6 ms·

Great app. I know everyone likes to extol the UNIX "A program should do one thing and do it well" philosophy, but Calibre is one of the few "monolithic" apps I

Great app. I know everyone likes to extol the UNIX "A program should do one thing and do it well" philosophy, but Calibre is one of the few "monolithic" apps I can think of that justifies the bulk. It does everything you could want it to do regarding eBooks: viewing, editing, management, delivery, etc.

paol 7y ago
Don't forget DRM stripping.
- AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
  I had mentally lumped that under "management," but maybe I should've added "conversion" as a category. Certainly DeDRM Tools has been worth the price of admission alone.
- hiram112 7y ago
  Do you know if the various 'add-ons' that were required to strip Kindle of DRM are still available and updated. Years ago, I enjoyed stripping my own purchased Kindle books to ePub with Calibre, so I could read them on my non-Kindle device, but it wasn't so easy as the patches became harder to find, and Amazon would constantly change their DRM.
  - skrowl 7y ago
    That's the primary reason I use it. Strip DRM from my purchased books and then upload to Google Books for viewing on all my devices.
    - michaelmrose 7y ago
      Have you considered that maybe you shouldn't be buying DRM content in the first place? If you are going to spend money buy a physical book and consider passing it on after you have read it if you don't want to reread or refer to later.
      - captn3m0 7y ago
        Sometimes I don’t want a physical copy because it is: 1. unavailable in my country at a reasonable price 2. Something I’d rather read while travelling. And often, Kindle e-books are the only ones that are priced by region. I try to buy from DRM free stores wherever possible, but it isn’t always doable.
        michaelmrose 7y ago
        Maybe piracy would be more acceptable? You could always mail the author the cost of the ebook if he doesn't have an online method to accept donations.
        captn3m0 7y ago
        I've done that in the past, but a lot of authors have rightful objections to this, since these direct payments to authors don't reach publishers, editors, and many other people who make the book happen.
      - skrowl 7y ago
        Unfortunately, many books are ONLY available from stores that still use DRM. Physical books are much less convenient in that I can't carry 50 of them around in my pocket like I can with books on my phone.
        michaelmrose 7y ago
        Buy the book from author, donate to someone, download from the internet.
  - AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
    Search for "DeDRM", follow the first result you see to Apprentice Alf's blog. That should lead you to the GH repo with instructions. It's still a bit of a pain, you may need to intentionally downgrade your version of the Amazon for Kindle app to an older version where the tools can break the encryption. But it can be done.
    - jpindar 7y ago
      Or you can download the older file format from the Amazon web page under "Manage Your Content and Devices", "Download and transfer via USB".
    - input_sh 7y ago
      The pain kinda disappears if you have a physical Kindle. You enter the serial number once during setup of the plugin, then download the books from amazon.com/myk ("Download & transfer via USB" option), and just drag-and-drop downloaded files into Calibre's interface. Works on Ubuntu too, which is really a PITA otherwise.
      - captn3m0 7y ago
        I never managed to get this working weirdly. Still running Kindle for PC 1.17 on Wine.
- bredren 7y ago
  Technically plugins do this, right?
tomlong 7y ago
Somewhat interestingly, under the hood calibre seems to be a bunch of little tools, strung together by the UI: Here's what's under calibre/bin calibre calibre-complete calibre-customize calibredb calibre-debug calibre-parallel calibre_postinstall calibre-server calibre-smtp cjpeg ebook-convert ebook-device ebook-edit ebook-meta ebook-polish ebook-viewer fetch-ebook-metadata jpegtran JxrDecApp lrf2lrs lrfviewer lrs2lrf markdown-calibre optipng pdfinfo pdftohtml pdftoppm web2disk You can use many (possibly all) of these independently of the UI.
- Mediterraneo10 7y ago
  Thanks for mentioning this. I didn't know that Calibre packages its own optipng, a program for which there have been some security advisories in recent years. I hope Calibre keeps pace with upstream releases of these tools.
- AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
  If it helps to think of Calibre as a "toolkit," then, instead of a single monolithic app, I'm all for it. It's funny, if they released a version of Calibre that had only the bins you mentioned and omitted the GUI entirely, it would probably be held in much higher esteem among the HN community.
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    I’d argue this is true in general: I once gave a presentation about a (IMO) pretty decent tool but made the mistake of demonstrating it with a UI that was usable but needed work. It got a lot worse of a reaction than an earlier and worse version of the same tool where I ran it from the command line.
    - AdrianB1 7y ago
      Showing tools that work, CLI or not, is better than showing something that barely works. It is a very natural and logical explanation.
- 7y ago

paol 7y ago

Don't forget DRM stripping.

AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
I had mentally lumped that under "management," but maybe I should've added "conversion" as a category. Certainly DeDRM Tools has been worth the price of admission alone.
hiram112 7y ago
Do you know if the various 'add-ons' that were required to strip Kindle of DRM are still available and updated. Years ago, I enjoyed stripping my own purchased Kindle books to ePub with Calibre, so I could read them on my non-Kindle device, but it wasn't so easy as the patches became harder to find, and Amazon would constantly change their DRM.
- skrowl 7y ago
  That's the primary reason I use it. Strip DRM from my purchased books and then upload to Google Books for viewing on all my devices.
  - michaelmrose 7y ago
    Have you considered that maybe you shouldn't be buying DRM content in the first place? If you are going to spend money buy a physical book and consider passing it on after you have read it if you don't want to reread or refer to later.
    - captn3m0 7y ago
      Sometimes I don’t want a physical copy because it is: 1. unavailable in my country at a reasonable price 2. Something I’d rather read while travelling. And often, Kindle e-books are the only ones that are priced by region. I try to buy from DRM free stores wherever possible, but it isn’t always doable.
      - michaelmrose 7y ago
        Maybe piracy would be more acceptable? You could always mail the author the cost of the ebook if he doesn't have an online method to accept donations.
        captn3m0 7y ago
        I've done that in the past, but a lot of authors have rightful objections to this, since these direct payments to authors don't reach publishers, editors, and many other people who make the book happen.
    - skrowl 7y ago
      Unfortunately, many books are ONLY available from stores that still use DRM. Physical books are much less convenient in that I can't carry 50 of them around in my pocket like I can with books on my phone.
      - michaelmrose 7y ago
        Buy the book from author, donate to someone, download from the internet.
- AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
  Search for "DeDRM", follow the first result you see to Apprentice Alf's blog. That should lead you to the GH repo with instructions. It's still a bit of a pain, you may need to intentionally downgrade your version of the Amazon for Kindle app to an older version where the tools can break the encryption. But it can be done.
  - jpindar 7y ago
    Or you can download the older file format from the Amazon web page under "Manage Your Content and Devices", "Download and transfer via USB".
  - input_sh 7y ago
    The pain kinda disappears if you have a physical Kindle. You enter the serial number once during setup of the plugin, then download the books from amazon.com/myk ("Download & transfer via USB" option), and just drag-and-drop downloaded files into Calibre's interface. Works on Ubuntu too, which is really a PITA otherwise.
    - captn3m0 7y ago
      I never managed to get this working weirdly. Still running Kindle for PC 1.17 on Wine.
bredren 7y ago
Technically plugins do this, right?

tomlong 7y ago

Somewhat interestingly, under the hood calibre seems to be a bunch of little tools, strung together by the UI: Here's what's under calibre/bin calibre calibre-complete calibre-customize calibredb calibre-debug calibre-parallel calibre_postinstall calibre-server calibre-smtp cjpeg ebook-convert ebook-device ebook-edit ebook-meta ebook-polish ebook-viewer fetch-ebook-metadata jpegtran JxrDecApp lrf2lrs lrfviewer lrs2lrf markdown-calibre optipng pdfinfo pdftohtml pdftoppm web2disk You can use many (possibly all) of these independently of the UI.

Mediterraneo10 7y ago
Thanks for mentioning this. I didn't know that Calibre packages its own optipng, a program for which there have been some security advisories in recent years. I hope Calibre keeps pace with upstream releases of these tools.
AdmiralAsshat 7y ago
If it helps to think of Calibre as a "toolkit," then, instead of a single monolithic app, I'm all for it. It's funny, if they released a version of Calibre that had only the bins you mentioned and omitted the GUI entirely, it would probably be held in much higher esteem among the HN community.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  I’d argue this is true in general: I once gave a presentation about a (IMO) pretty decent tool but made the mistake of demonstrating it with a UI that was usable but needed work. It got a lot worse of a reaction than an earlier and worse version of the same tool where I ran it from the command line.
  - AdrianB1 7y ago
    Showing tools that work, CLI or not, is better than showing something that barely works. It is a very natural and logical explanation.
7y ago