My e-book management currently consist of storing a bunch of files, both .epub, .pdf and .azw3 stored either by author (fiction) or by topic (non-fiction), for various sources (purchased e-books, downloaded via University subscriptions, Project Guthenberg and some from Library Genesis/Anna’s Archive). For some time I’d been wanting to organize them better, with a web UI to download in a format of my choice and to be able to share with others.
I first found out about and became interested in Booklore, as it seemed to fulfill my needs, and decided to research it more in-depth and oh boy, what drama… I am aware of the Grimmory fork, but I am not touching that with a ten-foot pole until it has matured and can be generally considered to be trustworthy.
So instead I started experimenting with the more established Calibre + Calibre-Web setup (I decided against Calibre Web Automated, as that also seemed a little shady). I find the UI of Calibre-Web to be fine enough for my use, but would have loved to be able to edit more metadata in the UI (it appears I am unable to add a cover for instance). But the Calibre server has so far been very frustrating to work with for me, and does not fit my desired workflow at all. I basically want to be able to dump my files onto my server (and continuously sync local files to the sever), get the metadata mostly automatically sorted with easy options to amend missing metadata (preferably from a web UI and not that screen-share thing that doesn’t even work in Librewolf). I have not found a way for it to automatically import new books, and if I reimport from the directory I dump my books in, it will reimport some of the books where the metadata was changed (some it will realize is the same, and ask to skip), so I end up with multiple duplicates. I work under the assumption that its mostly user errors so far, and I will try to master it better, but so far I find it very intuitive.
I will be looking more into Kavita as well, but so far I know very little about it.
How are you setup in your homelab for e-book management? Would love to see some examples of well-established workflows that works for you.
I kind of railroaded myself into using calibre unfortunately.
I have a very specific filenaming scheme which I originally came up with back when I only used folders for organising my books in order to group together books that belong to a series but where the series is part of a larger universe.
Basically my folder structure is {World}/{Reading Order}; {Series} #{Series_Index} - {Title} - {Author}
On my kobo I have the autoshelf plugin installed which automatically parses this information when I add books and groups them together by world while filling out the series information.
In order to properly make use of this system I need to use Calibre custom columns and be able to export the books I want with this specific name format. I have yet to find a program other than calibre that would support this.
It would probably be smarter for me to reorganize my books at some point but I really like being able to basically drop a ton of books at once onto my reader using SFTP and as far as I can tell all common options rely on manually downloading the books, sending them directly to the reader or pulling them from their internal file storage in whatever form the application stores them…
I do like Audiobookshelf for the ability to add a book to multiple series, but the missing mass export functions stop me from switching
Just today I tried switching from Calibre on my Desktop to calibre-web-automated. But after about an hour of fiddling and searching, I went back to calibre on my PC.
I couldn’t get KOreader on my kindle to simply sync books that I add to my library to my ereader wirelessly.
The best I could manage is use KOreader to subscribe to CWAs OPDS feed, but that doesn’t automatically add new books, I would have to manually go to the OPDS feed and download the books. And apparently, kosync is only able to sync reading progress.
With Calibre on. My desktop, I simply start the program on my PC, enable WiFi in Koreader and new books get automatically downloaded.
Openbooks downloading to Calibre’s auto ingestion folder, all running as a docker compose. OPDS service feeds FBreader on an Android tablet.
I almost wish I hadn’t started using FBReader. It’s ruined me for everything else.
Everytime I try a different reading app it just feels wrong.
Bunch of folders by general theme.
If it wasn’t for the fact that I wanted to share my library with someone else, I would likely stick with my system for quite some time still. But I need it to be browseable for them.
I just use Calibre-Web-Automated. I’m not a hoarder, I usually get one book at a time and I add it via the CWA web interface, often on my phone. Then I download it to my KOReader Tolino via OPDS.
While CWA indeed seems to be optimized for fully automated piracy, it’s working fine for the above-mentioned workflow as well.
I’ve been on Calibre Desktop before, which I used in a similar way, just with Syncthing instead of OPDS.
What is CWA?
Calibre Web Automated
Ah thanks!
Grimmory all the way. Once I tried it I haven’t gone back to my CWA deployment at all. Also, Shelfmark is pretty cool.
I’ve said this in a few other contexts too, but Grimmory/Booklore, while imperfect is loads easier and nicer to use than CW or CWA. You aren’t managing a calibre db + a separate web layer, and this meant I could tighten up my organization significantly since I wasn’t required to be on my host machine.
For me the primary benefits above the interface is the metadata control you have from the web UI. You can dump all those files into a single ingest folder and it will attempt to match metadata with the ability to apply all, or pick and choose as you see fit.
