way to change list view to last, first for authors

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scoghlan
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way to change list view to last, first for authors

Post by scoghlan »

Just upgraded and wish I had not as I am struggling with the author names. I hate the first last way of viewing authors names. I don't care how the database has them, but I prefer last, first when viewing them which is why that was how I had them all in my database. I couldn't find anything in help for this, nor could I find anything in the forums. Is there a way to do this or do I have to find another book library program? I have had bookpedia for many years and have 8,325 books in it. I am dreading having to find something else.

Also, for anthologies, I used a ; between author names so that I knew each story was by a different author, and for multiple authors writing the same story, I used the word 'and' between them. It looks like I have lost the ability to do this now. How can I manage that in the new version?

Just discovered another problem. When I had an author that had multiple pen names (for example Nora Roberts) I would put in the official author for the book, then put their pen names in (). For example, JD Robb (Nora Roberts). This no longer works either. So, how do I manage this? I don't want a custom field. I want to be able to search the author field for all books by a particular person, no matter the pen name used.
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Nora
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Re: way to change list view to last, first for authors

Post by Nora »

The display is fixed as "First Last" in Bookpedia version 5. Of course you can still sort the author column by last name (or first name), just hold down the Option key and re-sort the column to flip between the two options.

The semi-colon works as a separator in multi-value fields (the blue bubble fields). You could use the pipe (|) instead. Using "and" between authors is still an option. Adding parentheses also works as usual. Just type "JD Robb (Nora Roberts)" into the author field and it'll become
one blue bubble.

Of course you may also downgrade back to version 4 if you'd prefer, you can download version 4.6.8 here.
Make sure after you downgrade to version 4.6.8 you delete the data file for version 5 (Database.bookpd) so that if you ever do decide to update, the program will be forced to do this from your 4.6.8 file. You will find the file in the Bookpedia data folder, located in your Home folder under ~/Library/Application Support/Bookpedia
If you're on Lion, it hides the Library folder by default so to go to your Bookpedia data folder you have to use the Finder's 'Go' menu, select 'Go to Folder' and copy paste ~/Library/Application Support/Bookpedia into the window that appears.
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