Can't change metadata with ebook-meta

mumdigau · 08-03-2010, 10:07 AM

Hi,

I'd like to change the metadata of a huge number of ebooks, so I would like to do that via a small batch file which repeatedly calls ebook-media with the appropiate data. But already my first manual try with ebook-media wasn't successful. I tried to change the author in an epub-file as follows:

ebook-media "path\filename" -a "firstname lastname"

But the metadata were left unchanged as could be seen from the output of ebook-meta in the terminal. I also tried '--authors' instead of '-a', but that didn't help either.

Calibre (latest version) is running on an Windows XP Pro SP3 system. The file is not write protected.

What am I doing wrong? Many thanks in advance for any help

ciao

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-03-2010, 10:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

ebook-media "path\filename" -a "firstname lastname"

Your post title says ebook-meta and your post content says ebook-media?

Have you tried it without the quotes? If -a isn't working try the full --authors option instead.

I do all of my batch metadata updates via the gui, but the manual for ebook-meta is here.

Good Luck.

mumdigau · 08-03-2010, 11:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dwanthny

Your post title says ebook-meta and your post content says ebook-media?

Have you tried it without the quotes? If -a isn't working try the full --authors option instead.

Sorry, it's a typo. It should have read ebook-meta, of course.

Yes, I tried without quotes even though the manual says to use quotes if the arguments contain spaces. I tried both, -a and --authors, nop. I even changed path\filename so that it doesn't contain any spaces: no success.

Any other ideas?

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-03-2010, 10:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

Sorry, it's a typo. It should have read ebook-meta, of course.

Yes, I tried without quotes even though the manual says to use quotes if the arguments contain spaces. I tried both, -a and --authors, nop. I even changed path\filename so that it doesn't contain any spaces: no success.

Any other ideas?

It seems like you ran it correctly, what error did it give you?

In other words what was the output of the job. I just ran it, the same way you said to and it worked fine.

Here is the whole job from start to finish.

Spoiler:

FYI, I am also using the latest version of Calibre (0.7.12) and my OS is also Windows XP Pro SP3.

One last thought, this changes the metadata in the actual file not in Calibre's metadata.db. So after using ebook-meta to change the metadata in the book the change will not be shown in the Calibre GUI.

I did it once more from the root directory actually specifying a path this time and it still worked fine.

Spoiler:

kovidgoyal · 08-03-2010, 11:06 PM

You probably have the option set to only read metadata from filenames.

mumdigau · 08-03-2010, 11:13 PM

Hi,

I copied the file from Calibre's library to an external location, manipulated it there, deleted the original ebook via GUI in Calibre, and added the modified ebook again.

Here is my call of ebook-meta followed by the output:

Code:

E:\Programme\Calibre\ebook-meta "C:\0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben - Unbekannt.epub" -a "Kurt Brand"

Original-Metadaten::
	Title               : 0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben
	Author(s)           : Jagd nach dem [Unbekannt]
	Book Producer       : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com]
	Timestamp           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00
	Published           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00

Geänderte Metadaten::
	Title               : 0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben
	Author(s)           : Jagd nach dem [Unbekannt]
	Book Producer       : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com]
	Timestamp           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00
	Published           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00

Though is partly German you can see that nothing has changed. What is a bit strange is that in the GUI author of the original ebook is shown as 'Unbekannt' (i.e. Unknown), same for author_sort whereas here author contains some part of the title. This is identical to the metatdata shown in the GUI after import of the modified ebook.

Best regards

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-04-2010, 03:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

Though is partly German you can see that nothing has changed. What is a bit strange is that in the GUI author of the original ebook is shown as 'Unbekannt' (i.e. Unknown), same for author_sort whereas here author contains some part of the title. This is identical to the metatdata shown in the GUI after import of the modified ebook.

You probably have the option set to only read metadata from filenames.

Kovid answered the mystery in the post before yours. Even though you are using ebook-meta from the command line the settings in the GUI still hold true. Open Calibre and go to Preferences - Add/Save - Adding Books tab and make sure the box by Read Metadata only from file name is unchecked.

mumdigau · 08-04-2010, 05:26 AM

I finally got it. I found out that the plugin for writing metadata was deactivated. After activation everything went fine.

Best regards

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-04-2010, 07:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

I finally got it. I found out that the plugin for writing metadata was deactivated. After activation everything went fine.

Best regards

mumdigau

I thought about that but you were dealing with an epub and I never heard of that plugin being accidentally deactivated. People turn the PDF one off all of the time.

