Like anything these days I suspect it’s a profit maximisation thing. They push the stuff that makes them the most money, and since people don’t usually keep the full menu in their head if they can’t remember it they can’t order it.

KEPUB (whatever that is)

It’s an EPUB file that’s been optimized for a Kobo device.

And no, I don’t have Calibre running behind this anymore. I took the database Calibre (since I used it previously) had already created, loaded it with Calibre-Web, and it had enough capability that for me at least, I don’t need the desktop app anymore. I’m sure there’s any number of reasons why someone might, but for me, it works on its own.

What version of Calibre-Web are you using? Mine has support to upload an image for a cover. I’m just using the latest docker image from ghcr.io/linuxserver/calibre-web.

My current workflow is pretty basic, I took my Calibre library I already had, dropped it into Calibre-Web and moved to a fully web based setup (so I don’t use Calibre at all anymore, just Calibre-Web). I’ve got the Kobo integration working too so I can mark books to sync to my device through the browser and then just sync my Kobo wirelessly.

I tend to use the Kobo store to purchase new books so I’m a bit lax about grabbing local copies of everything, but whenever I do get new books I can upload them into Calibre-Web, edit the metadata after I match the book, and then I’m good to go. But I also don’t add books that often at the moment, so haven’t seen much point in investing much time into further automation.

My go to choice for this is ocserv to run a Cisco AnyConnect server, and sniproxy to sit on port 443 and handle traffic routing. You configure sniproxy to go to a different server by hostname, and configure ocserv as the fallback option to access the VPN. Any host I expose via sniproxy provides its own HTTPS certificate via my Traefik server.