Managing books

The book list

The Books tab lists your books. Other users' books are not shown. The list shows one folder at a time, the folders of the current one above its books; at the top level, with no folders made, it is simply all your books.

Column
Name	The name of the book.
Tags	The book's tags.
Created	When the book was created.
Last Modified	When the book was last changed.

The list is sorted by Last Modified, newest first. Click a column header to sort by it; with several sorted columns the list is sorted by all of them in order.

The row below the headers filters the list:

• Name - books whose name starts with the text. Use * as a wildcard: *dragon finds every book with "dragon" anywhere in the name.

• Tags - books that have all the selected tags.

The refresh button at the end of the filter row reloads the list.

Each row has buttons: the star makes the book a favorite, the pen opens it, Move to folder puts it into a folder, the clone button makes a copy of it and the trash button deletes it. The header has New folder and Organise (the window to move and copy books and folders), and the Mass changes menu.

Advanced search

Search (next to Tag books; the magnifier in the header on a phone) opens a window that finds books by more than the filter row can. Fill in what you want to check, leave the rest empty, and press Search (or Enter in a text field):

Field	Finds books...
Name	whose name contains the text (* is a wildcard).
Tags to include	that have the tags: All of the tags or Any of the tags, as you choose next to the field.
Tags to exclude	that do not have the tags: with Any of the tags a book with at least one of them is left out, with All of the tags only a book that has every one of them.
Created from / to, Modified from / to	created or last changed in the range; the day of a to date is included.
Number of parts from / to	with that many parts in all its branches (parts in the trash are not counted).
Text	with a part that has every word of the text. Words, "phrases" and * work as in the search of the story.
Include versions	off (the default): only the current text of the parts is searched; on: a book is also found when an earlier version of one of its parts has the words, see Version history.
Search in all branches	off (the default): the text is searched only in the branch the book is at (the story as you see it when you open the book); on: in the parts of all branches.

A book has to pass every check you filled in. The books found are listed below with their tags, the last changed first; a click on a column header sorts them. The folder button opens a book (in its window above the search, so closing the book brings you back to the results). Clear empties the fields.

Cloning a book

The clone button asks for the Name of the new book (the name of the original with (Copy) by default) and has the check box Only current branch, checked by default. The new book is a separate book that gets:

• the settings of the book (description, language, prompts, point of view, tense, style, backup settings), the data that extensions keep in the book, and the tags;

• the same Model, Protocol and lorebook. The lorebook is linked, not copied: a change of it shows in both books;

• the story with its own copy of the parts, their summaries and pictures. With Only current branch only the parts from the beginning to the end of the active branch are copied; without it all the branches are.

The clone starts a version history of its own (one version per part); the history of the original is not copied.

The clone is not published, even if the original is. The original is not changed. It is put into the same folder as the original.

Tagging many books at once

Tag books (next to Add Book) opens a window that puts one tag on many books, or takes it off them, without opening each. Pick the Tag (or type a new one and press Enter) and the list shows every book with its tags; the books that have the picked tag come first and show it highlighted. Each row has a + button that applies the tag to that book and a - button that removes it. To do the same for several books, tick their check boxes (the box in the header ticks all) and use Apply the tag to the checked or Remove the tag from the checked at the bottom. A book an agent works on is grayed out: it is locked, so it can not be ticked or changed until the run is paused or stopped. The same window tags lorebooks and their entries.

Changing the model and protocol of many books

The Mass changes menu (next to Tag books) has the item Mass Change Model/Protocol. It opens a window that puts one Model and/or one Protocol on many books without opening each. Leave a box empty (it shows Do not replace) and that part of the books stays as it is: pick only a model to change the models and keep the protocols. The table lists the books of the current folder by name with the model and protocol they have now; Include subfolders adds the books below it. Type in the filter under Name to narrow the list, tick the books to change (the box in the header ticks all the books that are shown) and press Replace and exit. Books that the filter hides are unticked, so only what you see is changed. A book an agent works on is grayed out: it is locked, so it can not be ticked or changed until the run is paused or stopped.

The item Mass Change Language of the same menu works the same way for the Language of the books: pick the language, filter and tick the books, press Replace and exit. The table shows the language each book has now, with what it inherits from its folders (see Language).

