Disappearing Books

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by maybedog

I've had this happen, too, and I've come up with several causes, most user error. One reason is what I think is a bug but is probably considered user error:

When I combine two books, Calibre doesn't check if the book is still in the directory. So if I select the book first that is a record without a corresponding book and then the other, Calibre just deletes the second format. [Example: I've lost the book already. The empty book folder is still there. I recover the book and just readd it. Now I have two records. I select the first one and the second one and choose combine and delete. Instead of making sure there is at least one copy, Calibre will delete the second copy so I still am left without a copy. I have to be sure to select the second one, first.] Since Calibre is supposed to *combine*, I expected Calibre to check and make sure all the formats were there. The reason I did it this way was because the original record had all the revised metadata. If I choose the second one first, then I lose much of the revised metadata as it is overwritten by the original metadata. To get around this, I have to manually add the book to the right folder. But the problem is that if the book is a different file size, like I've modified it externally to remove unused media files, the metadata isn't updated and Calibre has the wrong information.

The other two things I've come up with so far are that I was using a cloud drive to back up my files. This ran in the background and somehow deleted the files while syncing. However, this has happened with two different cloud storage sites which isn't supposed to happen and doesn't happen with any other kind of file, so I wonder if there's some bug in Calibre. I don't know what it could be, though.

The other cause is when I update metadata. Sometimes Calibre can't delete the old directory. So I might see both a "J.E. Doe" and "J. E. Doe" folders which are hard to distinguish at first glance. If I have other authors with initials starting with "J", I may miss one of these in the list. Or I switch the authors and the book is then moved to the folder for the author that is now listed first. The book is still there, just looks like it's missing when I look under the wrong name.

I don't see why calibre should be expected to waste time checking that the database and library wasn't FUBARed every time it does anything. That shouldn't happen unless you ignore the advice in the FAQs and use a NAS or sync while calibre is running.

There is a special tool to fix the database when it is out of sync with the library folders. If the database is lying and says there are formats there (that were lost through user error -- running sync software while calibre is running)... then use the tools for fixing it, to fix it. THEN start merging book records etc.

[Adoby]

While calibre is running it assumes that it has full unrestricted access to the contents in the calibre library. That means that no other programs can access the library at the same time. If this isn't true, then problems may ensue.

Also any changes to the contents inside the calibre library, done manually or with some other software other than calibre, can (and probably will) cause problems and data loss. You are strongly advised to not even look up the skirts of the calibre library, and if you look at least don't touch anything. Use the GUI.

When you backup your calibre library, do so when calibre is not running. Make sure that you backup the complete library as a single unit, to preserve the internal structure and function.