serverAppConfigs/serverAppConfigs-docs/Dankserver/Audiobookshelf.md

---
type: reference
description: "Audiobookshelf on Dankserver: quadlet shape, the read-only array bind, state on the SSD, the API bootstrap, authentik SSO, laws."
tags:
  - dankserver
  - audiobooks
  - quadlet
timestamp: 2026-11-02
---

# Audiobookshelf

Audiobookshelf (ABS) serves the [[Entropy Volume]] audiobook library to browsers
and phones: it scans `/mnt/entropy/Audiobooks`, keeps its own SQLite library with
per-listener playback positions, and streams the audio. It is **not** a media
server — it shares nothing with [[Plex]] or [[Jellyfin]] and owns no files on the
array.

**Host:** Dankserver — **Unit:** `audiobookshelf.service` (rootless Quadlet, user
manager) — **Internal-only:** LAN address `http://192.168.0.235:8000/audiobookshelf`, no vhost, no DNS name.

## Shape

| Item | Value |
|------|-------|
| Unit file | `dankserver/audiobookshelf/quadlet/audiobookshelf.container` (the authority for every number here) |
| Image | `ghcr.io/advplyr/audiobookshelf` pinned by **amd64 manifest digest** — see Laws |
| Port | `Environment=PORT=8000` + `PublishPort=8000:8000` — web UI and API on one port |
| Base path | `Environment=ROUTER_BASE_PATH=/audiobookshelf` — every URL below carries this prefix, and the shipped SPA cannot boot without it (Laws) |
| Network | `pasta` (standalone; publishes nothing to other containers) |
| Audio bind | `/mnt/entropy/Audiobooks:/audiobooks:ro` — read-only, by design |
| State | `/home/dank/Containers/audiobookshelf/config` → `/config`, `…/metadata` → `/metadata` (both NVMe) |
| Mount gate | `ExecStartPre=…/wait-for-mount.sh /mnt/entropy` |
| Health | `wget` against `/healthcheck` inside the container, 30 s / 3 retries |
| I/O share | `IOWeight=10` — a scan loses the array to every other tenant |
| Self-healing | `Restart=always`, `RestartSec=5`, `WantedBy=default.target` |
| Deploy | `./scripts/deploy.sh dankserver --service audiobookshelf` |
| Handler | `deploy_audiobookshelf` in `scripts/deploy-remote.sh` |
| Single sign-on | authentik provider `audiobookshelf`; the local `frank` account stays enabled as break-glass — see *Single sign-on* |
| Library layout | one book per folder — ABS groups by the first directory holding a media file (see Laws); every move is journalled at `/mnt/entropy/.media-campaign/media-relayout-audiobooks.jsonl` |

## Bootstrap

`scripts/audiobookshelf-init.sh` — run by the deployer after the health gate, so a
deployed ABS is a *usable* ABS: `/healthcheck` answers 200 on a server with no
user, no library and no scan, and nothing else in the deploy notices the
difference. The script is idempotent; re-running it costs one incremental scan.

| Step | Door | Printed |
|------|------|---------|
| credential | `~/.config/secrets/audiobookshelf` (mode 600, generated once, host-side) | `credential: created …` |
| account | `POST /init` with `{"newRoot":{"username","password"}}` | `account: created (frank)` / `already registered` |
| session | `POST /login` → bearer token | `token: obtained (root)` |
| library | `POST /api/libraries`, folder `/audiobooks`, provider `audiobook` | `library: created Audiobooks (<id>)` / `exists` |
| scan | `POST /api/libraries/<id>/scan` | `scan: accepted` |
| proof | `GET /api/libraries/<id>/items?limit=1` | `items: <total>` |

Sign in at `http://192.168.0.235:8000/audiobookshelf` as `frank`; the password is
`awk -F= '/^ABS_ADMIN_PASSWORD=/{print $2}' ~/.config/secrets/audiobookshelf` on
Dankserver. Change it in **Settings → Users → frank → Password**; the secret file
then holds a stale value and only matters again if the `config` bind is ever
destroyed (a fresh DB makes the script create a new owner from it).

A full scan is slow and runs in the background; watch the `items:` total climb,
never `/healthcheck`. It also reads files that are genuinely broken and logs
`[AudioFileScanner] Invalid data found when processing input` per file — that is
the file, not the bind: the same line count grows while the total climbs.

