[GUI Plugin] QuarantineAndScrub

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by DaltonST

The following quotes are spot on, correct, well-articulated, accurately reflect facts, and are valid corollaries to: "Percentage of Total Calibre Users to Whom This Add-On is Targeted: <0.001%".

Originally Posted by davidfor

If the intention of the first post is to repel people who would find this plugin useful and can actually follow clearly worded instructions, then it is probably doing a good job.

OK, I'll agree, a relatively small number of calibre users need this plugin, but, there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY (yes, I am shouting and I did consider adding another word) that what I said above could be a corollary for what you said. If you actually read what I said, I am trying to point out there are people out there that CAN follow instructions and do have a large enough library that this would be useful. But, those instructions need to be clear and error free. Your first post in this thread is in no way clear and definitely has errors.

A perfect example is the post that started this. That's axewood's post. He pointed out a simple problem: The file name mentioned had a space in it. And it didn't match the names of any actual file attached to the post. Between that, and the rest of the mess in the post he decided it was better to stop and disappoint his girlfriend than continue. That takes guts. And a HUGE bunch of flowers. Plus breakfast in bed.

Are you really only interested in helping people who can wade through the disorganised mess that is the first post of this thread? I can understand scaring away those who aren't willing to spend the time to do this right, but that first post is so bad I'm surprised you get anyone at all.

And before someone looks at my plugin threads and calls me a hypocrite, I make no claim to be perfect. If you see something in those threads, or the help supplied with the plugins, or, most importantly, in the actual plugins that can be improved, please tell me. I don't promise to make every change suggested, but I will try to explain why I don't accept one. And suggestions usually prompt improvements in other areas a well.

[eschwartz]

@davidfor -- I think you can understand the two as, well, not corollaries, but certainly in agreement with each other, if you keep in mind my conclusion to post #119:

Originally Posted by eschwartz

[...]

Maybe the target users are "people who enjoy playing games with the developer"?

I will note that the first post is still explicitly providing false instructions -- nothing has been done to fix even such basic errors in the canonical documentation, after being loudly discussed for over two days.


@DaltonST, what are the chances of you at the very very least updating old, out-of-date filenames in order to avoid unequivocally lying?

[axewood]

;-)

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by axewood

;-)

Smart guy!

[menthol]

After reading this thread for quite a while, I still do not understand what it does.

Does it consult online database to correct the metadata?
How to use it to get LCC for books?

Thank you!

[gand3r]

I'm really wondering what people here complain about. the author clearly stated, this addon is aimed at a minority of people. and he never said this addon is useful for a minority of people, just that he doesn't wish to cope with too many users. and his choice of who deserves to use that addon is made based on how much additional work he needs to perform. if he needs to edit some installation-instruction whenever the circumstances change, he is nor willing to do that! same with pretending to be someone else and using a friendlier tone. this addon is for free, and most likely the author intended it to be only for himself. let's be grateful there actually are instructions for how to use and install it!

as for what it actually does do, I too had difficulties figuring it out, to put it plainly it is aimed for distributors who obtained a huge library of badly tagged books and wanted to spread each individual book along with all the correct metadata -- be it legally or illegally, although I can imagine it's mostly legal distribution which has the requirement of accurate metadata. the idea is that metadata can be contained in the filenames or an additional file. so basically you must write a computer-program (in the language provided with this addon) to read out the metadata and this addon then takes care of converting it into the calibre-format. i.e. it's a general-purpose converter of metadata, with a lot of additional work being required to actually convert anything. no online-database is used, nothing is happening automatically through some wizard, you need to know for yourself what you're doing. if you had any specific task in mind, write a calibre plugin or external calibre-based program -- the sourcecode is available. probably equally easy as the use of this addon. but if you just want to add metadata to calibre-managed books and the metadata provided isn't sufficient for calibre to obtain the missing info online, this addon gives other possibilities to do that, with a few less keystrokes.

I tried using the built-in mechanisms for filling in metadata, of the original calibre. it's awful, search for book-title and author is very sensitive to misspelling, most books end up with multiple isbn numbers and calibre then wont know what to do, these must be edited manually. i.e. it works only if the book-files contain good metadata already. with this addon however, I get more control over the whole process...

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by DaltonST

It is somewhat of a "Swiss Army Knife" metadata tool, although like all knives, it requires proper handling and care.

If Jack only wants something to pick stones from his horses' hooves and Jill only wants something to sharpen her calligraphy quills, then its unlikely that either will be satisfied with a Swiss Army Knife, let alone one that they must share The scissors, corkscrews, nail files, eyelash curlers etc tend to get in the way of the pick and the knife

- maybe some features of Q&S could be made available as single purpose plugins - I have in mind features such as the LoC & DD codes, Manga and Graphic Novel metadata.

BR

[axewood]

You are completely missing my point here, and i don't understand why. I'm repeating myself endlessly and still you cannot see it. My girlfriend is using Calibre for many years now, working with it daily and COULD seriously be using this addon. However the instructions, however happy i should be that they exist, are completely useless AND WRONG in the first place. So again: they couldn't have been correct, EVER.
Maybe now you have a clue?

[DaltonST]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

....... some features of Q&S could be made available as single purpose plugins - I have in mind features such as the LoC & DD codes, Manga and Graphic Novel metadata.

