Manage Authors Dialog?

[mdibella]

THe FAQ describes a method to change author displays to 'Last, First' using a 'Manage Authors Dialog'. I don't see this dialog anywhere. Clicking on an author name in the list just displays the standard dialog for editing the book information.

I have a library with some author names in 'First Last' format and some in 'Last, First' format. I want to change the sort AND the display into 'Last, First'. I am thinking I need to set the 'author sort name algorithm' tweak to 'comma', recalc all of the sort fields using the bulk metadata, and then set 'Use author sort in tag browser'. This isn't what the FAQ says though.

Am I right or am I missing something? (it wouldn't be the first time, heh)

[kovidgoyal]

right click on an author name in the tab browser, the area to the left of the book list

[mdibella]

OK I found it, sorry (duh). It doesn't seem to work correctly though. When I recalculate the sort value, for example, author 'Holt, Tom' produces a sort value of ',Tom, Holt'.

I have the 'author sort name algorithm' tweak set to 'comma'.

[mdibella]

AHA! I think I see what's happening. The 'Holt,Tom' does not have a space after the comma, so the comma isn't being seen. I think I can fix that...

[Manichean]

Then everything works. If you have the tweak set to comma, Calibre expects the author field to contain the author name in the format FN LN and will recalculate the author_sort value accordingly. If your author field contains LN, FN Calibre will assume that the first name is indeed the last name and produce the result you saw.
If you, as you wrote in your first post, want both author and author_sort to contain LN, FN then you'd have to set the tweak to copy, put LN, FN in every author field and then recalculate the author_sort values.

[mdibella]

yup, my bad, sorry. I have a LOTTA bad. heh

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Manichean

Then everything works. If you have the tweak set to comma, Calibre expects the author field to contain the author name in the format FN LN and will recalculate the author_sort value accordingly.

True.

Originally Posted by Manichean

If your author field contains LN, FN Calibre will assume that the first name is indeed the last name and produce the result you saw.

Not True. If the author field contains LN, FN (a comma) it copies the author field to author_sort field.

Author Sort Tweak

The algorithm used to copy author to author_sort Possible values are:
invert: use "fn ln" -> "ln, fn" (the default algorithm)
copy : copy author to author_sort without modification
comma : use 'copy' if there is a ',' in the name, otherwise use 'invert'
nocomma : "fn ln" -> "ln fn" (without the comma)
When this tweak is changed, the author_sort values stored with each author
must be recomputed by right-clicking on an author in the left-hand tags pane,
selecting 'manage authors', and pressing 'Recalculate all author sort values'.

[Manichean]

Ah, you're right. I wrote from memory, which was obviously wrong.