Tags & Series

[RealRedhair]

Hello!

My tags & series information is a bit of a mess. If I try to download metadata from different sources (mainly Dutch books) this information is not present. I used Bol.com, Amazon and others but the fields remain mainly empty. How to solve this?

Thanks

[eschwartz]

I think the goodreads plugin (user-installed) may do series.

Most plugins don't, though.

I would recommend doing all tags by hand, as the sources out there will invariably have a different idea of what good tags are.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I think the goodreads plugin (user-installed) may do series.

Most plugins don't, though.

I would recommend doing all tags by hand, as the sources out there will invariably have a different idea of what good tags are.

+1

That includes Publisher (internal to the book) supplied tags. Scatter Shot

Get the Quality check Plugin. There is a configurable check for the number of tags. This will help identify the worst offenders

[RealRedhair]

Thanks, I will give it a try!

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by theducks

+1

That includes Publisher (internal to the book) supplied tags. Scatter Shot

Get the Quality check Plugin. There is a configurable check for the number of tags. This will help identify the worst offenders

I prefer to delete all tags no matter what. If I want it, I'll add it myself.

[Sabardeyn]

I agree that downloading tags can lead to a complex, horribly confusing mess of repeated and variant terms. After downloading tags for a dozen books, editing the tag list is mandatory.

However, one thing downloading tags provides is an alternate viewpoint for establishing keywords; including revealing aspects of the story that you might not have consciously noted during reading. Your own interest in a particular story, over time, may change as you mature. Additionally, each person's approach to a keyword search into the Library is going to be different and these tags can help in this situation.

So, despite the extra work, I download and edit these tags. My Library is a work in perpetual progress.

[toliman]

Probably some value in a Calibre addon that deletes the tags that only apply to one title. Hmm. Would clear a few "19th century history - fiction" quirky tags.

Will have a look at the quality check addon today.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I prefer to delete all tags no matter what. If I want it, I'll add it myself.

Yes, that's exactly what I do, too. I want to maintain high-quality metadata in my Calibre library, and the only way to do that is to enter it myself.

[Sabardeyn]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I want to maintain high-quality metadata in my Calibre library, and the only way to do that is to enter it myself.

Agreed. I perceive the downloaded tags more as a list of suggested alternate keywords which I take under advisement, decide what seems to be applicable/relevant and keep those tags, removing all of the rest.

I've seen keywords/tags like the following list (based on The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant):

• Fiction
• Fiction: Modern
• Fiction: Modern - 1980
• Fiction: 80's
• Fiction: 1980
• Fiction: Contemporary
• Fiction: Contemporary - 1980
• Fiction: Fantasy
• Fiction: Fantasy - Modern
• Fiction: Fantasy - Modern - 1980
• Fiction: Fantasy - Contemporary
• Fiction: Fantasy - Contemporary - 1980
• Fiction: Alternate World
• Fiction: Alternate World - The Land
• Fiction: Fantasy - Alternate World
• Fiction: Fantasy - The Land
• Fiction: <List of racial archetypes>
• Fiction: Fantasy - <List of racial archetypes>
• Fiction: Fantasy - Psychological [devolving after this into multiple psych terms]
• [And the list just continues to go on and on...]

I've seen many situations similar to this. Each book having highly repetitive tags with multiple variations of terms; reminds me of mathematical permutations and not a keyword search.

The thing to keep in mind is these are not knowledge databases, but sales databases. The website's intent is to sell you a product and to do that they provide information to gain your interest based on the widest possible similarity to any search term(s) requested.

So, for that series, I might have the following tags: Fiction, Fantasy, 1980's, Alternate World, The Land, <prominent character names, all sides of dispute>, <racial archetypes>. Probably a couple of psych related keywords depending on what resonates with my perception of the book: for Donaldson, "angst" is pretty much mandatory. This list is a far cry from the original set of downloaded tags.

