Calibre takes a long time to open

[K8HW]

For some reason Calibre is taking two minutes to start up. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. I started Calibre in debug mode and have attached the file.



Thanks ~ Dave

[DaltonST]

Originally Posted by K8HW

For some reason Calibre is taking two minutes to start up.

It is advisable to compact your Calibre metadata.db database periodically. The menu path is Calibre > Library > Library Maintenance > Check Library. It will perform a SQLite Vacuum operation to condense/compact/defrag the database. Example before and after a Vacuum:

Before compacting<<<----------->>>After compacting:
Page Count = 118,342<<<---------->>>Page Count = 3,606
Database Size = 121,182,208 bytes<<>>Database Size = 3,692,544 bytes
So, the metadata.db file went from over 121mb to less than 4mb in size.

[FizzyWater]

Wowzer. I've never done that, and I've been using Calibre since the Sony 500 days (wasn't it called something like Libre500 back then?)

I hope I remember to do this when I get home from work.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

Wowzer. I've never done that, and I've been using Calibre since the Sony 500 days (wasn't it called something like Libre500 back then?)

I hope I remember to do this when I get home from work.

If you have lots of Author, title or book churn, the DB grows fast. Any rename (Author or Title) creates a new record. Any deleted (all usage) Tags, publisher... deletes the record.

Thes ar 'soft deletes' until you run the maintenance tool.

[DNSB]

I'm wondering more about the startup time for the calibre server. If you turn off the automatic startup for the calibre server, does that have any effect on your startup time? On my laptop, it takes the startup time to 6.09 seconds which is not even close to your 2 minutes+ but I am not seeing the DEBUG httphelper and SMART_DEV lines.

Started up in 5.66 seconds with 7423 books
Started up in 6.09 seconds with 7423 books

The debug message around EpubMerge and the fanficfare_macmenuhack seems to show up rather often but I doubt that it is causing the long startup time.

[kovidgoyal]

Things to try:

1) Start calibre from the command prompt with --ignore-plugins
2) You have the wireless device connection running on startup, disable that and see if it makes a difference
3) Create a new empty library and see if starting up with that library makes a difference

[K8HW]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Things to try:

1) Start calibre from the command prompt with --ignore-plugins
2) You have the wireless device connection running on startup, disable that and see if it makes a difference
3) Create a new empty library and see if starting up with that library makes a difference

That did the trick. I created a new blank library and Calibre starts right up.

I am puzzled. This behavior started after the last update to 3.17. I also went under Library Maintenance and did a check library. No error messages.

Any more suggestions, please.

~ Dave

[BetterRed]

@K8HW - do you have any custom columns built from other columns via templates ? They've been known to slow things down.

What version of calibre were you running before you updated to 3.17 ?

BR

[kovidgoyal]

You can try attaching the metadata.db file from your calibre library and I'll see if I can reproduce the issue. (but dont do that if you dont want people to know what books you have in your library).

[K8HW]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

You can try attaching the metadata.db file from your calibre library and I'll see if I can reproduce the issue. (but dont do that if you dont want people to know what books you have in your library).

I do have custom columns, but none using templates. Here is my metadata.db file. Thanks in advance for your help.

~Dave

[kovidgoyal]

Starts up in 1.3 seconds with that metadata.db on my machine. Other common causes of slowdowns are antivirus programs interfering, try excluding the calibre library folder from your antivirus.

[K8HW]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Starts up in 1.3 seconds with that metadata.db on my machine. Other common causes of slowdowns are antivirus programs interfering, try excluding the calibre library folder from your antivirus.

I turned off the antivirus and it made no difference. I kind of wonder if it is the current version as I didn't have any problems until the last upgrade to 3.17. I'll try to go down one version. I'll let you know what happens.

Thanks again for your assistance.

~Dave

[K8HW]

I just removed Calibre 3.17 and installed version 3.16. Calibre now starts up in 2.6 seconds. It appears to be an issue with the latest version!

~Dave

[kovidgoyal]

Hmm odd, the only new thing that could possibly affect startup times in 3.17 is the new split view for the book list, but you dont have that enabled, so it should not matter.

[ShellShock]

Reinstall 3.17 and see if the slow performance comes back?