Thoughts for metadata?

[bthuree]

Hi fellow Calibre users

I have now accumulated numerous (700 or so) books in my calibre library, and when I was checking my tags I realized that they are all over the place.

I am mainly interested in the TAG one, and don't wanting like 20 different Science Fiction tags with different categories added to it.

For me, I was thinking of only using some main categories like
Fiction, Fantasy, Science Fiction, AutoBiography, Alternate History, History, Supernatural

And some extra, like short stories, space opera

Is there a tool that can be used to for every book grab key categories on the web for instance to help ensuring I get the proper key categories.

Which categories do you all otherwise use?

[feuille]

The main problem for such requirements is probably that in Calibre it is difficult to map complex taxonomies. CMS like Drupal or Wordpress distinguish between "categories" and "tags". Categories can have hierarchies, labels cannot.
Hierarchies can only be mapped in Calibre in series (main series.sub-series ...).

The second problem is that the appropriate pool of keywords is mostly genre-dependent. One would therefore have to define one or more suitable sources for each genre. For SF this could be isfdb.org. For this database I maintain a metadata plugin (ISFDB3). It has already a custom filter to exclude unwanted tags (the ISFDB provides a lot!).

If there are others here who want such a functionality, I could (after requirements analysis here in the forum) write a suitable plugin.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by feuille

The main problem for such requirements is probably that in Calibre it is difficult to map complex taxonomies. CMS like Drupal or Wordpress distinguish between "categories" and "tags". Categories can have hierarchies, labels cannot.
Hierarchies can only be mapped in Calibre in series (main series.sub-series ...).

The second problem is that the appropriate pool of keywords is mostly genre-dependent. One would therefore have to define one or more suitable sources for each genre. For SF this could be isfdb.org. For this database I maintain a metadata plugin (ISFDB3). It has already a custom filter to exclude unwanted tags (the ISFDB provides a lot!).

If there are others here who want such a functionality, I could (after requirements analysis here in the forum) write a suitable plugin.

Calibre does have a tag mapping tool. With that you can map tags to whatever you want. But, I haven't used it enough to be able to give advice on the best usage,

Some metadata source plugins will also do mapping. The Goodreads plugin has options to map from the shelves that GR uses to something the user wants. And for the Kobo store can have something like "Science Fiction > Romance > Unlikely" and Kobo metadata plugin can add that as "Science Fiction.Romance.Unlikely", three tags "Science Fiction", "Romance" and "Unlikely" or just the top level "Science Fiction".

There are also some plugins by @DaltonST that are explicitly about cleaning tags and getting them from good sources. I don't use them as my needs are a lot simpler. I'm not sure exactly which ones would be used.


@bthuree: Having said the above, you may just want to use the tag editor to rename tags. That can be access from the tag browser. In it, you can rename any tag to what you prefer. Or delete any that you don't want. For the renaming, you can rename several to the same thing. So my "Science Fiction.Romance.Unlikely" (invented, but I sort of want to read something with that tag) and "Science Fiction.Space Opera" could both be renamed to just "Science Fiction" in one go.

[feuille]

Originally Posted by davidfor

Calibre does have a tag mapping tool. With that you can map tags to whatever you want.

New to me and very interesting! Thanks for the hint.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by feuille

New to me and very interesting! Thanks for the hint.

Staying with 'Science Fiction' as the example:
I use the mapper to unify the 42 different ways this gets done into just Science Fiction.
(I also use it to purge (common)redundant entries like Fiction, Science Fiction. Duh! it is not Science Science )