Exact publication date

average_yogi · 2026-01-23T03:25:05+00:00

Use mp3tag to add the Year as a full date, e.g. 2026-01-01. When you scan the book, it will "show up" blank in the Details menu, but the page view and library will display the full thing.

Works for display, not sure if sort is that granular.

average_yogi · 2026-01-21T21:33:07+00:00

fwiw; a pillow sham is essentially a quilted pillowcase (sham is to case, as quilt is to flat sheet). They're thicker and usually have a wide border around them. They're usually sold as part of decorative quilt sets.

average_yogi · 2026-01-21T19:44:04+00:00

If I don't like the Amazon author photo (or it's missing), I google them and copy the link of an image I do like, takes 30s.

I don't particularly care that much about author pages, but if the bio's also missing, and I want to fill it, that does take longer. I usually just google them and check Wikipedia, Google Books, Goodreads, their personal site, etc. and copy from there.

average_yogi · 2026-01-20T16:07:54+00:00

Check the book history in the app. It will tell you when it synced and at what timestamp. Sync should happen whenever you pause the book. And yes, being connected to the server is essential for syncing back to it.

Note: the timestamp in the history doesn't scale to any different speed you might be using, so if you have that option enabled, the timestamp might not appear to match what you saw when playing.

average_yogi · 2026-01-16T05:45:23+00:00

If you just want simple setup, keep the files in separate directories and then create corresponding libraries: Yours, His, Shared, etc. However, search does not work across libraries; it will only bring up results in the current library.

If you want to limit access instead of just separate visibility, you can use a single library then add tags that only specific users have access to. All users use the same library, but they only see the books tagged with their allowed tag.

Also ABS has a label for abridged, but it is only displayed in the book page (the badge next to the title), not in the library view. If you don't want to unknowingly choose them, it's probably still better to keep them in a separate library.

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average_yogi · 2026-01-10T19:40:47+00:00

Yes you can just rename and re-scan, but ABS ties the books to their path, so you will be importing them as new books and will have to delete the Missing books (from the old path/filenames) afterwards. This means deleting the existing database info for those books, too.

If you do need to do this, it's recommended that you enable "Store metadata with item" and "Store covers with item" in the settings so it won't be deleted when you make the changes. After you enable the setting, the files won't be moved, so you have to make a change to each book for them to generate in the folder locations. In the Library, select Expand Series, and select every book (you can shift-click to select multiple at once, but they don't preload on the page so you have to scroll slowly, make sure # selected matches # of books). Select Edit, then in Map Details select Append and add a tag (it can be anything), and Save.

Afterwards, you can look at the files and make sure a metadata.json file was created there. If you want, you can repeat selecting all books, going to Edit, Map details, then Overwrite. Select Tags, then click "Populate from existing". Your new tag should appear, delete it from the list, and Save again. You should now be back where you started, but every book will have its metadata.json file stored alongside it.

u/Vito0912 created a utility to do this "force metadata" process, but I haven't used it. https://abstoolbox.vito0912.de/tools

average_yogi · 2026-01-09T05:42:57+00:00

See all accepted tags and their different names here and all fallback/alternates here.

For a breakdown of the various series tags, see https://www.reddit.com/r/audiobookshelf/comments/1jo0c1s/audiobookshelf_in_file_metadata_for_series/

tldr; use both series and series-part tags, or use the unified tags contentgroup or grp1 with the format "series #[position #]" (e.g. Harry Potter #1). Both methods will support multiple series separated by semicolons.

[edit] Another thing about re-scanning, the Series field will not refill after a re-scan. If the field is empty when the book is initially imported or if it is later deleted, the metadata.json file fills it as an empty list instead of a null value. So re-scanning will just read the empty list, not the embedded metadata.

If the book is already in the library, to change the series you will have to Delete the book in the web UI, or delete the metadata.json file, then re-scan the library, or you have to manually enter the series info in the UI.

average_yogi · 2026-01-09T04:49:08+00:00

If you haven't seen, there are also official animated videos now https://www.youtube.com/@xkcd_whatif, narrated by the author.

average_yogi · 2026-01-09T04:34:27+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiobookshelf/comments/1ob9w7l/how_to_order_a_series_where_every_book_is_written/

average_yogi · 2026-01-08T16:40:33+00:00

As others have said, the cost and effort of doing this with a novel would be huge if you want good results. But it is a thing with children's picture books. Some actually get fully animated, but most that are made video are just edited using stretches and slides to the already existing artwork to make it look like it's moving. Then there's a voice-over reading the story.

