If you haven't figured out already, I'm not very good at naming things. I don't have a name for this project yet, or this project log, but the goal is simple: give e-book lovers control over their library.

For centuries, if a book lover bought a book, they owned it. Currently, if an e-book lover buys an e-book (or any digital product) they are not buying the book, they are buying a license to read the book. In many cases, licenses can be modified or revoked without the seller notifying the book lover. This can lead to strange scenarios like Amazon secretly deleting purchased copies of 1984.

This project aims to at least mitigate this problem by giving book lovers an open source hardware and software solution that truly allows them to own their e-books. The hardware currently follows the Raspberry Pi hat form factor due to its ubiquitous nature, but I hope to generalize the firmware so it does not need to be run on a Raspberry Pi. There is currently a firmware version that runs on the Pine64-LTS.

The project leans on the Calibre E-Book Management software to host and serve a book library. Read the Calibre documentation on how to run a book server with that software. Here's a demo of the hardware and software working together: https://cdn.hackaday.io/files/1923668230186944/Version%203%20Demo.mp4

Visit the repository for the most up-to-date road map, hardware and software files, and intricate details of the project.