Custom Column with word count index

[Tanjamuse]

Hi.

I need help to create a custom column for my fanfiction, based on word count and category. Like below 1000 words would be a short story, from 1000 to 5000 would be a novel, 5000 to 20000 would be a medium and 20000 to 50000 would be long and +50000 would be an epic.

I hope this makes sense, and that someone might know how to make that custom column and can guide me through it

Thanks

[davidfor]

I have a custom column that does a similar thing with the following code in it:

program: 
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 7500, 'Short Story', 'Novelette', 'Novelette');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 17500, shelf_name, 'Novella', 'Novella');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 40000, shelf_name, 'Novel', 'Novel');

The "cmp" lines compare the value of "words" with the number and return the first value if there are less words, the second if the are the same and third if there more.

You can change the word count to test against and the text to be used to match what you want. As you have four ranges, you will want to add an extra line.

[Tanjamuse]

Where do I put it in and how ... I need some more guidance

[davidfor]

You need to add a custom column like you did for the word count. The column type for it is "Column built from other columns". When you select this type, there will be another field called "Template". The template code goes into this field.

I forgot to say that the "#words" in the second line needs to be replaced with the lookup name for you word count column.

[Tanjamuse]

I'll give it a try and then return

Thanks for the quick help ...

[Tanjamuse]

is this the correct way:

program:
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 1000, 'Short Story', 'Novelette', 'Novelette');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 5000, 'Novel', 'Novella', 'Novella');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 20000, 'Medium', 'Novel', 'Novel'); shelf_name=cmp(words, 40000, 'Long', 'Novel', 'Novel'); shelf_name=cmp(words, 100000, 'Epic', 'Novel', 'Novel');

[PeterT]

try

program:
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 1000, 'Short Story', 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 5000, shelf_name, 'Medium', 'Medium');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 20000, shelf_name, 'Long', 'Long');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 50000, shelf_name, 'Epic', 'Epic');

The idea is
If the words are < 1000 then use Short Story else Novel
If the words are < 5000 then use the already set name (either Short Story or Novel) else use Medium
If the words are < 20000 then use the already set name (either Short Story, Novel or Medium) else use Long
If the words are < 50000 then use the already set name (either Short Story, Novel, Medium or Long) else use Epic

[Tanjamuse]

Would it be possible to make the epic more than 75.000 words and then the 50.000 long and 5000 novel?

[PeterT]

One additional idea might be for those books with no word count

program:
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 0, 'No Word Count', 'No Word Count', 'Short Story');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 1000, shelf_name, 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 5000, shelf_name, 'Medium', 'Medium');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 20000, shelf_name, 'Long', 'Long');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 50000, shelf_name, 'Epic', 'Epic');

[Tanjamuse]

Then, isn't this correct?

program:
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 1000, 'Short Story', 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 5000, shelf_name, 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 10000, shelf_name, 'medium', 'medium');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 20000, shelf_name, 'Long', 'Long');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 50000, shelf_name, 'Epic', 'Epic');

[davidfor]

PeterT and I are cross posting here. But...

You can set the word counts and descriptions to whatever you want. But, I would suggest starting with the set I posted first. I did what you are doing some time ago and these are what I found to be the generally accepted counts for the different lengths. But, adding a "Long novel" or "Epic" makes sense.

Doing that would put it something like.

program: 
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 7500, 'Short Story', 'Novelette', 'Novelette');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 17500, shelf_name, 'Novella', 'Novella');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 40000, shelf_name, 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 50000, shelf_name, 'Long', 'Long');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 75000, shelf_name, 'Epic', 'Epic');

And to explain how this works:

shelf_name=cmp(words, 1000, 'Short Story', 'Novel', 'Novel');

That says, if the number of words is less than 1000, set shelf_name to 'Short Story'. If the number of words is equal to 1000 or greater than 1000, set shelf_name to 'Novel'.

Then

shelf_name=cmp(words, 5000, shelf_name, 'Medium', 'Medium');

says, if the number of words is less than 5000, set shelf_name to whatever the variable shelf_name already is. That means use whatever it was set to in the previous line. But, if the number of words is equal to 5000 or greater than 5000, set shelf_name to 'Medium'.

The following lines repeat this pattern. The column will display the result of the last line of code.

That means I could add an extra line at the end for all the likes of Tolkein and George RR Martin:

shelf_name=cmp(words, 200000, shelf_name, 'Far to long Fantasy Novel', 'Far to long Fantasy Novel');

[Tanjamuse]

Since I use Calibre mostly to fanfiction, wouldn't it be okay with the code I posted above?

[PeterT]

Possibly a slightly "cleaner" way of coding this might be

program: 
words=raw_field('#words');
shelf_name='Short Story';
shelf_name=cmp(words, 7500, shelf_name, 'Novelette', 'Novelette');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 17500, shelf_name, 'Novella', 'Novella');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 40000, shelf_name, 'Novel', 'Novel');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 50000, shelf_name, 'Long', 'Long');
shelf_name=cmp(words, 75000, shelf_name, 'Epic', 'Epic');

The major difference here is that all the calls to cmp are coded the same way;
shelf_name=cmp(word, number, shelf_name, 'Name to Use', 'Name to Use');
where number is the upper limit on the PREVIOUS book's length
and Name to Use is the name to assign to books LONGER than number words long.

[chaley]

Somewhat

Over the years I have seen several posts that talk about doing sequences of compares. I have considered adding a new template function to make this easier. Two questions:
1) exactly what to do? and
2) would anyone use it?

As for what to do, I see two choices. The first would be a function like first_non_empty, but doing a compare. Something like

first_matching_compare(v, lt1, val1, lt2, val2, ..., elseval)

Example:

first_matching_compare(words, 7500, 'Short Story', 17500, 'Novella', 40000, 'Novel', 'Long')

The second would be something like

first_matching_compare(v, gt_eq1, lt1, val1, gt_eq2, lt2, val2, ..., elseval)

This one would check the ranges until it found a match. Example:

first_matching_compare(words, 0, 7500, 'Short Story', 17500, 40000, 'Novel', 7500, 17500, 'Novella', 'Long')

The advantage of the second is that the values do not need to be in ascending order. The disadvantage is that it requires more typing and might in fact be more confusing.

Which of these two is better?

Would anyone use either of them?

[davidfor]

chaley: I like it. My vote goes for the first version. The second version is a lot more flexible, but I think the first is much simpler to read and understand. With the second I know I would mess up the arguments and spend hours trying to sort out. And if I didn't put them in order, I would miss a range somewhere.

I sort of like the idea of having it as:

first_matching_compare(v, val1, lt1, val2, lt2,  ..., ltn, elseval)

That reads to me as: val1 if v<lt1, val2 if lt1<=v<lt2, val3 if lt2<=v<lt3 and so on until elseval if v>=ltn. But, I think that would be inconsistent with the other template functions.