Friday, March 12, 2010

Tip: Kindle's Archived-Items folder - Updated

A lot of people on the forums have asked what the 'Archived Items' folder is for while others have asked how to delete books.   At some point, people may want to re-download a book after deleting it and this is doable as well.

 This tip is only for Kindle 2's and DX's although there is one note about Kindle 1's different way of jumping to a Home listing page.  Thanks to My2¢worth for reminding me I should note this blog entry guide doesn't apply to the Kindle 1.

UPDATED to incorporate varying pop-up wording, thanks to the comment by Betty Reed.
When you want to delete a book purchased from Amazon, for which a copy is always on their servers, you just press your 5-way button to the left and a pop-up appears with the words "remove from device" on it to offer you that option for that book and you press down on the 5-way button.  That removes the book from your Kindle but it's still available on your Amazon book management page if you decide you want it back.  It is then also listed in your Kindle's Archived Items folder.

  If the book was not purchased from Amazon or if it is a Kindle periodical which is no longer on the Amazon server, your first pop-up says "Delete" and if you press that, you get another pop-up that says, "This item will be permanently deleted.  Would you like to continue.?" (Thanks to PaxtonReader for part of the info on when that pop-up appears, noting it does not appear for Amazon-purchased books.)

  If you don't want to delete the book or periodical because your cursor was on the wrong item, say, then you can either 5-way (button) to the right or hit my favorite Kindle button, the "BACK" button, and you'll be back to where you were before starting the delete function.

  If you confirm removal for any book, then the title is removed, and if you purchased it from Amazon the book is on their servers in the area they made for your book management and remains there.
  As a convenience, you'll find, as mentioned above, your removed Amazon-purchased book listed under the Archived Items folder on your Kindle as well, as an easy way to retrieve it when you do want it again.  This just tells you what is yours and available for download.
  (Remember that annotations you've made on an Amazon-purchased book are saved along with the book if you don't disable the advertised annotations backup feature under Menu/Settings/Menu option and that they are downloaded with any re-downloaded books).

It could be that you have another Kindle-compatible device on your account and if so, it may have a book sent to it that this Kindle doesn't have.  That book will show up in this Kindle's Archived Items folder because it's not listed in the Home directory as available for reading.

  My book orders are sent mainly to my most recent Kindle (a DX) but I may want to read it on the Kindle 2 as well.  In that case, I can send it to the Kindle 2 from the Manage Your Kindle page at Amazon by using my computer's web browser (where I'll find my book-library info at the bottom-left area of that page in expandable format [a "+" sign means you can open up that line and see more info and options], or I can just get my Kindle 2 and go to its Archived Items folder to click on the book title and get it that way.

How do we get to the Archived Items folder?
If you're new to the Kindle or haven't explored it much, be sure to see my blog article on Basic Kindle folders organization and access.  This shows how to limit the display to only Personal Docs, subscriptions, and books when not wanting the All My Items option.
  It also shows the 3 possible sorting methods of what you've chosen to display: by Most Recent, Title, or Author.  The images and text in that article show how to navigate the top-of-page organization options (often hidden) on the Kindle's Home listings page.

Tips on getting to the Archived Folder easily
  a. Primary method: Press Menu and then select and click on "View Archived Items"
  b. If you have your Home listing sorted by the 'default' setting, which is "Most Recent" at the top, then the Archived Folder will be at the end of your listing, which could be page 12.

  Getting to the last-page number (for any reason):
  You don't have to go through each page, as I've seen some complain we must.
  You can just start typing the number of the last page in your listing.  In this case, you'd type in '1' and then '2' (not too slowly).  Then you'll see the '12' on your search bar, but the Kindle knows you may just want a page number if the number is smaller than the number of pages for the Home listing.

  At that point press down on the 5-way button, and you'll be taken to the last page.  From there, you can type, say, '6' and press down the 5-way button again to get to page 6 if you want.

  NOTE: This Goto page-number for the Home listing works on ANY sort option - Most Recent, Title, or Author.   I don't think this is commmonly known.

  (Kindle 1 or 'Classic' model note:  You can type in the number of the last page and do not need to press anything else down to get there.)

