Running a comic/ebook reader service on Raspberry Pi (Ubooquity)
Ubooquity is a free home server for comics and ebooks.
It is built with Java, but lightweight enough for being run on Raspberry Pi.
Here are a few steps for setting it up on your Raspberry Pi.
0. Install required packages
As mentioned above, Ubooquity is built with Java, so you need Java 7+ on your machine.
1. Download Ubooquity
Download .zip file from this page, and unzip it.
2. Start Ubooquity
Run the unzipped .jar file with java:
and open your web browser with url: http://localhost:8080/admin
.
3. Administration
When you open the url above, you will be greeted with a page which demands a new administrator password:
Type yours and continue to the administration page.
A. Create Users
First, click Edit
on Security section.
Check Protect shared content with user accounts
and click Apply
there.
Go back to the Security section and click Create new user
for creating a new user.
Now you will see the newly added user in the Security section.
B. Setup Comics and Books Directories
Click Edit
on Comics and/or Books section.
Type your comics’ and ebooks’ directories into Shared directory,
and also the users into Authorized users.
Click Apply
for applying them.
C. Other Settings
You can set other useful values in General and Advanced section.
4. Login as a User
Now open your web browser with url: http://localhost:8080
.
You can login with the id and password of a new user.
After logging in, you can read your comics and ebooks.
5. Running Ubooquity as a Service
Until now, Ubooquity was running from the command line.
It can be a nice choice for testing, but not good at all for everyday use.
So let’s register Ubooquity as a systemd service.
First, create a service file:
and fill it with following content:
Edit User and WorkingDirectory to yours, and if needed, also change the port number.
If you want to start Ubooquity on every boot, do the following:
If you just want to start or stop it now, do the following:
All done.
Ubooquity is really a nice solution for serving comics and ebooks.
If you’re running your Raspberry Pi as a NAS or alike, I think there would be no better choice for it.