I just recently started playing around with an old pc as my homeserver and am curious of any recommendations for lesser known self hostable foss software that you would recommend
So I use calibre as my backend client essentially. My library is managed through there, and I load my books in there as I get new books. It’s a bit clunky, but it’s reliable for what it does, and can even be set to auto tag your books and grab new covers for them
Calibre-web is what I mainly use to interact with it in my day to day uses. It’s a very clean front end that connects to my calibre server, and even has account management if that’s your thing. It’s hosted as a website, so I can access it from anywhere in the world. When I click on a book, I can either read it in the browser, or I can download it. Usually I just download them to my tablet and read them there as you would any other pdf/ebook. It’s a super clean way to manage a ton of books
Is this effectively like having a Kindle account without needing a Kindle? I just ordered an eink tab and am immensely curious about ebook options now that are non-Kindle
It’s more of an ebook manager. I haven’t used a kindle myself, so I can’t give you the best comparison there. It gives me an easy way to access my books from anywhere though since it’s essentially a website connected to my home lab. As long as your e-reader supports downloading epubs and pdfs from websites, this should be a good solution for maintaining your ebook collection
KOreader is a great app for ebooks, and i’m pretty sure it can sync your progress with your phone as well. I’ve put syncthing on my e reader and phone so my books are synced across both devices. I’d also recommend you look into selfhosting wallabag, because you can set up koreader to fetch your saved articles and webpages as well. It’s really handy.
