Mark as Read options

[tamhas]

In the notes, it says that the Read column can have the values Yes, No, and Empty and that I can assign meaning to these as desired. I find, though, that Calibre itself will accept other values, e.g., Reserved, meaning that I haven't read it yet, but I am holding it back from the daily queue. Will the CC column accept such other values?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by tamhas

In the notes, it says that the Read column can have the values Yes, No, and Empty and that I can assign meaning to these as desired. I find, though, that Calibre itself will accept other values, e.g., Reserved, meaning that I haven't read it yet, but I am holding it back from the daily queue. Will the CC column accept such other values?

The READ column is what (type) you make it in Calibre. Y/N or (if calibre 3 state mode enabled) Y/N/<blank>

I use a Time stamp so I know When in My Library on Calibre., Which I manually update as I have more than 1 non-CC device

[tamhas]

There was a pre-existing read column in Calibre. I did not add one. It accepts anything I type into it.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by tamhas

There was a pre-existing read column in Calibre. I did not add one. It accepts anything I type into it.

That is not stock calibre.

AFAIK only T/F (Y/N) and date are compatible with CC Read status.
Any other type is just another column (field)

[tamhas]

Well, I didn't add the column. It was there, but just not visible.

[tamhas]

So, I tried updating some values and then connected CC to Calibre. It showed me that it was querying metadata and then doing an update of 65 titles, which is about the number which I had updated in Calibre. Having done that, I now have Read in Grouping, but every one of the 902 books is marked as <<>> and none are marked yes or no, even though some of the ones I marked are marked yes.

Now what?

If the best I can do is yes, no, and blank, then fine, but how do I get Calibre to behave that way since the yes I marked did not go across to CC. Or, can I make a different column for CC called something like Status and use my multiple classifications.

I should note that my actual reading is done on a old Kindle, so no CC there, and the CC is on a phone where I am unlikely to do much reading. The purpose for the phone is just in selecting which book to read next.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by tamhas

In the notes, it says that the Read column can have the values Yes, No, and Empty and that I can assign meaning to these as desired. I find, though, that Calibre itself will accept other values, e.g., Reserved, meaning that I haven't read it yet, but I am holding it back from the daily queue. Will the CC column accept such other values?

I am a bit confused.

First, calibre base does not have a Read column. If you have one then someone created it at some point. Further, it sounds as if it was created as "Text with a fixed set of values". That leads us to ...

Second, CC requires that the calibre "read" column linked to CC's "read" be a calibre yes/no column. It will not work with any other column type. If should be impossible to associate the CC column with a calibre column that isn't yes/no. If you have managed to connect CC's read column with a calibre column that isn't yes/no then I would like to hear about how you did it.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by tamhas

Well, I didn't add the column. It was there, but just not visible.

Tamhaus

Did you merge ( use copy to library) from someone else's library? That can add a column (it did ask at the time) that did not exist in the destination. As chaley noted the possibility, the full set of values would NOT have been passed or the column just defaulted to a basic text type

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by chaley

I am a bit confused.

.. If you have managed to connect CC's read column with a calibre column that isn't yes/no then I would like to hear about how you did it.

Well I did it , somehow . and i did nothing except install CC ( amazon version) . it sees the read column - which I mistakenly created, way back, as accepting any letter, i.e. in calibre I have a custom column called "read" not limited to Y/N.
CC says it knows of 3 read values :Y N and <<>>. i t cannot see specifc letters that I have used like "i" for in progress

[chaley]

Originally Posted by cybmole

Well I did it , somehow . and i did nothing except install CC ( amazon version) . it sees the read column - which I mistakenly created, way back, as accepting any letter, i.e. in calibre I have a custom column called "read" not limited to Y/N.
CC says it knows of 3 read values :Y N and <<>>. i t cannot see specifc letters that I have used like "i" for in progress

Now I am even more confused. CC's code specifically checks for a yes/no column before it will sync CC's and calibre's is read information.

Are you saying that you can see a calibre custom column named "Read" or some such in the grouping drawer? This is normal. You can put almost any column you want in the grouping drawer and CC will show you the values in that column. This will be in addition to CC's "Read" group, which will show you only Yes, No and <<>>.

Alternatively, are you saying that you have set up CC to sync its "Read" information with a calibre custom column and that column is not a Yes/No column? And furthermore, that it works: information is synced? If so, this is what I don't understand because CC's code specifically disallows it.

It could be that you set up a non-Yes/No column in the past when CC asked you to manually enter the lookup names. I don't remember if it checked at that point. However, even if CC let you enter the name, CC should not sync data for the reasons given above. In addition, when you connect to calibre as a wireless device CC should show a popup message saying "The read sync column (column lookup name) is not a Yes/No column".

[cybmole]

I have not set up any syncing. I do not actually use grouping. I just happened to notice that read appears under groups and that books where I have I as the read value are classed as <<>>

[cybmole]

Ps I only use content server,not wireless device option

[tamhas]

This all sounds similar to what I am experiencing. I didn't do any merge and have no memory of creating a Read column ... particularly since it was hidden and had no contents. However, in the Add your own columns browser, I see that it has the icon indicating that it is custom.

And, yes, when I connected CC to Calibre, I saw a message about metaschema that flashed by and then it showed updating 65 records, which is the number which I had modified. If I look in CC at one of the books I updated I see a blank Read column at the top and then at the very bottom there is another Read label and that contains Ref, which is the code I put in to reflect presence in a Kindle collection for Reference material.

But, what is the solution now? Suppose I re-title the field I have as Status or Collection ... since it does correspond to Kindle Collection ... ah, but then I see that my Kindle Collection column is already there. Can I add Kindle Collection to the Grouping?

If not, I suppose I can discard the field I have, since it is redundant with Kindle Collection, and create a new field for Read of the yes/no variety.

[tamhas]

I deleted the old Read custom column and added the Kindle Collection column to Grouping and it works! Brilliant. Better really than read since all it requires is the semi-automated maintenance of the collection from Calibre.

[BetterRed]

@tamhas - for future reference, it's easy to see which columns are 'standard' and 'custom' - the presence of an ionic capital icon indicates it's custom.



BR