Newbie has Drop Box problem -probably stupid question

[dans6362]

Hi all,
Just discovered Calibre & this forum so this is my first post.

Over the years I've gathered a large collection (>5000) of S/F in TXT format & used Tom's EText Reader for accessing it. I've now commenced the task of converting it to EPUB for my Bookeen Opus.
My problem is that the txt files are very haphazard in how they have recorded Title & Author, and when Calibre converts them I get a range of values in the Author position. There is no predictable hyphenation or similar so I am resigned to a lot of editing.

But, each converted value for Author (which can be in a lot of cases part of the book title) appears in the Author Drop Box when I click on that to find the correct author. I do eventually find the author I want but the drop box keeps getting bigger & bigger the more conversions I do.

So, is there a way I can delete the "non-authors" from the drop box? Please!!
I can live with a few hundred different authors to space down (just) but not a few thousand!!

I'm hoping there is a simple delete process for this that I should but don't know.

Cheers

Dave

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by dans6362

But, each converted value for Author (which can be in a lot of cases part of the book title) appears in the Author Drop Box when I click on that to find the correct author. I do eventually find the author I want but the drop box keeps getting bigger & bigger the more conversions I do.

Are you using the command line or the GUI?

Originally Posted by dans6362

So, is there a way I can delete the "non-authors" from the drop box? Please!!

If you are using the GUI then every time you update the author in the library view the corresponding file and directory gets cleaned up automatically. You shouldn't have non-authors continue to exist once you have corrected the GUI the non-authors go away.

You can verify everything by running the Check Library under Library maintenance via the dropdown menu next to the library icon.

[dans6362]

I think Calibre is more scared of you than me!!

I had exited Calibre to visit the forum & send the email. When I went back after reading your answer & clicked on the dropbox all the nonsense authors had gone. As I said in the thread title, "A stupid question".

Thank you very much for the quick (& tolerant) answer

I'm really looking forward to the final outcome once I've got all my ebooks in the library.

Cheers

Dave

[Manichean]

Just as a side note: It sounds like you're accessing your library folder on Dropbox directly without using Calibre. Be very, very careful when doing so- you could easily mess up your libraries' consistency (as in database consistency) by accidentally moving a file or something similar. If at all possible, only use Calibre to interface with your library.

[dans6362]

Now you've got me worried. Let me describe step by step what I do and you can tell me where I'm at risk.
1/ Import via Get Books a group of ebooks I know have the same author
2/ They display on the GUI with e mishmash of titles & authors
3/ Click on a number on LHS of GUI
4/ On RHS, the title, author, author sort etc appear
5/ I enter the correct title
6/ I enter the correct author
7/ Click on another number on LHS
8/ Enter correct title
9/ Click on author drop box
10/ Select correct author from list
11/ Repeat 7 thru 10 until all books in that group are corrected\

Then grab next group etc

Am I at risk with this (admittedly tedious) process??

Cheers

Dave

[Dopedangel]

Originally Posted by dans6362

Now you've got me worried. Let me describe step by step what I do and you can tell me where I'm at risk.
1/ Import via Get Books a group of ebooks I know have the same author
2/ They display on the GUI with e mishmash of titles & authors
3/ Click on a number on LHS of GUI
4/ On RHS, the title, author, author sort etc appear
5/ I enter the correct title
6/ I enter the correct author
7/ Click on another number on LHS
8/ Enter correct title
9/ Click on author drop box
10/ Select correct author from list
11/ Repeat 7 thru 10 until all books in that group are corrected\

Then grab next group etc

Am I at risk with this (admittedly tedious) process??

Cheers

Dave

removed

[kiwidude]

I think your use of the word dropbox got you some confusing responses, when in hindsight it is clear you mean the dropdown combo as us geeks would call it. What Manichean was referring to is a remote storage software solution called dropbox which does not apply to you.

The list of authors you get presented with in the authors dropdown is from the authors that exist in your database. So to reduce the list, you have to actually rename those dud authors on books. Once there are no books for a particular author name then it will no longer appear in the dropdown.

Using the tag viewer pane on the left side of the screen in the authors section is a good way to rename incorrect authors in bulk.

[Dopedangel]

You can try using vbooksorter from here to clean up your filenames before importing into calibre
http://iterati.org/ebookTools/BookSorter/Default.aspx

[dans6362]

Thanks guys.
I can see I need to learn not just the tool but the terminology.

Ah well, back to the saltmines. Next author to be converted is Asimov with > 200 books.
This began as a labour of love - I can see it becoming just labour!!

Cheers

Dave

[Manichean]

I thought that this part here

Originally Posted by dans6362

[...] clicked on the dropbox all the nonsense authors had gone.

sounded like you accessed your files directly without using Calibre. Nevermind, what you're describing is perfectly safe.