## Phone app

The official **Audiobookshelf** app connects with Server Address
`http://192.168.0.235:8000/audiobookshelf` — the base path belongs in the address — username
`frank`, and the same password as the web UI, or the SSO button; plain HTTP. Verified from a
second host 2026-11-02: `/healthcheck`
and `/ping` answer 200 across the LAN and `iptables -S INPUT` carries no rule for 8000,
so a phone on `192.168.0.0/24` connects with no further setup; `download: true` on the
root account is what makes offline listening work. Away from the LAN it cannot connect —
see the LAN-only law, and note that the guard chain is not the remedy there.

**The login token is at `user.token`, not top level.** `POST /login` answers
`{ user, serverSettings, ereaderDevices, Source, userDefaultLibraryId }` and the bearer sits
inside the user object. A client that reads `response.token` gets the empty string, sends
`Authorization: Bearer ` with nothing after it, and every `/api/*` call then answers `401`
as though the password were wrong.

## Single sign-on (authentik)

Both doors take the household identity: the web UI puts **Sign in with Authentik** beside
the local form, and the phone app offers SSO on its server-address screen. The local
`frank` account stays enabled on purpose — `authActiveAuthMethods` is `local` **and**
`openid`, and `local` is how you get in when the IdP is down.

| Piece | Owner |
|-------|-------|
| Provider `audiobookshelf`, the two groups, the scope mapping | `scripts/authentik-audiobookshelf-sso.sh` — re-run it after an authentik rebuild, because this state lives in the IdP's database and a blueprint re-import reverts it silently |
| Client secret | `ABS_OIDC_CLIENT_SECRET` in `~/.config/secrets/audiobookshelf` on Dankserver (mode 600; never in the repo, a URL or an argv) |
| The ABS half: issuer, the four IdP URLs, claim, auto-register | `scripts/audiobookshelf-init.sh`, armed automatically when that secret exists in the credential file |
| Role at first SSO sign-in | the `abs_groups` claim: `audiobookshelf_admins` → `admin`, `audiobookshelf_users` → `user`, in neither → denied (fail closed) |

The IdP saying yes is not the same as being allowed in: with `authOpenIDAutoRegister` on,
a first sign-in creates the account, and the claim alone decides the type. A user in
neither group is refused after a successful authentication — that is the mapping working,
not a broken login.

