[GUI Plugin] Action Chains

[capink]

Preferences > Toolbars & Menus > Main toolbar > Add Action Chains.

[Zillion_]

Issue in 1.18.18: Convert Books action, set to convert EPUB to KFX (from EPUB) creates KFX-ZIP instead. The "Output Format" field says "KFX".

[ownedbycats]

Convert just calls Calibre convert.

[Liquid1346]

Originally Posted by capink

Preferences > Toolbars & Menus > Main toolbar > Add Action Chains.

Thanks, I had tried that already, but there is nothing remotely sounding like action chains available there.

Going to Preferences => Plugins => Installed I see all 5 plugin I installed, all are green (enabled) and the 4 others are working.

This is my second day of using calibre and calibre-web (running them via their linuxserver docker containers. Everything else seems to be working flawlessly.

Any more advice for debugging this?

I found "debug device detection" and it spits out this info:

calibre 7.1  embedded-python: True
Linux-5.15.126-1-pve-x86_64-with-glibc2.35 Linux ('64bit', 'ELF')
('Linux', '5.15.126-1-pve', '#1 SMP PVE 5.15.126-1 (2023-10-03T17:24Z)')
Python 3.11.5
Interface language: None
Successfully initialized third party plugins: Barnes & Noble (1, 5, 2) && Editor Chains (0, 9, 4) && Fantastic Fiction (1, 6, 4) && FictionDB (1, 4, 1) && Quality Check (1, 13, 6)
...

[capink]

I need the full debug log. Preferences > restart in debug mode.

[Liquid1346]

Originally Posted by capink

I need the full debug log. Preferences > restart in debug mode.

My apologies, I'm an idiot. I just noticed I confused "Actions Chains" with "Editor Chains" :-( I'm sorry for wasting your time. All is well now that I have figured that out.

[capink]

Never mind. No need to apologize. Can happen to anyone

[Zillion_]

Originally Posted by Zillion_

Issue in 1.18.18: Convert Books action, set to convert EPUB to KFX (from EPUB) creates KFX-ZIP instead. The "Output Format" field says "KFX".

Could anybody please tell me how to output a KFX file instead of a KFX-ZIP using the Convert action ?

This creates a KFX-ZIP (while I'm clearly asking for a KFX):

[capink]

Originally Posted by Zillion_

Could anybody please tell me how to output a KFX file instead of a KFX-ZIP using the Convert action ?

This creates a KFX-ZIP (while I'm clearly asking for a KFX):

Attachment 204951

As @ownedbycats has already pointed out, Action Chains only calls calibre convert. So my suggestion for you is to try to convert the same book using calibre convert (Without using the Action Chains plugin), and if you are still experiencing the same problem, you should ask for help in the KFX output thread.

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by Zillion_

Could anybody please tell me how to output a KFX file instead of a KFX-ZIP using the Convert action ?

This creates a KFX-ZIP (while I'm clearly asking for a KFX)

Converting to KFX produces KFX. My assumption is that the next step after converting to KFX is importing the book into calibre. File Type plugins will then run.

If the KFX Input plugin is installed then that will convert the book from KFX to KFX-ZIP on import. What normally happens after that is the DeDRM plugin (if installed) removes any DRM, which won't exist in this case. Then the KFX Input plugin converts the KFX-ZIP back to KFX.

It appears that this final step is failing for some reason. Perhaps a calibre debug log would help to show why.

Please feel free to contain the discussion in one of the KFX plugin threads.

[capink]

Originally Posted by jhowell

Converting to KFX produces KFX. My assumption is that the next step after converting to KFX is importing the book into calibre. File Type plugins will then run.

If the KFX Input plugin is installed then that will convert the book from KFX to KFX-ZIP on import. What normally happens after that is the DeDRM plugin (if installed) removes any DRM, which won't won't exist in this case. Then the KFX Input plugin converts the KFX-ZIP back to KFX.

It appears that this final step is failing for some reason. Perhaps a calibre debug log would help to show why.

Please feel free to contain the discussion in one of the KFX plugin threads.

I cannot test this myself because the conversion asks for a program (kindle previewer?) which is not available on linux, but if it is of any help for you, that's how Action Chains runs the convert process, and then imports the book:

gui_convert(input_path, output_path, recommendations)
db.new_api.add_format(book_id, output_format, output_path)

Is there anything here that causes the problems? It seems to work for all other formats.

Edit: output_path will end with a .kfx extension, and output_format is KFX.

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by capink

Is there anything here that causes the problems? It seems to work for all other formats.

I believe that should work. I will try it myself when I have time, but it might not be right away. Hopefully Zillion_ will provide a log that will shed more light on the problem.

[Zillion_]

There's no DRM. Conversion works fine through the normal Calibre interface ("Convert Books" button). Only when going through Action Chains do I get a KFX-ZIP instead of a normal KFX. Pretty strange.
I use the "KFX Output" plugin.

UPDATE: I've just updated to KFX Output plugin version 2.4.0, this resolves the issue !
Thanks for the suggestions.

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by Zillion_

UPDATE: I've just updated to KFX Output plugin version 2.4.0, this resolves the issue !

I was able to install Action Chains and test it myself. The original problem was caused by the KFX Input plugin expecting the imported KFX file to have an extension of ".kfx" when in the case of conversion using action chains the extension of the file produced is actually ".KFX". The latest release of the KFX Input plugin inadvertently works around this problem. I will further improve it to be insensitive to the case of the file extension in a future release.

[terry.nz]

A couple of years ago I had asked the question as to whether it was possible to add info to series. At the time it wasn't possible so I created a "special" TEXT book with series number 9999999 (highest number possible) and gave them the author (and title) called Series Information.

I see now with version 7 of Calibre it provides exactly what I was wanting back them. So now the question.

How to move the content of those TEXT books into the notes for each series. I have the actual sequence worked out. In english it would be:
1. Manage series
2. Select highest series number, open file and copy content (generally no more than 10-20 lines but there are 2 series with just over 1000 lines (Dr Who and Star Trek Universes).
3. Insert that content into the notes section for the selected series.
4. Possibly delete that TEXT book, This may be something I could do manually as if I try to create code and it doesn't work I've just lost my info.
5. Part of the TEXT book also contains a "http link" to the source info for that series, so even copying part of that content to the link portion for series, again more of a wish than absolute need.

What I was looking on the forum for was a macro recorder (not yet knowing if soemthing like that exists or if keystrokes are recordable) and stumbled on this which seems it might achieve what I need.

So I'm not asking for someone to give me the solution, I would like to try to create it myself. But some guidance and I suppose the first question is. Does this "Action Chains" plugin have this sort of capability?

Thanks for the replies (in advance)
Terry