From what I’ve understood, the recent drama was mostly about an immature creator rather than rampant AI generated code.
Grimmory looks sweet, but with the recent drama and the apparent opt-out (but not really) telemetry, the massive amount of AI-generated code etc. I will want to let the age a little before I install that on my server.
That’s fair. The community seems to be much more sane than the original dev and is working hard to clean it up. The first release already removed the telemetry and the obnoxious donation button.
Good to know - I will keep my eyes peeled!
Grimmory
Since you use Grimmory, what does it have that Calibre Web doesn’t
CWA largely removes the need for running Calibre.
I use CWA for the main book “hub” and upload everything (audiobooks and comics too) to it. Then I have audiobookshelf scan the calibre directory, and Komga do the same because the app I use for comics (cdisplayex) doesn’t sync with Koreader yet.
On the client side I use Koreader, Lissen and Cdisplayex.
It works fine but it would be nice to have one app that syncs all progress. And my holy grail is one that can sync ebook and audiobook progress like Amazon’s whispersync!
I’m pretty locked in to Calibre myself. I use a plugin called fanficfare to collect web fictions I like, which generates epubs and updates them when the stories get updated. Across those and regular books I’ve got about 6k books in my digital library. Right now it just runs on my desktop, but I’d like to move it to my server at some point.
As for actually reading them, I either plug in my kobo and manually sync/add books that way, or use the now discontinued Calibre Companion app on android to do the same on my phone. Unfortunately I haven’t found an app that is good enough to replace it for my needs, so I just deal with the app being unstable on the current version of android.I like audiobookshelf since I can self host it and listen to my podcasts. But I’ll admit it does have some issues visually when trying to read on the iOS or iPadOS app. The web view is great though.
Hm, I never considered Audiobookshelf for e-books - I already have it running for audiobooks. I should check that out!
I use mylar3 going to a comics folder and lazy librarian going to a books folder. I use IRCHighway for any books I have trouble finding. They handle the metadata well enough. Kavita is my reader of choice.
What version of Calibre-Web are you using? Mine has support to upload an image for a cover. I’m just using the latest docker image from ghcr.io/linuxserver/calibre-web.
My current workflow is pretty basic, I took my Calibre library I already had, dropped it into Calibre-Web and moved to a fully web based setup (so I don’t use Calibre at all anymore, just Calibre-Web). I’ve got the Kobo integration working too so I can mark books to sync to my device through the browser and then just sync my Kobo wirelessly.
I tend to use the Kobo store to purchase new books so I’m a bit lax about grabbing local copies of everything, but whenever I do get new books I can upload them into Calibre-Web, edit the metadata after I match the book, and then I’m good to go. But I also don’t add books that often at the moment, so haven’t seen much point in investing much time into further automation.
ETA: Well, I toured the Calibre-Web settings again, and now I can upload books and covers. Must have been a little tired on my first attempt. Still couldn’t get the conversion to work properly - I only have the option of going from EPUB -> KEPUB (whatever that is). I typically prefer reading PDF on my current reader, and I have users who need .azw3 for their jailbroken Kindle device. I guess the paths to the conversion tools aren’t properly configured.
ETA2: Now I got the conversion to work as well. Seems like I will be able to use it with Calibre-Web only as well. Nice!
Hm, I’m using lscr.io/linuxserver/calibre-web:latest, which is version 0.6.26 (5a1f3d8eec42d03228b1e5dec9bc750ca10bbc94 - 2026-02-06T20:40:07+01:00). Looked again to see if I could find a way to do it, but no.
How do you upload books directly using Calibre-Web? And do you not have Calibre running behind at all, just the original database?
An other shortcoming of Calibre-Web seems to be that I am unable to convert books from the UI (that is thankfully very easy to do in Calibre). I added some Docker mods that I thought would allow me to do this, but I have at least not found a way.
Nice to know it works with Kobo - I don’t have one, but if my current reader stops working I am likely to get one of those.
KEPUB (whatever that is)
It’s an EPUB file that’s been optimized for a Kobo device.
And no, I don’t have Calibre running behind this anymore. I took the database Calibre (since I used it previously) had already created, loaded it with Calibre-Web, and it had enough capability that for me at least, I don’t need the desktop app anymore. I’m sure there’s any number of reasons why someone might, but for me, it works on its own.
I see you’ve partly solved your upload and cover issue, but I will say that CWA with auto monitoring directories and auto conversion has been a godsend for me.
My workflow is to add the books manually to CWA, and I have a bookshelf that just syncs to my kobo.
