Calibre Companion prerelease 3.1.1c

[chaley]

CC prerelease 3.1.1c is available to people who are members of the CC prerelease program.

This prerelease has the following changes in addition to those in V3.1.1b:

• Optionally display comments in book details using the full screen width. This is controlled by a new preference in the "Display" group that defaults to "off" (existing behavior).
• In book details, use the minimum amount of space for labels that word wrap. Previously these labels forced the column width to its maximum, around 12-15 characters.
• Don't disable the "read" button in the content server book details page if the book isn't downloaded. Instead give the user a message that downloading is needed.
• [BUG FIX] Correctly handle another date format that appeared from nowhere.
• [BUG FIX] Remove "phantom books" from the count of books being displayed in grid (cover) view.

[PatNY]

The full-width comments are looking great on my device.

Nice improvement!

--Pat

[Dhevi]

The book count is working as intended as well. Thank you so much.

[jackie_w]

@chaley,

Another for the full-width Comments

As this release features the Details page quite a bit I thought I'd add a couple of thoughts:

• Before the full-width Comments option was available I renamed the labels for a couple of my custom columns to try and reduce the width of the label column to maximise the width for the actual values. I noticed that the new labels were only used for books sent after the label change in calibre. Existing books still displayed the old labels so I didn't gain anything. Is this inevitable or is there a way to update them all, other than resending all books?
• This would be a nice-to-have if your To-do list ever gets low . When I'm browsing for my next read the most important metadata to me is the Comments. As this is a long way down the page (at least on my phone) I've often thought that it would be handy to 'promote' the Comments to be the first field shown (after the cover), so I don't need to scroll down for every book. I'm not sure what determines the current field sequence on the Details page but the ability for user configuration would be nice, including the ability to exclude some fields, e.g. some of my custom columns are only useful in main calibre not on the reading device.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by chaley

• Optionally display comments in book details using the full screen width. This is controlled by a new preference in the "Display" group that defaults to "off" (existing behavior).

This works great. However, I think you should default this feature to on. Folks shouldn't have to hunt this down.

One minor observation. The Comments: title when the comments are full width is about 1/5 the font size of everything else on the book details page, see attached. This doesn't bother me, might even prefer it, just wondered if it was intentional.

[Purple Lady]

Like everyone else, I love the full width comments. That's why I changed my custom column name as well. This makes it possible to actually read the comments on my phone. Before, I had only two or three words on a line so it didn't work too well for me.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

As this release features the Details page quite a bit I thought I'd add a couple of thoughts:

• Before the full-width Comments option was available I renamed the labels for a couple of my custom columns to try and reduce the width of the label column to maximise the width for the actual values. I noticed that the new labels were only used for books sent after the label change in calibre. Existing books still displayed the old labels so I didn't gain anything. Is this inevitable or is there a way to update them all, other than resending all books?

Calibre sending metadata to CC is controlled by the last modified date in calibre. Up to calibre 1.3 (the last release), changing the db metadata (custom column specs, composite column templates) was not treated as a "book changing" event, with the consequence that the new information was not sent to CC. Starting with 1.3, updating DB metadata will update the last_mod date, so the new info will be sent.

If you are still having the problem, you can fix it in two ways.
1) Go to the custom column definition and change it in some way. I don't remember if changing it to itself is enough.
2) Click the down arrow on the Library button, choose Library Maintenance, Library Metadata Backup Status, and click the Queue all books for backup. This has the side effect of updating the last_mod date for all the books.

After doing one or the other of the above, connect CC as a wireless device. The updated information will be sent.

• This would be a nice-to-have if your To-do list ever gets low . When I'm browsing for my next read the most important metadata to me is the Comments. As this is a long way down the page (at least on my phone) I've often thought that it would be handy to 'promote' the Comments to be the first field shown (after the cover), so I don't need to scroll down for every book. I'm not sure what determines the current field sequence on the Details page but the ability for user configuration would be nice, including the ability to exclude some fields, e.g. some of my custom columns are only useful in main calibre not on the reading device.

