Audiobook support?

[Jack Burton 94]

Hi,

 

I am following the thread very attentively, since I am also thinking about to import my whole audiobooks into emby. Since the naming of my audiobooks doesn't follow any naming schema, I need to rename a lot of abooks and folders. I already read some suggestions from other users here, how to name them and how to structure them, but i still have some problems to represent the abooks in emby like i want:

 

1. Is there any metadata support for audiobooks atm?

2. (How) can i provide my own images and cover inside the folder, so that emby automatically choose them as Cover?

3. How should the name exactly be? Especially the folder structure. could someone give an concrete example? I am still struggeling with setting up the folder structure properly

 

I would appreciate if someone could help me.

 

Hey, I've been pumped for audiobook support in Emby, and it's getting there. Still a ways to go, but it works. I'll let you know what I do, it's more work than adding a show or movie, but I don't really mind.

 

1. Not as far as I know, I add everything myself

2. I'll cover 2 and 3 together, and just tell you my whole process for adding a new book. As far as naming, it's far more lax than naming conventions for tv shows or movies right now since there's no metadata to scrape, so it really doesn't matter what the folder is called, organize it how you like it.

 

At first, I had things organized by author (I had a folder for, say, Ernest Cline, one for Stephen King, etc, with book folders inside), but only had about 10 audiobooks, and it looked sparse. Simply for aesthetics, I decided I wanted to see a bunch of audiobooks on the page, like looking at a bookcase (they can be organized by author, but you still see each book). I decided to organize by author, but bulk series' together so I can see all the audiobooks, but the Wheel of Time doesn't take up a full page, as a series, it's bulked together.

 

Here's an example of what my folder structure looks like:

 

Andy Weir - The Martian > Files

Brandon Sanderson - Mistborn

        - Book 01 - The Final Empire >Files

        - Book 02 - Well of Ascension > Files

        - Book 03 - The Hero of Ages > Files

Ernest Cline - Armada > Files

Ernest Cline - Ready Player One >Files

George R. R. Martin - A Song of Ice and Fire

        - Book 01 - A Game of Thrones >Files

        - Book 02 - A Clash of Kings > Files

        - Book 03 - A Storm of Swords > Files

        - Book 04 - A Feast For Crows >Files

        - Book 05 - A Dance With Dragons > Files

Neil Gaiman - American Gods > Files

etc.

 

Now the real work comes in, images. I google each audiobook for the cover. audible.com and amazon are great sources, as well as a simple google image search. Say I have Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, and it's split into chapters and has 19 files. I make a new folder, Ernest Cline - Ready Player One, and copy the files into that folder. Emby will add it to audiobooks, but have no images. Gross. 

 

I then go into emby for chrome, right click Ernest Cline - Ready Player One, and edit images. I add a downloaded cover image to primary images, and bam, it's pretty. I don't add any synopsis currently, since emby doesn't show it anyway yet, hopefully that will change soon  . But, clicking into it reveals 19 files, none of which have images (some files have images automatically, others don't). This page looks extra gross. At first I went individually for all 19 files and added the primary image. This is dumb and took awhile, especially once you get a lot of books. Instead, go to the parent folder in emby and edit images just like the primary image, but, instead of selecting primary image this time select thumb. Now all files inside the parent folder have an image as well. Pretty.

 

Series are a bit trickier, since finding Audiobook covers for a book series instead of the books themselves can be tough. I like things as organized as possible (obviously ^) so I did have a few series that were a struggle to get a good image for (like the Wheel of Time). For those I found the most acceptable image I could, as close to square dimensions as I could, downloaded it, then edited the image, resizing to a square. For the most part, it works.

 

Here's a screenshot of my audiobook page:

 

 

Anyway, hope this helps!

 

Edit: Just saw the last part of question 2. Try copying the cover into the audiobook folder (same one as the files) and rename it poster

Edited April 22, 2017 by Jack Burton

[SomeAwesomeDude 1]

Wow that Looks so awesome Thanks Jack! I gonna try it as soon as i am back home. Gonna give some feedback later!

[SomeAwesomeDude 1]

Hey, I've been pumped for audiobook support in Emby, and it's getting there. Still a ways to go, but it works. I'll let you know what I do, it's more work than adding a show or movie, but I don't really mind.

 

1. Not as far as I know, I add everything myself

2. I'll cover 2 and 3 together, and just tell you my whole process for adding a new book. As far as naming, it's far more lax than naming conventions for tv shows or movies right now since there's no metadata to scrape, so it really doesn't matter what the folder is called, organize it how you like it.

 

At first, I had things organized by author (I had a folder for, say, Ernest Cline, one for Stephen King, etc, with book folders inside), but only had about 10 audiobooks, and it looked sparse. Simply for aesthetics, I decided I wanted to see a bunch of audiobooks on the page, like looking at a bookcase (they can be organized by author, but you still see each book). I decided to organize by author, but bulk series' together so I can see all the audiobooks, but the Wheel of Time doesn't take up a full page, as a series, it's bulked together.