BR

@BR:

No worries. Combining the derivation of Library of Congress Codes and D.D. Codes into a single plugin has been on my list since I added them to Q&S a (subjectively) long time ago. I've been working down my list in a priority sequence based on what currently strikes my fancy at the end of my last inspiration. After just releasing CALM version 2, I need something totally trivial, so that new plugin just gained some prioritization points.


DaltonST

[japastor]

I've been a software developer for 35 years, I've developed and documented several large-scale systems. I've also installed and used hundreds, if not thousands, of software packages on Berkeley Unix, SunOS, all versions of Windows from 3.1 on, and Linux. In other words, I can (and do) RTFMs and can generally decode even opaque instructions.

I'd love to use your plug-in, but it appears that the original instructions have never been updated, despite some fairly obvious and well-documented ... limitations.

I'll ignore the "space-inside-the-filename" issue, which I'd assume is a simple typo (although if so, it should really have been corrected by now), but the fact that the file referenced in the instructions is not the one that's attached to the post is not something that I can ignore.

Nor is the use of the term "the parent directory of your Calibre libraries": to illustrate, if the path to the directory in which the sub-directories named for authors are housed is (on a Win system) \Doc\Calibre\ -- i.e., the files themselves are in directories like "\Doc\Calibre\Adam Smith\", "\Doc\Calibre\Ambrose Bierce\" -- do I place the zip file in \Doc\ or \Doc\Calibre\ (or somewhere else)?

If it's \Doc\, then "parent" is accurate, but if it's \Doc\Calibre\ I'd be more inclined to use the term "root" -- but in either case, and example such as the one I gave here might be useful, and certainly not excessively verbose, given the length of the instructions as they are.

Would you consider making a few minor revisions to the instructions, updating them to match the current filenames and being a bit clearer about where the directory QuarantineAndScrub\ will be created -- not automatically by unpacking the current zip file, as suggested by the instructions: "'Extract (it) Here' automatically into its special Calibre Library subdirectory, QuarantineAndScrub."

I'd like to try your plugin, but after reading through this thread it seems that a few issues have been brought to your attention that are quite reasonable and deserve to be addressed, but do not appear to have been.

[DaltonST]

Version 3.6.94 -30 December 2015 Automatic display of Calibre Job Dialog after submission of Author-Level and Book-Level Scrubbing Jobs, as well as the Derive Genres Job. All Job Logs must be reviewed for Q&S to work properly for you.


Version 3.6.93 -29 December 2015 Major speed improvements at the end of Book-Level Scrubbing while Miscellaneous Scrubbing is changing Work Series Index to Web Series Index when appropriate. Improved job progress notifications for that functionallity as well.


Remember to run the "After Version Upgrade" job at the top of the Q&S Menu. A technical change in #work_series_full was made in Q&S Database Version 4.97 to ensure compatibility with Calibre's "Manage User Categories" function.



DaltonST

[DaltonST]

Version 3.6.95 -31 December 2015 Major speed improvements at the end of Book-Level Scrubbing while Miscellaneous Scrubbing (of all books) is potentially changing Work Title to Web Title when they are different (yet very similar) but the Work Series and its Index are identical to the Web Series and its Index.


Remember to always run the "After Version Upgrade" job near the top of the menu after upgrading to any new version of Q&S.




DaltonST

[DaltonST]

Version 3.6.96 -01 January 2016 Additional data-mining of historical web source series detail for use by Miscellaneous Scrubbing at the end of Book-Level Scrubbing; Series-Level Scrubbing job "Rename Work Series Name to Web Series Name" has been enhanced and optimized for speed and performance.

Remember to always run the "After Version Upgrade" job on the menu after upgrading to any new release or version.



Other recent releases:


Version 3.6.95 -31 December 2015 Major speed improvements at the end of Book-Level Scrubbing while Miscellaneous Scrubbing is changing Work Title to Web Title when they are different yet similar but the Work Series and its Index are identical to the Web Series and its Index.


Version 3.6.94 -30 December 2015 Automatic display of Calibre Job Dialog after submission of Author-Level and Book-Level Scrubbing Jobs.


Version 3.6.93 -29 December 2015 Major speed improvements at the end of BookLevel Scrubbing while Miscellaneous Scrubbing is changing Work Series Index to Web Series Index when appropriate. Improved job progress notifications for that functionallity as well.



DaltonST

[DaltonST]

Remember to always run the "After Version Upgrade" job on the menu after upgrading to any new release or version of Q&S.


Version 3.6.99 -08 February 2016 Revised User Guide.


Other recent new releases:

Version 3.6.98 -06 February 2016 ToolTips added to Menus; Technical webscraping tweaks.

Version 3.6.97 -04 January 2016 Updated User Guide.

Version 3.6.96 -01 January 2016 Additional data-mining of historical web source series detail for use by Miscellaneous Scrubbing at the end of Book-Level Scrubbing; Series-Level Scrubbing job "Rename Work Series Name to Web Series Name" has been enhanced and optimized for speed and performance.



DaltonST

[DaltonST]

Version 3.6.101 -16 February 2016 New Global Authors (total now: ~ 20,215) and New Book Awards (total now: ~ 4,194).

Remember to always run the "After Version Upgrade" job on the menu after upgrading to any new release or version of Q&S.



DaltonST