Register Guidelines E-Books Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read

Go Back   MobileRead Forums > E-Book Software > Calibre

Notices

Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Old 03-17-2009, 12:55 AM   #1
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Multiple computers and Calibre

I've been trying to figure out the best way to sync books across Calibre libraries on multiple computers, and every way I try to do it seems to have a gotcha. I must be missing something.

Never mind a full sync for now. Say I've got a few books on my desktop PC that I want to get into my laptop's Calibre library. I can't just drag and drop the Calibre library folders, right? Because that'll mess up the database--or at least not update the laptop's db?

So if I drag and drop the original files into the laptop's Calibre library, I get the books, but lose any fixing I've done to the metadata--tags, etc. I thought I could "Save" the books in the desktop Calibre to update the metadata in the files, then drop those saved files into the laptop's library. But that didn't work, either. The metadata still comes through messed up.

What am I missing? Seems like this should be easy.
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 01:07 AM   #2
kovidgoyal
creator of calibre
kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
kovidgoyal's Avatar
 
Posts: 44,377
Karma: 23764838
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Mumbai, India
Device: Various
If you doa save to disk, you then need to do a recursive import (click the arrow next to the add button) and selct the one book per directory option. THat should preserve your metadata
kovidgoyal is offline   Reply With Quote
Advert
Old 03-17-2009, 01:57 AM   #3
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Quote:
Originally Posted by kovidgoyal View Post
If you doa save to disk, you then need to do a recursive import (click the arrow next to the add button) and selct the one book per directory option. THat should preserve your metadata
Do you mean that Calibre reads the metadata from the file differently if you use that command, from the way it does if you drag and drop the file onto the library?
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 01:59 AM   #4
kovidgoyal
creator of calibre
kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
kovidgoyal's Avatar
 
Posts: 44,377
Karma: 23764838
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Mumbai, India
Device: Various
yes, when you use that command it reads metadata from the OPF file that is stored in the directory alongwith the various file formats
kovidgoyal is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 02:39 AM   #5
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Huh. So...does that new metadata ever get incorporated into the book file itself? I'm trying to tweak things for a new book release, and I thought I could edit the metadata in Calibre, then Save it to a new file and use that file for download purposes. It sounds as if that isn't the case.

If I reimport using the method you just described, does the metadata get written into the new file Calibre creates, or just put it into the library db?
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Advert
Old 03-17-2009, 03:03 AM   #6
kovidgoyal
creator of calibre
kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
kovidgoyal's Avatar
 
Posts: 44,377
Karma: 23764838
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Mumbai, India
Device: Various
depends on the file, different file formats support different kinds of metadata.
kovidgoyal is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 04:57 PM   #7
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Well, suppose I want to finalize the metadata in:

mobi
lrf
epub
lit

What do I have to do to have my changes to metadata actually incorporated into those files? Can Calibre do it by saving and then reimporting, or do I need to look to other tools? Or do I need to use the command-line interface?
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 05:12 PM   #8
kovidgoyal
creator of calibre
kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.kovidgoyal ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
kovidgoyal's Avatar
 
Posts: 44,377
Karma: 23764838
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Mumbai, India
Device: Various
The problem is that most file formats dont support much metadata, so you can't "finalize" the metadata to be all the metadata in the calibre database since the file format does not support the metadata at all.

calibre supports writing metadata to MOBI, EPUB and LRF files. So when you save to disk, the metadata in those files is updated to reflect the metadata in calibre *to the extent supported by the file*.

Which is why saving a file and re-importing it is not going to give you correct metadata beyong title and author and maybe publisher.
kovidgoyal is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2009, 07:01 PM   #9
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Quote:
Originally Posted by kovidgoyal View Post
The problem is that most file formats dont support much metadata, so you can't "finalize" the metadata to be all the metadata in the calibre database since the file format does not support the metadata at all.

calibre supports writing metadata to MOBI, EPUB and LRF files. So when you save to disk, the metadata in those files is updated to reflect the metadata in calibre *to the extent supported by the file*.

Which is why saving a file and re-importing it is not going to give you correct metadata beyong title and author and maybe publisher.
Ah. I get it. (Finally.)
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-18-2009, 10:07 PM   #10
asktheeightball
Junior Member
asktheeightball began at the beginning.
 
Posts: 9
Karma: 10
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: Montreal, QC
Device: Sony PRS-505
Correct me if I'm wrong but what if you use a program like Dropbox?

I've been using that to keep my library synced between a macbook and a pc and it seems to save all my metadata changes
asktheeightball is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-19-2009, 01:18 AM   #11
starrigger
Jeffrey A. Carver
starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.starrigger ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
starrigger's Avatar
 
Posts: 1,355
Karma: 1107383
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Device: Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus, Droid phone, Nook HD+
Quote:
Originally Posted by asktheeightball View Post
Correct me if I'm wrong but what if you use a program like Dropbox?

I've been using that to keep my library synced between a macbook and a pc and it seems to save all my metadata changes
I'm not familiar with Dropbox. Do you use it in conjunction with Calibre? Or as an alternative?
starrigger is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-19-2009, 12:14 PM   #12
pilotbob
Grand Sorcerer
pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.pilotbob ought to be getting tired of karma fortunes by now.
 
pilotbob's Avatar
 
Posts: 19,832
Karma: 11844413
Join Date: Jan 2007
Location: Tampa, FL USA
Device: Kindle Touch
Quote:
Originally Posted by starrigger View Post
I'm not familiar with Dropbox. Do you use it in conjunction with Calibre? Or as an alternative?
Dropbox is software and service that syncs files between multiple computers and the "cloud" backup.

It is free and awesome. http://getdropbox.com

BOb
pilotbob is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Forum Jump

Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Multiple computers one db? giddion Calibre 15 05-20-2011 08:11 PM
How to Duplicate My Calibre Library on Multiple Computers? Sydney's Mom Related Tools 101 03-10-2011 12:14 PM
Calibre & Dropbox and 2 computers???? jekoby Related Tools 3 08-02-2010 03:16 AM
Syncing across multiple computers Sridhar Calibre 4 07-10-2010 11:27 AM
Calibre on multiple PC's? chaznsc Calibre 12 10-03-2009 03:52 PM


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 08:05 PM.


MobileRead.com is a privately owned, operated and funded community.