Error Importing Files Into New Created Ebook

[edeniz]

Hello,

I have a bit of a problem. I have a folder with several plain html files in it that I want to make an epub out of with calibre's ebook editor. I tried to create a new ebook. But when I tried to "import files into book", I got this error message:

Spoiler:

calibre, version 2.82.0
ERROR: Unhandled exception: <b>OSError</b>:[Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/tmp/calibre_2.82.0_tmp_US3zp_/ctX6TP/00001-pegWKA'

calibre 2.82  embedded-python: True is64bit: True
Linux-4.4.0-72-generic-x86_64-with-debian-stretch-sid Linux ('64bit', 'ELF')
('Linux', '4.4.0-72-generic', '#93-Ubuntu SMP Fri Mar 31 14:07:41 UTC 2017')
Python 2.7.9
Linux: ('debian', 'stretch/sid', '')
Successfully initialized third party plugins: EpubMerge (2, 1, 0) && Wiki Reader (2, 1, 0) && Goodreads (1, 1, 12) && Search The Internet (1, 7, 6) && Manage Series (1, 2, 8) && Diaps Editing Toolbag (0, 3, 4) && Recoll Full Text Search (1, 0, 1) && English Noun Frequency (1, 0, 6) && Fantastic Fiction Adults (1, 0, 4) && Open With (1, 5, 10) && EpubSplit (2, 2, 0) && Modify ePub (1, 3, 13) && Unplugged (1, 0, 0) && food network Recipe Reader (1, 0, 2) && BigOven Recipe Reader (1, 0, 1) && Overdrive Link (2, 11, 0) && Consolidate All Library Metadata (2, 0, 28) && MultiColumnSearch (1, 0, 69) && Similar Stories (1, 0, 58) && Medical Reader (1, 0, 1) && Author Book Count (2, 1, 4) && Recipe Reader (1, 0, 1) && BOL_DE (0, 7, 5) && Fantastic Fiction (1, 1, 6) && Quality Check (1, 9, 11) && EpubCheck (0, 1, 1) && Find Duplicates (1, 6, 2) && BBC GoodFood Recipe Reader (1, 1, 0) && all recipes Recipe Reader (1, 0, 1) && Read MP3 AudioBook metadata (1, 0, 79) && Count Pages (1, 7, 0) && FanFicFare (2, 9, 4) && Reading List (1, 6, 6)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/boss.py", line 481, in add_files
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/boss.py", line 724, in add_savepoint
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 89, in clone_container
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 1143, in clone_data
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 298, in clone_data
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 73, in clone_dir
OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/tmp/calibre_2.82.0_tmp_US3zp_/ctX6TP/00001-pegWKA'

Perhaps related to it, when I tried to use the "open folder (unzipped epub) as ebook" to see if it would work, it didn't either, and I got this error message:

Spoiler:

calibre, version 2.82.0
ERROR: Failed to open book: Failed to open book, click Show details for more information.

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/job.py", line 35, in run
  File "site-packages/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/boss.py", line 59, in get_container
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 1463, in get_container
  File "site-packages/calibre/ebooks/oeb/polish/container.py", line 1121, in __init__
InvalidEpub: No META-INF/container.xml in epub

Of course, I understand now that this second option would not work for lack of the in this message mentioned xml file, since this folder really is not actually an unzipped epub. But I don't quite understand the first error message. The html files I'm trying to import into a newly created ebook are utterly plain (it doesn't get any plainer - it has the usual...what's the phrase I'm looking for? you now, the whole html, head, title,meta etc. template, and then a body with absolutely no styling or images whatsoever), and check out just fine. In fact, each and every one of them converted into epubs via the editor's "import html or docx file as a new ebook" just fine.

What am I not understanding here? I use the calibre editor to create new ebooks all the time, and I never had such problems.

Thanks in advance for your help.

[theducks]

The first error says there is a problem with your TMP folder access.

[kovidgoyal]

Yeah your error indicates something is deleting files int he /tmp folder out from under calibre. You can try using a different, dedicated tmp folder using an environment variable, as described here: https://manual.calibre-ebook.com/cus...ment-variables

[edeniz]

Thank you both a lot, theducks, kovidgoyal! Much appreciated!

(I didn't know about the dedicated tmp folder, I think I'll do just that.)

I don't quite understand why the editor had trouble accessing the tmp folder, since it never happened before. A restart of my notebook however, took care of that problem.

Mind, I had to restart *twice*, because of this strange behaviour:

The first time I restarted, I immediately opened the editor and the epub in question, clicked on "import files into book", added one of the html in question, and voila, it worked fine. I then opened calibre, but before I actually did anything in calibre, I had an idea and went back to the editor to add the other html files to the new ebook, but this time I basically got the same error as above. Since I had absolutely no other program open, I have to assume that it was calibre that blocked the tmp folder. I restarted again, but this time I could not reproduce this behaviour, and in fact I now have no problem adding even multiple files into the ebook.