Kindle Metadata

[redallover]

Hello. My first post so please make allowances!
I download books regularly from Gutenberg as EPUB to read on Kindle. I have noticed that in the Kindle there seems to be no basic metadata - principally book title and author - which you would see if the title was Amazon purchased. Can anyone tell me where exactly in the HTML this data should be provided - or is it just a proprietary Amazon thing. I did find those details in content.opf but they don't show. Cheers!

[Turtle91]

I’m not a kindle expert, but someone who is should be along shortly to help. I just wanted to say Welcome to MR!

[nabsltd]

Originally Posted by redallover

I download books regularly from Gutenberg as EPUB to read on Kindle.

You cannot read an EPUB on a Kindle...it does not support the format. You need to convert to a format the Kindle supports:

1. KF8 (AZW3 file extension...works on most Kindles)
2. KFX (works on newer Kindles and adds some features like better typography support)
3. MOBI (only use for older Kindles that do not support newer formats)

Calibre can do the conversion and load the converted file onto your Kindle via USB. You can also use "Send to Kindle", via either the Amazon website, the Send to Kindle app, or via e-mail. Either of these methods will get a file of the correct format onto the Kindle in a way that you can read it.

OTOH, if you are already using one of these methods and the files still don't show up to read on the Kindle, then you would need to edit the source EPUB to add the correct metadata. Again, Calibre allows you to do this, as do other EPUB editors (Sigil, etc.).

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by nabsltd

You cannot read an EPUB on a Kindle...it does not support the format.

But the OP is complaining only about meta-data. Maybe they use Send to Kindle or already convert, rather than downloading the Kindle version from Gutenberg.

Gutenberg have "funny to me" ideas of formatting so I download epub (allegedly for kindle) and the mobi (old Kindle) in case the epub is broken.

Then I add both to Calibre and convert, always!

Usually the publish date is the release date. But mostly the metadata for author & title is correct, so I suspect OP is using "Send to Kindle", which I'd not use for many reasons, is ignoring the metadata.

I smarten punctuation, remove paragraph spacing, putting a 1.3em indent (this doesn't mess up headings, verses, quotes etc) and also remove line-height and white-space entirely (though Gutenberg don't usually have those, but that's my default on ALL ebook conversions).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by nabsltd

You cannot read an EPUB on a Kindle...it does not support the format. You need to convert to a format the Kindle supports:

1. KF8 (AZW3 file extension...works on most Kindles)
2. KFX (works on newer Kindles and adds some features like better typography support)
3. MOBI (only use for older Kindles that do not support newer formats)

Calibre can do the conversion and load the converted file onto your Kindle via USB. You can also use "Send to Kindle", via either the Amazon website, the Send to Kindle app, or via e-mail. Either of these methods will get a file of the correct format onto the Kindle in a way that you can read it.

OTOH, if you are already using one of these methods and the files still don't show up to read on the Kindle, then you would need to edit the source EPUB to add the correct metadata. Again, Calibre allows you to do this, as do other EPUB editors (Sigil, etc.).

KFX is crap. Stay away. KFX breaks things. Go with KF8. Also, with calibre, use the Hyphenate This! plugin if you want hyphens.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

KFX is crap. Stay away. KFX breaks things. Go with KF8. Also, with calibre, use the Hyphenate This! plugin if you want hyphens.

Is there any reason that you believe anyone would take that as good advice, or if it is an order, follow it?

Do you ever take into account a poster's posting history before assuming they know nothing about what they are writing?