Quote:
Originally Posted by BetterRed
My observation is that tag bloat usually results when new users load up their existing books, but if they spend a bit of time to clean them up (as in the example I quoted) then when they download metadata for new books they're careful not to add superfluous tags.
An option to export a list of Tags, Publishers, Authors etc, would be nice, perhaps via a right click item on the category header such as Export Author list, Export Tag list etc. Poking around in the metadata.db file with a SQL tool is fine for a few, but it's not something I'd suggest to... er, my attorney, or her PA.
One can be very productive with a desk, paper & pen, and there's a real danger of making simple things harder by over automating. The finance industry is littered with examples - such as LTCM, arguably a canary in the mine for the sub-prime collapse of 2007/8, and the Reinhardt and Rogoff spreadsheet macro errors, that some argue resulted in misguided austerity regimes in Greece, Portugal etc.
BR
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I agree that if I had had the presence of mind and/or knew what I was doing when starting out I could have prevented the problem I have now. Now, whenever I add a book the first thing I do is Edit Metadata and make sure I've got the author's name correct (matching the way the name the name as is if already in my library), published date, series name, and now, the tags to use my system.
Problem is that we don't know how important those things will become -- all we want to do is get that book into the library -- until it's too late and the tags have become totally useless as a means of finding books that you want to find.
Although I like your idea to at least be able to export the lists, make your desired changes and then to apply them, my intuitive process would be to add a couple of buttons on the left (a la the delete button) or maybe expand the delete button to include merge and sub-tag options.
I don't think user's editing their own metadata.db is a process to be encouraged.