[GUI Plugin] EpubMerge

[JimmXinu]

@thecookiemommma - Give this version a try.

UPDATE Jul 30, 2013 -- Remove obsolete beta versions

[thecookiemommma]

Looks good. Haven't used it quite yet, but it appears to take the information properly. Thank you so much !

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by thecookiemommma

Looks good. Haven't used it quite yet, but it appears to take the information properly. Thank you so much !

Any chance you can test it? I hate to release a new version with a feature that hasn't been confirmed by the requester.

[thecookiemommma]

It works. Thank you. I had tested it earlier with a series that didn't have the stats, and just ran it through one that did, and it does work. Thank you so much!`

[JimmXinu]

Version 1.3.5 - 30 Jul 2013

• Add options to average int/float type custom columns on merge.
• Add option to configurably attach tags to new merged books.

[ThePage]

I believe that ePubMerge will be more frequently used to combine series books than short-stories. Therefore the term anthology will more often be incorrect for this usage. Where short-stories are being compiled, a collection is of secondary likelyhood.

There should therefore be a settable default for options of:

1. Omnibus
2. Collection
3. Anthology

and the word contains (rather than containing) seems to work better as part of the heading for the listing of books or stories for use in the book details block.

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by ThePage

I beleive that ePubMerge will be more frequently used to combine series books than short-stories. Therefore the term anthology will more often be incorrect for this usage. Where short-stories are being compiled, a collection of secondary likelyhood.

While that may be your most frequent use, I have no statistics about what is most common over all.

According the dictionary definition an anthology is "a collection of selected literary pieces or passages or works of art or music". So while anthology may be less precise than omnibus when merging series, it is not wrong, it is the literal truth. Collection is an even more general word than anthology.

When you are merging books that all have the same Series set in calibre, the title of the merged book will be the series name without the word anthology. And you are always presented with the merged book's metadata to correct and confirm.

I will consider making the word 'Anthology' a configuration option, but primarily because responding to this made me consider that non-English users may want a different word.

[loximuthal]

Originally Posted by ThePage

I beleive that ePubMerge will be more frequently used to combine series books than short-stories. Therefore the term anthology will more often be incorrect for this usage. Where short-stories are being compiled, a collection of secondary likelyhood.

FWIW, I use this PI almost exclusively for collecting short stories together. OTOH, I don't particularly like the name "Anthology" in the title of the book. So I simply edit the metadata when it is offered in the merging process, and I'm fine. It's easy to do, and I can adjust the title to whatever I want (which varies from case to case) before the new book is created.

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

I will consider making the word 'Anthology' a configuration option, but primarily because responding to this made me consider that non-English users may want a different word.

Attached is a version that makes the word 'Anthology' used in default title (non-series) and the summary. There does have to be something there--it will change back to Anthology if cleared.

Let me know how this works for you if you try it. Thanks.

UPDATE - Aug 18 2013 Remove obsolete beta versions

[Sefiriot]

Hi JimmXinu. Fantastic work you have going here. I've a question to ask about the merge function though-- is there anything in the output that could cause a reader program to only see the first merged ebook? I'm using Moon Reader Pro and am baffled as to why it only sees the first ebook and its TOC in ePubMerge created anthologies and the rest of the file seems to be invisible; but the same file works perfectly fine in everything else I've tried. E.g. downloaded ePubs of Oliver Twist and Tale of Two Cities from Gutenberg, merged both in ePubMerge with Tale of Two Cities first; Moon Reader only sees and lists the contents and TOC for Tale of Two Cities, but both books with TOC show up in everything else.

At this point it looks like a specific and weird bug with Moon Reader, and I've emailed the Moon Reader dev about the issue, but thought you might like a heads up.

[JimmXinu]

@Sefiriot - To preserve internal story links and structure as completely as possible, EpubMerge puts each merged book into it's own directory inside the epub zip file.

This is perfectly valid by standard, but is a little bit unusual. Sigil, for example, doesn't handle it well.

You might try using the Flatten TOC option in EpubMerge. Using calibre's convert to do an epub->epub conversion is brute force, but does get around many problems.

[ThePage]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

According the dictionary definition an anthology is "a collection of selected literary pieces or passages or works of art or music". So while anthology may be less precise than omnibus when merging series, it is not wrong, it is the literal truth. Collection is an even more general word than anthology.

When you are merging books that all have the same Series set in calibre, the title of the merged book will be the series name without the word anthology. And you are always presented with the merged book's metadata to correct and confirm.

I will consider making the word 'Anthology' a configuration option, but primarily because responding to this made me consider that non-English users may want a different word.

I use a custom column of the Yes/No type in Calibre which I decided to label ACMO for Anthology, Collection, Magazine or Omnibus.

I consider grouped stories by a single author to be collections, as most antholgies are thematic groupings by multiple authors vs. Magazines grouping multiple authors in a somewhat looser format, and Omnibi are normally either multiple novels by the same author or within the same series. I only need a single notation as a reminder, since which of these applies is usually easy to tell from context.

[Sefiriot]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

@Sefiriot - To preserve internal story links and structure as completely as possible, EpubMerge puts each merged book into it's own directory inside the epub zip file.

This is perfectly valid by standard, but is a little bit unusual. Sigil, for example, doesn't handle it well.

You might try using the Flatten TOC option in EpubMerge. Using calibre's convert to do an epub->epub conversion is brute force, but does get around many problems.

I've tried the Flatten TOC option in EpubMerge-- no luck there however. I'll try converting epub to epub; however if I do so will that affect FFDL and EPubMerge's ability to update anthologies?

[theducks]

Originally Posted by JimmXinu

@Sefiriot - To preserve internal story links and structure as completely as possible, EpubMerge puts each merged book into it's own directory inside the epub zip file.

This is perfectly valid by standard, but is a little bit unusual. Sigil, for example, doesn't handle it well.

You might try using the Flatten TOC option in EpubMerge. Using calibre's convert to do an epub->epub conversion is brute force, but does get around many problems.

Sigil interaction:
It is important that each file have a unique name as Sigil will flatten all folders into its basic structure. Existing names .

I suggest using a '2 letter (676 combinations) prefix' on all merged files to break any possible ties. This does require all internal links be updated to reflect the new name.

[JimmXinu]

Originally Posted by Sefiriot

I've tried the Flatten TOC option in EpubMerge-- no luck there however. I'll try converting epub to epub; however if I do so will that affect FFDL and EPubMerge's ability to update anthologies?

Dunno, I don't recall trying. I'm on vacation this week, so I'm replying to messages some, but that's about it.