[GUI Plugin] FanFicFare

[JimmXinu]

New Test Version Posted

2024-04-27
- adapter_ficbooknet Fix update date not working (#1066) Thanks, dbhmw
- adapter_literotica: Collect averrating from hidden JSON. #1058
- adapter_literotica: Improved description collection. #1058

[kamille3]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

New Test Version Posted

2024-04-27
- adapter_ficbooknet Fix update date not working (#1066) Thanks, dbhmw
- adapter_literotica: Collect averrating from hidden JSON. #1058
- adapter_literotica: Improved description collection. #1058

Not a fan of how the new descriptions work. The earlier system where the description of each chapter was provided was so much better and helpful than current one where only a singular summary is provided. And for series where series introduction is not provided, the summary remains empty.

I've added a comparison for how it looked for a previously downloaded book versus now.

https://imgbox.com/g/yOCbViA65u

So please a request to you to reinstate the old way where chapter descriptions were provided with a numbered list.

Also, the tags in the newer version seem a quite a few less than the older version for the same book (as you can see in the comparison image). Has something changed?

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by kamille3

Not a fan of how the new descriptions work. The earlier system where the description of each chapter was provided was so much better and helpful than current one where only a singular summary is provided. And for series where series introduction is not provided, the summary remains empty.
...
So please a request to you to reinstate the old way where chapter descriptions were provided with a numbered list.

That was an ugly kludge implemented because the site didn't have a 'story' description before.

No other supported site gets a ToC when there isn't a description, and the site now requires at least the 'Short Description' on all new 'Story Series'.

But I will consider putting it back in if enough other people also ask for it.

Originally Posted by kamille3

Also, the tags in the newer version seem a quite a few less than the older version for the same book (as you can see in the comparison image). Has something changed?

Yes. Before, FFF would collect tags from the first chapter and (optionally) from each downloaded chapter. Which meant you could get different tags during a full download vs an update. That wasn't my idea, it breaks FFF's paradigm.

Now FFF is collecting tags from the 'Story Series'(/series/se) page, which is the defining story page. For that story, the tags given on the story don't exactly match the tags on any of the chapter pages, nor is it the union or intersection of the chapter page tags.

So presumably those are the tags the author has chosen to assign to the story as a whole.

[kamille3]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

But I will consider putting it back in if enough other people also ask for it.

Oh god I really hope it gets implemented back otherwise a lot of my already downloaded book series will lose their chapter summaries when a new chapter update arrives

I've seen quite a few authors I follow not putting a series intro so summary field stays blank. This is why I feel the separate chapter summaries were so good.

[applegaa]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

Yes. Before, FFF would collect tags from the first chapter and (optionally) from each downloaded chapter. Which meant you could get different tags during a full download vs an update. That wasn't my idea, it breaks FFF's paradigm.

Now FFF is collecting tags from the 'Story Series'(/series/se) page, which is the defining story page. For that story, the tags given on the story don't exactly match the tags on any of the chapter pages, nor is it the union or intersection of the chapter page tags.

So presumably those are the tags the author has chosen to assign to the story as a whole.

Literotica has a 10 tag limit per story. It appears that this limit applies to series as well. Authors are not able to set tags on their series. Instead, it appears to grab the first 10 unique tags from the included stories.

- Andrew

[JimmXinu]

New Test Version Posted

2024-04-28
- adapter_literotica: Don't setDescription() if tag is empty #1058

Originally Posted by kamille3

Oh god I really hope it gets implemented back otherwise a lot of my already downloaded book series will lose their chapter summaries when a new chapter update arrives

FFF shouldn't erase Calibre Comments to set it empty. But that was effectively happening because it was being set to an empty tag: <div class="bn_B"></div>

Now if the tag is empty (AKA there's no specific story series description), the Calibre Comments field will be left instead of set to the empty tag.

So while you won't get new ToC descriptions, you won't lose the ones you have--or whatever comments you manually filled in--unless/until the author puts in a description.

