Adding <something> to metadata automatically for 1000s of books?

[patrik]

I read a lot of non-fiction. In order to make my life a bit easier I have gotten a membership at a company doing summaries of books.

The problem is that all the summaries (epub) have the same title and author metadata as the original books, thus making a mess/"duplicates" in the library.

What is the easiest way to change a metadata field for many books?

I'm thinking adding "company & " to the beginning of all author-fields. (I want to keep what's there as well (if not, this would be easy of course).)

So, if the author field was "John Doe" I want it to become "company & John Doe".

It doesn't matter if I do this before, during or after importing them into my Calibre library.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by patrik

I read a lot of non-fiction. In order to make my life a bit easier I have gotten a membership at a company doing summaries of books.

The problem is that all the summaries (epub) have the same title and author metadata as the original books, thus making a mess/"duplicates" in the library.

What is the easiest way to change a metadata field for many books?

I'm thinking adding "company & " to the beginning of all author-fields. (I want to keep what's there as well (if not, this would be easy of course).)

So, if the author field was "John Doe" I want it to become "company & John Doe".

It doesn't matter if I do this before, during or after importing them into my Calibre library.

Start by adding those books to an (empty) 'Intake" Library.
Use Bulk mode Search and Replace to APPEND, the extra Author or Title info

Author (& Company)
or
Title (Notes)

( stuff ) at the end does not seem to count in the sort field, thus the 2 would sort nearby

[eschwartz]

Select all the books you want to change, and click Edit Metadata. The Bulk Edit Metadata dialog will pop up.

You can set specific fields in bulk, or use the Search & Replace tab for fine-grained control.

[patrik]

Originally Posted by theducks

Start by adding those books to an (empty) 'Intake" Library.
Use Bulk mode Search and Replace to APPEND, the extra Author or Title info

Author (& Company)
or
Title (Notes)

( stuff ) at the end does not seem to count in the sort field, thus the 2 would sort nearby

You mean to create another (temporary) calibre library and import the books into it? Do the changes and then import those books into the main library?

I have tried allt the options I can find, and have searched the calibre manual, but I can't find anything about APPEND. Please advise.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Select all the books you want to change, and click Edit Metadata. The Bulk Edit Metadata dialog will pop up.

You can set specific fields in bulk, or use the Search & Replace tab for fine-grained control.

Yes, but I can't find a way to append data, only replace. Am I missing something obvious?


Thanks,

[eschwartz]

Yes, you certainly are.

Find: (.*)
Replace: \1 New Stuff


There is even a plain old "append" mode, but not a "prepend" mode.

[patrik]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Yes, you certainly are.

Find: (.*)
Replace: \1 New Stuff

Fantastic, that worked!

I tried to replace with "Company & \1" which did the preappend I prefer.


How would a typical Calibre user find out how to use this? Is this "regex"-syntax?

There is even a plain old "append" mode, but not a "prepend" mode.

As with this "special" syntax, or as a choosable function somewhere where I have yet to find it?




A follow up question of sorts... what would be a good best practise to include these summaries in the ordinary library? Separate as a virtual library? Or simple as a (custom) shelf/category/gengre (as I do with all my books)?
Since I have 1000s of these summaries, I would prefer to not see them at all unless I specifically choose to.



Thanks a bunch!!

[theducks]

Originally Posted by patrik

You mean to create another (temporary) calibre library and import the books into it? Do the changes and then import those books into the main library?

I have tried allt the options I can find, and have searched the calibre manual, but I can't find anything about APPEND. Please advise.

Yes, but I can't find a way to append data, only replace. Am I missing something obvious?

Thanks,

Yes, to a 'working' Library. Use Copy To Library (right click ), not import. All the metadata will be used

Append is a mode on a pulldown on the right of Bulk S&R

[patrik]

Originally Posted by theducks

Yes, to a 'working' Library. Use Copy To Library (right click ), not import. All the metadata will be used

Hmm, I'm thinking of importing all the summary-books into my ordinary library, and selecting them all, and then do the pre-append.

How is to import them first into a separate library a better option? I know you are very experienced, so I'm probably missing something obvious again.

Append is a mode on a pulldown on the right of Bulk S&R

Ahh, how I have searched for such an option.... not finding it.... but now I see it's there. The "trick" was that one has to change Search mode from character match to regular expression in order for the new dropdown-menu to appear.

[theducks]

The advantage is you don't have to deal with 'Duplicates' at initial import time, which was your whole reason for adding to Author (or Title). Keeping things separate when doing major operations also means less chance of, "Oops!"


Sorry,
I always use REGEX mode. Never thought to check the other modes

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by patrik

Fantastic, that worked!

I tried to replace with "Company & \1" which did the preappend I prefer.


How would a typical Calibre user find out how to use this? Is this "regex"-syntax?

That is standard regex syntax as used in replacements. Less so when you are just searching.

As with this "special" syntax, or as a choosable function somewhere where I have yet to find it?

Regular Expressions mode is kind of more powerful, as theducks elucidated.

A follow up question of sorts... what would be a good best practise to include these summaries in the ordinary library? Separate as a virtual library? Or simple as a (custom) shelf/category/gengre (as I do with all my books)?
Since I have 1000s of these summaries, I would prefer to not see them at all unless I specifically choose to.



Thanks a bunch!!

I agree with theducks.
You can use a Virtual Library, tagging them all with "Summary" and separating those out, or go with a separate physical library.
But the primary difference will be not having to mess with duplicates when using separate physical libraries.

[patrik]

Got it, Thanks! :-)