Define path for converted files

[DelaneyBC]

I have adjusted the "template" for "Saving Books to Disk" to be:

{title}/{title} - {authors}

And yet, when I convert a book, it is always saved as:

author\title\title-author.pdf

This is terribly painful to manage as, sadly, not every author is a Shakespeare. When I download a book, I usually know it's name but rarely will I know it's author. So, after conversion, I must hunt for it.

This is a useless naming scheme for me. And, the change to preferences doesn't seem to have worked.

I'd ultimately prefer to store the converted file in a folder of my choosing rather than a two-tiered new file for every new book.

Any suggestions?

[itimpi]

That path setting is only relevant when you use the Calibre "Save to Disk" functionality to export a book from Calibre. When using the GUI, converted books are always placed in the same Calibre folder as the book that was being converted from.

If you want complete control over placement of files during conversion then you need to look at by-passing the GUI and using the Calibre CLI interface.

[Man Eating Duck]

Originally Posted by DelaneyBC

This is a useless naming scheme for me. And, the change to preferences doesn't seem to have worked.

I'd ultimately prefer to store the converted file in a folder of my choosing rather than a two-tiered new file for every new book.

Any suggestions?

If you use the "Save to disk" feature (right-click on a book) it will respect your template and create new directories as necessary. If you just want to find the file easily you can highlight your book and hit "o", this will open your file manager to the correct directory. Do not delete or change files here as this might confuse Calibre, only copy them to another location.

Note that Calibre's library directory structure and file naming is considered part of its database, and it is not subject to change for a host of reasons (also, this issue has been debated to death in numerous threads). It's not designed to be user-manageable. Use the mentioned GUI functionality to export files if you want to manage your directory structure yourself.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by DelaneyBC

This is a useless naming scheme for me. And, the change to preferences doesn't seem to have worked.

I'd ultimately prefer to store the converted file in a folder of my choosing rather than a two-tiered new file for every new book.

Any suggestions?

@DelaneyBC - As itimpi suggested you can use the command line, but if you're not comfortable with that, then

1. do what you want to a book via the GUI - Conversion, Metadata Editing etc, Quality Check etc
2. use the Click to open in Book Details to open the book folder
3. copy the files you want to wherever you want them and rename as you wish.
4. delete the book from Calibre

BR

[itimpi]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

@DelaneyBC - As itimpi suggested you can use the command line, but if you're not comfortable with that, then

1. do what you want to a book via the GUI - Conversion, Metadata Editing etc, Quality Check etc
2. use the Click to open in Book Details to open the book folder
3. copy the files you want to wherever you want them and rename as you wish.
4. delete the book from Calibre

BR

This will not achieve the desired result in many cases. If you do not run a conversion as part of step 1) then metadata and/or covers do not actually get embedded into the eBook file held inside Calibre

It is better to
- ensure you have set the save template to the naming format you want.
- drag the files from the main calibre book list to the desired target location. This will cause Calibre to effectively export the file and update its metadata and/or covers. Unfortunately the format exported will only be the one set as the preferred format, but this may be sufficient?

[BetterRed]

@itimpi, I hoped my "etc, Quality Check, etc" would have conveyed that I wasn't being prescriptive.

br

[itimpi]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

@itimpi, I hoped my "etc, Quality Check, etc" would have conveyed that I wasn't being prescriptive.

br

OK - but I was pointing out that only some actions actually update the metadata and cover embedded inside the book. Your process would fail if one of these has not been done.

My suggestion of dragging direct from the Book List eliminates a step, and also ensures that Calibre will try and update the embedded metadata and/or cover as it saves the file to disk. Taking the file directly from inside the Calibre library as your process suggests does not do this.