Editing Metadata in Bulk

[ballast]

When I add multiple books to Calibre for an author, they frequently come with title & author reversed and the author in last,first format. I can use the "swap title and author" button and I can enter the author in correct format for bulk updating.....

The problem is, Calibre apparently applies the author correction before the swap correction. Is it possible to get this changed so it applies the swap first (thus getting title in the correct spot) and THEN apply the mass change to author. Seems like this would be the logical order to do it???

[I know I can futz with the definitions for getting data from the file names, but I would have to swap them around constantly]

[kumbaja]

As a workaround you could split the process in two steps manually. Bulk edit metadata -> switch author & title -> save. Bulk edit again -> correct author.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by kumbaja

As a workaround you could split the process in two steps manually. Bulk edit metadata -> switch author & title -> save. Bulk edit again -> correct author.

Karma to you for clearly speaking the obvious.

[kovidgoyal]

Do it in two steps, theres no canonically right order in which to do bulk operations.

[ballast]

That's what I do now, but it presents this problem...

I need to swap title/author first to get them in the correct order... but now it has re-sorted by author (the sort I normally work in) and I will find the new titles moved to last,first or whatever strange thing that is now in Author. Then I have to find them (usually easiest to resort by date to find the new ones) and then bulk rename the author.

I admit this is only a minor inconvenience. I love the program and I'm impressed by the amount of work Kovid devotes to it.

My argument would be this... when would you ever want to bulk change the Author and then swap the author/title? I cannot see that ever producing a valid update. I realize that there is no inherent "right" order for the bulk change, but it obviously has an order now, presumably executed in top to bottom sequence. If it were conditional, when Author and swap are both selected, it could execute the swap first. Having spent 30 years as a programmer/analyst, I know that the seemingly smallest change often requires the largest effort.

Enough said - It just seemed a logical suggestion at the time.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by ballast

I need to swap title/author first to get them in the correct order... but now it has re-sorted by author (the sort I normally work in) and I will find the new titles moved to last,first or whatever strange thing that is now in Author. Then I have to find them (usually easiest to resort by date to find the new ones) and then bulk rename the author.

Whenever I am operating on a set of books (changing metadata, doing a sequence of bulk metadata edits, etc), the first thing I do is add a unique tag (e.g., ToDo) to all the books of interest. I then create a saved search for the ToDo tag, then set a search restriction to show only books with that tag.

At this point all I see is the set of books I want to mess with. I can search, sort, change metadata, what-have-you, all without losing control, as long as I do not remove the unique tag. Once I am done, I take the tag off the books, keeping it laying around for next time.