Using templates for file names, plugboards, composite columns, searches, tooltips

[theducks]

Oh! you are editing the Kobo DB

I tested only at Calibre

[PeterT]

I think one issue with editting the Kobo database is that the device does a sync with the Kobo servers; I think there is an option in Kobo Utilities to cleanse the collections which I again think sets a date of change on the rows to allow the sync to have the desired effect.



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[DNSB]

On the second page of the KoboTouch/KoboTouchExtended driver, check the box beside Delete Empty Bookshelves (Kobo used to refer to collections as bookshelves).

[chaley]

Originally Posted by DNSB

On the second page of the KoboTouch/KoboTouchExtended driver, check the box beside Delete Empty Bookshelves (Kobo used to refer to collections as bookshelves).

I experimented with this a bit. The Kobo driver doesn't actually delete the collections, instead setting them to "deleted". Collections with this status don't show on the Kobo but are still in the db. Others have speculated on how they can be made to be truly deleted, for example by doing a sync with the mothership. I don't know whether "deleted" collections have a significant performance impact.

I also found that collections won't go away (be set to "deleted) unless there is an actual template in the template box or an actual column name in the collections box, or both. Interestingly enough, the column name doesn't need to be a real column. Example: I was able to delete all my collections by setting the collections column box to the lookup name "foobar", which of course doesn't exist. How to change this behavior isn't obvious because it is likely that some people depend on how it currently works. I am strongly tempted to leave it the way it is.

Of course, Preferences / Sending to device / Metadata management must be set to automatic for any of this to happen.

[theducks]

Does the Compress Device Database item on KU, do the actual purge?

[chaley]

Originally Posted by theducks

Does the Compress Device Database item on KU, do the actual purge?

Looking at the code, no. It does a "vacuum", which removes empty holes in the database. It doesn't do anything with "deleted" collections.

[BrandonGiesing]

Originally Posted by PeterT

I think one issue with editting the Kobo database is that the device does a sync with the Kobo servers; I think there is an option in Kobo Utilities to cleanse the collections which I again think sets a date of change on the rows to allow the sync to have the desired effect.

I haven't synced my device in literal months (last sync date was Nov 2023) cause it hasn't connected to Wifi so that isn't it.

Originally Posted by DNSB

On the second page of the KoboTouch/KoboTouchExtended driver, check the box beside Delete Empty Bookshelves (Kobo used to refer to collections as bookshelves).

Which has nothing to do with my issue cause none of the shelves were "empty", that only deletes collections when all books inside said collection have been removed from the device, I didn't remove any books so none of the collections I no longer wanted were "empty"

[Doum]

Hello,
Do you know how i can do a search for serie name where their serie_index can be greater than 20 for example .
I only want the serie name , not all ebooks with serie_index > 20, or any template ... just a search method with serie name as result

Thanks for your help

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Doum

Hello,
Do you know how i can do a search for serie name where their serie_index can be greater than 20 for example .
I only want the serie name , not all ebooks with serie_index > 20, or any template ... just a search method with serie name as result

Thanks for your help

AFAIK Calibre was not designed for that level of fineness.

But the following steps might work
1)

series:true and series_index:>=20

That gets you the list of 20+ series.
Now create a CSV Catalog with only the series name. (Catalog respects the current view)

Alternate way if your SQL foo is moderate is to use a SQL Browser (for SQL Lite) and roll your own query

[chaley]

Originally Posted by Doum

Hello,
Do you know how i can do a search for serie name where their serie_index can be greater than 20 for example .
I only want the serie name , not all ebooks with serie_index > 20, or any template ... just a search method with serie name as result

Thanks for your help

Please don't double post.

See your original thread at https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=361245

[maddz]

Can someone help with editing a template in the Kobo Utilities plug-in?

Currently, I use the subtitle field for subseries & index:
{#subseries:|| {#subseries_index} - } {#myshelves}

What I want to do is add a new bit which will pull through any "From Where" fields (#fromwhere) that contain the word "Nominee", separating them with a comma if there are more than one. This should be on a new line if there is an entry for subseries.

Is that doable?

[maddz]

Originally Posted by maddz

Can someone help with editing a template in the Kobo Utilities plug-in?

Currently, I use the subtitle field for subseries & index:
{#subseries:|| {#subseries_index} - } {#myshelves}

What I want to do is add a new bit which will pull through any "From Where" fields (#fromwhere) that contain the word "Nominee", separating them with a comma if there are more than one. This should be on a new line if there is an entry for subseries.

Is that doable?

Well, in the end I created a custom column for the various nominations and used the following template:

{#subseries:|| {#subseries_index} - } {#myshelves} {#hugonominees:|| - {#hugonominees}}

However, I don't understand why it isn't inserting the hyphen between my shelves and the nominations list when there is an entry in the latter field.

Ideally, I want each section to be on a separate line, but I can't figure out newlines in the template language. I am guessing I should use something like character('newline') or \n...

[chaley]

Originally Posted by maddz

Well, in the end I created a custom column for the various nominations and used the following template:

{#subseries:|| {#subseries_index} - } {#myshelves} {#hugonominees:|| - {#hugonominees}}

As said in the calibre template documentation, don't use subtemplates Single Function Mode.

However, I don't understand why it isn't inserting the hyphen between my shelves and the nominations list when there is an entry in the latter field.

Are you are referring to the last expression?

