Can't clear "custom" date field?

[joegearhart]

I'm setting up Calibre to work with the Kindle that I'm giving my wife on Christmas.

I wanted to create a custom date field called "Date Read", and did so with no problems.

Well, then I wanted to set up some custom searches related to that. To do so, I had to put in some dummy dates on a few books so that I could make sure the searches operated as expected.

#dateread:<2010
#dateread:<2010-05
#dateread:false
#dateread:true

These all worked PERFECTLY!

But now that I want to clear the date fields, I can't find a way to do so! I can only edit the "date read" field. I can't clear it out again.

I have tried deleting the value, right clicking and selecting "cut", I've gone to "Edit Metadata" > "Edit Metadata Individually" > "Custom Metadata" and tried to delete it there but just can't do it.

Is this a bug or am I missing something very simple?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by joegearhart

I'm setting up Calibre to work with the Kindle that I'm giving my wife on Christmas.

I wanted to create a custom date field called "Date Read", and did so with no problems.

Well, then I wanted to set up some custom searches related to that. To do so, I had to put in some dummy dates on a few books so that I could make sure the searches operated as expected.

#dateread:<2010
#dateread:<2010-05
#dateread:false
#dateread:true

These all worked PERFECTLY!

But now that I want to clear the date fields, I can't find a way to do so! I can only edit the "date read" field. I can't clear it out again.

I have tried deleting the value, right clicking and selecting "cut", I've gone to "Edit Metadata" > "Edit Metadata Individually" > "Custom Metadata" and tried to delete it there but just can't do it.

Is this a bug or am I missing something very simple?

Set a date with the year 0000
I also think 0101, but that might have changed

[joegearhart]

Winner!!

I am amazed at how robust Calibre is. I've been playing with tweaks and stuff ALL day to make this as simple for the wife as possible.

Thanks theducks!

[kiwidude]

Originally Posted by theducks

Set a date with the year 0000
I also think 0101, but that might have changed

Oooh, now that is a cool trick, thx.

Next question related to this would be could someone point to the place(s) in the source code (since I haven't found it as an option) whereby we could set the publication date column to this when it is unknown? I'm not a fan of it setting the publication date to "today" for every new book - I would much rather it was set to "0000" and only set when an actual date is available in the metadata or you manually type one...

[theducks]

Originally Posted by kiwidude

Oooh, now that is a cool trick, thx.

Next question related to this would be could someone point to the place(s) in the source code (since I haven't found it as an option) whereby we could set the publication date column to this when it is unknown? I'm not a fan of it setting the publication date to "today" for every new book - I would much rather it was set to "0000" and only set when an actual date is available in the metadata or you manually type one...

Date is the day you create the Record
Publication_Date is from the Internal Meta-data (or Downloaded)

You might be able to use "Edit_Meta-data in Bulk" to set this (if you must)
BTW The date is probably set by a Trigger or defaults if not set in the DB

[chaley]

Originally Posted by kiwidude

Next question related to this would be could someone point to the place(s) in the source code (since I haven't found it as an option) whereby we could set the publication date column to this when it is unknown? I'm not a fan of it setting the publication date to "today" for every new book - I would much rather it was set to "0000" and only set when an actual date is available in the metadata or you manually type one...

One instance (I think the only one) is in database2 in add_books, line 2363. Leave the pubdate as None.

Note that programatically you reset the pubdate by setting it to None. If you need to manipulate a None date (e.g., for sorting), use utils.date.UNDEFINED_DATE.