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haertig · 01-17-2019, 01:34 PM

I haven't had to do a recovery for Calibre, but it looks like itimpi has given you some stellar advice/procedures.

I would comment on your need for backups though. Many people don't do backups, until they run into a disaster situation like you just did. Then they begin doing backups. Hopefully you will become one who now does backups.

For my Calibre library, I have it set up this way: The main installation is on my desktop computer. Every night, that gets backed up to a different computer at a remote site (my entire desktop computer contents, not just Calibre). Additionally, the desktop Calibre installation gets copied over to a third computer (on the same premises as my desktop computer). This third computer is my server, which runs Docker, NGINX and Calibre-Web to make my book collection available on the web for myself and family. So at any moment in time, I have three copies of my Calibre stuff on three different computers - one of them off site. And if somehow my server gets compromised or corrupted, I can easily restore everything from the other copies. Additionally, the server's copy of Calibre is maintained read-only.

I run this same backup and separate server strategy for most all of my media - photographs, music, videos, etc. Initially, I could only access this server remotely by first VPN-ing into my home network. This got a little unwieldy as time went on and I added more family clients on mobile devices. Now I use HTTPS with client-cert authentication for remote access. I haven't switched everything over to that method yet, but I'm working on it. This is why I use NGINX as a frontend for Calibre-Web ... so I can implement HTTP client-cert authentication, which is much more secure than login/password authentication.

01-17-2019, 01:34 PM	#3
haertig Wizard Posts: 1,899 Karma: 31522252 Join Date: Sep 2017 Device: PW3, Fire HD8 Gen7, Moto G7, Sansa Clip v2, Ruizu X26	I haven't had to do a recovery for Calibre, but it looks like itimpi has given you some stellar advice/procedures. I would comment on your need for backups though. Many people don't do backups, until they run into a disaster situation like you just did. Then they begin doing backups. Hopefully you will become one who now does backups. For my Calibre library, I have it set up this way: The main installation is on my desktop computer. Every night, that gets backed up to a different computer at a remote site (my entire desktop computer contents, not just Calibre). Additionally, the desktop Calibre installation gets copied over to a third computer (on the same premises as my desktop computer). This third computer is my server, which runs Docker, NGINX and Calibre-Web to make my book collection available on the web for myself and family. So at any moment in time, I have three copies of my Calibre stuff on three different computers - one of them off site. And if somehow my server gets compromised or corrupted, I can easily restore everything from the other copies. Additionally, the server's copy of Calibre is maintained read-only. I run this same backup and separate server strategy for most all of my media - photographs, music, videos, etc. Initially, I could only access this server remotely by first VPN-ing into my home network. This got a little unwieldy as time went on and I added more family clients on mobile devices. Now I use HTTPS with client-cert authentication for remote access. I haven't switched everything over to that method yet, but I'm working on it. This is why I use NGINX as a frontend for Calibre-Web ... so I can implement HTTP client-cert authentication, which is much more secure than login/password authentication.