Note: To quote Rocky Horror Picture Show, "Time is fleeting". The use of terms to convey time as a keyword/tag is so subjective it's effectively useless. Current, Contemporary, Modern, Today and other such terms are only appropriate once you specify a larger time period - a decade, century or period. For instance "the 80's" could signify any century at all - including ones that didn't happen yet as time travel stories are quite popular.

[BookJunkieLI]

Originally Posted by Sabardeyn

I've seen many situations similar to this. Each book having highly repetitive tags with multiple variations of terms; reminds me of mathematical permutations and not a keyword search.

The thing to keep in mind is these are not knowledge databases, but sales databases. The website's intent is to sell you a product and to do that they provide information to gain your interest based on the widest possible similarity to any search term(s) requested.

I call this kitchen sink tagging and I'm still waiting for the day that I find the actual words "kitchen sink" as a tag.

Originally Posted by Sabardeyn

Note: To quote Rocky Horror Picture Show, "Time is fleeting". The use of terms to convey time as a keyword/tag is so subjective it's effectively useless. Current, Contemporary, Modern, Today and other such terms are only appropriate once you specify a larger time period - a decade, century or period. For instance "the 80's" could signify any century at all - including ones that didn't happen yet as time travel stories are quite popular.

This is something I've never really thought about but is really true. I have a number of stories tagged as Modern or Contemporary but something that is Present Day now is out of date in 5-10-20 years. Thank you @Sabardeyn for making me rethink my tagging scheme.

[theducks]

But we are ALL using a computer these days!
(Does anybody (Library) still use one of those 'Card Catalogs' that stood in the center area of the Library that were filled with paper cards? ) The Secondary Keywords (Fiction: Fantasy - Alternate World should be sufficient.

Can you normally have the content topic: Fantasy without it being fiction? The exceptions are what should be flagged: 'The Art of Fantasy Writing'

'General' , If it ain't flagged, it IS 'General'. And certainly there is no need for all the permutations of 'General'

Fiction: Fantasy - Modern

Please define when it stops being 'Modern'. Stoker wrote modern Fantasy...way back when. Today, many of the 'Modern' items mentioned are now 'Antiques'


I switched to Hierarchical Tags: Fantasy.Alternate World
it makes it easy to drill down using the Tab browser' ( I assume 'Fiction' since the bulk of my Library is Fiction. I tag the exceptions like 'Reference', 'Biography'...
I add another layer when I desire a finer separation.

<end rant>

[RealRedhair]

Hello!

Tried the plugin Goodreads and I want it to fill ONLY my tags. See pictures below how I configured it. Mainly those which are now empty.
1.
2.
3.

Still it want to add identifiers etc. How to only add tags?

Thanks

[theducks]

Not every Metadata plugin provides every field.
You need to use them in sets for full population.

Test some of the other sources (for Identifiers ) and configure those you like/trust you can have more than 1 source. Calibre merges them

[RealRedhair]

Originally Posted by theducks

Not every Metadata plugin provides every field.
You need to use them in sets for full population.

Test some of the other sources (for Identifiers ) and configure those you like/trust you can have more than 1 source. Calibre merges them

The problem is NOT hat not all fields are filled. Maybe I did not explain well.

As mentioned before: I want it to fill ONLY my tags. See the pictures how I configured the plugin. In picture 3 you can see that also other fields are filled like identifiers. I do not want that. How to solve that?

[theducks]

Maybe I was not clear either.

somewhere, you might have :

a field that is already populated. Calibre will only overwrite, but never auto-clear. Fields can be populated upon adding from existing in BOOK metadata or from filename.


It is also possible (I don't use Goodreads) that BLANK identifiers are NOT considered an option on that PI. The data you see MUST belong to a specific identifier (GR and linked others), so it will be filled for the source that was used.

In a normal (using built-in sources) metadata search, a blank is a 'best guess' to the edition. (sometime it is way wrong ). Using an ID limits the results to that one (includes Not Found because that edition has fallen totally out of use.)

You can always add or remove identifiers at a later time