  Getting to Archived Items folder with ANY sort option.:
  If your Home books-listing is sorted by Title, you're already at the 'A's. Then you type 'a' and the search bar will appear with the 'a' in there, at which point you can then press the 5-way button down and be shown not all the other titles that start with 'A' (or titles that begin with numbers) but only 3 items: Archived Items, Periodicals: Back Issues and any Items Not Yet Indexed (which means they haven't been catalogued for key word searches yet or that a subscription issue is no longer available).

  Notice that this is a short cut to Periodicals folder also.

  But since the sorting option is on 'Title' we could have typed 'p' to get there as well.  That typing of 'p' wouldn't work when on Most Recent sort-method though, although typing the alpha-character works with 'a' for Archived Items folder.

  The key thing is that although I mentioned getting to the Archived Items folder via Title above, you can type 'a' when your list is sorted by either Title or Author OR even Most Recent and you'll be taken to the listing of 3 items - the Archived Items, Periodicals and any unindexed items.

Again, whenever you're through with any unusual action, the BACK button is a great feature to get you back to where you were before a jump to another location was made.

UPDATE: A thanks to PaxtonReader for additional information, which has been included.


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6 comments:

  1. Your parenthetical note distinguishing the go-to procedure on a K1 versus a K2 in the context of your discussion of the "Archived-Items" folder might lead some to believe that such an "Archived-Items" folder exists on the K1. Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't believe there is an "Archived-Items" folder on the K1.
    I deleted an Amazon purchased book then restarted my K1. Found no "Archived-Item" folder.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous,
    Very good point!

    No, there's no Archived Items folder on the K1, nor is there a 5-way button, nor the sort options of the types I described. I just happened to remember the K1 for a moment :-) as I do still have one.

    Thanks for bringing that to my attention.

    The book you deleted, if from Amazon, you can still get back by going to the linked Manage Your Kindle page and re-sending it. Sorry for the trouble.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sorry for the "anonymous" it was very late and I hadn't signed in.

    Enjoy your blog--think it is one of the most useful and carefully written about the Kindle. I also enjoyed your recent chat with Len.

    No trouble for which to be sorry. It made me delete a book to check it out which I never do. With the advantage of the K1 memory card I'm sneeking up on the Library of Congress. :-D

    ReplyDelete
  4. My2¢worth,
    Love the user/commenter name.

    Thanks for the nice words. I think we were in an unusually merry mood during that podcast. I told Len that speaking objectively upon hearing me, I was reminded of a combo Minnie Mouse and a hyena :-) But it was fun.

    So you never delete a book! I do back mine up so that I don't have to see them all on my Kindle and to make it easier for the indexing process, which slows it down when we insert SD libraries and then replace them with another one. People thought their Kindle 1's were freezing when they were just busily indexing again, which takes a lot of processing time on it.

    And now we can have 32 gig memory cards - that's the top-level storage capacity of the new iPad.

    I do also depend on a couple of external 500gig hard disks. They're really nice to have, but I get so paranoid that I make sure the data is backed up somewhere else too.

    Thanks again for letting me know! Now I have a commenter ID I can use :-) I like that lithograph in the background...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Just a minor thing, Andrys...when you push the navigator to the left, on the K2, it doesn't say "delete" any more. They changed the wording to "remove from device" to clarify that one is not permanently deleting a book. (If you are deleting an item under subscriptions, however, or if you are deleting a book that you did not download from Amazon, then it does say "delete".)

    I enjoyed that podcast too! It was fun hearing your voice instead of just reading your words. I'm a big fan of yours and try to read everything you write!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Betty, thanks.

    It's not really minor because it's not what most people would see. So I'll modify that this week.

    You're right. I was (last week) deleting a magazine downloaded from Amazon the year before and the item is no longer available at Amazon due to time limitations, so I got the 'delete' white against black popup box.

    Am answering as I read along ...
    Glad you didn't mind my unusual state of merriment that day! Thanks for your very nice words. And thanks for the heads-up about book-removal popup. Much appreciated.

    ReplyDelete

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