## Laws

- **Speak the image's env names, not the README's.** The server reads `PORT`,
  `CONFIG_PATH`, `METADATA_PATH` and `ROUTER_BASE_PATH`; the `ABS_*` family printed
  by the server's own README is the npm package's naming and is **inert** in this
  image. Measured 2026-11-02 on the first deploy: with `ABS_PORT=8000` the server
  listened on `:80` under base path `/audiobookshelf`, so `systemctl` said
  `active (running)` while every probe of `:8000` was refused and the deploy gate
  failed at 180 s. Two seconds with the pinned digest settles it:
  `podman inspect --format '{{.Config.Env}}' <image>`.
- **The URL carries `/audiobookshelf`, and that is not a style choice.** The SPA in
  `/app/client/dist/index.html` is built with `routerBasePath:"/audiobookshelf"`, so it asks
  for its assets under that prefix whatever the server is mounted at. Mounted at `/`, every
  script request falls through to the SPA fallback, comes back `text/html`, Chrome refuses to
  execute it, and the page never leaves "Loading…" — while `/healthcheck`, the API and the
  phone app stay perfectly healthy, which is how this hid behind an API-only verification
  (measured 2026-11-02). Prove a UI claim in a browser, never from `/health`.
- **The OIDC redirect subfolder is a value you send, not a default you inherit.** The 2.17.4
  upgrade only fills `authOpenIDSubfolderForRedirectURLs` on a database that ALREADY had OIDC
  enabled, so a DB created before SSO leaves it unset and the server builds
  `http://host/undefined/auth/openid/callback`. authentik answers the authorize request with
  "Redirect URI Error" and nothing on the ABS side looks wrong (measured 2026-11-02). The
  provider's registered URI must equal `<origin><subfolder>/auth/openid/callback`, so each
  script derives the value from one variable of its own (`ABS_URL`, `ABS_BASE`) and
  `tests/audiobookshelf_init.bats` pins what reaches the wire.
- **The audio bind stays `:ro`.** ABS writes nothing that belongs beside the
  audio: its library, covers, progress and sidecar metadata all land in
  `/metadata` on the SSD. A writable bind would put stray writes on the spindle
  and hand the array to a service with no reason to hold it. If per-book
  `.opf`/`.nfo` sidecars on disk are ever wanted, the rollback is one line —
  point the audio bind at the [[Media Metadata View]] the media servers already
  use — but that view's upper layer exists for those two servers' sidecars, so a
  third writer needs a reason first ([[Media Metadata View]]).
- **Do not bind the raw array without the mount gate.** In a rootless unit
  `ConditionPathIsMountPoint=` is fail-*dead* and `RequiresMountsFor=` is inert,
  so a missing array does not stop the start: podman invents an empty directory,
  ABS indexes it, and an empty library becomes recorded truth. `wait-for-mount.sh`
  is the only gate that works here — same law the media servers obey
  ([[Quadlet Lifecycle]]).
- **The `HealthCmd` must use `wget`.** The image is Alpine and ships `wget`, not
  `curl`; a `curl` health command reads a perfectly healthy server as unhealthy
  and `Restart=always` turns that into a loop.
- **The image pin is the amd64 manifest digest, not the index digest.**
  `podman inspect` reports the platform manifest (`RepoDigests[0]`) for what was
  pulled, which differs from the manifest-list digest `latest` points at. Pin the
  one this host runs. `latest` is newer than the newest version tag: upstream
  stopped publishing version tags after `2.19.0` while `latest` kept moving, so
  "highest version tag" is stale here — read the index, don't guess from tags.
- **`IOWeight=10` is inert without the host drop-ins.** `dankserver/host/systemd/`
  carries `user.slice.d/io-accounting.conf` and the `user@1000` delegate, and the
  deployer installs both; without them systemd silently drops the weight
  ([[Quadlet Lifecycle]]).
- **No `systemctl --user enable`.** Generated Quadlet units cannot be enabled on
  this host; `WantedBy=default.target` in the unit file is what carries the
  service across a reboot ([[Quadlet Lifecycle]]).
- **LAN-only until Frank says otherwise.** `0.0.0.0:8000` with no reverse proxy
  in front. Any public vhost requires the Anubis + Authentik chain first, and the
  outpost proxy provider has to exist before the vhost flips (external exposure
  policy in `AGENTS.md`). That chain serves browsers: the phone app is a non-browser
  client and cannot solve a challenge, so guarding a vhost does not make remote
  listening work — remote listening wants a VPN into the LAN, after which the LAN
  address in *Phone app* is correct unchanged.
- **There is no `/setup` route; the creation door is `POST /init`.** `/status`
  (no `/api` prefix) reports `isInit` = "a root user exists", `POST /init` with
  `{"newRoot":{"username","password"}}` creates it, `POST /login` returns the
  bearer every `/api/*` route wants. `POST /setup` answers `Unauthorized` — that
  is a missing route wearing an auth message. Read off `dist-server/server/Server.js`
  inside the pinned digest rather than from a forum.
- **A 200 may carry plain text.** `res.sendStatus(200)` answers the body `OK`, and
  `/init` and the scan route use it; a client that parses every success as JSON
  crashes on the one call that matters (`tests/audiobookshelf_init.bats` pins it).
- **The item count is not a field on the library DTO, and paging never ends
  itself.** The door is `GET /api/libraries/<id>/items?limit=1` → `total`; a poller
  that guesses a plausible name (`numItems`) prints `0` forever beside a scan that
  is working. Paging is on `page` (0-based) plus `limit`, and **`offset` is
  ignored**: `limit=500&offset=500` returns the same 500 ids as `offset=0`, while
  `page=1` shares none of them. A census that pages on `offset` therefore reads
