[GUI Plugin] FanFictionDownLoader

[JimmXinu]

New Version 1.5.30 - 08 Jun 2012

Add user/pass/is_adult for onedirectionfanfiction.com. Thanks, Ida.

As usual, there may be a delay before calibre notices the new version. You can get the latest by going in and telling calibre to install it again.

[Firedancer885]

Originally Posted by riothamus

I'm intersted in using this plugin, but I have several authors that have LOTS of stories. I am currently using a calibre recipie that utilizes a member's python script but I'd like to use a built in plug in. The recipie creates one epub (or other format) file with all stories by an author. Now this isn't a requirement for me but is there anyway to give an author's URL and have the plugin get all stories by that author? If not, do you have a recommendation on how to get all those URLs into the plugin without copying and pasting each unique one?

Thanks!

The method I use needs Firefox and a plugin called downthemall!. I open the page I want to download from in Firefox and then right click and choose the downthemall option. The window will list all the urls on the page. I then use the filter option at the bottom of the downthemall window. Queue up the selected links, a new window appears. Highlight all the links. Right click again, export the links to a txt file. I usually delete the links from the queue window after exporting, because I don't need them any longer. I then open the txt, copy all or a portion of the urls and then open up the "download new" window in FFDL. It sounds difficult, but it's easy and way faster than copy pasting one by one.

I downloaded a 89 part series this way from AO3.

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by riothamus

If not, do you have a recommendation on how to get all those URLs into the plugin without copying and pasting each unique one?

You can avoid the copy/paste at least by just opening the Add New dialog and dragging each link from the browser onto it. I find that acceptable quick for my purposes.

[Ealdwulf]

I have a question/suggestion... would it be possible to add a field or flag of some sort that could be put to a custom column in the case that the fic is either on an unsupported site or is no longer available at the site that it was originally obtained from?

I think this could be something that would be quite useful, especially with the purge that is currently going on at ff.net...

[skb]

Jim thank you for creating such a useful plugin. I discovered it yesterday and I've been hammering since It's made a huge difference to my workflow already.

Thanks again!

[texasnightowl]

Just have to say first, that this plug in is AWESOME!

Due to the goings on at fanfiction.net, I've been downloading tons of fics the last couple days and I love FFDL. I had been using flagfic mostly, but was looking at options for sycophanthex since the dev of the "Graffer" program went MIA. Lo and behold, FFDL was the answer.

I'm not kidding when I say I've downloaded a couple hundred fics the last couple days.

One question...re: the sycophanthex sites...the couple times I tried to reference a single chapter story, it would fail. Is there anyway to get FFDL to work with a single part story?

[Ealdwulf]

hrmmm... seem to have found a bug when downloading stories from SIYE that are part of a series...

The story Harry Potter and a Future Uncertain located at http://www.siye.co.uk/viewstory.php?sid=127359 indicates that the word count is 86135. When using the downloader with a column set up to show the word count it shows the count as 35101.

The word count mentioned of 35101 is the word count for the first story in that particular series... unfortunately it has successfully managed to affect the word count for all stories by that author that are part of a series...

When I just checked other authors on that site that I have downloaded stories from that are parts of series, the word count gets messed up on the individual stories for them too...

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by texasnightowl

Just have to say first, that this plug in is AWESOME!

Glad you like it.

Originally Posted by texasnightowl

One question...re: the sycophanthex sites...the couple times I tried to reference a single chapter story, it would fail. Is there anyway to get FFDL to work with a single part story?

Example URLs?

Please, always post URLs when reporting problems.

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by Ealdwulf

hrmmm... seem to have found a bug when downloading stories from SIYE that are part of a series...

The story Harry Potter and a Future Uncertain located at http://www.siye.co.uk/viewstory.php?sid=127359 indicates that the word count is 86135. When using the downloader with a column set up to show the word count it shows the count as 35101.

Good catch. SIYE does indeed format the metadata for stories on the author page differently when their part of a series. Not so much that you can see the difference, just enough to mess up parsing.

Attached is a version that fixes the problem for me, please give it a try.

(There are a couple other problems reported this morning as well, I'd like to get those addressed before rolling out an official new version.)

[texasnightowl]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

Glad you like it.

Example URLs?

Please, always post URLs when reporting problems.

Ooops...sorry.

As it turns out, it must be something with some particular stories. I'm including 2 links below. On both of these, the download fails with the comment that it failed to login. (I do have an entry for ashwinder in the personal.ini with my user name/password.) Both of these prompt me for my user name/password despite being defined.

http://ashwinder.sycophanthex.com/vi....php?sid=12244
http://ashwinder.sycophanthex.com/vi....php?sid=15146

Here is another single part story that works and did not prompt me for user name for an example.

http://ashwinder.sycophanthex.com/vi....php?sid=11282

[iatheia]

Ah, they changed the redirection after the login ever so slightly. Easy fix, if I may =)

[Ealdwulf]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

Good catch. SIYE does indeed format the metadata for stories on the author page differently when their part of a series. Not so much that you can see the difference, just enough to mess up parsing.

SIYE uses the eFiction PHP script, as do many other sites that are capable of having their stories downloaded by this plugin. I do not know if this is something that is set by having "Series" enabled or if it is caused by the way they have their skin set up.

Might be something to look into...

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

Attached is a version that fixes the problem for me, please give it a try.

This certainly seemed to resolve the word count issue for SIYE for me. Just had to go in and update the personal.ini file to make it match what I had previously.

[JimmXinu]

New Version 1.5.31 - 09 Jun 2012

Fix for SIYE metadata for stories in a series.
Fix for ashwinder.sycophanthex.com login.
Fix for onedirectionfanfiction.com login.

As usual, there may be a delay before calibre notices the new version. You can get the latest by going in and telling calibre to install it again.

[ILB]

Could http://samdean.archive.nu/ possibly be added as well?

[texasnightowl]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

New Version 1.5.31 - 09 Jun 2012

Fix for SIYE metadata for stories in a series.
Fix for ashwinder.sycophanthex.com login.
Fix for onedirectionfanfiction.com login.

As usual, there may be a delay before calibre notices the new version. You can get the latest by going in and telling calibre to install it again.

Wow! on the quick turnaround. Thanks...will try it shortly!

Was wondering if there is a max number of links you should copy into it for downloading? I've been doing batches of 20-25 and it seems fine so far as I can tell?