Customising Calibre Content Server

[deadfly]

Hello all!

Has anyone customized their content server site? Any tips? I really love Calibre, but it would be excellent if I could design my own first page, where I can add some intro text and give links to parts of my library.

Also, is it possible to skip the "Choose the calibre library to browse" step if there is only one library?

Thanks so much for any help!


Jessica

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by deadfly

Hello all!

Has anyone customized their content server site? Any tips? I really love Calibre, but it would be excellent if I could design my own first page, where I can add some intro text and give links to parts of my library.

In the install folder there's this sub folder .../app/resources/content-server. If you copy that folder to the .../resources folder within the calibre configuration folder you can edit the various files.

Delete anything you don't want to change - e.g. locales.zip, calibre.png, calibre.appcache (I don't know what that is). The files have a Read Only disposition, so they may copy as that, in which case you will have to turn that off.

That's the theoretical bit, I have not tried editing the HTML or CSS files myself, so I can offer no practical advice - happy hacking

BR

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

That's the theoretical bit, I have not tried editing the HTML or CSS files myself, so I can offer no practical advice - happy hacking

I recently looked into modifying the HTML but it's pretty much pure javascript. Hence, I'm sticking to COPS and Calibre-PHP server.

[kovidgoyal]

Simply bookmark the library page instead of the start page if you would like to skip the choose library page.

As for customization, not really. The server is essentially a program, it does everything via javascript.

[deadfly]

Thanks, BetterRed! I'll try that!

Thanks also, ilovejedd. Can you tell me a bit about COPS and Calibre-PHP server? I haven't heard of them. I've been using Calibre for many years, but haven't delved too deep into any third-party stuff.

Thanks again!

Jessica

[deadfly]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Simply bookmark the library page instead of the start page if you would like to skip the choose library page.

As for customization, not really. The server is essentially a program, it does everything via javascript.

Thanks, kovidgoyal, I can certainly bookmark the library page for when I access it myself, but the library URL is a bit of a mouthful when giving it to other people...


Jessica

[kovidgoyal]

I doubt you give them the home page URL verbally either, so just share the library page URL instead.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by deadfly

Thanks also, ilovejedd. Can you tell me a bit about COPS and Calibre-PHP server? I haven't heard of them. I've been using Calibre for many years, but haven't delved too deep into any third-party stuff.

Both are PHP-based, lightweight alternatives to Calibre content server. You'd need a web server to run these.

COPS:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=170903
https://blog.slucas.fr/projects/cali...ds-php-server/

Calibre-PHP server (no longer maintained):
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=104188
http://charles.the-haleys.org/calibre/

I use both - COPS for OPDS and Calibre-PHP for HTML. It was easier changing the templates/layout on the latter to play nice with the experimental browser on the PW3/PW4 so I don't have to zoom in all the time. Despite not having been updated since 2012, Calibre-PHP server still works quite well and it's got more robust support for custom columns compared to COPS.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

I doubt you give them the home page URL verbally either, so just share the library page URL instead.

Is it supposed to work with password-protected user accounts? I bookmarked the list view sorted by author and series, but it didn't work with password protection (gave an error message which I cannot remember right now, have to try again.) This was with the latest Calibre on Windows 10, both Chrome and Firefox.

[kovidgoyal]

yes, password protection should not make any difference.

[Sirtel]

Well, I tried again now. Sometimes it gave the following error message:

Failed to load books from calibre library, with error:
Failed to communicate with "/interface-data/books-init?library_id=Kirjandus&sort=author_sort.asc%2C% 20series.asc&1551961695483", with status: [401] Unauthorized

Go back to the home page

And sometimes there was no error message, I could log in, but the home page was totally unsorted and displayed the cover grid instead of book list.

When I disabled the password protection, the bookmark worked as it should.

The server log said An established connection was aborted by the software in your host machine. I tried with two different computers, same result and the same message in the log.

[kovidgoyal]

Just hitting refresh in the browser should take care fo that error.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Just hitting refresh in the browser should take care fo that error.

Unfortunately not. No matter what I try, I cannot get the bookmark to work with password either in Chrome or Firefox. I always get the error message or the default home page (unsorted). I even tried logging in to the server, going back to the browser home page, going to the bookmarked page again. Nope. Still the default unsorted front page. The only way I could get the bookmark to work was to manually sort everything again, then going back to the browser home page, and then going to the bookmarked page again. Then it worked, but it's pretty pointless doing it this way, when I have to sort everything manually anyway every time I log in.

Another thing. I wrote in a previous post that the bookmark worked without password, but I found now that it works only when I have already been there before and have the cookies saved. When I delete the cookies or go to the bookmarked page in a different browser, then it doesn't work (takes me to the default unsorted home page). So if I hypothetically give the URL to a person who has not used the content server before (no cookies from previous sessions), then he or she won't get the bookmarked page even without password.

[kovidgoyal]

Can you post one of these URLs you are trying to bookmark?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by kovidgoyal

Can you post one of these URLs you are trying to bookmark?

http://xxx.xxx.x.xx:8080/#library_id...asc,series.asc