COPS : Calibre OPDS PHP Server

[richreads]

Hi.
Just set up COPS on my Synology and it works great .
Looking at the config entries it seems cops_ignored_categories should stop some categories from being displayed.
I've added
$config ['cops_ignored_categories'] = array (publisher,rating,language);
to the config_local.php file and the publisher,rating,language are still showing up.

Am I entering the wrong values?

Thank-you

[vlad59]

Hi,

You shoud just enclose each category with double quote :

$config ['cops_ignored_categories'] = array ("publisher","rating","language");

[mcaron1234]

Hi all,

I'm hoping to get a bit of advice on the best practices for setting permissions in the cops directory. Currently I have them set as chmod -R 0755, but I don't want to give more permissions than necessary. Is this the correct permissions, or should I do something differently?

FYI, I'm running cops on a mac mini using xampp.

[mariosipad]

I never change the permissions of cops from what they were on download/installation.

Most files have pretty restrictive permissions (0644), while directories and some "executable" files?) have permissions more like 0755.

So why change the permissions?

If you cannot edit config_local.php (config_default.php) with your user, either edit them with sudo or give only this file other permissions (0666 = r/w).

[vlad59]

Originally Posted by mcaron1234

Hi all,

I'm hoping to get a bit of advice on the best practices for setting permissions in the cops directory. Currently I have them set as chmod -R 0755, but I don't want to give more permissions than necessary. Is this the correct permissions, or should I do something differently?

FYI, I'm running cops on a mac mini using xampp.

Hi,

Nothing is ever written in the COPS program directory so even if you change all the content to read only it will work fine.

I did that to make it easier to install on every server without being a Linux Guru.

The situation should be the same with the Calibre directory but :
* With PHP, It's impossible to specify that you won't update a Sqlite database so you may need write persmission on the metadata.db
* On Synology DSM5, specific permission have to be set.

[beerygaz]

I see a lot of members are running their library on their Synology NAS and using COPS. What about the FAQ item that says you should not put your Calibre library on a NAS drive? When I try this, I get file lock errors whenever I try to edit metadata, etc. I'd love to store the library on my NAS so that I can use COPS and have all the content in one place, but I'm really struggling with Calibre (Windows) throwing errors all the time.

Anyone found a way around this with a Synology NAS?

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by beerygaz

Anyone found a way around this with a Synology NAS?

Well, it Just Works for me . I know it's not officially supported, but it's giving me no problems. I run a library check every now and again (including a full check of db vs. files on disk) and haven't run into issues yet.

But you could sync a copy of your library to your NAS and run COPS on that.

[Goner]

Originally Posted by beerygaz

Anyone found a way around this with a Synology NAS?

I've been using the calibre library on my DS212j for ages ...
There's even a package to install COPS on a Synology NAS, where did you read it's not supported ??

And did you follow the special instructions : https://github.com/seblucas/cops/wiki/Howto---Synology
(I'm not using the package anymore, it's much easier to just unzip COPS into a folder in your /volume1/web directory and edit the config files)

Did you give the PC user who runs Calibre read/write permissions on the calibre folder on your NAS ?

[vlad59]

Originally Posted by beerygaz

I see a lot of members are running their library on their Synology NAS and using COPS. What about the FAQ item that says you should not put your Calibre library on a NAS drive? When I try this, I get file lock errors whenever I try to edit metadata, etc. I'd love to store the library on my NAS so that I can use COPS and have all the content in one place, but I'm really struggling with Calibre (Windows) throwing errors all the time.

Anyone found a way around this with a Synology NAS?

To tell the truth, mon Calibre library is on my laptop, it's shared to a NAS and a VPS with Bittorrent Sync and in addition I'm the only user so no risk here.

[tony59]

Tag Request

I have been using COPS on my Synology DS412+ very successfully for some months now. I have a request for consideration on future development.

I find the Calibre feature of using a period (.) to seperate tags that then cascade very handy. For example a tag that reads "Fiction.Fantasy.Epic" cascades.
Fiction
|
-->Fantasy
|
--> Epic

This feature make all tag management for me really easy.

Is it possible to include this in a future release please.

Happy to test, but I can't code.

[tony59]

I host my Calibre library on my Synology DS412+ running DSM 5.0 and then sync it back to my desktop hard drive (for backup purposes). I have had no issues at all with this approach. It works really well.

Both COPS installations I am running 0.9.0-1 and 1.0 RC1 (for testing and for working out how to use passwords) work really well.

I prefer this approach as it ensures that any changes are immediately available.

BTW, really appreciate the effort vlad and other coders put into this project.

I follow this thread and used it extensively to help me work out pitfalls not to fall into when starting to use my new NAS for serving my ebooks.

[nangface]

Hi!
Just getting started with COPS, and managed to get it set up. But I want to use password protection, and can't figure out how to properly set it up.
I've uncommented the bit in the .htaccess file to activate it, but can't for the life of me figure out where and how I actually create a username and password!
Sorry if this is really obvious, but I can't find anything about it in the documentation, nor in the config file.
Thanks,
Steve

[bkwrmgrl]

Hi, I love Calibre and have used it for years manually on my laptop. Recently, I used it to convert files to epub and then manually load the books I want to read at that time to Dropbox. Then I load from Dropbox into Marvin.

I wanted to set up Calibre library on my new NAS and have done so. It's updating directly to the NAS. I also wanted to be able to pull the books directly thru Marvin using COPS or OPDS.

I'll be honest, I've read a lot of google search and Mobileread forum posts on both COPS and OPDS for the last 4 weeks including the 62 pages here and frankly I'm still confused about how to set up COPS or OPDS. Nothing I've done have worked so far.

I think the reason is that I'm not a programmer or techie like many enthusiasts here. I've followed the "detailed" instructions but many things that you take for granted is not obvious to newbies. For example, a simple instruction to edit the config_local is not easy when you use MS Notepad. It doesn't show anything that y'all talk about.

After banging my head for days, I finally figured out that I need a PHP editor to actually see the file correctly. There are many other small details like that such as clicking on the install file for COPS does not automatically install like the install file for regular programs.

I'd like to do a pictorial & video instruction to show how to install COPS and OPDS for Calibre so that others would not have the same stress and frustration that I've had. I plan to make it very detailed for the total tech newbie. It probably will also reduce the repetition of the basic questions on this forum.

Would someone be willing to walk me thru the set up for COPS via phone or Skype?

[mariosipad]

Hi,

I'm probably one of those "techies" but I can remember the first time I wanted to set up COPS. Not all was obvious the first time, but I was able to work it out in the end. It's not that difficult once you know what to do.

On what hardware (NAS, Synology?) do you want to install COPS?

Or is your actual objective just to be able to use Marvin with Calibre and enjoy your books? Marvin can connect to Calibre without COPS trough OPDS. (Start Connect/share in Calibre -> Marvin the IP-address to connect to is shown in Calibre -> http://<IP-Caliber>:8080/feed.php -> and it should work!).

To edit the COPS config file (config_local.php) you first have to open (in a text editor such as notepad) config_default.php and then save it to config_local.php.

[mariosipad]

@nangface

On what system (Windows, Linux, Mac, Synology) have you setup COPS?
The solution sometimes depends on this.