

Maybe not, but Calibre is good at organising stuff, and also, if you ever want to change the font used, Calibre has a nice feature to add extra css (stylesheet info) as it converts them, to set it to use a new font.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Stormchild

Not quite true Ducks. The Mobi format uses metadata. It uses the Title field.

But you can not FIND the MOBI format to open it To use the Metadata.
The PEz solely uses folders and file names for sorting.

MOBI devices may have a Metadata based file browser, but the PEz does not.

[polly]

Originally Posted by rleguillow

Ducks, what does that look like displaying on the reader?

and (I'm new with Calibre) is this something you need to do to each book as you bring it into Calibre, or is this just a setting that affects how it loads to the reader?

I'm not the Ducks, but I do a variation on what he does. This is something you do as you load it to the reader. In my case, I use Save to Disk in Calibre. You can use preferences in Calibre to control what the output will look like, depending on what's important to you. In my case, I want the author to be the main folder. Inside the author folder I want another folder for any series that author might have written. I like to read series in order and don't always remember that order, so I have Calibre use the series info to put a number at the beginning of each book title. The expression that I use to accomplish all of this is this:

{author_sort}/{series}/{series_index} - {title}

It means that in Calibre I can select a range of books, choose to send a specific format to Calibre, wait a few moments, and all of the folder creation and file renaming happens automatically. Calibre is smart enough to recognize that a folder already exists and to add content to that folder. If the book is not part of a series, then it ends up in the author's folder.

People in the Calibre forum can give you more details on how to make this work.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by rleguillow

Ducks, what does that look like displaying on the reader?

and (I'm new with Calibre) is this something you need to do to each book as you bring it into Calibre, or is this just a setting that affects how it loads to the reader?

Sorry, missed your post


From the Root (top level folder)

Series_name

Next layer
_____ Book_number_in_Series - Title_calibre_index# <- the last is Optional

Next layer
__________Title-Author (all the pictures, versions if sent, Metadata if sent. Some things do not show on the PEz menu)

I use a dummy series "00NoSeries" <- Start with numbers makes it appear in front of Letters . <- all other books would land in the Root layer if you left series_name blank

For books that do not belong to a series. I also use a transfer pattern that does not include {series_index}- because Calibre does not suppress characters used as visual separators when the value of the index is 0 (null is not allowed)

[Stormchild]

Originally Posted by theducks

But you can not FIND the MOBI format to open it To use the Metadata.
The PEz solely uses folders and file names for sorting.

MOBI devices may have a Metadata based file browser, but the PEz does not.

Sorry Ducks. I am not trying to start an argument but the Pez (Mini for me) uses the Title field of the Mobi Metadata. It reverts to the File name if there is no metadata. I only use Mobi. This is non DRM'd Mobi of course.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Stormchild

Sorry Ducks. I am not trying to start an argument but the Pez (Mini for me) uses the Title field of the Mobi Metadata. It reverts to the File name if there is no metadata. I only use Mobi. This is non DRM'd Mobi of course.

I am confused
Where are you looking?
If I change the name of a MOBI file from Yellow to Pink. Pink is what I see in the folder list. I have no search tool available until I open the document.
Note I am running Astak's Nov 2009 release of firmware.

[Stormchild]

theducks.

You have to change the metadata of the Mobi file. The metadata is the same as ID2/3 tags in MP3. Use Mobi2Mobi or Calibre for existing Mobi files or Mobipocket creator when converting to Mobi.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Stormchild

theducks.

You have to change the metadata of the Mobi file. The metadata is the same as ID2/3 tags in MP3. Use Mobi2Mobi or Calibre for existing Mobi files or Mobipocket creator when converting to Mobi.

I have been using the Default- as shipped MOBI which is probably blank. (I have seen ID3 tags show up in "Music is Playing" MP3 files.)

I have never seen an option to sort by this auxiliary (to the PEz) data.
Thanks for pointing out a feature I had not noticed before.
(I tried the Lbook firmware, and I really like the bold and more informative file display. The status bar icons have way better contrast. Then, you run into the Russian only menus without you Russian co-worker handy )

[Acreo Aeneas]

Here's the sorting I use with Calibre and in general:

{tags}/{series}/{series_index} {title} - {author}

The only thing I do is edit each book's metadata so the tags only falls under one category and correct the series and series index if needed. For example, if a book falls under Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Fiction, and several other categories, after my edit, the only tag there is Sci-Fi.

[Davimee]

Can you sort in more than one way? For example, could you sort both by author, and by genre? That will probably be self explanatory once I get it, but I just thought I'd ask. I'm hoping to get mine by the middle of February! I can hardly wait!