Plugin? Search original publication date
 

Is there a plugin that searches and updates metadata for "original publication date" for books? Not for a specific edition or printing or format, but for the date of the very first publication of the novel (in any form). Maybe something that searches WorldCat or Library of Congress? I am mostly interested in fiction novels written within the last 100 years.

If there is no such plugin available, is there an easy to parse source for this kind of information somewhere? When I go to various websites (e.g., "Book Series in Order", "WorldCat") sometimes the information conflicts.

There isn't an individual plugin that does it, but some of the metadata source plugins will. It will depend on what the metadata source has. Goodreads can have both the original publication date and the edition date. The Goodread metadata source plugin will use the original publication date if it can.

I haven't looked at the other sources enough to be sure what they all have.

Metadata Download in Calibre can be configured to use published date of first edition from worldcat.org.

You can suggest in the simplest possible way how to set it to take advantage of this opportunity.

Thanks
bravosx

Preferences->Metadata download
Tick the checkbox-'Use published date of first edition from worldcat.org'

Thanks everyone!

Hi, new member here.

I don't seem to have that option in my version of Calibre (v 3.33.1).

Please see the screenshot attached.

Is there something else I need to do to enable that option?

Thanks!

See ==>> First Publication Date Download - sad news unfortunately :(

BR

That's such a shame!

Thank you for your response, though. I might give the Goodreads plugin a try, and see how I go!


Jon

I just created the wikidata plugin to download publication date.
This helped with a lot of my books...