# Calibre Database



## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

Hi Folks, 

I am new here, forgive if this is listed somewhere in this site...

I have converted books on calibre and sent to Kindle.
But I have also emailed many docs from my PC to the Kindle.
And I have got many books from Amazon.

QUESTION is this:  Is there any way for calibre to get EVERYTHING off my Kindle in it's database?
I would like calibre to manage everything.

Thanks.


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## Linjeakel (Mar 17, 2010)

Hi Toy2Boy, welcome to Kindleboards!

You can add any of the books or documents you have on your Kindle into a Calibre database. Connect your Kindle via USB, go to 'add books', browse to where the file is - in the Kindle's documents folder - and click on the file.

The difficulty can arise because some books won't necessarily have a recognisable filename and many, if not all, books will have more than one file associated with them and you need to go into the book's 'edit metadata' screen to add in all the other files after you've added the main file in the normal way.

I suggest you go to the Calibre website and read the support pages there for a detailed explanation of how to do all this.


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

There's an easier way... note I haven't got my Kindle connected right now so some of the menu items I describe may not be worded exactly correctly, I'm sure you can work it out...  

If you have your Kindle connected by USB while you have Calibre open you will get buttons for "Show Device" and "Show Library", and extra columns in Calibre titled either "On Device" or "In Library". This will show for each view where a book is located - so if you pick "Show Device", a tick will indicate a book that's already in the library.

So if you do "show device", then sort by "In Library", then pick all the books that don't have a tick, right click and pick "Copy into library" then the books will be copied from your Kindle into your Calibre library...

But...

Any books you have bought from Amazon will be encrypted (DRM), so can't be used anywhere else. IIRC they will be copied into your Calibre library, but you will not be able to open the book or modify it in any way.


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## Linjeakel (Mar 17, 2010)

That's a good tip, Morf, especially if you're uploading a lot of books at once into Calibre. I've learnt something new - though with Calibre it's not surprising, I've only ever got to grips with the very basics. 

To be honest, I'd like not to have to bother with it at all, but I do so hate having things like the author's name sorting by first name on some things and last name on others etc. If only Amazon would let us change stuff like that on the Kindle ..... *daydreams*


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## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

Thank you for the information.  I figured out a lot quickly.

Why doesn't this site email me when there are responses?

Since I got the Kindle Tuesday:

Calibre Installed, managing ALL my information on Kindle
120+ Books
10+ Audio books
100+ Songs in the special directory
30+ logo (my business) pictures in the hidden area
Subscribed to 14 news feeds daily
40+ personal files (including XLS spreadsheets converted to PDFs)
8+ hours (18 files) of comic audio

Minus the news feeds, I have the above in 10 different "collections".

All backed up via USB.

Now I just need better ways of organizing it on the Kindle.
Whoosh.


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## Linjeakel (Mar 17, 2010)

Toy2Boy, if you want to be notified about any replies, click on the notify button on the bottom right of the post.

As a quick check you can click on 'show new replies to your posts' at the top of the screen.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Toy2Boy,

welcome to KindleBoards!  We've got a lot of great members here always willing to help, as you've found.  Just to clarify, at the top right and bottom right of the thread's page, there are several button options.  One of these is "Notify."  Click on that to have notifications of replies to that thread sent to your registered email address.

Betsy


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## Linjeakel (Mar 17, 2010)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Toy2Boy,
> 
> welcome to KindleBoards! We've got a lot of great members here always willing to help, as you've found. Just to clarify, at the top right and bottom right of the thread's page, there are several button options. One of these is "Notify." Click on that to have notifications of replies to that thread sent to your registered email address.
> 
> Betsy


Thank you, Betsy, for explaining that more clearly than I did! (I'm too busy playing with my new KTouch!)


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## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

Alrightythen, thanks for the welcome kind folks!

New question:  Where is Calibre holding my books/docs?  
I am hoping that the FULL books (data) is being kept separately by Calibre.

(I have made sure Calibre AND my Kindle are holding the same information.)

However, I don't wish to be restricted to only EITHER Calibre OR Amazon.
I wish to back up my data INDEPENDENT of above.
(Especially the books I have purchased.)

Thanks folks,
Read on!


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

You were actually asked by Calibre where you want your books stored when you installed it  but you may have missed it! 

Normally the Calibre library is put in "My Documents", in a folder called "My Calibre Library" or "Calibre Library".

This folder contains the Calibre database itself and all of the books you have in Calibre.

If you take a backup copy (make sure Calibre isn't running, of course) then your books will be safe...

Except... As mentioned above, books bought through Amazon are encrypted so the backups will not be of use. However, all these books are stored on Amazon's servers and you can download them at any time so it really doesn't matter.


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## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

I installed Calibre TWICE as to ensure where the data went.
It did NOT allow specific designation for where the database was stored.
It DID allow me to locate the download, so I placed the whole thing outside of my C drive.

I'll do some searching. 
For backups AND to keep my boot partition simple, I never allow ANY software to dump potentially large amounts of data there.


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

The database is within the download area, so there only is one location used. As I understand it, Calibre uses the metadata.db in the root of "My Calibre Library", along with files stored with each book. I think the folder names the books are in are also important - certainly there are some numbers there that I don't know what else they are for!

Anyway, rest assured that if you backup the whole of "My Calibre Library" then you can restore from there - even on a new computer, just restore the backup then point Calibre to that folder and it will all be fine, I've done it myself.


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## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

Thanks for the info

All the books, from many sources are stored in the Documents folder on the C drive.  I don't know how to move this.  But I'll live.

Next to figure out how to better control the metadata.  I have downloaded from multiple sources on all books.

THEN, I will think about getting the Amazon books moved to another format.  I don't like that once purchased, I DON'T really own the data (without Amazon approved methods of reading it).  Hmmm.


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

Ok, I think we're talking at cross purposes here, and misunderstanding each other. It happens!  

When you got your books from your various sources, you'll have put them into your Documents folder.

When you import them into Calibre, Calibre copies them from wherever they are into the Calibre folder. It creates a folder for each author, and within the author it creates a folder for each book, and it puts a copy of the book in this folder. It also adds book information into the metadata.db file.

So now you have duplicates of each book - the original one you downloaded, and the copy that Calibre took. 

If you want to, at this stage you could delete the downloaded file; Calibre no longer uses it, it uses the copy it's taken and put in its own folder.

Browse through your Calibre folder, you'll be able to see what I mean, the contents are fairly transparent - just don't delete anything!  

So, as I said, if you've got all your books in Calibre then you simply need to back up the Calibre folder.



Please don't discuss decrypting or converting Amazon books on here - it is not an approved topic for discussion and nobody will answer questions about it.


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## Toy2Boy (Apr 19, 2012)

Yes, I understand all above, thanks.
Once converted, I have deleted the source texts.
I just didn’t appreciate the Calibre location of the database.

As for converting Amazon format, that didn’t take long to find the Calibre plugin via Google.

I am still more concerned about getting my books metadata detailed so I can make reasonable searches against said data.  For example, seems beyond retarded that many books don’t list genre(s) at minimum.  I’ll figure this out soon though, my next project when I get a break.


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