{#hugonominees:|| - {#hugonominees}}

The expression doesn't make sense to me. It appears to be trying to include #hugonominees twice, with a hyphen between them. And again, the subtemplate shouldn't be used.

I think you want

{#hugonominees:| - |}

Ideally, I want each section to be on a separate line, but I can't figure out newlines in the template language. I am guessing I should use something like character('newline') or \n...

The character() function works only in General Program Mode.

I think this GPM template gets close to what you want.

program:
# This template produces a three line result.
# Line 1 is the subseries, or - if there isn't one.
# Line 2 is the shelves, or '-' if there aren't any
# Line 3 is the hugo nominees, or '-' if there aren't any

	ss = $subseries;
	ssi = $subseries_index;
	if ss then 
		ss_res = ss & ' - ' & ssi
	else
		ss_res = '-'
	fi;

	shelves = ifempty($#myshelves, '-');

	hugo = ifempty($hugonominees, '-');

	return ss_res & character('newline') & shelves & character('newline') & hugo

[maddz]

Originally Posted by chaley

As said in the calibre template documentation, don't use subtemplates Single Function Mode.
Are you are referring to the last expression?

{#hugonominees:|| - {#hugonominees}}

The expression doesn't make sense to me. It appears to be trying to include #hugonominees twice, with a hyphen between them. And again, the subtemplate shouldn't be used.

I think you want

{#hugonominees:| - |}

The character() function works only in General Program Mode.

I think this GPM template gets close to what you want.

program:
# This template produces a three line result.
# Line 1 is the subseries, or - if there isn't one.
# Line 2 is the shelves, or '-' if there aren't any
# Line 3 is the hugo nominees, or '-' if there aren't any

	ss = $subseries;
	ssi = $subseries_index;
	if ss then 
		ss_res = ss & ' - ' & ssi
	else
		ss_res = '-'
	fi;

	shelves = ifempty($#myshelves, '-');

	hugo = ifempty($hugonominees, '-');

	return ss_res & character('newline') & shelves & character('newline') & hugo

The expression is used in the Kobo Utilities output plugboards to define the output to the Subtitle field. I think it was Davidfor who helped me to set it up initially because of the problems with sorting braided series (I use a main series with the index as the internal chronology, and the subseries is added as appropriate; if you include the subseries in the series output, it doesn't sort properly - all entries with a subseries sort to the end of the list).

The || is to suppress the function if there is no entry in the field prior to || (so I don't get " - My Shelves" if there is no entry for a subseries but I get just "My Shelves" instead). I output 'My Shelves' so I can see at a glance if a particular series is split across multiple shelves - which has happened - so I know to update Calibre to correct the error. Given I have 6700+ ebooks collected since the early 2000s, eyeballing the Calibre list makes for easily missed inconsistencies. It's been cleaned up over the years though, so eventually I'll drop that section of the plugboard.

What it's doing is if there are entries in all 3 fields is producing the output:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index' - 'My Shelves' 'Hugo Nominations'

What I want it to do is produce:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index' - 'My Shelves' - 'Hugo Nominations'

Ideally, it should be:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index'
'My Shelves'
'Hugo Nominations'

But I am not sure if the subtitle field can take more than one line...

If there is less than three entries (every title will have 'My Shelves'), the line breaks for the subseries and Hugos should be suppressed, so there is either 1 line or 2 lines:

'My Shelves'

or

'Subseries' Subseries Index'
'My Shelves'

or

'My Shelves'
'Hugo Nominations'

I hope this makes sense! I'm fiddling with the output now, as I am trying to prioritise my reading; some novels from the packet are in the Best Editor nominations, and they are low priority, so I want to see which unread title to go for first.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by maddz

What it's doing is if there are entries in all 3 fields is producing the output:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index' - 'My Shelves' 'Hugo Nominations'

What I want it to do is produce:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index' - 'My Shelves' - 'Hugo Nominations'

Ideally, it should be:
'Subseries' 'Subseries Index'
'My Shelves'
'Hugo Nominations'

But I am not sure if the subtitle field can take more than one line...

If there is less than three entries (every title will have 'My Shelves'), the line breaks for the subseries and Hugos should be suppressed, so there is either 1 line or 2 lines:

'My Shelves'

or

'Subseries' Subseries Index'
'My Shelves'

or

'My Shelves'
'Hugo Nominations'

Putting aside the newlines, this template does what the above says you want. There might be some misspellings in the column lookup names as I don't have those columns in my database.

{#subseries}{#subseries_index:| | - }{#myshelves}{#hugonominees:| - |}

I tested it with columns I have:

{#series}{#series_index:| | - }{#genre}{tags:| - |}

EDIT: According to this post I tested newlines in the subtitle and they didn't work. The the template below isn't useful.

This GPM template does the same thing except for using newlines instead of the minus signs.

program:
# This template produces a 1-to-3 line result.
# The first line is the subseries if there is one.
# The next line is the shelves, which are always present.
# The last line is the hugo nominees, if there is one.

	if $subseries then
		ss = $#subseries & ' ' & $#subseries_index & character('newline')
	else
		ss = ''
	fi;

	if $#hugonominees then
		hugo = character('newline') & $#hugonominees
	else
		hugo = ''
	fi;

	return ss & $#myshelves & hugo

NB: I left off some of the '#' characters in the template in my last post. I tested it with columns that exist then incorrectly edited it to reference your columns.