Plugboard, template, and custom composite column recipes

[StreakyG]

Is it possible to create a custom column to show booksize in eg Bytes? When comparing for possible duplicates in my library, MB is too coarse to assume the duplication.

I've had a look around for pointers, with no luck. If this has been covered already then a gentle nudge to look in the right direction would be much appreciated.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by StreakyG

Is it possible to create a custom column to show booksize in eg Bytes? When comparing for possible duplicates in my library, MB is too coarse to assume the duplication.

I'm unsure of your request, but if you install the Find Duplicates plugin there is a binary compare feature that will take the guess work out of comparing books for exact matches.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by StreakyG

Is it possible to create a custom column to show booksize in eg Bytes? When comparing for possible duplicates in my library, MB is too coarse to assume the duplication.

I agree with dwanthy that you probably don't want to use the size data to check for duplicates. The find duplicates plugin does a more thorough job. But putting that aside ...

The template for a "column built from other columns" that shows the size information in bytes is

program: booksize()

This value is the sum of all the formats associated with a book, which might not be what you want. The template to show the sizes of the individual formats is

program: formats_sizes()

See the Using General Program Mode documentation for more information on templates that begin with "program:" The documentation for the two functions is available here.

Note that the second template (formats_sizes) can cause performance problems when used in large libraries, especially if the column is sorted. The first template will slow things down a bit, but not as much as the second.

[StreakyG]

dwanthny , chaley.

Very many thanks. c answered my question as phrased and I'll be able to go and 'play' a bit now. d answered the 'what I was trying to achieve' so between you I well happy.

As I said, vmt.

[capnm]

StreakyG -

You might also look into the Count Pages plugin.
Find Duplicates binary compare won't flag as duplicates otherwise identical books that have, for example, an internal timestamp difference.
But for myself, I'm willing to work with the assumption that two versions of a book with identical word counts are duplicates ...

[DriverJC]

I'm having a hard time with this. I have a few thousand books that have their title set to "Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi #05: Allies" and the Series is set to "Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi [5]".

I would like to remove the "{series} #{series_index}: " from the title.

Can someone please point me in the right direction on the regular Expression I should be using to do this in Bulk.

Thank you
Joel

[theducks]

Originally Posted by DriverJC

I'm having a hard time with this. I have a few thousand books that have their title set to "Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi #05: Allies" and the Series is set to "Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi [5]".

I would like to remove the "{series} #{series_index}: " from the title.

Can someone please point me in the right direction on the regular Expression I should be using to do this in Bulk.

Thank you
Joel

Use Bulk Metadata Edit

Field to search: title
Search for:

(Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi \#\d+\: )

Your Test (optional): Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi #05: Allies

Anything inside paren will be gobbled. escape the # (or any special to REGEX characters). \d+ gets any numbers following. \: gets the colon.
Spaces MUST be exactly placed as exists to make the match work.

BTW :welcome" to MR

[DriverJC]

Use Bulk Metadata Edit

Field to search: title
Search for:
Code:

(Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi \#\d+\: )

Your Test (optional): Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi #05: Allies

Anything inside paren will be gobbled. escape the # (or any special to REGEX characters). \d+ gets any numbers following. \: gets the colon.
Spaces MUST be exactly placed as exists to make the match work.

BTW :welcome" to MR

Thank you for the Quick Response and your welcome to the forum.

The Code you gave me worked great on any Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi Books. Is there any way it can be modified to take the information in the Series field and remove it from the title field. I have somewhere north of 1834 Books that have various series listed. in the Title and Series field.

Thank you
Joel

[theducks]

Originally Posted by DriverJC

Thank you for the Quick Response and your welcome to the forum.

The Code you gave me worked great on any Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi Books. Is there any way it can be modified to take the information in the Series field and remove it from the title field. I have somewhere north of 1834 Books that have various series listed. in the Title and Series field.

Thank you
Joel

Someone might have a different idea on how to use templates and REGEX in the search term
In the meantime:
if your format is solidly consistent...

(.+ \#\d+\: )

This change will gobble everything up to the <space>#

The nice thing about the bulk editor S&R is you can CANCEL if you can't create a satisfactory find or replace term .
Warning: One you hit apply or OK it is a done deal Backup or try on a test lib

[DriverJC]

That worked FLAWLESSLY.

Thank you so much for the help.

Joel

[remus.grrrl]

Originally Posted by chaley

[Edited on 23/Jan/2011]

Several people are doing interesting and useful things with templates, plugboards, and composite fields. This thread is both a request that they share what they have done and a place to put the information.

Suggestions/recipes are summarized below. Don't hesitate to post corrections and useful variants.

General Metadata

Metadata: Put series into the title, using either initials or a shortened form. Strip leading articles from the series name (any) (inspired by Gary_M_Mugford)
The solution requires creating three composite columns. The first column is used to remove the leading articles. The second is used to compute the 'shorten' form. The third is to compute the 'initials' form. Once you have these columns, the plugboard selects between them. You can hide any or all of the three columns on the library view.

First column:

Name: #stripped_series. Template: {series:re(^(A|The|An)\s+,)||}

Second column (the shortened form):

Name: #shortened. Template: {#stripped_series:shorten(4,-,4)}

Third column (the initials form):

Name: #initials. Template: {#stripped_series:re(([^\s])[^\s]+(\s|$),\1)}

Plugboard expression:

Template:{#stripped_series:lookup(.\s,#initials,.,#shortened,series)}{series_index:0>2s| [|] }{title}
Destination field: title

This set of fields and plugboard produces:
Series: The Lord of the Rings
Series index: 2
Title: The Two Towers
Output: LotR [02] The Two Towers

Series: Dahak
Series index: 1
Title: Mutineers Moon
Output: Dahak [01] Mutineers Moon

Series: Berserkers
Series Index: 4
Title: Berserker Throne
Output: Bers-kers [04] Berserker Throne

Series: Meg Langslow Mysteries
Series Index: 3
Title: Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos
Output: MLM [03] Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos

Trying to use this, however, no matter what the series is, it always uses the initials for it. I have a lot of series that are one word that keep showing up as one letter which is making it hard to figure out which series the books belong to.

ie: Both series name Bite, and Berserk....will both show

B [1] {title}......do I need to tweak the metadata plugboard so it will recognize that it is to use the series alone if it is only 1 word?

Help is greatly appreciated.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by remus.grrrl

Trying to use this, however, no matter what the series is, it always uses the initials for it. I have a lot of series that are one word that keep showing up as one letter which is making it hard to figure out which series the books belong to.

I don't currently use this setup, but have in the past. Have you double checked each of the three custom columns you created to verify the template and look up names are correct?

stripped_series
shortened
initials

Good Luck.

[remus.grrrl]

Here is all my information in screen shots....

Spoiler:

BOOKS IN LIBRARY


COLUMN HEADINGS




METADATA PLUGIN


SAVED TO FILE OUTPUT IN DIRECTORY

[remus.grrrl]

Okay.....now the whole thing isn't working at all.....is there a specific save to disk template I need to use??

Problem found and fixed....see next post.

[remus.grrrl]

A HA HA HA......finally got the dang thing to work.......at least with the newer calibre (0.8.70) You do NOT put the plugboard expression in the Metadata Plugboard like I thought.....You put it in the save to disk, template area. As below....now it works perfectly.....