Newbie Needs Help

[eschwartz]

Dang, we are offtopic.

[BetterRed]

In Word, if you tick Options->Advance->Save->Always create backup copy - then when you do a save it renames the current file to Backup of <document name>.wbk, which can be opened and 'converted' to a doc(x) if/when the need arises. But only one backup.

This is a separate 'thing' to the recovery copy. Then there's the Windows Previous Versions feature - it relies on system Restore Points, which I take at the start of day. I used it once to recover a trashed metadata.db.

In Excel the option to create a backup copy is specified at the workbook level rather than globally as in Word - hence the weird extension for Word Backups. Again only one backup.

The backup utility I use (Goodsynch) will keep as many 'earlier' backups as you desire for as long as you desire - I note that FFS also has a Versioning option which I suspect is similar (ie multiple backups). And both will do it in real time - just configure for the file types you edit - eg EPUB, DOCX, etc - but not the database .opfs etc.

BR

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Dang, we are offtopic.

I reckon we blame cybmole for that

BR

[cybmole]

well back to epub versioning then.

this is what I like to do:
epub to epub convert after adding a book to acheive 2 or 3 things:
1. apply my preferred standardised extra css,
2. allow alf's plug in to do it's thing.
3 create a dont-call-it-an-archive.original_epub.

Then I turn to sigil usually and zap anything thats not part of the main story - like now read on for 2 chapters of something completely different - so that the book ends at end of main story and the the page count reflects that. ( if its non fiction, then zap unwanted indexes, bibliography... )
Finally, I use modify epub & count pages as a final tidy up + add a better cover if needed etc...

Now I have a personal reading copy good to go...

BUT until I actually get through reading the entire story, there is always the faint chance that I zapped a page that I shoudl have kept!, so I really do want to have the original_epub still lying around just in case. AND, if I for some reason want to read on kindle instead, I want to get my edited version converted from epub to mobi.
So its really frustrating that i have to choose one of those options & lose the other.

My workflow is seemingly unique, no-one else seems to want or need this so I accept it's not going to happen.

we've established several ways to archive the original books but there's no obvious slick way to restore an original_epub into the calibre database except by one at a time, multi-step manual methods.

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I reckon we blame cybmole for that

BR

we bored the OP to death about 17 posts ago so let's just keep going

I'll play the hard-to-please newbie, you guys keep on with the clever solutions

[eschwartz]

Like I said, start using Sigil as your first step, instead of relying on the hack of converting to create an ORIGINAL_EPUB.

Check your work when editing!

This is now your canonical copy.

You can use one of a dozen different time-machine solutions to version stuff, or just keep a backup of untouched direct-from-source-only-alf-has-touched-this EPUBs. (Many people do this. I do it myself, but with MOBI7/8. )
That should not be necessary, though -- since you were careful when you edited.

[BetterRed]

@cybmole my processes are not dissimilar to yours - after much to-ing and fro-ing (eschwartz can attest to some of it) this is the 'best solution' for me.

I keep a sparse clone of my library - by convention its named <library>Info (eg the _Main library has a corresponding _MainInfo folder). It contains Author and Book folders with the same names as are used in the library folder, but only for those Authors and Books for which I want to keep something I can't or don't want to keep in the library folders. Such as the original download, a different edition, reviews, emails to/from author, links to author website, facebook page. amazon page, obits, pictures... whatever.

I link the xxxxInfo\author folders to the Link field in Manage Authors, and I link the book folders to a comments-like Notes column that I show in Book Details panel. So I click on Author name in the Book Details panel to open the Author info folder - if there isn't a folder it'll do a Google Search. And I click on the Book Info link to open its folder - if there isn't a book info folder there won't be a link to click (so I have to use my heels - groan)

Regarding the restoration of ORIGINAL_EPUB. How often would you want to do that - if it not very, then why does it have to be slick.

If I need to 'edit' a book extensively then I copy the relevant file (DOCX, EPUB or the occasional PDF) to the book info folder, I can work on there just as I please without disturbing the library - I flag the book as being 'Under Edit' in a Status column.