I'm glad you figured it out.

mumdigau · 08-04-2010, 09:39 PM

Hi,

Everything is running fine here now, except one thing: I can't change the cover via ebook-meta. The old covers stay unchanged. The terminal doesn' t show any error, but on the other side doesn't indicate that there has been a change to the covers:

Code:

Original-Metadaten::
	Title               : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben
	Title sort          : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben
	Author(s)           : Kurt Brand [Brand, Kurt]
	Book Producer       : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com]
	Series              : Perry Rhodan Heftromane (Erstausgabe) #51
	Timestamp           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00
	Published           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00

Geänderte Metadaten::
	Title               : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben
	Title sort          : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben
	Author(s)           : Kurt Brand [Brand, Kurt]
	Book Producer       : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com]
	Series              : Perry Rhodan Heftromane (Erstausgabe) #51
	Timestamp           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00
	Published           : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00

I thought there might be a conflict within the parameter declaration for ebook-meta, as all arguments I picked up have a short form which I used (--title --> -t, --authors --> a, --index --> i, etc.), but not --cover (-c goes to comments!). So I switched all parameter declarations to the long form, but that didn't help.

Any idea what's going wrong here?

Best regards

mumdigau

kovidgoyal · 08-04-2010, 10:23 PM

setting covers in epub files requires the epub file to properly identify its cover, most epub files do not. And you need calibre 0.7.12

mumdigau · 08-05-2010, 03:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

setting covers in epub files requires the epub file to properly identify its cover, most epub files do not. And you need calibre 0.7.12

What do you mean by 'properly identify'? And how do I check if a epub file is OK on behalf of this?

Via GUI I can change the covers. And yes, I have latest version 0.7.12 installed.

Ciao

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-05-2010, 04:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

What do you mean by 'properly identify'? And how do I check if a epub file is OK on behalf of this?

Until this version the only way to add a new cover was by converting the file, even epub to epub sufficed. As of this version ebook-meta can change the cover if it is already properly labeled as a cover inside the book. You can open a epub in Sigil, right click on the titlepage then go down to Add Semantics, if cover is checked then this was properly set.

I believe this means that if the cover is not properly set then the only way in calibre to add the cover is to convert the file.

mumdigau · 08-05-2010, 08:36 AM

@dwanthny

Thanks for your explanation. Indeed, the epubs I'm going to add to the library haven't their cover properly set. If I do that in Sigil then the cover will be replaced by ebook-meta.

On the other hand, I tried a simple epub2epub conversion with ebook-convert (no options set besides --cover). This adds the specified image as a cover, the original image is still there, most probably since it isn't properly set as cover, and the new added cover looks somewhat strechted. The old image can easily be removed in Sigil, but in any way I have some manual work with Sigil (apparently there is no batch mode). That makes both procedures more or less infeasible, because I want to add more than 2500 ebooks to the library.

At the moment, I see best chances in adapting the conversion process, i.e. replacing the image (not shure if this is possible), and avoiding that the new cover get stretched (that should be possible through properly set conversion options). Since ebook-convert can modify metadata, too, I could do all my changes in one go.

Ciao

mumdigau

DoctorOhh · 08-05-2010, 08:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mumdigau

On the other hand, I tried a simple epub2epub conversion with ebook-convert (no options set besides --cover). This adds the specified image as a cover, the original image is still there, most probably since it isn't properly set as cover, and the new added cover looks somewhat strechted.

There are two settings at play here.

1. In the GUI there is an option under Preferences - Conversion - Structure Detection - if you check remove first image, then the first image will be removed when converting.

2. The image is slightly distorted because it is now rendered as a .SVG image and will stretch to fill the screen. If you prefer an unstretched image where the aspect ratio of the image remains in tact then go to Preferences - Conversion - Epub output. Here you will find two options that will do this. The Preserve cover aspect ratio, leaves the file as svg and it will not stretch to fit the window and thus not be distorted. The other option is to check No SVG cover, this will produce a jpeg for the cover that will not stretch to fit either. Some readers don't handle SVG images and this last option is primarily used for providing covers for those readers.

So to get what you want, run the epub to epub conversion with remove first image and Preserve cover aspect ratio checked. If these are your saved default settings in the GUI they should affect the ebook-convert too.

