Windows 7 - Best Practice Folder Locations

[AZBooks]

We are new to using Calibre to manage our audio books and ebooks. We are not sure our current folders are in the best location for the Calibre library.

Awhile back in the "Music" folder of Win7 we created two sub-folders (eBooks, AudioBooks). It seemed like the only logical place because audiobooks need playlists (Windows Media Player) so chapters play one after the other. We then created a playlist for each audiobook which created a 3rd sub-folder called "Playlists" which contains the .WPL playlist files. When using a laptop, we select the playlist for a book....and it loads all it's mp3 files (chapters).

Should we put the Calibre library in the Music Folder? What is the best approach/location for the library location?

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by AZBooks

We are new to using Calibre to manage our audio books and ebooks. We are not sure our current folders are in the best location for the Calibre library.

Awhile back in the "Music" folder of Win7 we created two sub-folders (eBooks, AudioBooks). It seemed like the only logical place because audiobooks need playlists (Windows Media Player) so chapters play one after the other. We then created a playlist for each audiobook which created a 3rd sub-folder called "Playlists" which contains the .WPL playlist files. When using a laptop, we select the playlist for a book....and it loads all it's mp3 files (chapters).

Should we put the Calibre library in the Music Folder? What is the best approach/location for the library location?

@AZBooks - The "Best Practice Solution" is whatever works for you, it almost inevitable you won't get it right first time, so try different things in a Test Library. This is what works for me

I keep all my calibre libraries in a folder called "Books" in the root of my primary data drive, in there I have five libraries - Duplicates, Main, New, Test, Workshop.

Initially I load books into the New library. In there I sort out Author and Title and other metadata, and I do a first cut conversion, most of my books come as PDF's, my target format is EPUB.

If a book is "not okay" (usually because of a really lousy conversion) then I move it to the Workshop. For "okay" books I do an inter-library duplicate check (Find Duplicates PI) with Main. I move any duplicates to Duplicates, I move the others to Main.

When a book arrives in Main it gets a status (custom column) of 00 - Just Added - the objective is to progress them to status 75 - Final, this can be done in a single step, or it may involve several steps.

Audiobooks

It's only recently that I started to acquire audio-books. I want to have them available from my Books/Main library because I will often have the corresponding ebook(s), real book(s), tv series, and movie(s). I like the idea of having them all visible from the one place.

So far the approach I like best for audio books, is to keep the audio files in a separate folder. To that end I've created the folder E:\Audio\Books (alongside E:\Audio\Music and E:\Audio\Talks). The individual book folders are currently named as they come from the supplier, but I will probably adapt the Calibre folder conventions, so I'll have

E:\Books\Main\Jane Austen\Emma (117)
E:\Audio\Books\Jane Austen\Emma

I'm not too au fait with playlists, so I'm experimenting with different types (WLP, XSPF etc). I created some playlist files in the audio book folder - e.g. E:\Audio\Books\Jane Austen\Emma.

I added the playlist files to the Jane Austen - Emma folder in Calibre via AddBooks->Add files to selected book records. The playlist files appear in Book Details, which I can click on in order to listen to the book.

When you add a file to a book in Calibre it takes a copy of the file. So I now have different playlist files for the same book in two places, one in Books\Main\... and another in Audio\Books. I'm experimenting with creating hardlinks in the Audio\Books folder to the playlist files that Calibre created in the Books\Main folder - this results in the same playlist file being accessible from multiple locations.

I imagined that playlists would keep track of where your 'up to', so that you can resume where you 'left off', so far that's not working for me. But that's nothing to do with Calibre, I'm probably using the wrong sort of play lists or I've not ticked the right boxes.

Further research needed, but looks promising

There's plugin relating to Audiobooks which may be relevant to your needs, https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=143629

BR

[Adoby]

It seems that you use plural. It is good practice to use separate login accounts. That most likely means that the folder for the calibre library/libraries should be in a folder that is shared with other users.

I believe that a long path may be problematic. So it could be a good idea to create a new folder "books", "shared books" or just "shared" directly in the root, as BR suggests. That way you reduce the length of the path.

Also that folder could be shared not only between users on the computer, but also over the network. So audio books and the calibre library easily can be shared and copied over the network. Please note that it is NOT possible to run more than one instance of calibre against the calibre library at any time, and that it is NOT recommended to use the calibre library from a network filesystem. So copy the library, and don't use it directly from the network share.