BR

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Like I said, start using Sigil as your first step, instead of relying on the hack of converting to create an ORIGINAL_EPUB.

but I like my lazy "hack" and the conversion does some useful other extra stuff (listed below) that I'd otherwise have to do manually every time, which would be repetitively tedious. It also calibre-izes the class names,which suits me, as I am familiar with that naming convention & can find may way around the CSS easily.

in fact I am currently favouring an added 2nd step.
1.The epub to epub convert to add my own extra css, regularise css class names, regularise page_styles , expand css ( for ease of editing), apply my preferred font key sizes....
2 ( new step) modify epub to remove un-necessary spans before manual edits.
3. edit with sigil....

so there's a lot of normalisation stuff going on in step 1.

PS looking ahead, if some completely new epub reader device came out that needed a different approach to CSS, then that would be another reason for starting over from original_epub. When I switched from Sony readers to what I have now, there were various settings that I used to apply in conversion that did not look good on Kobo / tablets, and there were other things which the Sony used to ignore that now needed extra CSS preference coding - line heights, hyphens.
I've made short term decisions with other media in the past & regretted them as hardware & costs changed e.g. ripping my music CDs at 160 VBR & not 320 CBR, converting DVDs to compressed video to save space - because on my old small monitor there was no difference..... So learning from that, I now try to preserve an as-close-to-source-as-possible backup whenever I add anything to PC.
For e-books, for me that means capture it after any DRM strip but before anything else gets done. Then if a book store goes about of business (remember Sony! ) , or I lose the credentials for a site, it's no loss. And ideally ( here comes the dead horse again) - keep that stuff in calibre so I have a grand total of ONE books collections program & database to manage & backup.
Neigh

[cybmole]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Regarding the restoration of ORIGINAL_EPUB. How often would you want to do that - if it not very, then why does it have to be slick.

BR

so far - never - but there are possible scenarios in my previous post. The "new reader device" one is the most likely.

I hate the thought of executing a humpty-dumpty process: e.g time needed to zap all original_epubs ~10 seconds; time needed to put them all back together ( with the database) again ~10 hours , peace of mind from knowing there's an automated solution - priceless

your approach looks good, I need to read it slowly & take it all in...

[eschwartz]

Then I suggest you use BetterRed's (famous ) auxiliary bookinfo folders idea.

You will need to edit the Manage Authors value for each author. If you don't mind getting a fail instead of the default search, every time an author doesn't have authorInfo folders, then edit Preferences ==> Interface ==> Look & Feel ==> Book Details (tab)
Default author link template == C:\Path\to\libraryInfo\{author}

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Then I suggest you use BetterRed's (famous ) auxiliary bookinfo folders idea.

You will need to edit the Manage Authors value for each author. If you don't mind getting a fail instead of the default search, every time an author doesn't have authorInfo folders, then edit Preferences ==> Interface ==> Look & Feel ==> Book Details (tab)
Default author link template == C:\Path\to\libraryInfo\{author}

I may be misreading - if the Author link field is empty and you click on the author in book details you end up at whatever is at top of Prefs->L&F->Book Details

May not be a good idea to use {author} in the Author-link field.

• some of the file systems that calibre supports would disallow "Irène Némirovsky" as a folder name - I think.
  
• forces you to have the folder name as an exact match what's in calibre metadata, if you correct a name in calibre then you must rename the Author info folder, otherwise when you click on Author Name nothing happens.
  
• implies you can't link pseudonyms to a common folder - eg Abu Mazen (occasional Journalist) to the Mahmoud Abbas (politician) folder.

@cybmole - my epiphany on this came when I realised my desire to "keep it all in the calibre library" would be better expressed as "have it all accessible from the calibre library".

I keep everything relating to calibre, except temporary files and caches in a root level folder on my data drive - it gets backed up every day. BTW that includes the configuration folder.

BR

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I may be misreading - if the Author link field is empty and you click on the author in book details you end up at whatever is at top of Prefs->L&F->Book Details

May not be a good idea to use {author} in the Author-link field.

• some of the file systems that calibre supports would disallow "Irène Némirovsky" as a folder name - I think.
  
• forces you to have the folder name as an exact match what's in calibre metadata, if you correct a name in calibre then you must rename the Author info folder, otherwise when you click on Author Name nothing happens.
  
• implies you can't link pseudonyms to a common folder - eg Abu Mazen (occasional Journalist) to the Mahmoud Abbas (politician) folder.

@cybmole - my epiphany on this came when I realised my desire to "keep it all in the calibre library" would be better expressed as "have it all accessible from the calibre library".

BR

Didn't think of that.