This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
For the self-hosters among us:
calibre-web-automated and [grimmory] (https://grimmory.org/) are two examples of self-hosted ebook management platforms that integrate with the Kobo ereader very nicely.
I'm sure there are other FOSS solutions as well out there, whom integrate with the Kobo ereader.
I'm getting more and more convinced to buy an ereader from this company.
Also, can I upload my own books via wifi?
Not directly. I upload to Dropbox and can download from there.
I will report that I have not tried uploading books via WiFi to my kobo, but I have had such simple and straightforward success by plugging the kobo into a laptop and simply dropping book files onto it like an external drive. Kobo handles the rest
Send.djazz.se
You can do this over hotspot, but it's not as convenient as just dropping it in GDrive
Never tried via WiFi, I just use calibre. But you probably can, it's rich with features.
I might be asking too much of a random guy, but if you own a kobo, can you pls check if such a feature exists?
Not natively. As someone else said, you can use calibre. You can also use Grimmory if you have that set up/access to someone's grimmory server, but it does require going into the config files of your Kobo.
Standard operating procedure is just to plug it into the computer and drop files into it.
EDIT: This is said from an owner of a Clara B/W I can't speak to other models.
Sorry, I no longer own one. Had one a few years ago tho and was very happy with it. I used to mostly sideload books via calibre through a cable connection but I'd be surprised if it wasn't feasible via WiFi. IIRC I put an android launcher on it so was also able to use the browser to download directly from various free books sites.
It's ok . thank you
I use calibre web for this. It is a bit funky to setup though depending on your level of experience. Here's a guide to look over https://jccpalmer.com/posts/setting-up-kobo-sync-with-calibre-web/
Ugh calibre is really just so ass
10/10 features
0/10 UX
I would never let mine online, but still that does sound neat.
will this work for sideloaded books from calibre?
Likely not, only for registered books (Koo/Overdrive).
Nice 👌🏻 Kobo readers are great, and will now be greaterer 😁
Amazon should never been allowed to buy Goodreads.
Amazon should not be able lock authors into exclusivity contracts with Kindle Unlimited either, but who's gonna stop them?
My wife lost her amazon account (with all her ebooks) twice and she still buys ebooks there. I managed to import a Kobo from Paraguay to try and get her off the hook but it only worked for like 3 months as almost everything is amazon exclusive these days.
(both times she lost the accounts for disputing credit card charges that were not tied to her account)
You should check out Anna's Archive you can download whatever from there and upload it to her kindle using Calibre. Just make sure to use the links from Wikipedia for Anna's Archive.
I was never a heavy GR user because it felt like homework for reading, but I used to really enjoy reading user reviews on books I particularly disliked. Some of the reviews were more well written than the thing being reviewed. It makes me so upset that amazon is now profiting off of the dedication of the GR community.
And then some other evil corporation buys story graph and we are back to square one, instead of building these proprietary integrations why don't companies just build open systems and people can setup the integrations on their own. If you read ebooks on windows Microsoft doesn't have to build a direct integration with some book tracking website, because a computer isn't a locked down hardware device, it's a open platform that gives the user the freedom to do whatever they want. In 2026 most devices should be running open platforms.
Kobos are already owned by a giant megacorp, but because it's Japanese most of the west hasn't heard of it
Kobos are just running Linux, albeit somewhat stripped down. You can run open source software on them just fine.
I have been using Storygraph for about 4 years and I love it. It has so many good filters and options when you are looking for a book to read. Even the automatic recommendation engine is pretty good. I picked up quite a few books from there. I have never done that on goodreads.
Only thing I am missing from Goodreads are Author's pages. When you click on an author's name on Storygraph, it just shows you their name and all their books in infinite scroll and in random order. Not even chronologically or alphabetically sorted, or even by series. No, nothing and you can't change that. There is no photo of an author or their bio either.
I really hope they view change that.
I don't like the website design much; feels like it runs on Electron or something, just not as snappy as the good old CSS of Goodreads. And their choice to implement AI stuff is annoying. But I'm happy they can be real competition for Amazon.
Yeah the author pages need work, as do the reviews/social aspect.
I completely forgot that there is some AI stuff on storygraph, because you can easily turn it off in settings and then you will never see it again. But I get what you mean.
I would love to have https://joinbookwyrm.com/ capability. That would be fun. You finish a book, and bookwyrm would auto tell you were finished. Give users the option to post about it.
For those interested in bookwyrm, the main instance is really slow. The second biggest English instance is invite only, and I've been waiting a week and the owner still hasn't responded.
The rambling readers instance seems to be three way to go.
Yeah - I've been burned so often by companies entshittifying their product that I simply stopped using new commercial services. I mean - if I start using Storygraph, their goal is to annoy me as much as possible until I buy their $50/year subscription. The fediverse is so awesome because it it the opposite of that.
Bookwyrm looks really neat. Thanks for mentioning it.