[kamille3]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

New Test Version Posted

2024-04-28
- adapter_literotica: Don't setDescription() if tag is empty #1058


FFF shouldn't erase Calibre Comments to set it empty. But that was effectively happening because it was being set to an empty tag: <div class="bn_B"></div>

Now if the tag is empty (AKA there's no specific story series description), the Calibre Comments field will be left instead of set to the empty tag.

So while you won't get new ToC descriptions, you won't lose the ones you have--or whatever comments you manually filled in--unless/until the author puts in a description.

Don't get me wrong...I like that ToC desc won't get deleted for now but still is it possible to implement both Series intro and numbered ToC desc?

Its just that separate descriptions for each chapter helped me know the exact summary of what was about to happen in that specific chapter. A single summary an entire book series feels wrong when different chapters already have different descriptions.

Not trying to annoy you just saying what I feel.

[applegaa]

Originally Posted by kamille3

Oh god I really hope it gets implemented back otherwise a lot of my already downloaded book series will lose their chapter summaries when a new chapter update arrives

I've seen quite a few authors I follow not putting a series intro so summary field stays blank. This is why I feel the separate chapter summaries were so good.

The current Series feature is new and still listed as Beta. I don't believe the old method of creating series even allowed authors to add a description or introduction like the new beta version does, as I don't see them on old series by authors who include them on their current series.

Short Description is now a required field (along with Series Title), so any series lacking a description is older than the current series feature. Series Introduction is an optional field. The only other options when creating a series is the story list, sort order of those stories, and the In Progress/Complete setting.

In a perfect world where we didn't have to depend on JimmXinu's slave labor (), we would get the series introduction followed by the series description and each of the chapter descriptions.

- Andrew

[kamille3]

Originally Posted by applegaa

In a perfect world where we didn't have to depend on JimmXinu's slave labor (), we would get the series introduction followed by the series description and each of the chapter descriptions.

- Andrew

Also a lot of authors have left the site or have stopped updating their stories (so no chance of them ever updating the series under the new format) so when I eventually download them the summary box will be empty. Which is why I'm in favor of keeping the numbered ToC system

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by kamille3

Don't get me wrong...I like that ToC desc won't get deleted for now but still is it possible to implement both Series intro and numbered ToC desc?

And if I do that special for adapter_literotica, how long until you or someone else says "Hey, that's great! Now can I have it for this other site, too?" And then another and so on. And then it's going to be "Can I customize the appearance: I do/don't want numbers, etc, etc."

Originally Posted by applegaa

In a perfect world where we didn't have to depend on JimmXinu's slave labor (), we would get the series introduction followed by the series description and each of the chapter descriptions.

Case in point. applegaa is already asking(not-asking) about further refinement.

Originally Posted by kamille3

Also a lot of authors have left the site or have stopped updating their stories (so no chance of them ever updating the series under the new format) so when I eventually download them the summary box will be empty.

Then you're not losing anything you already had.

Normal release day is in three days. Except for legitimate bugs, I'm done with looking at this adapter for this release.

[kamille3]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

And if I do that special for adapter_literotica, how long until you or someone else says "Hey, that's great! Now can I have it for this other site, too?" And then another and so on. And then it's going to be "Can I customize the appearance: I do/don't want numbers, etc, etc."


Case in point. applegaa is already asking(not-asking) about further refinement.


Then you're not losing anything you already had.

Normal release day is in three days. Except for legitimate bugs, I'm done with looking at this adapter for this release.

I get that I won't be losing the ToC desc for book series I've already downloaded but I'm saying that since Lit site is so old with millions of stories and there are so many series that won't ever get updated to match the series intro format. So when I download a series from such an author the summary field will always be empty.

I get that you must feel annoyed at me making such a request but its just that we already had such an excellent implementation before so to lose that feels like such a massive blow.

Anyways Jimm I still thank for being patient with me and for developing such an excellent plugin.

[ownedbycats]

PSA for FanFiction.net users: Email notifications seem to be failing again, at least on gmail accounts.

