Re: [Meta] Wait, you sort your books how???

On 21 Jul 2024 16:29:21 -0000, kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

Paul S Person  <psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:

On Sun, 21 Jul 2024 13:59:34 +1200, Titus G <noone@nowhere.com> wrote:

>
You probably don't need to back up Amazon purchases as you can download
them again for no cost. (I haven't done that for years and years but
when I lost a hard disk once, it was a simple task to reload them Amazon
using "Kindle for PC".)
If you need to back up individual books, then do a web search for DeDRM
Calibre Kindle (or maybe Amazon).

>
The "Manage Content and Devices" Page (can't find it? Pull up "Returns
and Orders", go to "Digital Orders" and find an eBook; the button
should be the right) can download files for transfer by USB. You have
to designate which device you are planning to use it on, but it
downloads to Download and from there it can be moved ... anywhere.

>
This is great if you trust Amazon's long-term ability to keep providing
them.

Actually, the idea is that you do this every time you buy one and then
move it somewhere Amazon can't find it and so can neither modify it
nor remove it. That still leaves DRM to be handled, of course, but I
keep reading about that not being unsolvable.

The last time I tried to actually copy a file to a Kindle, I found the
directory system hard to understand. I don't know where they are
supposed to go, but they can be found and used in what is clearly not
the intended location. Or could be, I think this was with my
now-replaced PaperWhite.

With the new Kindles, for a while, if I did the "download and
transfer" before having Amazon send it to the device [1] the device
would claim that, since I had copied it via USB, it was not synched
and never would synch. Rather a churlish attitude, but what can you
do?

[1] Which quite an adventure with the new Kindles: by default, they go
to sleep and so /cannot receive books/ until you turn them on and they
wake up. And even then it is possible to see a book, delivered to the
wrong one because of Amazon's no longer allowing you to choose where
it is to go when you buy it (at least they stopped asking where you
wanted it to go and then sending it wherever /they/ decided was your
default), on the device and not be able to get the "Manage Content and
Devices" page to recognize that it is there and so cause it to be
removed. Chewing gum and baling wire, /that's/ what Amazon's support
of this feature is made of.
--
"Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"