02-21-2010, 02:30 AM | #1 |
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Feature request: Anthology creation
I have a couple of books in a series (e.g. Dune Series). I recently purchased the Night's Dawn trilogy in a single volume, and was thinking how useful that would be for a lot of my other series. It's now a single entry in the awful Kindle system of book organisation.
So, if Calibre could take as input three books, say, and then output a single volume with a table of contents with links to the three volumes, that would be fantastic. Thoughts? |
02-21-2010, 11:06 AM | #2 |
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Baen call those Omnibus editions
Where 1 to 3 books in a series have been combined into a single volume. I currently use an Omnibus tag, but that does not easily cross reference to the individual (original) titles, using the Omnibus title as a reference link only. I am looking for ideas Condition 1: Individual books are in library, and series indexed in order <Calibre does this well Condition 2: Omnibus is in the library, no individual book index overlap < 1) How to make cross a reference entry 2)What to set the series index value to for the Omnibus Condition 3: A mix within a series of Omnibus and individual books < series index setting a huge issue I already use empty books as (and tagged) placeholder for future release/purchase markers Ideas please Next up: Author Pseudonym cross referencing within Calibre |
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02-21-2010, 09:17 PM | #3 |
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I have quite a few of those and they are a pain, yes. I've figured out a way to handle it on calibre however it doesn't change anything on the kindle. What I do is add the anthology file to calibre multiple times. (the number of books that are contained within the anthology) Then I rename each file as the individual books. It doesn't change the contents of the file, each book is still the full anthology but at least I know what books are in my library. That way if I've only read one or two books in the anthology I can mark them read and rate them.
Like this: Anthology - rename as book 1 Anthology - rename as book 2 Anthology - rename as book 3 It can be a bit clunky but it is better than nothing. Also, now with the new ability to rename DRM books coming with the next calibre release you could essentially do the same on the kindle. |
02-22-2010, 03:16 AM | #4 |
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I think the first hamster, er, I mean poster, is talking about doing it the other way around.
For example, if you have 10 short stories by Edgar Allen Poe cluttering up your reader's index, it would be nice to be able to merge them into one book called "10 Stories by Poe". This is a big deal to me, as a confirmed Project Gutenberg addict, because every single short story is its own ebook, which is downright annoying at times and leads to massive index clutter. |
02-22-2010, 05:31 AM | #5 | |
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Quote:
The Dune books in the example are full novel length stories written when a Mass market Paperback was about 5/8 inch thick. Today's books are over an inch thick, so Publishers choose to combine older books to get the size (and price) up to standards. Ace Doubles, anyone |
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02-22-2010, 08:17 AM | #6 | |
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Quote:
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02-22-2010, 08:30 AM | #7 |
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For Calibre to actually have the ability to combine books in a series with a clickable TOC is a great idea.
I currently use Calibre to convert each file in a series to rtf format, open in OpenOffice, save as HTML - combine all into a single HTML file and then do a large amount of cleaning up as well as coding in a clickable TOC. It's a lengthy process but once I have the HTML format I can easily convert to mobi or other formats. I guess I could use Sigil but I like HTML. |
02-22-2010, 08:48 AM | #8 | |
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Quote:
Use the MobiUnpack script to unpack the books you want to combine, and then using Mobipocket Creator to rebuild as one omnibus, by moving the HTML into one folder, amending one of the opfs to reference all HTML files, and perhaps even tweaking the HTML to set a suitable tag for getting Mobipocket Creator to make a TOC that links to the individual TOCs in the books. Well, if you're on Windows, of course. Mobipocket Creator doesn't work on Mac or Linux. |
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02-22-2010, 08:54 AM | #9 |
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That would be pretty neat. Especially now that I am reading the Dark Tower Series. I could buy all 7 books, add them to Calibre, and have one massive book
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02-22-2010, 09:14 AM | #10 |
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I actually do that homebrewed via Perl, using Plucker, have a TOC that links to all the books or short stories of interest for a given author, etc.
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02-23-2010, 02:48 AM | #11 |
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With epub supporting Mutilevel TOC I think the problem of very cluttered index should not
exist I also would like it to have the ability to break down a omnibus edition to its individual books using the TOC but I think the conversion would need a well defined TOC and most formats don't support it. |
02-23-2010, 09:44 PM | #12 |
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LOL! The funny thing is I've got the exact opposite issue.
I've got a few Omnibus editions and I would prefer to have the individual titles within calibre's database rather than the Omnibus Title. Right now I am entering the Omnibus Title, Series Name and Series Index # (as appropriate to the whole series). This prevents issues within large series where books 1-10 are individual and then 11-14 are an omnibus edition, listed as 11. I enter the names of all book titles within the Description / Comment field. This does alter the book numbering though (what should be book #15 is now listed as #12 which is the right order, but the wrong number - strictly speaking). For real world examples, think H. P. Lovercraft (and any of the numerous adherents who increase the Cthulhu Mythos every day), or Agatha Christie, who both have had books published in multiple formats, multiple titles, multiple omnibus editions, etc. To know what is in the book is more important than the book title. But personally I am finding that this does not work all that great. I have several Omnibus, let alone Anthologies. And then their are Manga and Magazines... Those two get very, very ugly to deal with. I've wondered if adding a new field, Book Title (and renaming Title to Story Title), would allow Books and Stories to be differentiated without adding too much extra work or overhead. Of course, calibre would also need to support something like the HTML anchor function so you could click a story and jump directly to that story instead of the first page of the book. A somewhat related issue is version numbers for books. If we're all making corrections to typographical errors, adding TOCs, altering format for readability, etc there should be a means of keeping track of the books version number. Otherwise you cannot know for certain which version is the most up to date. |
02-24-2010, 02:42 AM | #13 |
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I'd love to see a feature that would automatically collect books together; nearly half the books on my device are of the type "XXXXXX, part I"/"XXXXXX, part II", "XXXXXX, part III", so it would really streamline my library.
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02-24-2010, 10:41 AM | #14 |
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Breaking an Omnibus apart requires actual manipulation of the book file. This clearly violates DRM restrictions. (Just anoter reason to avoid DRM).
Would I rip apart my paper edition. H--- No So why would I do this with an e-edition (other than I could if no locked)? I think the solution to the omnibus, is x-reference records, Where title, author and original series index are entered, but it places a "dummy book" that, when opened (attempt), redirects to the Omnibus edition. (A 3 title omnibus, would have 3 x-ref records. It would really be cool if the link could force a jump to the actual chapter-section in the omnibus (may not be doable with all formats or reading devices). This would work really well for anthologies, where Author information currently gets muddled (one long list). Now we can create an X-ref for each Author-sory pair. |
02-26-2010, 10:53 PM | #15 |
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I didn't actually call them "x-references", but isn't that what I said?
I think this issue is a potential major stumbling block for calibre. As ebooks expand into different types of publication markets the need to handle portions of a physical book as separate entities is going to become critical. There are thousands of multiple article/story publications that calibre cannot handle gracefully at this point in time. |
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