kobodl

This is a hard fork of kobo-book-downloader, a command line tool to download and remove Digital Rights Management (DRM) protection from media legally purchased from Rakuten Kobo. The resulting EPUB files can be read with, amongst others, KOReader.

NOTE: You must have a kobo email login for this tool to work (you can't use an external provider like Google or Facebook). However, you can create a NEW kobo account and link it with your existing account on the user profile page. Go to My Account -> Account Settings to link your new kobo login.

Features

kobodl preserves the features from TnS-hun/kobo-book-downloader.

• stand-alone; no need to run other software or pre-download through an e-reader.
• downloads .epub formatted books

It adds several new features.

• audiobook support; command-line only for now.
  • Use kobodl book get. There will not be a download button in the webpage for audiobooks because they consist of many large files.
• multi-user support; fetch books for multiple accounts.
• web interface; adds new browser gui (with flask)
• docker image
• pypi package

Web UI

WebUI provides most of the same functions of the CLI. It was added to allow other members of a household to add their accounts to kobodl and access their books without having to set up python. An example of how to run kobodl on your server with systemd can be found at subdavis/selfhosted.

Installation

with pipx

pipx install kobodl

with pypi

pip3 install kobodl

with docker

# list users
docker run --rm -it --user $(id -u):$(id -g) \
  -v ${HOME}/.config:/home/config \
  subdavis/kobodl \
  --config /home/config/kobodl.json user list

# run http server
docker run --rm -it --user $(id -u):$(id -g) \
  -p 5000:5000 \
  -v ${HOME}/.config:/home/config \
  -v ${PWD}:/home/downloads \
  subdavis/kobodl \
  --config /home/config/kobodl.json \
  serve \
  --host 0.0.0.0 \
  --output-dir /home/downloads/kobodl_downloads

Usage

General usage

# Get started by adding one or more users
# See `Getting a reCAPTCHA code` below for more help
~$ kobodl user add

# List users
~$ kobodl user list

# Remove a user
~$ kobodl user rm [email protected]

# List books
~$ kobodl book list

# List books for a single user
~$ kobodl book list --user [email protected]

# Show book list help
~$ kobodl book list --help

# Download a single book with default options when only 1 user exists
# default output directory is `./kobo_downloads` 
~$ kobodl book get c1db3f5c-82da-4dda-9d81-fa718d5d1d16

# Download a single book with advanced options
~$ kobodl book get \
  --user [email protected] \
  --output-dir /path/to/download_directory \
  c1db3f5c-82da-4dda-9d81-fa718d5d1d16

# Download ALL books with default options when only 1 user exists
~$ kobodl book get --get-all

# Download ALL books with advanced options
~$ kobodl book get \
  --user [email protected] \
  --output-dir /path/to/download_directory \
  --get-all

Running the web UI

~$ kobodl serve
 * Serving Flask app "kobodl.app" (lazy loading)
 * Environment: production
   WARNING: This is a development server. Do not use it in a production deployment.
   Use a production WSGI server instead.
 * Debug mode: off
 * Running on http://127.0.0.1:5000/ (Press CTRL+C to quit)

Global options

# argument format
~$ kobodl [OPTIONS] COMMAND [ARGS]...

# set python tabulate formatting style.
~$ kobodl --fmt "pretty" COMMAND [ARGS]...

# set config path if different than ~/.config/kobodl.json
~$ kobodl --config /path/to/kobodl.json COMMAND [ARGS]...

# get version
~$ kobodl --version

Getting a reCAPTCHA code

Adding a user requires a bit of hackery to get a reCAPTCHA code from Kobo's website. This GIF helps to explain how to do that.

Development

To get set up for development:

1. clone this repo
2. create a virtual environment (optional)
3. pip3 install -e . to install for development
4. kobodl should be available inside the virtual env

Linting

VS Code is configured to do this for you. Otherwise, run the following:

pip3 install -r dev-requirements.txt
isort -rc kobodl/*
black .

Release

First, update setup.py's version, then run the following

docker build -t subdavis/kobodl .
docker push subdavis/kobodl

python3 setup.py sdist bdist_wheel
twine upload dist/*

Notes

kobo-book-downloader will prompt for your Kobo e-mail address and password. Once it has successfully logged in, it won't ask for them again. Your password will not be stored on disk; Kobodl uses access tokens after the initial login.

Credit recursively to kobo-book-downloader and the projects that lead to it.

FAQ

How does this work?

kobodl works by pretending to be an Android Kobo e-reader. It initializes a device, fetches your library, and downloads books as a "fake" Android app.

Why does this download KEPUB formatted books?

Kobo has different formats that it serves to different platforms. For example, Desktop users generally get EPUB3 books with AdobeDrm DRM. Android users typically get KEPUB books with KDRM DRM, which is fairly easy to remove, so that's what you get when you use this tool.

Is this tool safe and okay to use?

I'm not a lawyer, and the discussion below is strictly academic.

The author(s) of kobodl don't collect any information about you or your account aside from what is made available through metrics from GitHub, PyPi, Docker Hub, etc. See LICENSE.md for further info.

Kobo would probably claim that this tool violates its Terms of Use but I'm not able to conclusively determine that it does so. Some relevant sections are reproduced here.

The download of, and access to any Digital Content is available only to Customers and is intended only for such Customers’ personal and non-commercial use. Any other use of Digital Content downloaded or accessed from the Service is strictly prohibited

This tool should only be used to download books for personal use.

You may not obscure or misrepresent your geographical location, forge headers, use proxies, use IP spoofing or otherwise manipulate identifiers in order to disguise the origin of any message or transmittal you send on or through the Service. You may not pretend that you are, or that you represent, someone else, or impersonate any other individual or entity.

This might be a violation. This client announces itself to Kobo servers as an Android device, which can safely be construed as "manipulating identifiers", but whether or not the purpose is to "disguise the origin" is unclear.

Kobo may also take steps to prevent fraud, such as restricting the number of titles that may be accessed at one time, and monitoring Customer accounts for any activity that may violate these Terms. If Kobo discovers any type of fraud, Kobo reserves the right to take enforcement action including the termination or suspension of a User’s account.

In other words, you could have your account suspended for using kobodl. Please open an issue on the issue tracker if this happens to you.