Calibre Viewer annotations/highlights are not sorted correctly

[Noirtier]

Ref. https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=337917

Calibre Viewer annotations (/highlights) are not properly ordered according to how they appear in the book. In the two pdf examples attached, they appear to be mostly ordered in reverse (i.e. most recent highlight listed first), but not consistently so.

Calibre versions tested on: 5.12 & 5.14
Windows 8.1

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

The fix for this was already released in 5.14, try doing a refresh/cache
clear in your browser to make sure the updated code is used.

 status fixreleased

[Noirtier (noirtier)]

Thank you Kovid. I still have this issue on 5.14 and not sure what browser you are referring to. Is it something to do with the Calibre Viewer, and how then do I clear the cache on it?

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

There is no cache for the calibre viewer as opposed to the browser viewer. I suggest you first try updating calibre to the current release then try sorting the highlights again. I certainly cant replicate your issue with the attached pdf file. And are you sure you are opening the PDF files in the calibre viewer? The calibre viewer is not designed for PDF, and by default calibre will open PDFs in the system pdf viewer.

[Noirtier (noirtier)]

Thank you Kovid. I am not sure what you mean by "browser viewer", but probably of no matter (Annotations browser window?). When you say "sorting the highlights", do you mean there is a particular way of doing this? Maybe this is what I am missing as I cannot see this option anywhere.

I usually highlight text on my e-reader, and then import those highlights with the separate annotations plugin. But since I cannot make highlights on PDFs on my device (Kobo Forma), I was trying the new Calibre Viewer annotations feature as a possible workaround to instead highlight them on my laptop. So yes, it is definitely the Calibre Viewer I am selecting to open them with while trying this, and it is specifically with PDFs I was hoping to use it for. But if this if out of scope, then no worries.

In any case, I have done some more testing now with both PDF and EPUB files, and the annotations are appearing consistently in reverse order in both 5.14 and 5.17. I tried marking a fresh PDF and then EPUB in 5.14, then updated to 5.17 and tried the same again with different PDF and EPUB files respectively. I have attached the four files in question (2x PDF and 2x EPUB) that I tested with, along with a screenshot showing the reversed ordering for all four of them in the annotations browser. In all cases I have highlighted numbered chapter titles in order, so you can clearly see how they are reversed. E.g. marking chapters 1 – 9 consecutively in the first PDF get displayed in reverse order 9 – 1 in the annotations browser and export.

[Noirtier (noirtier)]

P.S. I have discovered a workaround / different approach which resolves this issue. Instead of using the "Browse annotations" option, if I instead open the book in the Calibre Viewer, and then open the right click → "Highlights" menu here which opens a panel on the right hand side, the highlights all appear in correct order, and can also be exported correctly with the Export button at bottom right.

Since I only need this feature occasionally, this workaround with opening one book at a time in the Calibre Viewer is perfectly adequate for my needs. :)

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

Fixed in branch master. The fix will be in the next release. calibre is usually released every alternate Friday.

 status fixreleased

[Noirtier (noirtier)]

Impressive! Many thanks