08-03-2010, 10:07 AM	#1
mumdigau Member Posts: 23 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: none	Can't change metadata with ebook-meta Hi, I'd like to change the metadata of a huge number of ebooks, so I would like to do that via a small batch file which repeatedly calls ebook-media with the appropiate data. But already my first manual try with ebook-media wasn't successful. I tried to change the author in an epub-file as follows: ebook-media "path\filename" -a "firstname lastname" But the metadata were left unchanged as could be seen from the output of ebook-meta in the terminal. I also tried '--authors' instead of '-a', but that didn't help either. Calibre (latest version) is running on an Windows XP Pro SP3 system. The file is not write protected. What am I doing wrong? Many thanks in advance for any help ciao mumdigau

08-03-2010, 11:13 PM	#6
mumdigau Member Posts: 23 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: none	Hi, I copied the file from Calibre's library to an external location, manipulated it there, deleted the original ebook via GUI in Calibre, and added the modified ebook again. Here is my call of ebook-meta followed by the output: Code: E:\Programme\Calibre\ebook-meta "C:\0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben - Unbekannt.epub" -a "Kurt Brand" Original-Metadaten:: Title : 0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben Author(s) : Jagd nach dem [Unbekannt] Book Producer : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com] Timestamp : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Published : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Geänderte Metadaten:: Title : 0051 - Jagd nach dem Leben Author(s) : Jagd nach dem [Unbekannt] Book Producer : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com] Timestamp : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Published : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Though is partly German you can see that nothing has changed. What is a bit strange is that in the GUI author of the original ebook is shown as 'Unbekannt' (i.e. Unknown), same for author_sort whereas here author contains some part of the title. This is identical to the metatdata shown in the GUI after import of the modified ebook. Best regards mumdigau

08-04-2010, 09:39 PM	#10
mumdigau Member Posts: 23 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: none	Hi, Everything is running fine here now, except one thing: I can't change the cover via ebook-meta. The old covers stay unchanged. The terminal doesn' t show any error, but on the other side doesn't indicate that there has been a change to the covers: Code: Original-Metadaten:: Title : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben Title sort : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben Author(s) : Kurt Brand [Brand, Kurt] Book Producer : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com] Series : Perry Rhodan Heftromane (Erstausgabe) #51 Timestamp : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Published : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Geänderte Metadaten:: Title : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben Title sort : 0051 Jagd nach dem Leben Author(s) : Kurt Brand [Brand, Kurt] Book Producer : calibre (0.6.20) [http://calibre-ebook.com] Series : Perry Rhodan Heftromane (Erstausgabe) #51 Timestamp : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 Published : 2009-10-31T13:08:33+00:00 I thought there might be a conflict within the parameter declaration for ebook-meta, as all arguments I picked up have a short form which I used (--title --> -t, --authors --> a, --index --> i, etc.), but not --cover (-c goes to comments!). So I switched all parameter declarations to the long form, but that didn't help. Any idea what's going wrong here? Best regards mumdigau

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08-03-2010, 11:06 PM	#5
kovidgoyal creator of calibre Posts: 43,835 Karma: 22666666 Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Mumbai, India Device: Various	You probably have the option set to only read metadata from filenames.

08-04-2010, 05:26 AM	#8
mumdigau Member Posts: 23 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: none	I finally got it. I found out that the plugin for writing metadata was deactivated. After activation everything went fine. Best regards mumdigau

08-04-2010, 10:23 PM	#11
kovidgoyal creator of calibre Posts: 43,835 Karma: 22666666 Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Mumbai, India Device: Various	setting covers in epub files requires the epub file to properly identify its cover, most epub files do not. And you need calibre 0.7.12

08-05-2010, 08:36 AM	#14
mumdigau Member Posts: 23 Karma: 10 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: none	@dwanthny Thanks for your explanation. Indeed, the epubs I'm going to add to the library haven't their cover properly set. If I do that in Sigil then the cover will be replaced by ebook-meta. On the other hand, I tried a simple epub2epub conversion with ebook-convert (no options set besides --cover). This adds the specified image as a cover, the original image is still there, most probably since it isn't properly set as cover, and the new added cover looks somewhat strechted. The old image can easily be removed in Sigil, but in any way I have some manual work with Sigil (apparently there is no batch mode). That makes both procedures more or less infeasible, because I want to add more than 2500 ebooks to the library. At the moment, I see best chances in adapting the conversion process, i.e. replacing the image (not shure if this is possible), and avoiding that the new cover get stretched (that should be possible through properly set conversion options). Since ebook-convert can modify metadata, too, I could do all my changes in one go. Ciao mumdigau