Fandom Calibre Screencap Tutorial (Guide to fandom plugins)

[amalthia]

I've seen more requests on how to use Calibre plugins to download fic from archives into Calibre and how to merge series into a single file. This tutorial will first cover how to install plugins. As well as how to use the plugin Fanfiction Downloader to download fic from archives into Calibre and then the use of the plugin Epubmerge to merge series into a single file.


You can access the complete list of all the built-in plugins in calibre by going to Preferences->Plugins.

I've highlighted each step of the way on the screencaps.







This step is important. You'll need to pick Not installed from the dropdown list. This will list all the plugins you do not have installed. Scroll down until you find Fanfiction Downloader and Epubmerge. As well as any other plugins that you'll like to use. I highly recommend Count Pages. Install them one at at a time.


Once the installs are complete you'll need to restart Calibre.


The next part intended to help users to set up and use the plugin Fanfiction Downloader.

First make sure your plugin is visible on your main menu toolbar. To configure the plugin select the arrow next to the image and select configure plugin from the dropdown.



You will see a box that looks like this:



These are my personal settings and you can either copy or use defaults.

The second tab of settings called personal.ini and this is where you can enter your archive information such as username and passwords. This is useful for A03 because if you don't enter your username/password here you will get adult warning messages that popup asking if you are over 18. It becomes rather annoying very quickly.

The default code will list multiple archives like this:

[www.thewriterscoffeeshop.com]
#username:YourName
#password:yourpassword
#is_adult:true

In order for the program to work you will need to remove the pound sign # and add your information like this:

[ksarchive.com/]
username: fakeusername
password: fakepassword
is_adult:true

[archiveofourown.org]
username: fakeusername
password: fakepassword
is_adult:true

This is also where you can enter custom css code to add indents, change font size, text alignment, and etc... This is an example of my custom css. [This code goes at the end of all the archive login information].
## output background color--only used by html and epub (and ignored in
## epub by many readers). Included below in output_css--will be
## ignored if not in output_css.
background_color: ffffff

## Allow customization of CSS. Make sure to keep at least one space
## at the start of each line and to escape % to %%. Also need
## background_color to be in the same section, if included in CSS.
## 'adobe-text-layout: optimizeSpeed;' prevents hyphenation on newer Nooks
## Only ini substs, like background_color are done.
output_css:

@font-face {font-family: "Times New Roman";  font-weight: normal;  font-style: normal;
src: url(res:///ebook/fonts/../../mnt/sdcard/fonts/Times-New-Roman.ttf);}
@font-face {font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-weight: bold; font-style: normal;
src: url(res:///ebook/fonts/../../mnt/sdcard/fonts/Times-New-Roman-Bold.ttf);}
@font-face {font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic;
src:url(res:///ebook/fonts/../../mnt/sdcard/fonts/Times-New-Roman-Italic.ttf);}
@font-face {font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;
src: url(res:///ebook/fonts/../../mnt/sdcard/fonts/Times-New-Roman-Bold-Italic.ttf);}

 body { font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 1em; background-color: #ffffff ; text-align: justify; margin: 2%; -epub-hyphens: none; adobe-hyphenate: none; -webkit-hyphens: none; -moz-hyphens: none; hyphens: none;}
 p {font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt; text-indent: 15pt;}
 h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 { text-align: center; padding-bottom: 10pt;}

 .CI {
 text-align:center;
 margin-top:0px;
 margin-bottom:0px;
 padding:0px;
 }
 .center {text-align: center;}
 .cover {text-align: center;}
 .full {width: 100%%; }
 .quarter {width: 25%%; }
 .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;}
 .u {text-decoration: underline;}
 .bold {font-weight: bold;} .bold {font-weight: bold;}

My custom css adds indents to the paragraphs, centers chapter headers, and modifies the margins.

The other important tabs are the standard column and custom column:

In the standard column you can select which items you wanted filled every time you update the story. I only use it for my tags. This page shows what is added to calibre's columns.



