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Manual Installation

A Holt edited this page Oct 9, 2024 · 52 revisions

Manual Installation on Linux

If you want to manually install Calibre-Web (“from source”), follow the instructions below.

These instructions assume a Debian-based Linux distribution (Ubuntu, Raspberry Pi OS...)

  1. Switch to user root:

    • sudo -i
  2. Install git, imagemagick, netifaces, pip, venv, and cryptography:

    • apt install git imagemagick python3-netifaces python3-pip python3-venv python3-cryptography

    PRO TIPS:

    • On Ubuntu and Debian, python3-cryptography is installed by default, unlike on Raspberry Pi OS.
    • Installing python3-cryptography may not be required if you install a newer version of cryptography using pip, as described in Step 6.
  3. Download and extract Calibre-Web:

    • cd /opt
    • git clone https://github.com/janeczku/calibre-web
    • cd calibre-web
  4. Create a virtual environment for Calibre-Web:

    • python3 -m venv venv
  5. Install dependencies by running:

    • ./venv/bin/python3 -m pip install -r requirements.txt
  6. As of 2024-10-09, the OS version of python3-cryptography is mysteriously no longer enough (as tested on 4 OS's — Debian 12, Debian 13, Ubuntu 24.04, Ubuntu 24.10), so install cryptography using pip:

    • ./venv/bin/python3 -m pip install cryptography
  1. Run Calibre-Web: (FYI the command below does NOT come back to the prompt, and that's OK!)

    • ./venv/bin/python3 cps.py

    PRO TIP:

    • Or use nohup ./venv/bin/python3 cps.py if you want to exit the terminal window.
  2. Browse to try it out!

Additional Issues and Considerations: (several below appear old, and no longer relevant!)

  1. Raspberry Pi (Raspberry Pi OS):

    1. Depending on your version of pip, the installation might fail with Failed to build cryptography.
      • If you encounter this issue, try updating pip:
        • ./venv/bin/python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip
      • If the error persists, install cargo:
        • apt install cargo
      • Then, try installing Calibre-Web again.
  2. Ubuntu:

    1. On some Ubuntu versions, you may encounter the error can't combine user with prefix. This is a known bug and can be resolved by installing the requirements with the --system flag:
      • ./venv/bin/python3 -m pip install --system -r requirements.txt
  3. Configuration Files:

    1. All configuration files (settings database, log files) are stored in the Calibre-Web root folder (in this example, /opt/calibre-web). Additional config files, such as those for Google Drive or Gmail integration, should be placed there as well.

Manual Installation on Windows

On Windows, pip and venv are included with the basic Python installation. Follow the steps below:

  1. Download and install the newest Python version for Windows from python.org.

  2. Open a command prompt (cmd) and navigate to the folder where you want to install Calibre-Web, e.g., c:\calibre-web.

  3. Create a virtual environment for Calibre-Web in the folder venv:

    • c:\python\python.exe -m venv venv
      (This example assumes Python is installed in c:\python.)
  4. Download and extract Calibre-Web into the current folder (in this example, c:\calibre-web) from the releases page on Github.

  5. Install dependencies by running:

    • .\venv\Scripts\python3.exe -m pip install -r requirements.txt
      (Executed from the c:\calibre-web folder.)
  6. Run Calibre-Web with the command:

    • .\venv\Scripts\python3.exe cps.py

Configuration Files: All configuration files (settings database, log files) are stored in the Calibre-Web root folder (in this example, c:\calibre-web). Additional config files (e.g., for Google Drive or Gmail) should also be placed here.