Add by ISBN / webcam barcode scanner

[Christian Weiske]

I'm managing my "real" books with calibre, too - adding them is a bit tedious since I have to type the ISBN myself.

http://zbar.sourceforge.net/ is a barcode scanner that can use the webcam. I use its "zbarcam" app to scan the book's bar code from the laptop's webcam, and then copy&paste the ISBN from the terminal into calibre.

zbar offers python bindings, so it could be possible to directly integrate it into calibre. I'd love that.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

Right click the add books button and use the Add from ISBN action, this
allows you to copy paste a whole bunch of ISBNs at once.

If you know how to script you can do more sphisticated automation, using
the calibredb command, it is documented in the calibre user manual.

 status invalid

[Christian Weiske (cweiske)]

Yes, this is possible and I do that currently.

I just thought that native integration ("Add"-dropdown -> Scan Book with webcam) would be nicer.

[Kovid Goyal (kovid)]

You are welcome to create a calibre plugin to do that, but it is not
something that I am willing to add to core calibre. I'd then become
responsible for debugging a whole new set of hardware related issues.