The customize plugin tab is the one I found most interesting for my own fannish uses. You have to have custom columns to make this work. I have a custom column for Word Count, Relationships, Warnings, Status, and etc...When I download a story using the plugin it pulls metadata from the archive an automatically fills in the standard column information and everything I have selected in my custom columns. This means I don't need to worry manually adding pairings/relationships, warnings, word counts, and status (used to show if a story is complete or in-complete)



*note: Word Count will not work properly unless you have the plugin Count Pages installed. Please visit: Mobile Read Count Pages Plugin Thread to find out how to properly install and setup this plugin. Truly it's awesome for anyone that wants to know how long a story is without much effort.



To use the plugin you first need to copy the URL of the story you want to add to Calibre. Then click on the Fanfiction Downloader arrow and select from the drop down "Add New from URL" a box will pop up that looks like this:



When you're done your page may look like this:



Note of warning: I'm using my Calibre in screencaps. You will see my own custom columns that do not exist as the default when Calibre is installed. Custom Columns is a whole other tutorial. I use them to organize everything I download and they are incredibly useful. Kovid already has a video tutorial at the website Getting help with calibre under the link Grand Tour introductory video



Epubmerge does not require modifying any settings. Once the plugin is installed and Calibre is restarted you can start right away merging fic. Select the stories you want merged, a pop-up box will open and ask you to pick the order the stories should go in. Once you hit okay the metadata box will open. You can add your own summary, a series title, change the publisher/author/title, and etc...You can just hit okay and go with the default metadata.

That's the end of the tutorial. I put it together over the last two nights and I'm not an expert at making tutorials so please let me know if you find any errors so I can correct. I'm also willing to answer questions if you need further clarification. Hope this helps!


http://amalthia.dreamwidth.org/785544.html#comments

*this is also posted my personal journal. Sorry for anyone that saw this post twice. It didn't feel right to direct community members to my personal journal to read the tutorial.

Comments

[mama-pyjama.livejournal.com]

This is so fab, thank you. I hadn't come across epubmerge before, so am very pleased.

[amalthia]

Yay! glad I was able to provide info on Epubmerge. It's officially my new favorite plugin. :)

[springwoof.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Such wonderful tools at our disposal, but not everyone is very techy, or else they're just plain intimidated. A pictorial tutorial is just the ticket! How thoughtful you are!

[amalthia]

Thanks! :) I'm probably going to make another tutorial for custom columns. (or at least share my settings) It took me a bit of guess work when I first started. The one thing I could not find were clear directions.

[the-other-sandy.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for this.

[amalthia]

You're welcome. :)

[yukisa.livejournal.com]

Thanks a lot for this!

Your custom-colums look really nice! I also have some, but let's just say that they kinda do what they want....

Because it really looks awesome like this (and it makes it far easier to search for things) but I found that it oftern takes a lot of time and therefore my fanfics are sorted by fandom and I make a note every time I thing a fic is really awesome that's kind it....

But I try to optimize it now a little bit as well, so thank you a lot!!!

[amalthia]

Glad I could help! :)

[bettybaby63.livejournal.com]

thanks for all your effort with this tutorial. i am still slightly confused though....will the fanfic downloader work on LJ entries. i have many great stories on LJ, yet there doesn't seem to be a downloader compatible with LJ?

they all seem to specifically exclude LJ?

any advice you could offer would be greatly appreciated <3

[amalthia]

For LJ what you need is Squeebook and the Firefox add on called Copy Links

Squeebook will merge multiple chapters of an LJ into a single post. Calibre cannot at this time do that.

LJ has weird code and that is why I think no one has really tackled how to merge multiple posts into one. It sounds like a coding nightmare compared to the other archives.

[vmom.livejournal.com]

Finally able to use this plug in! Worked like a dream after I read the list of supported archives (of course the first attempt was an unsupported one).

Hopefully I can come back and sort through your explanation of custom css code because I am really clueless and need to use with some of my other e-books.

Also the links are an added bonus.

Thank you for putting together this tutorial.

[amalthia]

You're welcome!

Let me know if you need any extra help with the custom css. :)

[idella]

Thank you so much for this!