Calibre Content Server - Basics

ddjohn · 12-09-2011, 01:58 PM

I've been looking for a way to let my family browse (not change) my Calibre Library from other computers in the house. Someone referred me to this forum to learn about Content Server. I've read the User Manual, and spent the entire day searching this forum and still not finding the data I need.

What is Calibre Content Server?
What does it do?
How does it do it?
Is my library passing through the Internet?
Is it Private?
How does someone access my Calibre Library if we set up the Content Server?
What if they don't have Internet access on their computer (just wifi LAN)?

Just the Basics please. So far all I have been able to find on this topic has been problem resolutions. As a non-technical newbie, I need the crayola crayon version of how this works.

ilovejedd · 12-09-2011, 03:23 PM

Quote:

What is Calibre Content Server?
What does it do?
How does it do it?

It's basically a web/http server designed so you can access your Calibre Library via web browser or through the "Online Catalog" function of ereader apps on mobile devices. The how is handled by CherryPy, a lightweight, Python-based web server included in Calibre.

Quote:

Is my library passing through the Internet?
Is it Private?

Through the internet - only if you want it to. It can be as private or as public as you wish. Knowledge of how to set-up firewalls for your specific operating system/security program/router might be necessary.

Quote:

How does someone access my Calibre Library if we set up the Content Server?
What if they don't have Internet access on their computer (just wifi LAN)?

Several methods depending on what device you have. The most generic one being opening a web browser (Safari, Firefox, Chrome, IE, etc) and typing http://192.168.1.100:8080 in the address bar. You will need to replace 192.168.1.100 with the actual, local IP address of the computer running Calibre Content Server. Internet access isn't required

ddjohn · 12-09-2011, 08:15 PM

That was EXACTLY what I needed!!!! Thank you so much. We set it up and gave it a test run. So far it looks pretty good. We will experiment and get familiar with this.

Is it that easy to set it up for long distance also? My daughter lives have way cross the country from us and would love to be able to share our book collection too. Is this possible if you have several computers on the local network and Calibre is only running on one of them? Will the router know which computer to connect to for this?

theducks · 12-09-2011, 11:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddjohn

That was EXACTLY what I needed!!!! Thank you so much. We set it up and gave it a test run. So far it looks pretty good. We will experiment and get familiar with this.

Is it that easy to set it up for long distance also? My daughter lives have way cross the country from us and would love to be able to share our book collection too. Is this possible if you have several computers on the local network and Calibre is only running on one of them? Will the router know which computer to connect to for this?

Long distance, better known as WAN/internet is a lot more complicated.
You will need to assign (or reserve) a Static IP to your Calibre server so it is ALWAYS the same.
Then your Router needs to forward the port being used (8080 is the default) to the IP of your server. (every one doe it differently but the end results are the same)

lastly, you need to know the current Public IP (Not the 192.x.x.x) or use a service like DYNDNS.org so your daughter can enter THAT in her browser.

silverraven · 12-11-2011, 06:12 AM

Quote:

DYNDNS.org

My son set ours up using dyndns, works great! Don't ask me HOW he set it up.........

S

ddjohn · 12-16-2011, 02:01 AM

Ohhhh. This could get complicated. We have a static public IP to the first router (Uverse) then we have a second router to handle the LAN on WiFi(802.N). We have had problems with this configuration before. To access a specific machine on the network (using No-IP), we had to take that machine off the High Speed Wifi router and connect to the Uverse 2Wire. Tedious. Dear daughter may have to wait for spring break to browse the book shelf.

Many thanks for the help getting started with the LAN configuration.

DoctorOhh · 12-16-2011, 02:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddjohn

Dear daughter may have to wait for spring break to browse the book shelf.

You might want to consider this as an option.

melmac · 12-16-2011, 02:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dwanthny

You might want to consider this as an option.

Thats brilliant, Thank you I had no idea that function existed

ddjohn · 12-16-2011, 09:48 PM

We have a large library, so we separated by genre into a couple libraries. I know a lot of people would say "why did you do that?!?", but it was more manageable to have smaller libraries.

But getting back to the Content Server, the guest can only see whichever library is open on the server. (We are running 0.7.47) We stopped updating for a while because we have a stable system and didn't see new features to make updating important. Are there any changes to Content Server in newer versions? The web menu is not as attractive as looking at the Calibre GUI. Is there a setting we should be aware of that allows the guest to select which library to visit?

DoctorOhh · 12-16-2011, 10:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddjohn

But getting back to the Content Server, the guest can only see whichever library is open on the server.

You can run multiple instances of the calibre content server at the same time, read this thread for examples.

12-09-2011, 01:58 PM	#1
ddjohn Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2010 Device: Palm TX; Pandigital-7W	Calibre Content Server - Basics I've been looking for a way to let my family browse (not change) my Calibre Library from other computers in the house. Someone referred me to this forum to learn about Content Server. I've read the User Manual, and spent the entire day searching this forum and still not finding the data I need. What is Calibre Content Server? What does it do? How does it do it? Is my library passing through the Internet? Is it Private? How does someone access my Calibre Library if we set up the Content Server? What if they don't have Internet access on their computer (just wifi LAN)? Just the Basics please. So far all I have been able to find on this topic has been problem resolutions. As a non-technical newbie, I need the crayola crayon version of how this works.

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12-09-2011, 08:15 PM	#3
ddjohn Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2010 Device: Palm TX; Pandigital-7W	That was EXACTLY what I needed!!!! Thank you so much. We set it up and gave it a test run. So far it looks pretty good. We will experiment and get familiar with this. Is it that easy to set it up for long distance also? My daughter lives have way cross the country from us and would love to be able to share our book collection too. Is this possible if you have several computers on the local network and Calibre is only running on one of them? Will the router know which computer to connect to for this?

12-16-2011, 02:01 AM	#6
ddjohn Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2010 Device: Palm TX; Pandigital-7W	Ohhhh. This could get complicated. We have a static public IP to the first router (Uverse) then we have a second router to handle the LAN on WiFi(802.N). We have had problems with this configuration before. To access a specific machine on the network (using No-IP), we had to take that machine off the High Speed Wifi router and connect to the Uverse 2Wire. Tedious. Dear daughter may have to wait for spring break to browse the book shelf. Many thanks for the help getting started with the LAN configuration.

12-16-2011, 09:48 PM	#9
ddjohn Enthusiast Posts: 33 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2010 Device: Palm TX; Pandigital-7W	We have a large library, so we separated by genre into a couple libraries. I know a lot of people would say "why did you do that?!?", but it was more manageable to have smaller libraries. But getting back to the Content Server, the guest can only see whichever library is open on the server. (We are running 0.7.47) We stopped updating for a while because we have a stable system and didn't see new features to make updating important. Are there any changes to Content Server in newer versions? The web menu is not as attractive as looking at the Calibre GUI. Is there a setting we should be aware of that allows the guest to select which library to visit?