Change comma delimiter to semicolon in tags?

[woodr2011]

Is it possible to change the delimiter in tags from a comma to a semicolon? Some tags contain commas, such as "Freud, Sigmund—Biography." I come from a library science background, so it would be helpful to have this as an option.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by woodr2011

Is it possible to change the delimiter in tags from a comma to a semicolon? Some tags contain commas, such as "Freud, Sigmund—Biography." I come from a library science background, so it would be helpful to have this as an option.

CSV is an industry standard from long ago.
The C is Comma


Now to your example: Freud, Sigmund—Biography

IMHO the Tag is Biography
The books title should be Sigmund Freud (sort: Freud, Sigmund)

I would expect Tags to always be a 'Many' (occurrence): Biography, Psychoanalysis

AND how many places would you need to look for a PERSON (not the Author)

Freud, Sigmund
You seem to be stuck in the mid 20th century where (index) card catalogs are still in use.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by woodr2011

Is it possible to change the delimiter in tags from a comma to a semicolon? Some tags contain commas, such as "Freud, Sigmund—Biography." I come from a library science background, so it would be helpful to have this as an option.

Woodr2011 - FWIW I replace commas in tag values with colons, so

"Freud: Sigmund—Biography",
"Freud: Sigmund—Citation",
"Freud: Sigmund—Critique" etc.

Actually I'd probably make those "Freud: Sigmund", "Biography", "Citation" and, "Critique"; then I could reuse the latter three for Freud: Anna and Freud: Lucian

Also FWIW I normally use semi-colons in so-called CSV files.

BR

[woodr2011]

Hi BR,

I number my tags as follows: 1. Freud, Sigmund—Biography; 2. Psychoanalysis—Theorists—Biographies, etc.

This allows for the grammatically correct structure of each tag. It is also a carry-over from the old days of library science.

Best,

R

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by woodr2011

This allows for the grammatically correct structure of each tag. It is also a carry-over from the old days of library science.

Chiselled with a burin on copper I trust

cheers BR

[woodr2011]

Originally Posted by theducks

CSV is an industry standard from long ago.
The C is Comma


Now to your example: Freud, Sigmund—Biography

IMHO the Tag is Biography
The books title should be Sigmund Freud (sort: Freud, Sigmund)

I would expect Tags to always be a 'Many' (occurrence): Biography, Psychoanalysis

AND how many places would you need to look for a PERSON (not the Author)

Freud, Sigmund
You seem to be stuck in the mid 20th century where (index) card catalogs are still in use.

Using your "tags as 'many'" line of reasoning, would it be more advantageous for me to add a custom column for my own subject headings, such as "Freud, Sigmund—Biography"? It seems as though a customizable program like Calibre could be modified slightly to change that default tag delimiter to a semicolon.

[eschwartz]

Perhaps you could customize your tags by using a semicolon instead of a comma in the tag body.


As for "could be modified", perhaps so -- see what Kovid thinks.
I don't believe anyone has ever requested it before, which explains why it definitely wasn't an option thus far.



Personally, I think library science should change the primary purpose of a tag is to help people find things, and relational databases allow you to find things a lot more easily than the flat card catalog model.

I see no reason to limit yourself to the old ways. Break up your tags into a form more easily manipulated by queries.

[theducks]

The world was Flat. Then they invented World explorers and Sextants.

When I was in the Navy, they invented the "Navy Navigation Satellite System" (the predecessor to GPS).
I was the trained technician. The Master Chief Quartermaster hated the disruption to his chart house when it was installed... Worthless...Unreliable (a bit, actually) until I ran a 'Fix' at the same time he did his Sextant thing . He plotted his 3 fixes on the chart, then I pulled the printout (Lat & Long) an made my mark. Caged by his 3 fixes .
"Well I guess I can use that on a cloudy night

Library Science today is not the same as when I went to school. We have Personal computers, instead of drawers of card s, that can search Databases for books.
And they even show the Covers of what they find.

Except in locations where power is so unreliable, the new way has replaced the 24 -48 card drawers in the middle of the floor.

[woodr2011]

Believe me, I hear where you are coming from. I would like to have both options available to me: Modern meta-style tags AND the "conventional" subject headings of yesteryear. It's a small request in the technological scheme of things, so I'm sure it will be possible.

[kovidgoyal]

This is not going to happen. The assumption that tags are comma separated items is baked into a lot of places. Not just in calibre but in the metadata of many ebook file formats.

[woodr2011]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

This is not going to happen. The assumption that tags are comma separated items is baked into a lot of places. Not just in calibre but in the metadata of many ebook file formats.

Hi Kovid - I understand your point. Which settings in a custom column would allow me to accomplish this best?