[clug] Kindle 3 WiFi

[David Schoen]

On 3 March 2011 09:04, Felix Karpfen <felix.karpfen at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 03 Mar 2011 08:00:43 +1100, David Schoen wrote:
>>
>> Also I've placed regular .txt files directly on the kindle via mounting
>> it as a USB drive and the kindle picked up and displayed them without
>> issue.
>>
>> I have a 3rd generation kindle.
>
> This is exactly what I had imagined - based on the Amazon reply to my
> first query.
>
> Please confirm that I have correctly understood your reported experience
> - Kindle 3 (mounted via a USB 2.0 socket) is recognised by a Debian OS
> and that <.txt|.mobi> files can then be copied directly from my "home"
> directory to the Kindle library directory.

I couldn't remember with certainty whether I had transfered the .txt
file via a regular FS action so I've tested it again.

After a bit of playing around I've discovered it only seems to work
when I copy to the "documents" subdirectory under the root of the
Kindle's file system.

Result after simply plugging in the USB cable:
$ mount | grep Kindle
/dev/sde1 on /media/Kindle type vfat
(rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=udisks,uid=1000,gid=1000,shortname=mixed,dmask=0077,utf8=1,flush)

I think this indicates USB 2.0, but I'm not certain:
$ sudo lsusb -vvv | grep -A 20 'Bus 004 Device 003: ID 1949:0004
Lab126' | egrep 'bcdUSB|iProduct'
  bcdUSB               2.00
  iProduct                2 Amazon Kindle

I then created a test directory and copied a .mobi and .txt like so:
$ mkdir /media/Kindle/test;
$ cp Around\ the\ World\ in\ 80\ Days\ -\ Jules\ Verne.mobi
/media/Kindle/documents/test
$ echo "I am the very model of a modern major general" >
/media/Kindle/documents/test/test.txt

Ejected the device:
$ sudo eject /dev/sde1

After running the above eject command, the Kindle immediately exited
USB drive mode but continued to charge off the USB port (as in I could
immediately start using it as a reading device again). After a few
seconds of a little spinner running in the top left of the screen both
documents were visible (I think it takes a few seconds to index the
contents of the documents). Both documents open and display as I would
expect them too.

In short, aside from having to put the documents under <kindle
root>/documents/* it seems to "just work" for both .txt and .mobi.


I can't speak for all Debian versions, but if you can mount vfat I
assume it will work for you too.


Cheers,
Dave