This is something I have been thinking about for some time. The problem is the UI. Because CC can connect to multiple libraries and libraries can change, it doesn't have an accurate list of custom columns so it cannot pop up a nice dialog where you would choose and order the columns.

It would be quite easy to provide a text box where you could enter the lookup keys of the fields you want first, similarly to how calibre's tweaks work. There would be three fields. The first would be to specify the order of fields. Any field listed in that box would be displayed first, and in the order given. The second would be a list of fields that are to be displayed. The third would be a list of fields that are not to be displayed. Similar calibre tweaks are "Order of custom column(s) in edit metadata (ID: metadata_edit_custom_column_order)" and "Set custom metadata fields that the content server will or will not display. (ID: content_server_will_display)".

However, even though the above is easy to implement, it isn't very easy to use. We are in the situation where the question "Is it better to do nothing than something that is just adequate?" is very pertinent. Steven and Annie both lean heavily toward the "do nothing" camp. I am not sure.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by DoctorOhh

[/LIST]This works great. However, I think you should default this feature to on. Folks shouldn't have to hunt this down.

I have been burned too many times by changing behavior that doesn't need to change. Someone who decides that comments need more space is motivated to go look at the preferences. In addition, some people (like me) prefer the comments to be to the right of the label. I never use large fonts and I almost never read on my phone, so I have plenty of space. In fact (and of course, for me), on my 10" test tablet full-width comments look a bit silly, especially in landscape.

One minor observation. The Comments: title when the comments are full width is about 1/5 the font size of everything else on the book details page, see attached. This doesn't bother me, might even prefer it, just wondered if it was intentional.

No, it wasn't intentional. I have fixed it.

You might find that some books don't have this problem/feature. Those would be books that have pure text comments containing no HTML. Those of us who have used calibre for a long time can easily have these.

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by chaley

Calibre sending metadata to CC is controlled by the last modified date in calibre. Up to calibre 1.3 (the last release), changing the db metadata (custom column specs, composite column templates) was not treated as a "book changing" event, with the consequence that the new information was not sent to CC. Starting with 1.3, updating DB metadata will update the last_mod date, so the new info will be sent.

I'm still using calibre v1.2 but as luck would have it I finally got around to installing the 'Count Pages' plugin last night. This had the side-effect of updating all the necessary metadata.opf files. So a simple CC connect has now updated all the labels. Thanks for explaining

Because I was specifically looking at user columns on the Details page I did spot one other anomaly. I used to have a user column called 'Test' which I removed from calibre a few months ago. However this column is still displaying for some books in CC. Can you explain why this column would still exist in CC? I see no sign of the column in the metadata.opf file for these books in calibre.

Originally Posted by chaley

This is something I have been thinking about for some time. The problem is the UI. Because CC can connect to multiple libraries and libraries can change, it doesn't have an accurate list of custom columns so it cannot pop up a nice dialog where you would choose and order the columns.

Might it be an option, for starters, to consider only the calibre standard fields, as they wouldn't vary by library or by user?

As for the UI, I've seen at least one app (MortPlayer Music, I think, when customising a user mini-menu) which displays a list of items (one per line) and allows the user to:
- drag item up/down into desired sequence
- tap item's icon to add/remove item from the custom mini-menu
(however, I wouldn't necessarily champion MortPlayer Music as the best role model for good overall UI design as the number of options is rather large and can be a bit confusing for the casual user).

[Purple Lady]

I now have all my books on my new Nexus 7 LTE. I wanted all the same books that I had on my old Nexus 7 so I created a custom yes/no column and valued it as yes for all books on the old Nexus. I added all these books on my new Nexus using the wireless connection and it only took a few minutes for 400 books. I then went and updated the custom column to "no" so all the books had the last_mod date updated and then deleted the custom column. I then connected wirelessly to update the metadata, but the custom yes/no column is still in my book details. Is there a way to remove this? I have Calibre 1.2 and CC 3.1.1c

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

I then connected wirelessly to update the metadata, but the custom yes/no column is still in my book details. Is there a way to remove this? I have Calibre 1.2 and CC 3.1.1c

I think the following quote from post 7 may indicate you need to upgrade to 1.3 to get the results you want.