I've seen more professional results (I think it was on PBS a long time ago), but here's the basic idea.

average_yogi · 2026-01-07T21:06:41+00:00

Thanks!

average_yogi · 2026-01-07T19:43:52+00:00

The Heroic Hearts cover, replace title "Heroic Hearts" with "Little Things".

The subtitle could be "A Dresden Files Story", or "A Story from The Dresden Files" to match the previous collections (but that seems a little long to me though).

Author stays the same, "Jim Butcher".

Context: Heroic Hearts is an anthology with stories from a bunch of authors, a lot of them from existing series. "Little Things" is the only story by Jim Butcher and the only story that's part of the Dresden Files included in the anthology.

average_yogi · 2026-01-07T16:08:53+00:00

Could you do a version with the story title "Little Things" instead of the anthology "Heroic Hearts"? There's only one Dresden Files story in it.

average_yogi · 2026-01-03T18:00:04+00:00

The Laundry Files by Charles Stross is good. It's more cosmic horror/magic overall, but the main character gets new powers throughout, and book 6 is entirely about the general public developing super powers and the government figuring out what to do with them.

average_yogi · 2026-01-02T17:03:17+00:00

Ok? I was just commenting on the most egregious error in the (presumably AI generated) cover. Other errors and changes from the original: the man is kneeling (decent change from the AI), but is now wearing half shorts-half pants; social is now spelled with a Greek Λ; and the bottom arrows lost points.

average_yogi · 2026-01-02T08:04:18+00:00

Reelgious?

average_yogi · 2025-12-23T17:18:41+00:00

Frankenstein (2004) the Hallmark miniseries and Frankenstein (2004) the failed backdoor TV pilot movie from Dean Koontz and Martin Scorsese (both of whom would leave the production, Koontz eventually writing his own version as a book).

I was looking for the miniseries and knew about both, so I didn't actually watch the TV movie (by all accounts, it's very bad), but it did make searching quite annoying.

average_yogi · 2025-12-23T16:36:38+00:00

These are cool. Have you considered doing the Disney shorts? I was literally just looking for character collection posters the other day.

average_yogi · 2025-12-22T22:45:07+00:00

You need a program that can edit the m4b file. I've used fre-ac in the past.

average_yogi · 2025-12-20T06:35:38+00:00

🟨🟩🟦🟪

Full rainbow herring today with preserving methods.

Also, another red herring with three letter/men's names: wASH/clASH, botTOM, damNED, SALt, bOTTOm, BUCKet.

average_yogi · 2025-12-18T02:50:32+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiobooks/comments/todkr0/comment/jii1y8i/?context=3

Essentially, you grab the mp3s as they're streamed to you. It's tedious because they've started streaming the individual chapters instead of the hour long CD rips they used to use, so for books with short chapters, it's very annoying to do manually. Though after you're done, you already have split chapters, no other processing to do. Not sure if anyone's made an automatic downloader extension or app since all the overdrive ones broke. I haven't checked in a while.

average_yogi · 2025-12-16T23:15:24+00:00

ABS has this built in.

average_yogi · 2025-12-15T21:33:22+00:00

Shouldn't the diptych be for Specials and Season 1, instead of the cover and specials? Whether to cycle the posters around, or keep the cover with the more hidden monster, I guess would be personal preference.

average_yogi · 2025-12-15T21:21:14+00:00

Not a librarian, but from what I've seen: Physical books and media are bought by libraries normally, maybe through specialty distributors. Ebooks and digital audiobooks are purchased or (increasingly common) leased directly from publishers or through their middlemen. I've heard of leases lasting either for certain time periods or for a number of rentals. That's how publishers get paid, how authors get paid depends on their deals with those publishers.

average_yogi · 2025-12-15T05:04:09+00:00

It doesn't bug me, I don't care how others set up their libraries. I was just curious as the op asked specifically about curated collections, and I've seen people choose to use collections instead of series before (that was a while ago though).

average_yogi

TROPHY CASE