Calibre error: "Is it open in another program" and "this book has no available format

[Timucin]

Hi. Lately, when I want to change the book title on calibre, I get this error: "Could not change the on disk location of this book. Is it open in another program?" but it is not open in another program. and now the book won't open and the cover is invisible. I use Calibre 6.17 windows 11 latest.

https://imgur.com/a/Ar7jixu

after that it says: The Girl You Left Behind has no available formats.

https://imgur.com/a/oShflm9

[chaley]

Moderator Notice
Moved to correct subforum

[chaley]

I suspect this is yet another case of storing the library on a NAS, Dropbox, Onedrive, or equivalent. See https://manual.calibre-ebook.com/faq...rked-drive-nas

[theducks]

I give Chaley's guess top points

But, Having the book open in ANY viewer will lock files.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by theducks

I give Chaley's guess top points

But, Having the book open in ANY viewer will lock files.

Untrue, my comic viewer Honeyview doesn't lock files, nor does Sigil. If I open an epub in a calibre library in Sigil and then change its title in calibre I get an error when I try to save the epub in Sigil.

Error info: Cannot save file D:/Calibre/Libraries/Test/Anne de Courcy/The Fishing Fleet (457)/The Fishing Fleet - Anne de Courcy.epub: D:/Calibre/Libraries/Test/Anne de Courcy/The Fishing Fleet (457)/The Fishing Fleet - Anne de Courcy.epub
Sigil version: 1.9.20
Runtime Qt: 5.12.9
Compiled Qt: 5.12.9
System: Windows 10 (10.0)
Architecture: x86_64

BR

[chaley]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Untrue, my comic viewer Honeyview doesn't lock files, nor does Sigil. If I open an epub in a calibre library in Sigil and then change its title in calibre I get an error when I try to save the epub in Sigil.

Error info: Cannot save file D:/Calibre/Libraries/Test/Anne de Courcy/The Fishing Fleet (457)/The Fishing Fleet - Anne de Courcy.epub: D:/Calibre/Libraries/Test/Anne de Courcy/The Fishing Fleet (457)/The Fishing Fleet - Anne de Courcy.epub
Sigil version: 1.9.20
Runtime Qt: 5.12.9
Compiled Qt: 5.12.9
System: Windows 10 (10.0)
Architecture: x86_64

BR

Of course that means that the permitted interleaved updates will probably scribble on each other. That is why ACID semantics are generally accepted as a good thing. But in the end, up to you ...

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by theducks

I give Chaley's guess top points

yes.

Originally Posted by theducks

But, Having the book open in ANY viewer will lock files.

OS and possibly Filesystem dependant.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by chaley

Of course that means that the permitted interleaved updates will probably scribble on each other. That is why ACID semantics are generally accepted as a good thing. But in the end, up to you ...

I was responding to the assertion:

Having the book open in ANY viewer will lock files.

The "ANY" is not my emphasis… it's @theduck's.

Of the "viewers" I use frequently, I get one of three behaviours if I change a book title in calibre whilst they have the file open, e.g.:

a) they lock the files and calibre won't allow me to change the book title - PDF xChange and MS Word.

b) they discover the file location has disappeared when the file is saved - Sigil, calibre ebook-editor.

c) they detect the change as it happens and have a whinge about it - Notepad++.

I suspect most calibre users would associate ACID with something they had in the '60s or the Doors or Jefferson Airplane rock bands. Changing a book's metadata in calibre whilst one of its format files is open in another program is like ACID in one respect… best avoided without medical supervision

BR

[chaley]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I suspect most calibre users would associate ACID with something they had in the '60s or the Doors or Jefferson Airplane rock bands. Changing a book's metadata in calibre whilst one of its format files is open in another program is like ACID in one respect… best avoided without medical supervision

BR

I know you are injecting humor and perhaps you are right, but those who build systems must care. For example, how happy would you be if you make reservations for something such as air travel, hotels, or whatever; only to discover that your reservations were ignored because of simultaneous transactions? Or perhaps with some card payment that throws you into overdraft because it wasn't ACID?

Sometimes I think the rush to "agile programming" where one ships semi-working prototypes, has destroyed the notion that correct is better than fast. But then I am an old fart...

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by chaley

I know you are injecting humor and perhaps you are right, but those who build systems must care. For example, how happy would you be if you make reservations for something such as air travel, hotels, or whatever; only to discover that your reservations were ignored because of simultaneous transactions? Or perhaps with some card payment that throws you into overdraft because it wasn't ACID?

Maybe that's what happened when that Russell Square hotel tried to tell me that Singapore time was 8 hours behind GMT and on that basis tried to charge me for an extra night's accommodation. That was in pre-Brexit times when Thatcher occupied No 10, now her successors have a fantasy of London becoming Singapore-on-Thames.

Originally Posted by chaley

Sometimes I think the rush to "agile programming" where one ships semi-working prototypes, has destroyed the notion that correct is better than fast. But then I am an old fart...

The woes to which you refer started long before 'agile programming' (whatever that is) became fashionable. In the latter part of last century many so-called 'skunkworks projects' suffered the same malady.

BR