Merging books keeps metadata of first book but the cover of the of the second book

[Jonatan Nyberg]

When merging books by dragging one book on to another, the metadata from the first book will be kept but the cover from the second book. IMHO it would be better if the metadata and the cover was kept from the first book.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

I cannot reproduce. Steps I tried:

1) Drag a book that has a cover onto another book that has a cover
2) Select merge metadata in the popup asking what to merge
3) the cover of the dragged book is discared as is any metadata that
already exists in the book onto which it is dropped. Metadata not
present in the target book is updated from the dragged book.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

Yes it works as you say but it would be better if the cover of the dragged book could be added to the book it is dropped on. Could there be an option for that in the merge popup? Thank you.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

Merging works by setting values previously unset or adding to
multi-valued fields. Making one particular
value behave differently is just confusing and why limit such an option
to covers only? Next someone will ask for the option for title and so
on.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

The reason I asked for the option was because I thought it was weird that the cover was deleted when the book was merged with another. Please add a warning at least because there is no way to recover the lost cover.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

Covers, fornmats and metadata re all lost when you merge. That's what
merging means and thats why there is an option to keep the originals
when merging. Use it.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

All formats from the first book are saved, I find it confusing that the cover is not saved the same way.

[Diego Delond (delond)]

I have the same issue with the book covers. While dragging, I lost the book's metadata and couldn't figure out what was wrong. Unfortunately, this happened at a very inopportune moment while writing an essay. The deadline was close, and I had to turn to https://edubirdie.com/pay-for-essays for help. Fortunately, the authors could help me with writing in a short time, and this bug did not affect anything. I hope this will be fixed soon.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

No, all formats are not saved. Any format that already exists in the dropped book is lost from the dragged book. Read the help text when you select "Merge formats" in the merge dialog. And the same is true for covers when you select "Merge metadata" as the cover is metadata.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

Fixed in branch master. The fix will be in the next release. calibre is usually released every alternate Friday.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

Thank you!

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

After this fix merging books will result in the format of the first book being deleted.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

I found out it was because Merge formats was not checked. Can you make it pre-checked so that this doesn't happen by mistake?

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

All the checkboxes start out pre-checked.

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

Hi Kovid, would it be possible to keep the author from the dragged book if the author is unknown in the book the dragged book is being dragged to?

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

It should already be doing that, is it not?

[Jonatan Nyberg (bugreporter41)]

I tested and it does but in the target book example in the Merge books popup it says the author is unknown so I thought it wouldn't.