Undo bulk metadata edit (remove data in a field)?

[rebl]

Hi all, I've just removed, by mistake, all publishing dates (years) for a couple of books using the bulk metadata editor.
I meant to remove the Publisher, but not paying attention to what I'm doing I've also clicked the "clear published" green "recycle-like" button. Of course, this is all my fault, and actually it is not really such a big problem (only 34 books were affected), but that made me wonder if this kind of kind of action can be undone.
One could clear by mistake much more important fields. Of course, that would need a certain dose of stupidity or carelessness (or a cat walking on the unattended keyboard)... but still... Is there any way to undo a bulk edit or clear?
Thank you in advance.

P.S. I've searched the forum (in google) and only found a 2009 topic regarding undo for text entry in a field (like ctrl-z).

P.P.S - I'm already asuming there is no bulk undo function, but I thought it's better to be sure... before moving on.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by rebl

P.P.S - I'm already asuming there is no bulk undo function, but I thought it's better to be sure... before moving on.

Nope, bulk edits aren't undo-able. In the bulk Search & Replace you get a warning about it, but it goes for the other things too.

[Divingduck]

There is no option to reverse the result once the job is finished.

The only way I know is using a backup for restoring the data.

[rebl]

All right, thank you all. Too early to backup...
So I'd better be more careful next time

[theducks]

Originally Posted by rebl

All right, thank you all. Too early to backup...
So I'd better be more careful next time

It is never too early for a backup

When bulk editing (replace), I usually do a 'Save', just before I fire off the bulk S&R.
I don't have enough digits to count the times I forgot to consider some other condition that resulted in a total hash of the previous work.

Save/backup takes a little extra time

Reconstruction take A LOT more time

[rebl]

Originally Posted by theducks

It is never too early for a backup

When bulk editing (replace), I usually do a 'Save', just before I fire off the bulk S&R.

Thanks for the advice, theducks.
May I ask you what kind of Save do you mean? Save to disk? I'm rather not used to the backing up the library (mostly because it's still rather empty ).

[theducks]

Originally Posted by rebl

Thanks for the advice, theducks.
May I ask you what kind of Save do you mean? Save to disk? I'm rather not used to the backing up the library (mostly because it's still rather empty ).

If you are doing a Bulk Metadata Search and Replace edit, you need to save (backup) the FULL library because:

File/path names can get mangled (authors or titles)
The DB gets the changes almost instantly
AND
The individual metadata.opf start updating (IIRC ~3 per second. Status can be found on the Library icon menu) <<Once this happens, only recently Polished books will be with the good metadata recover and that requires a full add book import AND NOT allowing the use of (now bad) metadata opf (a simple 'Restore Database' is out of the question)

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by rebl

Thanks for the advice, theducks.
May I ask you what kind of Save do you mean? Save to disk? I'm rather not used to the backing up the library (mostly because it's still rather empty ).

Best kind of backup is this one: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=244228