Managing books in multiple series?

[Shianelle]

Hi, I've been organising my library and I've run into a snag. I have come across my first book belonging to multiple series. I tried to seperate the series with a comma, before realising that it didn't work.

After coming here, and reading other people's threads, and finding out that tagging a book with multiple series is impossible, I am desperate for some help that I can actually understand.

I would like to try the column suggestion that has been mentioned so many times, but I don't understand what the columns are, or how to add, customise, or search them! I don't know any programming, and no matter how many time I read the help manual I find the words turning into gibberish.

All I want to do is tag a book that is part 5 of series A, as also being part 2 of series B.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, as I do not have the brainpower to figure this out myself.

Thank you,

Shianelle

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Shianelle

Hi, I've been organising my library and I've run into a snag. I have come across my first book belonging to multiple series. I tried to seperate the series with a comma, before realising that it didn't work.

After coming here, and reading other people's threads, and finding out that tagging a book with multiple series is impossible, I am desperate for some help that I can actually understand.

I would like to try the column suggestion that has been mentioned so many times, but I don't understand what the columns are, or how to add, customise, or search them! I don't know any programming, and no matter how many time I read the help manual I find the words turning into gibberish.

All I want to do is tag a book that is part 5 of series A, as also being part 2 of series B.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, as I do not have the brainpower to figure this out myself.

Thank you,

Shianelle

Shianelle - you shouldn't need to do any programming

First add a second series column, viz



You can create a combined column for searching, viz



If you have not already done so, I suggest spending a bit of time watching the videos Kovid has made ==>> Video Tutorials

BR

[Shianelle]

Thank you! Sorry for the delayed response, I only just got the email notification that someone had responded.

I'm going to try your column suggestions now. Thank you for the video links too. I've just opened the link, but haven't looked at them yet.

Thank you!

EDIT: Um...what do the Column Type options do? Is there an FAQ for them anywhere? I searched the manual but there doesn't seem to be a description of how each one behaves. Am I missing something?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Shianelle

T
EDIT: Um...what do the Column Type options do? Is there an FAQ for them anywhere? I searched the manual but there doesn't seem to be a description of how each one behaves. Am I missing something?

The description to the Right? Behaves like... (a standard column name)

[Shianelle]

Originally Posted by theducks

The description to the Right? Behaves like... (a standard column name)

I'm sorry, but that doesn't actually explain anything. I'm having trouble understanding what each Column Type description actually does, and which one I am meant to be choosing.

For instance, what does it mean when it says Yes/No and is that the wrong choice in comparison to whatever floating point numbers is? Should I be choosing the one that says series-like information, and what does a fixed set of permitted values even mean?

Do I need to keep creating and deleting columns to figure out what each Column Type does, or is there an FAQ somewhere that actually tells you what each one means and does?

[eschwartz]

series-like is equivalent to the actual series column -- that is, you get a text field as well as a numerical field, and they go together.

Yes/No creates a dropdown with only two (or three) options, e.g. blank/check/x

Text with fixed values means you specify each possible value of the column beforehand, and cannot put anything new in it.




You want a series-like column.

[Shianelle]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

series-like is equivalent to the actual series column -- that is, you get a text field as well as a numerical field, and they go together.

Yes/No creates a dropdown with only two (or three) options, e.g. blank/check/x

Text with fixed values means you specify each possible value of the column beforehand, and cannot put anything new in it.




You want a series-like column.

Thank you!

[theducks]

Post #2 shows you how to make a (series) search look in 2 places because, now a series name might be in either place.

Being Greedy ,
I want the ability (option) to use the Same lookup table (single/MASTER list of Series names) . (ditto for Authors names: I use the Editors name as the main Author and the list in a Author-like field as my device uses file names and 42 authors long )

[Shianelle]

Thank you all for your help.

Just one more question...for every series story A is related to I have to make a new column, is that right?

I'm asking because I now have two custom series columns so far in addition to Calibre's series column, and I think it's only going to get worse the further into my folders I go.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Shianelle

Thank you all for your help.