  `ceil(total / limit) × limit` rows containing only `limit` distinct items — the
  exact origin of the "exactly 1,500" and "exactly 4,000" counts two runs
  reported for one library. Page on `page`, count *unique ids*, stop on `total`,
  and take the number after the pass settles (`total` moves during a scan).
- **A fresh scan is the only thing that notices new audio.** `inotify` does not
  cross a rootless podman bind — measured for [[Jellyfin]], whose page owns that
  law — so the in-container watcher sees nothing a host process files onto the
  array, and the deployer's re-run of the bootstrapper is the cheap scan trigger.
- **One stray media file at a collection root turns the whole collection into one
  book.** Every scan re-walks the tree from disk (`scanFolder` → `recurseFiles`),
  and `utils/scandir.js:groupFileItemsIntoLibraryItemDirs` assigns each file to the
  FIRST directory along its path that already has a group: the first file seen at a
  root owns every deeper file, and the folders below it never become items. One
  949 MB `.cbr` sitting at `_unsorted`'s root collapsed 652 book folders into a
  single item of 5,693 tracks, titled after whichever file supplied metadata.
  "Hundreds of books are missing" is a layout fault, not a scan fault.
- **"Media file" means audio OR ebook, so an audio-only census cannot see the file
  that is hiding the library.** With `audiobooksOnly=false` (the deployed shape)
  the predicate is `SupportedAudioTypes` ∪ `SupportedEbookTypes`: 20 audio
  extensions (including `mp4`, `mpg`, `webm`) plus `epub pdf mobi azw3 cbr cbz`. A
  census reporting "that root holds no loose audio" can be correct and still
  useless — the file doing the shadowing here was a comic archive.
- **Deleting the covering item does not un-shadow anything.** Grouping is recomputed
  from disk, so the next scan rebuilds the item from the same stray file (measured:
  `DELETE`, then scan → `1 Added`, the item back at the same path). The fix is the
  MOVE: give every stray root file a folder of its own (one file per folder is
  ABS's own single-book layout; formats of one book share a folder), through the
  journal-guarded mover, then delete the stale item so the old path is not kept,
  then scan.
- **`?force=1` is neither a discovery arm nor a repair arm.** Both arms of
  `POST /libraries/:id/scan` walk the disk, so finding new folders needs neither
  and the deployer's cheap trigger stays on the plain arm. Force additionally
  re-scans every item that already exists (measured 1:33 against 0:04 on ~4,600
  items) and repaired nothing on a library whose residuals were file-level: item
  count, path set and media-less count identical before and after.
- **`DELETE /api/items/:id` is a DB row; `?hard=1` is `fs.remove()`.** In
  `LibraryItemController.delete`, `hardDelete = req.query.hard == 1` and then
  `fs.remove(libraryItemPath)`. Pointed at a covering item, that path is the whole
  swallowed subtree — `hard=1` there deletes every book beneath it off the array.
  Assert the item's `path` first, and never pass `hard`.
- **`Invalid data found when processing input` names the file, not the bind.** The
  scanner logs it per file and skips that file; a book whose files ALL fail never
  becomes an item at all, so the disk-vs-DB folder census shows it as a book with
  no item. That is corrupt media, not a lost book. Never clear a suspect file with
  a lenient probe: `ffprobe -show_entries format=duration` happily returns three
  hours for the WAV bytes wearing a `.mp3` name that the scanner refuses. Read the
  log's file paths instead, and `stat -c %s` first — 0-byte files are the common
  case, and a truncated download reports `moov atom not found`.
- **A `Disc 01` / `CD 1` subfolder is part of a book, not a book.** The extension
  census counts those folders; ABS deliberately does not — its grouping attaches
  their files to the ancestor item (measured: 110 such folders under one item
  carrying all 192 tracks). Read the basename before believing a disk-vs-DB gap.
- **`.cbr`/`.cbz` group like media and never play.** They sit in the grouping
  predicate, so they hide books, but the comic parser throws `ERAR_BAD_ARCHIVE`
  (`parseComicMetadata` → `CbrComicBookExtractor`) and the item lands with no
  media. A media-less row beside those lines is the file, not the scanner.
- **A scan is finished when a NEW scan uuid completes.** Match
  `Library scan "<uuid>" completed in ...`. `podman logs --since 30m` is a sliding
  window: the set of visible completion lines changes on its own as old lines age
  out, so a poller keyed on that hash reads a mid-scan number and calls it done.

## Verification

`./tests/run.sh` covers this unit through `tests/dankserver_quadlet.bats`
(boot persistence, the SSD state roots, the `:ro` array bind, the mount gate, the `wget`
health check, the base path the shipped SPA needs), `tests/audiobookshelf_init.bats` (the
bootstrapper against a stub of the API above: create-once, idempotent re-run, no secret in a
URL, refusal by URL when the server does not answer, the deployer calling it only after the
health gate, and the SSO arm sending the mounted base path as the redirect subfolder) and
`tests/media_overlay.bats` (only [[Plex]] and [[Jellyfin]] may reference the metadata view).

Five book folders hold media no scanner can read, so they stay out of the library:
three 2024 Nebula nominees in the `_unsorted` box (two `.m4b` with no `moov` atom,
one 36-file `.mp3` set that is not MPEG audio at all), `Anthony Heald/Bounty
Hunter Wars - Book 1` and `Star Wars Full Cast Audio Drama/Dark Empire III` — the
latter two also exist in readable form under their author folders. Fix by
re-acquiring the files; the scanner names every one of them in its log.