Renaming many books

The item Mass Rename renames the checked books at once. Pick how:

Way	What it does
Add prefix	Puts the Text to add before the name.
Add postfix	Puts the Text to add after the name.
Find and replace	Replaces every occurrence of Find in the name with Replace with (empty removes it). The text is taken as it is, not as a pattern; Case sensitive is off by default.
Number the books	Gives the books numbers: the Name pattern is the new name, with {name} for the current name and {n} for the number, for example {name} {n}, {n}. {name} or Chapter {n}. The first checked book gets Start at, each next one the Step more, and Digits pads the number with zeros (007).

The column New name shows what each checked book would get while you type, so check it before you press Rename. A numbering counts the checked books in the order of the list (by name). Spaces at the start and the end of the new name are removed. Nothing is renamed, and the window stays open, when a text is missing, when the pattern has no {n}, when no name would change, or when a name would end up empty. Filtering, Include subfolders and locked books work as in the other mass changes.

Tag books and the item Tag folders work on the books, or on the folders, of the current folder in the same way.

Creating a book

1. Click Add Book.
2. Enter the name and confirm.

The new book is put into the folder the list shows, and so are the books you import from an archive or from SillyTavern. It opens right away. It starts with your Default Model and Default Protocol from the Settings tab (see Account & settings), if you have set them; otherwise select them on the About tab before generating.

To start a book from a folder of text files, use the import button (file icon, Import from archive) next to Add Book: upload a .zip of .md files and the new book, named after the archive, gets a part for each file, see Importing text files.

Importing from SillyTavern

To continue a roleplay or story you started in SillyTavern, use the import button with the speech bubbles (Import from SillyTavern) next to Add Book. In SillyTavern, export the chat (Manage chat files, or take the .jsonl files from data/<user>/chats/<character>/), then:

1. Upload one or more .jsonl chats. A file that is not a SillyTavern chat is refused, the others stay.

2. Give the book a name (it is filled from the character of the first chat).

3. Tick Merge user and assistant messages into one part if you want one part per turn: the message of the user (several messages in a row are joined with an empty line) becomes the instructions of the part and the answer after it its text. Without it every message is a part of its own, with its text as the text of the part, so the book reads like the chat did.

4. Click Import. A progress window with Stop shows the parts being stored; stopping keeps what was stored.

SillyTavern copies the chat when you create a branch or a checkpoint, so the chats of one story share their beginning. Upload them together and Marginalia finds the common messages and stores them once: the chats become the branches of one tree, which you can walk in the tree view. The swipes (alternative answers) of a message become sibling parts, and the book opens at the end of the chat written last (by the date of its last message). Chats that don't begin with the same message become separate first parts. Hidden (system) messages are skipped, and so are swipes that are empty. The reasoning and the model name of an answer are kept with the part.

To start a book from a backup file, use Import Backup as New Book in the Settings tab, see Book backups.

The About tab

Field
Name	The name of the book.
Tags	Tags for sorting your books and for lorebook activation. Type to pick an existing tag or create a new one.
Description	What the book is about. Available to the prompt templates as the book description.
Language	The language the book is written in. Used for automatic hyphenation of the text in the book reading style and in the viewer; it does not change what the model writes. Empty means inherit: the language of the nearest folder above the book that sets one, else English; the box then shows which and from where.
Model	The inference provider that writes this book.
Protocols	The protocol with the generation settings.
Versions kept per part	How many earlier versions of the text of a part the history keeps. Empty means inherit: the grey number in the box is the limit that applies and the line under it says which folder, your settings or the administrator sets it. 0 keeps no history.
Published	Lets other users read the book, see Publishing & viewer. Once checked, the reader link of the book (<address of Marginalia>/view/<book ID>) is shown under the checkbox; copy it and send it to the readers.

Changes are saved as you type.

Below are read-only counts:

Total Word Count, Total Token Count	All parts of the book, in all branches.
Active Branch Word Count, Active Branch Token Count	Only the parts of the active branch.

A book needs a model and a protocol to generate. Without them, generating stops with Book is missing model. or Book is missing protocol.

Deleting a book

Click the trash button in the book list and confirm. The book disappears from your list.

Deleted books are not removed from the database right away. Until an administrator removes them, with all their parts, using Cleanup, you can bring the book back from the Trash tab. Until then the data is still in the database backups. The book's own backups are files and stay where they are.