Using Series in Save to Device

[kgn]

I have a lot of books that are in Series. I have come up with a template that almost works

{author_sort[0]}/{author_sort}/{series}/{series_index:0>2s} {title} - {authors}

This actually works just fine with those books that are in Series. The problem arises with those books that are NOT in a Series. It puts a '00 ' at the beginning of every book title.

So - what I do then is use a rename program that scans for these leading '00 ' characters and renames all the files. So far so good.

This all works are far as it goes - except when I want to upload one of these files again for any reason. It uploads ok - I then have two books on the device - one with a '00 ' leading, and one with not. The problem now is that I cannot rename the files like I did before as the rename TO name already exists, so the rename fails.

I would like a way of getting around this problem. Of course I can simply grin and bear the fact that a lot of my book titles start with '00 ' and be done with it.

One way suggested to me is to make up a new tag field for those books that are not in a Series, and process those differently. This sounds ok - but how can I use a different template for these differently tagged files? Do I simply have to remember what the different templates are for each tag, or is there someway of switching templates programatically?

Currently - every so often I simply delete ALL the books on my device, and re-save the lot. This takes a long time - so I really want to get this format worked out.

Any suggestions welcomed....

[kgn]

error

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by kgn

{author_sort[0]}/{author_sort}/{series}/{series_index:0>2s} {title} - {authors}

This actually works just fine with those books that are in Series. The problem arises with those books that are NOT in a Series. It puts a '00 ' at the beginning of every book title.

So - what I do then is use a rename program that scans for these leading '00 ' characters and renames all the files. So far so good.

We had this discussion previously Starson17 uses the following to avoid the preceding zeros. You'll see that he puts the series in the file name too, not a separate folder.

Originally Posted by Starson17

There is a trick I use that works well - not perfect, but OK for me, and easier than swapping save templates. I set my output to:

This tries to leave two spaces in front of the title in the filename when the series and series_index are empty, but the spaces are stripped off during the save process. You end up with all your series sorted together and no sign of a series when there isn't one.

[kgn]

Originally Posted by dwanthny

We had this discussion previously Starson17 uses the following to avoid the preceding zeros. You'll see that he puts the series in the file name too, not a separate folder.

Yes - I tried that first - and that works as far as it goes.

But I would rather put the series into a sub folder. Some authors have quite a few series, and it looks better this way. Also, some authors can have 70+ books - this makes for a very confusing list.

Are you suggesting that I do both??

You might also notice that I am using {series_index:0>2s} and NOT {series_index:>2s}. This also makes all the difference as I need a leading 0 - many series go over 9 volumes. If not done this way, the books do not sort correctly.



Then again, maybe I am missing something....

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by kgn

Then again, maybe I am missing something....

I don't think you're missing anything. What exactly are you trying to do? Are you sending everything to your device?

I would suggest using two passes. The template remembers previous templates. Use the tags/search and select all books in that are in series, then use the template you've been using.

Then grab all of the non-series books and change the template to send them the way you would like to see them show on your device.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by kgn

Yes - I tried that first - and that works as far as it goes.


Then again, maybe I am missing something....

I use 2 templates

00NoSeries/
{author_sort[0]}_authors/{authors}/{title}-{id}/{title}


{series[0]}-series/{series}/{series_index:0>2s}-{title}_{id}/{title}_{authors}

(note: I added the series alpha-grouping level because I was worrying that I was approaching the maximum root entry limit, and it was easier to find a series name in the smaller list )
with 2 filters to make it easy

series:false
series:true

[kgn]

Originally Posted by dwanthny

I don't think you're missing anything. What exactly are you trying to do? Are you sending everything to your device?

I would suggest using two passes. The template remembers previous templates. Use the tags/search and select all books in that are in series, then use the template you've been using.

This seems like it might be workable. I send everything to my device - so I will try the two pass thing.