Help viewing calibre gui data via commandline

[jackie_w]

I am trying to get a better understanding of the calibre library data available when creating a typical user interface plugin. Please could someone get me started.

As an example, some simple code I already have in a working plugin is this:

db = self.gui.library_view.model().db
book_authors = db.authors(book_id, index_is_id=True)

where book_id is a known value.

If I want to create that gui db object in a commandline session (either interactive or in a script.py file) so I can poke around a little (viewing only) what do I need to do?

I've seen the calibre-debug -e myscript.py option in the user manual but I'm not sure how to access the gui data.

Secondly, if the above is possible I would also like to look around the available data when a device is connected (self.gui.device_manager.connected_device when used in a plugin).

In case it's relevant, I don't have any development environment - just my trusty text editor (Notepad++)

[kovidgoyal]

calibre-debug -c "from calibre.library import db; db = db(); Do whatever with the db object"

For device access, you can directly instaantiate the device plugin, like this

calibre-debug -c "from calibre.customize.builtins import PRS505; device = PRS505(None)"

[jackie_w]

Many thanks, I'll have a play

[jackie_w]

After some playing around I'm OK with the 'db' part of your reply but not the 'device' part. I understand, using your example, that I can do things like

device=PRS505(None)
print(device.EBOOK_DIR_MAIN)

to view some variables, but if I want to be able to examine other device data available whilst the device is actually connected to my PC, what extra do I need to do?
e.g within a plugin, if I wanted to know what drive the device was connected as I would use

root_path = self.gui.device_manager.connected_device._main_prefix

what extras would I need to import to be able to access this data via the commandline?

[kovidgoyal]

Call device.open((1,1,1,'','',''), 'test') then calibre will connect to the device and you will be able to interrogate the device.

[jackie_w]

Thank you, that works. The fog is lifting...