Enhancement Request: Perform Conversion from Content Server UI

[ac4lt]

I suspect it's becoming more common for multiple devices to source books from a single calibre install. For example, a family with a kindle, ipad and an iphone.

Using the content server it is pretty easy to grab a copy of the book and read on your preferred device but only if the needed format already exists.

In this situation calibre's "preferred format" is no longer sufficient. The kindle's want mobi, the iOS devices probably want epub. While one can go to theh details page and select the desired format this only works if the necessary format has already been created.

I've got a series of related enhancement requests that I think can make calibre work better in a shared, heterogeneous environment.

1. Allow multiple user id's for the content server. For each userid specify a preferred format.

2. Doing a "get" of the preferred format can do an automatic conversion to the preferred format using canned prespecified conversion settings. Alternatively or in addition, the full conversion dialog could be presented allowing complete control. The converted file could be a transient result that isn't added to the library. This would allow the library to keep only original formats but still allow access to other formats for content server users.

The idea here is sort of like a metadata plugboard but for formats. The library can remain simple, containing only original formats but the devices can have access to whatever they need. Nobody needs to remember to do all the format conversions when adding a new file which should make library maintenance easier.

I know that's a lot of non-trivial work but wanted to put it out there for consideration.