 

Here's an example of what my folder structure looks like:

 

Andy Weir - The Martian > Files

Brandon Sanderson - Mistborn

        - Book 01 - The Final Empire >Files

        - Book 02 - Well of Ascension > Files

        - Book 03 - The Hero of Ages > Files

Ernest Cline - Armada > Files

Ernest Cline - Ready Player One >Files

George R. R. Martin - A Song of Ice and Fire

        - Book 01 - A Game of Thrones >Files

        - Book 02 - A Clash of Kings > Files

        - Book 03 - A Storm of Swords > Files

        - Book 04 - A Feast For Crows >Files

        - Book 05 - A Dance With Dragons > Files

Neil Gaiman - American Gods > Files

etc.

 

Now the real work comes in, images. I google each audiobook for the cover. audible.com and amazon are great sources, as well as a simple google image search. Say I have Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, and it's split into chapters and has 19 files. I make a new folder, Ernest Cline - Ready Player One, and copy the files into that folder. Emby will add it to audiobooks, but have no images. Gross. 

 

I then go into emby for chrome, right click Ernest Cline - Ready Player One, and edit images. I add a downloaded cover image to primary images, and bam, it's pretty. I don't add any synopsis currently, since emby doesn't show it anyway yet, hopefully that will change soon  . But, clicking into it reveals 19 files, none of which have images (some files have images automatically, others don't). This page looks extra gross. At first I went individually for all 19 files and added the primary image. This is dumb and took awhile, especially once you get a lot of books. Instead, go to the parent folder in emby and edit images just like the primary image, but, instead of selecting primary image this time select thumb. Now all files inside the parent folder have an image as well. Pretty.

 

Series are a bit trickier, since finding Audiobook covers for a book series instead of the books themselves can be tough. I like things as organized as possible (obviously ^) so I did have a few series that were a struggle to get a good image for (like the Wheel of Time). For those I found the most acceptable image I could, as close to square dimensions as I could, downloaded it, then edited the image, resizing to a square. For the most part, it works.

 

Here's a screenshot of my audiobook page:

 

audiobooks capture.PNG

 

Anyway, hope this helps!

 

Edit: Just saw the last part of question 2. Try copying the cover into the audiobook folder (same one as the files) and rename it poster

 

Thank you so much. Got things running by structuring them the same way you suggested. Its fine so far. Still much work, but its worth. 

Only thing missing so far is to play all the files from the audio book continuously (I'd like to avoid creating a playlist, since i read that within a playlist, you don't have any progress saving). It seems like when creating an library with content type books, there is no "play all" button on the parent folder, which is pretty sad. Are there any plans for the near feature that could let us hope that some similar functionality will be implemented in emby?

[Jack Burton 94]

Thank you so much. Got things running by structuring them the same way you suggested. Its fine so far. Still much work, but its worth. 

Only thing missing so far is to play all the files from the audio book continuously (I'd like to avoid creating a playlist, since i read that within a playlist, you don't have any progress saving). It seems like when creating an library with content type books, there is no "play all" button on the parent folder, which is pretty sad. Are there any plans for the near feature that could let us hope that some similar functionality will be implemented in emby?

No problem, glad you're liking the setup! There are definitely issues right now. I find that I can play continuously if I go to audiobooks, the book, then the 3 dots on whatever file and click play all from here. Doesn't seem to work on android or chrome from the "continue listening" in suggestions though. Also, there is progress saving, sort of. It will keep track just like a show or movie, but when you select resume, it tends to start the track over. I use the progress bar to see how far I am so I can skip back to it. I did get resume to work once on android, but I don't remember what I did.

[SomeAwesomeDude 1]

No problem, glad you're liking the setup! There are definitely issues right now. I find that I can play continuously if I go to audiobooks, the book, then the 3 dots on whatever file and click play all from here. Doesn't seem to work on android or chrome from the "continue listening" in suggestions though. Also, there is progress saving, sort of. It will keep track just like a show or movie, but when you select resume, it tends to start the track over. I use the progress bar to see how far I am so I can skip back to it. I did get resume to work once on android, but I don't remember what I did.

 

Thanks again. I think there is still some space for improvement from emby's side, but for now it's good enought.

[Luke 37272]

Please make sure to open feature request topics for your ideas .Thanks !

[SomeAwesomeDude 1]

Please make sure to open feature request topics for your ideas .Thanks !

 

I followed several threads regarding discussing more or less the same problem with audiobook support. As far as i remember, there should already be a request, that is somehow that what I would suggest. I just want to avoid duplicate requests.

 

 

Edit:

Here is a Thread that already discussed some solutions for that:

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/32855-audiobooks/

 

I can still open an issue/featurerequest if you want. 

 

Edit 2:

In the meantime, could you maybe tell, if there are currently some progress/improvements for the audiobook support in the near feature? I mean its actually somehow supported, but tbh it does not reaches the level of user experience like you have for shows and movies. And I personally would not like to use anything else but emby for managing all my media content.

Edited April 23, 2017 by SomeAwesomeDude

[Luke 37272]

Yes we will continue to improve audio book features in future updates. thanks !