Originally Posted by chaley

Calibre sending metadata to CC is controlled by the last modified date in calibre. Up to calibre 1.3 (the last release), changing the db metadata (custom column specs, composite column templates) was not treated as a "book changing" event, with the consequence that the new information was not sent to CC. Starting with 1.3, updating DB metadata will update the last_mod date, so the new info will be sent.

If you are still having the problem, you can fix it in two ways.
1) Go to the custom column definition and change it in some way. I don't remember if changing it to itself is enough.
2) Click the down arrow on the Library button, choose Library Maintenance, Library Metadata Backup Status, and click the Queue all books for backup. This has the side effect of updating the last_mod date for all the books.

After doing one or the other of the above, connect CC as a wireless device. The updated information will be sent.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by DoctorOhh

I think the following quote from post 7 may indicate you need to upgrade to 1.3 to get the results you want.

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

I then went and updated the custom column to "no" so all the books had the last_mod date updated and then deleted the custom column. I then connected wirelessly to update the metadata, but the custom yes/no column is still in my book details.

According to Chaley The last_mod date needed to get updated and what I did updated the date so that's why I expected this to work.

Originally Posted by chaley

2) Click the down arrow on the Library button, choose Library Maintenance, Library Metadata Backup Status, and click the Queue all books for backup. This has the side effect of updating the last_mod date for all the books.

After doing one or the other of the above, connect CC as a wireless device. The updated information will be sent.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Because I was specifically looking at user columns on the Details page I did spot one other anomaly. I used to have a user column called 'Test' which I removed from calibre a few months ago. However this column is still displaying for some books in CC. Can you explain why this column would still exist in CC? I see no sign of the column in the metadata.opf file for these books in calibre.

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

I now have all my books on my new Nexus 7 LTE. I wanted all the same books that I had on my old Nexus 7 so I created a custom yes/no column and valued it as yes for all books on the old Nexus. I added all these books on my new Nexus using the wireless connection and it only took a few minutes for 400 books. I then went and updated the custom column to "no" so all the books had the last_mod date updated and then deleted the custom column. I then connected wirelessly to update the metadata, but the custom yes/no column is still in my book details. Is there a way to remove this? I have Calibre 1.2 and CC 3.1.1c

And again, thanks to both of you for persevering.

There is a bug in the calibre side that has been there for at least 2 years. In some cases the metadata sent to a device was the union (merge) of the correct metadata stored in calibre and the metadata already on the device. In this case, because the deleted columns were in the metadata coming from the device, calibre merged them back into the metadata that was sent back to the device, again and again. And they rode forever 'neath the streets of Boston ...

This will be fixed in calibre 1.4. (It is in the source now.) Correcting the metadata in CC will require that calibre send the book's metadata to CC, which will require that the last_mod times be updated.

The only other way I can think of to fix it is to resend the book. That should send new, correct, metadata to CC without the incorrect merge step being applied.

[chaley]

Originally Posted by jackie_w

Might it be an option, for starters, to consider only the calibre standard fields, as they wouldn't vary by library or by user?

Could be, but we would be pushed very hard to add the custom columns.

As for the UI, I've seen at least one app (MortPlayer Music, I think, when customising a user mini-menu) which displays a list of items (one per line) and allows the user to:
- drag item up/down into desired sequence
- tap item's icon to add/remove item from the custom mini-menu
(however, I wouldn't necessarily champion MortPlayer Music as the best role model for good overall UI design as the number of options is rather large and can be a bit confusing for the casual user).

This sounds a bit like the UI we have in CC's format/folder setup dialog. It shows a list of valid book formats. The user can reorder the list using up/down arrows, can select which formats s/he wants to receive using a check box, and can change the folder where the format will be stored.

Still thinking ...

[jackie_w]

Originally Posted by chaley

This will be fixed in calibre 1.4. (It is in the source now.) Correcting the metadata in CC will require that calibre send the book's metadata to CC, which will require that the last_mod times be updated.

Thanks. It's no problem to wait.