[ratspootin]

I don't think this is an FFF issue specifically but I'm assuming ya'll also read works in progress so maybe someone has ran into this issue before.

Since I started sideloading my fics after Send to Kindle dropped MOBI support, I'm running into a issue where my Kindle sees my updated fics as READ and with the original date that I send the first version.

It's like my Kindle is smart enough to know it's the same "book" even though they're two different files. I'm assuming this is a sideloading issue since sideloading (a) sees the files as ebooks, where as Send to Kindle saw them as documents, and (b) I recall sideloading having indexing issues with covers(?) so maybe it also has indexing issues with Kindle's status of the book?

I'm going to make up an example to explain what happening.

On Janaury 1st, I download an EPUB from AO3. That fic is a work in progress with 1/5 chapters posted. I download the EPUB from AO3 and drop it into Calibre. I then use FFF to get the metadata from AO3, convert the EPUB to MOBI in Calibre, and then use Calibre to "send to device" via USB. This "first chapter" fic shows up on my Kindle at the top of my Uncollected folder as NEW (I have my Uncollected folder sorted by MOST RECENT and filterd for UNREAD). All good so far.

That night, I finish reading the first chapter. Kindle marks the file as READ. I then go on to read another fic or two before I fall asleep, without moving the file to a collection or deleting it.

A month goes by...

On January 2nd, that fic updates to chapter 2/5. I download the EPUB again from AO3, drop it into Calibre to replace the existing EPUB, use FFF to get the updated metadata from AO3, convert the EPUB to MOBI--tell Calibre it's okay to overwrite the existing MOBI. And to double check the conversion process because I know I'm having issues with WIPs, I open the new MOBI file via Calibre's viewer to check the cover and chapter count. Once that's done, I use Calibre to "send to device" via USB.

This "second chapter" fic does not show up at top of my Uncollected folder as NEW like I expect it to. Instead, when I search for it on my Kindle, it shows up as READ (and sometimes the location is in the middle of the fic where the last chapter ended?). And when I remove my "UNREAD" filter from my Uncollected folder I have to scroll scroll scroll until I find it.

Now, in Calibre, if I right-click on the fic and choose "Remove Books" -> "Remove match books from device", the table will list both files on my Kindle as it should, but the date of the new updated fic is from... a month ago. Hence why on my Kindle it's showing further down my list than it should be.

I'm also running into the issue where if I "Remove Books" -> "Remove match books from device" via Calibre, the fic will still exist on my Kindle, but now the cover is gone, and I have to delete it from the Kindle UI. This is why I'm thinking there might be an indexing issue at play?

Troubleshooting
I've tried various combinations of deleting the updated fic and disconnecting my Kindle. The only thing that worked (at least today) was the following but I'm not sure what in this list did it because I kinda over did it.

I did this process on the four WIP fics that have been giving me trouble:

1. Delete both the original and updated fic from my Kindle via Calibre
2. Disconnected my Kindle from Calibe
3. Remove the USB cable from my Kindle
4. Search for the fic on my Kindle and if I find it, delete it there via the Kindle's UI
5. Restarted my Kindle
6. Reconvert the updated fic's EPUB to MOBI (I did not delete the existing MOBI files from my computer, just confirmed to overwrite them)
7. Reconnected my Kindle to my PC/Calibre
8. Used "Send to Device" to send those 4 fics to my kindle.

When I look at those fics via "Remove Books" -> "Remove match books from device", the dates show as today (good!). On my Kindle, I just scroll up and down a bit to refresh the UI--I see all four fics as NEW with the correct chapter count. Awesome. But doing this every night or so is not sustainable for me. First world problems, I know.

I'm assuming it's still impossible for Kindle to tell Calibre which fics are NEW vs % vs READ on the device? Because if that existed, I could easily delete the READ fic file on my Kindle via Calibre before sending the updated WIP. Assuming even having the "first chapter" fic on my Kindle still when I sideload the WIP is even the issue.