Quick question about IDs

[Joliet Jake]

Most of my ebooks have IDs (typically ISBNs, but also it will say Goodreads, Amazon, Gutenberg, etc). I want to search by ID but I've not been able to do so. Setting up custom columns was a total failure, and repeated searches merely said something about "UUID" or how to modify the database (I definitely do not have the skills to do that without destroying my library).

Why do I bother? Some of my Gutenberg books have issues with covers. I just want to be able to sort them and fix the covers. Whenever I find one of my books is a Gutenberg book, I just add "Gutenberg" to the tags (which I can easily do a search of).

[theducks]

Please use the word Identifiers for these
(Yes I see the Label in the MDE. Not sure when it changed. The balloon help still says identifiers.)

Calibre has an internal {id} (used in many places via the CLI), and using Id could lead to confusion) FWIW ID is the number in (##) that is the title folder, if you peeked under the skirts.

You can edit the value, list in identifiers.
You could delete a whole family using the Tag Browser. eg barnsnoble 7
Simply right click on thatelete barnsnoble:Yes
You can add any identifier you want. I added PG:<pg#>
Identifiers have 2 parts
Familyname : value

[Comfy.n]

Additionally, you can create a rule to convert your custom PG identifier into a link for the Book Details pane, see:

1 -

2 -

I had been using tags for filtering PG titles, never minded creating a custom id (identifier, oops) for those.

identifiers:gut:true will now filter those, as I've just set up this.

(also, I have a "grouped" search which is just a search alias for identifiers. This way I can do just i:gut:true)

[Joliet Jake]

So I tried "identifiers:gut" and it worked, but "identifiers:gut:true" didn't work for some reason. Thank you.

[Comfy.n]

Originally Posted by Joliet Jake

So I tried "identifiers:gut" and it worked, but "identifiers:gut:true" didn't work for some reason. Thank you.

identifiers:gut will match whatever titles contain "gut" somewhere as an identifier.

for instance, in the example screenshot above, that title already had this string within the identifiers list:

uri:http://www.gutenberg.org/17829

identifiers:gut:true means: find titles that have the "gut" identifier

I think it would probably be best to assign a "pg" identifier instead of "gut", to avoid confusion

[Comfy.n]

I've added 'pg' just to illustrate:

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Comfy.n

Additionally…

In all these tears [sic] I'd never spotted that, and I see it's also in the context menu of the Book Details->IDs field - thanks.

BR

[Comfy.n]

BTW, the PG custom links for the Book Detais pane should use this template:

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/{id}

[Comfy.n]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Attachment 203598

In all these tears [sic] I'd never spotted that, and I see it's also in the context menu of the Book Details->IDs field - thanks.

BR

Oh wow! Now I'm really proud of something!

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Comfy.n

BTW, the PG custom links for the Book Detais pane should use this template:

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/{id}

I was about to mention the need to define 'pg' in L&F->BD->Create rules to convert identifiers into links table.

BR

[Joliet Jake]

Originally Posted by Comfy.n

identifiers:gut will match whatever titles contain "gut" somewhere as an identifier.

for instance, in the example screenshot above, that title already had this string within the identifiers list:

uri:http://www.gutenberg.org/17829

identifiers:gut:true means: find titles that have the "gut" identifier

I think it would probably be best to assign a "pg" identifier instead of "gut", to avoid confusion

Maybe I should have done that, but I didn't need to.

Using the thing that worked for me (so without "true") I found 102 books, about half of which already had a "Gutenberg" tag. I updated the rest. Many needed replacements for covers. (One book had a cover of only 128 x 192 pixels!)

I wasn't interested in changing identifiers, just locating them.

[Comfy.n]

Originally Posted by Joliet Jake

Maybe I should have done that, but I didn't need to.

Using the thing that worked for me (so without "true") I found 102 books, about half of which already had a "Gutenberg" tag. I updated the rest. Many needed replacements for covers. (One book had a cover of only 128 x 192 pixels!)

I wasn't interested in changing identifiers, just locating them.

Most of my PG books contain this string (within the book content, I mean):

"The Project Gutenberg EBook"

So, one other approach you could have used to locate them would be running FTS, if you have this feature enabled.

Searching the library for books containing the string "The Project Gutenberg EBook" should enable you to mark all of them.

[ownedbycats]

I use this template to convert uri: identifiers to gutenberg: ones.

program:
	publisher = $publisher;
	ids = $identifiers;
	u = select(ids, 'uri');
	g = select(ids, 'gutenberg');

	if 
		publisher == 'Project Gutenberg' 
		&& u != g 
	then
		n = re(u, '^http://www.gutenberg.org/(\d+)', '\1');
		ids = list_union(ids, strcat('gutenberg:', n), ',')
	fi;

	if 
		publisher == 'Project Gutenberg' 
		&& u 
		&& g 
	then
		ids = list_difference(ids, strcat('uri:', u), ',')

	fi;

	ids

To use this, get the Action Chains plugin and make a chain that applies a single-field template edit to the identifier field.



If you prefer different identifier, change 'gutenberg' in lines 5 and 12. You can also change the checks in line 8 and 16 to something like 'Gutenberg' inlist $tags.

[Comfy.n]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

I use this template to convert uri: identifiers to gutenberg: ones.

I think I'll test this tomorrow. From looking at the code, I take it it's necessary to make sure that all titles have "Project Gutenberg" set as Publisher before running the chain, right?

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Comfy.n

I think I'll test this tomorrow. From looking at the code, I take it it's necessary to make sure that all titles have "Project Gutenberg" set as Publisher before running the chain, right?

Yes, set publisher to Project Gutenberg.