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Originally Posted by chaley
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Originally Posted by dwanthny
I'm confused. How will restoring just the metadata.db make things much much worse? It will create blank folders with no books but it won't cause any folders to go poof, will it? Running a database integrity check at this point will point out any mismatches and you can manually search for the missing items or re-add those items via the metadata edit window.
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No, calibre won't create blank folders. |
Ok, folks are starting to not understand things.
Calibre will, in fact, create empty folders, based on the metadata.db file. Try it yourself. Create an empty library, exit calibre, place a large metadata.db file in the completely empty library (mine had 4019 book) in place of the recently created metadata.db and when you start calibre it will populate that empty library with a complete folder structure that matches what the metadata.db file says should be there. There won't be any files but the entire folder structure will be created (see attached).
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Originally Posted by chaley
This must be done before calibre notices that the folders are missing and changes the db.
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Calibre does not change the metadata.db file to match the existing folders, it changes the existing folders to match the metadata.db file. It will create folders to match the db but not delete or change any existing folders.
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Originally Posted by Manichean
Uhm, it has been said in this thread that replacing your metadata.db with an older version leads to much headache and hairpulling and thus isn't recommended. So I don't see why the developers would include that as an "official" backup method.
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While I don't think this should be a feature and that doing a full restore from back up is the least problematic method to restore a library, it may not be the quickest, and doing a full restore is not your only option.
If I had been updating my library for a week (since the last full backup) and I get hit by a power glitch that corrupts my metadata.db file. Simply replacing the corrupt metadata.db file with a recent backup from the last time the metadata.db file was updated prior to the power glitch is a quick way to get you back up and running with minimal risk to pulling out any hair. My metadata.db file using Dropbox version 0.8.?? is backed up every time the file is changed.
While there may be items lost, running a database integrity check should point out where any discrepancies lie. There is virtually zero chance of things getting much worse then not working to begin with, which is the state the library would have been in when you tried to restore it. And there is virtually every chance that the restoration will be a smooth one with minimal bumps in the road.