[HN Gopher] Calibre Replacement Considerations (2019)
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Calibre Replacement Considerations (2019)
Author : edward
Score : 81 points
Date : 2023-09-02 19:48 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (anarc.at)
(TXT) w3m dump (anarc.at)
| toenail wrote:
| This seems to be from 2019. Still no viable fork in sight. Yawn.
| Can't be so bad.
| [deleted]
| RockRobotRock wrote:
| fire up your IDE
| JadeNB wrote:
| I think toenail meant less "will no one rid me of this
| turbulent reader?", and more "if it were really so bad, then
| someone would have written some sort of alternative solution
| already." (I'm not sure I agree with the assertion, but, if
| I've read it correctly, then "fire up your IDE" doesn't seem
| to address it.)
| RockRobotRock wrote:
| good point! i see what they meant now.
| CameronNemo wrote:
| Not the original commenter, but if the code is as messy as
| the blog post states, a fork might not be the ideal choice.
| Might be better to start cutting out libraries, then
| implement bespoke, feature-specific applications on top of
| them.
| mcpackieh wrote:
| I don't use the Calibre GUI for anything, I have my own library
| management software, but the `ebook-convert` command-line tool
| which comes with Calibre is very useful. Much respect to Kovid
| Goyal for making these tools.
| redandblack wrote:
| Best is someone familiar with the LLM based coding tools to help
| the calibre team refactor their code.
|
| IMHO, calibre components can be replaced with other tools, but
| very difficult to assemble and engage an open source team
| successfully as they have shown. I have the same view on VLC also
| nerdponx wrote:
| Are LLMs useful for large-scale refactoring? Seems like you'd
| need a specific model for that.
| ilyagr wrote:
| I think installing Calibre is a good use case for installing Nix
| (https://www.nixos.org).
|
| Unfortunately, you might also need
| https://github.com/guibou/nixGL to run graphical apps under Nix.
| It's a shell script to use the correct OpenGL library.
| MattPalmer1086 wrote:
| I really only have 3 use cases for Calibre : "sync my device with
| my library", "convert format", and "strip DRM".
|
| I can never figure out how to do those things without massive
| research each time I need to do them.
|
| Maybe it's just me, but I do find the UI horribly confusing.
| ghostpepper wrote:
| I think you can do most/all of that from the command line using
| tools like ebook-convert
| freedomben wrote:
| For the last several years I've had terrible luck with number
| 3, though I supect that's entirely amazon's fault rather than
| calibre. It's a real shame too because I used to buy _a lot_ of
| books, but once I couldn 't read them on the device I wanted
| (like Remarkable tablet) there's no point in buying anymore so
| I stopped. I still buy from DRM-free sellers, but most of the
| books I want to read are only available through the popular
| e-reader store.
| fbdab103 wrote:
| Similar boat, I have not been able to open some books for the
| last few times I have tried.
| unethical_ban wrote:
| Amazon books _published_ after some date in 2023 have new
| formatting /encryption.
|
| Now I think for those new books, you need to do some hoop
| jumping about "send to device" with an old kindle or PC.
| rolobio wrote:
| This is correct. My answer is simply to not buy any
| Kindle books. In the future, I may buy some again if I
| can strip DRM.
| LegitShady wrote:
| the strip DRM part was always a plugin for calibre, not a
| native function.
|
| Personally Calibre did amazing work for me always, even if
| the UI was clunky. When I used a kindle i had it set up to
| immediately convert everything to a non DRM format and use
| amazon whispernet (or whatever they're calling it now) to
| send them automatically and wirelessly to the device.
|
| Hard to argue with that kind of flawless performance.
| michaelmrose wrote:
| 1: Sync 1a: Plug in device via USB, right click, send to device
| 1b: with your android/ios device connect wirelessly with the
| calibre companion app, right click, send to device
|
| Tips:
|
| calibre companion avoid the need to fiddle with a usb cord and
| worry about your device properly talk to your computer
| something that is harder than it ought to be with
| phones/tablets
|
| ondevice:false shows you all the books in your library that
| aren't on the connected device and can be combined with any
| other query eg tags:scifi and ondevice:false. If its harder
| than this you may be selected a device that was not only
| proprietary and shitty but also uncommon so that calibre don't
| know how to work around its shittiness.
