Quote:
Originally Posted by Adoby
What exactly is the wish?
Read-only files in a custom folder tree? Would it be enough to generate a fake directory tree, on command, using something similar to what save templates does, but with symlinks, like BetterRed described?
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The alternate directory tree I create is real, nothing "fake" about it, gives direct access to the data just like any other directory entry in a POSIX compliant file system. A symlink is just a directory entry, they're a bit like file forks (hardlinks), but they work on directories and files, and deleting all symlinks wont delete the original as happens with file forks (hardlinks), and symlinks can span volumes, whereas file forks (hardlinks)are normally limited to a single volume.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Adoby
One obvious problem is the current optimization with lazy update of metadata in the ebooks, metadata is only written to books when the books leave calibre or when manually launched. To change that would slow down calibre a lot.
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The format files are not the only place where Calibre stores the metadata, in fact its the last place Calibre stores the metadata; unless you meticulously Polish or Modify books after the metadata is updated, but given Calibre does not provide a way to ensure that you do, then the metadata in the format files is, as you imply, inherently unreliable.
However, no programmer worthy of the title would consider going to a format file to get metadata if they are accessing Calibre Library folders. They would get it from the .opf files or from the metadata database. Not only is it more or less 'guaranteed' to be current, it is also complete, the metadata written to the format files is usually a subset of what's in the database/opf files. And if all you have is PDF's or TXT's you wont even get that.
BR
PS : As an experiment I just created a symlink clone of my Test Calibre Library which has 37 books in it. I "pointed" Calibre at the clone and Calibre worked just as it does on the original, same function, same speed... blah, blah, blah.
It took more time to tell Calibre about the clone than it did to create it... which was done with a single drag/drop in a 2 pane file manager using Link Shell extension.