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Tibs · 11-29-2010, 04:58 AM

Please imagine me speaking very gently, because I know it's easy to forget the following (and I've done so myself in the past - indeed, within the last few weeks), but:

* It is not a "bad thing" to realise that a piece of software is close to what you want but not actually the right thing. This happens all the time. One should not get too upset by it.

* Calibre is free software, and I don't believe anyone is being paid anything to develop it, it is being written and maintained for the love of it. If it is useful to those of us who are *not* working on the code, that's a wonderful thing, but it's not our right. (We can donate, but that's a *gift*.)

* Kovid has a very long list of future developments that he wishes to make to Calibre, that fit with what he wants from it. So understandably he is not likely to address something he believes to be a bad idea (even if he were wrong - I don't think he is, personally, but even if he were - he'd still focus on what he believes is worthwhile). He only has so much time available.

* Calibre is also open source. This isn't necessarily much help, if you're not a coder, but if you are, or can find/pay someone else, it is possible to either submit changes to do what you want, or even to fork the project.

In your situation, I'd be tempted to do one of three things:

1. Give up, don't use Calibre, since it's not close enough to what you want. But if you go for this option, I'd keep an eye on the development of Calibre over time, because it's always possible someone else might add in what you want, or fork and provide an alternative.

2. Use Calibre for the "finished" books, assuming those are the ones you actually read, but don't touch any of the original files (this is easy, since Calibre takes its own copies of what it catalogues). I suspect this might be the best-of-both-worlds solution.

3. Work out some naming scheme for the books at different stages, so that the actual *name* of the book in Calibre has a prefix or postfix that indicates its state. Getting books into Calibre in this fashion would then probably be best done with scripts, and the non-GUI Calibre commands. I'm not sure if this would be worth your bother, but only you can judge.

11-29-2010, 04:58 AM	#17
Tibs Junior Member Posts: 6 Karma: 68 Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Cambridge, UK Device: Kindle3, Bookeen Cybook Gen3	Please imagine me speaking very gently, because I know it's easy to forget the following (and I've done so myself in the past - indeed, within the last few weeks), but: * It is not a "bad thing" to realise that a piece of software is close to what you want but not actually the right thing. This happens all the time. One should not get too upset by it. * Calibre is free software, and I don't believe anyone is being paid anything to develop it, it is being written and maintained for the love of it. If it is useful to those of us who are not working on the code, that's a wonderful thing, but it's not our right. (We can donate, but that's a gift.) * Kovid has a very long list of future developments that he wishes to make to Calibre, that fit with what he wants from it. So understandably he is not likely to address something he believes to be a bad idea (even if he were wrong - I don't think he is, personally, but even if he were - he'd still focus on what he believes is worthwhile). He only has so much time available. * Calibre is also open source. This isn't necessarily much help, if you're not a coder, but if you are, or can find/pay someone else, it is possible to either submit changes to do what you want, or even to fork the project. In your situation, I'd be tempted to do one of three things: 1. Give up, don't use Calibre, since it's not close enough to what you want. But if you go for this option, I'd keep an eye on the development of Calibre over time, because it's always possible someone else might add in what you want, or fork and provide an alternative. 2. Use Calibre for the "finished" books, assuming those are the ones you actually read, but don't touch any of the original files (this is easy, since Calibre takes its own copies of what it catalogues). I suspect this might be the best-of-both-worlds solution. 3. Work out some naming scheme for the books at different stages, so that the actual name of the book in Calibre has a prefix or postfix that indicates its state. Getting books into Calibre in this fashion would then probably be best done with scripts, and the non-GUI Calibre commands. I'm not sure if this would be worth your bother, but only you can judge.