|
| 2: right click book book convert individually/bulk convert
|
| Tips:
|
| If you want to know what things are not in your preferred
| format say you want epub and not mobi you can search for
| formats:mobi and not formats:epub. This makes it easy to ensure
| everything is in a format that for instance works well with
| your device.
|
| Don't expect conversions to and from PDF to work well. If might
| turn out readable but it wont be optimal. It works MUCH better
| converting between more standardized ebook formats.
|
| 3. You CAN configure calibre to strip DRM on import
| automatically but this is inherently going to be a continuing
| struggle because its an arms race. Consider just not buying
| books that are protected by DRM. You can virtually always get a
| book without DRM, get a pirated version that doesn't by its
| nature have DRM, or a physical book. Hell if you like buy a
| physical book and donate it and enjoy your pirated book without
| guilt.
|
| If you find the interface confusing in the settings you can
| literally customize
|
| - the items that show up in the toolbar - the items that show
| up in the toolbar when a device is connected - the context menu
| that pops up when you click a book in each type of view if need
| be
|
| You can further customize short cuts including single key
| shortcuts
|
| If you do 3 things you can have 3 buttons in the toolbar or if
| you please 3 single character shortcuts. Want e to edit the
| books info and s to send it to your connected device then
| configure it so.
| stoolpigeon wrote:
| Number 3 makes it worth it alone. If I buy something I want to
| be able to back it up and own it.
|
| Number 2 is awesome because when people publish without DRM,
| effectively I don't need to worry about the format.
|
| The first has never been that big a deal to me but I'll always
| have it on a machine I use for the other two.
| 5e92cb50239222b wrote:
| $ ebook-convert source.fb2 .epub
|
| I don't know about the other two, never needed them.
| bane wrote:
| I have a pretty sizable library of e-books (comics, magazines,
| regular books, PDFs, papers, etc.). The way I manage, organize,
| and read them is very personal to my workflows and interests.
| As a result I've pulled together a hodge-podge of different
| tools to accomplish what I want, and it works very well for me.
|
| Calibre is not one of those tools.
|
| However, to be fair, I have the feeling that Calibre is mostly
| the result of Kovid Goyal's version of what I do, but he
| decided to write some software to do it back when there were
| fewer choices. As a result, it's highly personal to his
| interests and workflow, and lots of the complaints about it are
| really just a result of other people wanting to do things their
| own highly personal way and running into an impedance mismatch
| with Goyal's way, just like they'd run into one with how I do
| things.
|
| It's clear that there's huge demand for ebook management
| software, but there's no comprehensive "Plex" for ebooks, and
| as a result you end up having to strap together your own stuff
| to get it working.
| davidgerard wrote:
| (2019)
|
| Calibre 6.x is in current Debian
| https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/calibre
| Aisen8010 wrote:
| Calibre always had some update. It was annoying.
| [deleted]
| aaron695 wrote:
| > I know almost exactly zero people that have an ebook reader
| that do not use Calibre.
|
| Calibre is like curl an important part of the foundation of the
| worlds knowledge base, except Kovid Goyal doesn't have a wiki
| page.
|
| While MIT blowhards came up with BS like OLPC, Calibre has helped
| spread books worldwide.
|
| It was great Kovid Goyal got Calibre to Python 3 as the sole (?)
| developer , I'm not sure if any of the complainers offered to pay
| to get it there quicker?
|
| I have no idea why the blog post is getting upvoted, but I'm sure
| helping Calibre along with bug fixes or $ is better than the
| most/all of the musings in the blog.
|
| Experiences in FOSS | Kovid Goyal (2022)
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-nFFtQt-Gg
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