Big messy library, low skill - What's a good workflow?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye666+

I use a program called Everything to search both all of my Calibre libraries (20) with my last count showing 463K volumes and my raw unallocated books that need review and classification. I cull dupes but don't worry about multiple copies until I read a book, at which point I add a code to the title to tell me at a glance I have read it and if I need a better copy. Everything will tell me at a glance if I have a particular book and where it is or what books I have in any library by a particular author. I keep a seperate copy for a similar search of my unassigned books.

My libraries are organized by genre and alphabetical author group using first name of author. When I am organizing a particular author I isolate a book title and add a not read identifier, series, and number in the series with an indication it is ready for reading.

I never add a book directly to it's library but load it to an empty library so I can set the proper author format, title information, and clean up meta as required, including any tags. I then transfer the book (s) to the proper library based on genre and author name.

If I receive an additional copy I clean it in my empty catalog, transfer to to the proper catalog, and when I sort the author by title I can tell what duplicate of a book I have read has been received and I can delete at that time.

When I am ready for a Kindle transfer I pick out the books I want, convert, and transfer. Once read I mark my library copy read and if it is satisfactory I then delete the unneeded copies. I also then delete the Kindle copy. The only books on my reader are books that I intend to read.

Why keep 20 separate libraries based on genres when you could keep genres as tags, a custom column or virtual libraries? You wouldn't need Everything then to search your libraries, because you would have only one physical library.

I do use Everything, but not to search my calibre library. Calibre's own search works perfectly for that.