Just one more question...for every series story A is related to I have to make a new column, is that right?

I'm asking because I now have two custom series columns so far in addition to Calibre's series column, and I think it's only going to get worse the further into my folders I go.

NO, Not usually. For collections (more than 2 in a book), I have a Series called 'Various'. the other Series column gets My favorite/the biggest one

Also consider setting series to be Hierarchical. (note metadata downloads will not follow this plan. It is totally a manual edit, but many series names already are a mess)
Pern.Harper Hall
Pern.Dragondrums
You can use the tag browser 1 click (1 + shows) on 'Pern' and see those with just Pern. Or 2 clicks (2+ show) and see All Pern an the children

Seperate Columns are for types of things (cars,Houses,People),
not variations on a thing (red, blue, green)

The reason we make a second column is the FIELD (typein box) can only hold one kind of entry and do what it does with index numbers. OTOH Tags allows a 'list'

[Shianelle]

I think one of my problems is that I have so many anthology collections.

For example, in Anthology One, story seven is the sequel to story one, whilst story four is the prequel to story two, with story five being the sequel to story two, and story six is the sequel to story three.

They are all part of a larger story arc, hence the weird order (which is also the order they were originally published in), and I can't combine them because in Anthology XYZ, story three references characters in Anthology One's story number four (the prequel), but is not related to any of the other stories or contents, and so on, rinse and repeat.

I think I just confused myself again.

[eschwartz]

I use one (1) extra series column -- called "subseries". For story arcs e.g. Riftwar, Legend of Drizzt, etc. (the main series column gets the universe series order).
I don't really have any crossovers.

When it comes to anthologies, you will just drive yourself crazy. Use the EpubSplit plugin and divide the anthologies into individual per-story ebooks.

You might be able to get away with NO custom columns.
I certainly don't see the need for more than one extra.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

When it comes to anthologies, you will just drive yourself crazy.

That's the truth. Some of the anthologies I have tie into half a dozen different series or more. No good way to manage those unless you want to split them up.

[PeterT]

I took maybe a simple approach for sub-series. I added two new columns to calibre

Column Header: Sub Series
Lookup Name: subseries
Column Type: Text, column shown in the tag browser
Description: Sub Series for a book. Used as part of a calculated column for shelf definitions.

Column Header: Subseries Shelf
Lookup Name: subshelf
Column Type: Column built from other columns
Description: Provides for a subseries shelf (first used for Discworld books)
Template: {#subseries:'test($,strcat(field('series'),' - ',$),'')'}

What this allows me to do is to specify a value for a subseries within a series of books; for instance Carpe Jugulum is book 23 of the Discworld Series, but is also in the Witches subseries.

When the book is transferred to my Kobo, it will end up being called D - 23 - Carpe Jugulum, and be located on both the Discworld AND Discworld - Witches shelves. (I use a metadata plugboard to massage the title of the book to include an abbreviated form of the Series name and the number of the book in that series).

[Sabardeyn]

Although I've been offline for some time, I've explained in older messages that I use several custom columns (#universe; #ser1, #ser2, etc) to produce something similar.

#universe is the largest "bucket" for grouping books together from one or more authors and/or series. It is meant to be a location name wherein all events from all books take place. Particularly helpful if they're prolific writers and/or have several separate series that are later declared to be in the same over-all setting.

#ser1 (etc) is a "nested" set of series columns. They're basically used in the standard Calibre manner, but sub-dividing series as needed. This works, for instance, to place books into time groups (Medieval, Renaissance, etc), characters (Doctor Who [a time traveler so time groups are useless here!]), multi-generational writings, etc. The nesting is important here because it means that entry is a container that partially or wholly holds other sub-series.

Thereafter I've standardized the index numbers used to account for oddities. I won't try giving examples here.

Anyway, it's not perfect. I still have not found a good way to account for cross-over books (example: Superman vs X-Men both having separate and complex series numbers of their own, etc).