Readarr Settings

Media Management

Note: Some of these settings are only visible through 'show advanced' settings which is on the top bar under the search bar

Root Folders

Readarr is unique in that it can integrate with an outside application known as Calibre to further manage, tag and even serv up your media to various readers

Name - This is a unique name for the given path
Path - This is where your media is going to be stored (do not have your downloads going here)
Calibre Library - Toggle if you're going to use Calibre to further manage your library
Calibre Host - The IP address for your Calibre instance
Calibre Port - The port number associated to your Calibre instance
Calibre Url Base - Adds a prefix to the calibre url, e.g. http://[host]:[port]/[urlBase]
Calibre User Name - The username in order to access your Calibre server
Calibre Password - The password in order to access your Calibre server
Convert to format - Calibre has the ability to convert any incoming format to a specific format (eg. epub or mobi just to name a few)
Calibre Output Profile - ????
Use SSL - Toggle if you'd like Readarr to connect to Calibre using SSL encryption
Monitor
- All books - Readarr will monitor all books in your library
- Future Books - Readarr will only monitor future books, Readarr will not monitor any current or older books
- Missing - Readarr will only monitor any books that are missing
- Existing - Readarr will monitor only existing books in order to meet your given cutoff
- First - Readarr will only monitor the given author's first book
- Last - Readarr will only monitor the given author's last book
- None - Readarr will not monitor any authors books
Quality Profile - These can be changed within the Profiles section and will dictate what quality is acceptable
Metadata Profile - This can be changed within the Metadata section and will dictate what metadata source
- Standard is set by default
- Select 'None' to only include items manually added via search or that match files on disk
Default Readarr Tags - Select what tag you'd like to set for this content (more information on Tags can be found here)

Naming

Rename Books - If this is toggled off (no check in the box) Readarr will use the existing file name if renaming is disabled
Replace Illegal Characters - If this is toggled off (no check in the box) Readarr will replace illegal characters.

Example: \ # / $ * < > just to name a few

Standard Book Format

Here you will select the naming convention for the actual audio files

Dropdown Box (upper right corner)
- Left Box - Space Handling
  - Space ( ) - Use spaces in naming (Default)
  - Period (.) - Use periods in lieu of spaces in naming
  - Underscore (_) - Use underscores in lieu of spaces in naming
  - Dash (-) - Use dashes in lieu of spaces in naming
- Right Box - Case Handling
  - Default Case - Make title uppercase and lowercase (~camelcase) (Default)
  - Uppercase - Make title all uppercase
  - Lowercase - Make title all lowercase

Author

Input	Result
{Author Name}	Author Name
{Author CleanName}	Author Name
{Author NameThe}	Author Name, The
{Author Disambiguation}	Disambiguation

Book

Input	Result
{Book Title}	Book Title
{Book CleanTitle}	Book Title
{Book Disambiguation}	Disambiguation
{Book TitleThe}	Book Title, The
{Book Type}	Book Type

Release Date

Input	Result
{Release Year}	2020

Medium

Input	Result
{medium:0}	1
{medium:00}	01

Medium Format

Input	Result
{Medium Format}	CD

Quality

Input	Result
{Quality Full}	FLAC Proper
{Quality Title}	FLAC

Media Info

Input	Result
{MediaInfo AudioCodec}	FLAC
{MediaInfo AudioBitRate}	320kbps
{MediaInfo AudioSampleRate}	44.1kHz
{MediaInfo AudioChannels}	2.0
{MediaInfo AudioBitsPerSample}	24bit

Other

Input	Result
{Release Group}	Rls Grp
{Preferred Words}	iNTERNAL

Preferred words will be the word or words that were the literal matches of any preferred words you have. The above example would be a preferred word of iNTERNAL or similarly a preferred word of /\b(amzn|amazon)\b(?=[ ._-]web[ ._-]?(dl|rip)\b)/i would return AMZN or Amazon

Original

Input	Result
{Original Title}	Author.Name.Book.Name.2020.FLAC.EVOLVE
{Original Filename}	01-book name

Original Filename is not recommended. It is the literal original filename and may be obfuscated t1i0p3s7i8yuti.
Original Title is the release name is is what is suggested to be used.

Author Folder Format

Here you will select the naming convention for the Author Folder

Dropdown Box (upper right corner)
- Left hand one - Replaces all spaces with selected variable
- Right hand one - Sets to default upper and Lowercase, all lowercase or all uppercase

Input	Result
{Author Name}	Author Name
{Author CleanName}	Author Name
{Author NameThe}	Author Name, The
{Author Disambiguation}	Disambiguation

Folders

Create Empty Media folders - This will create an empty folder during disk scan
Delete Empty Folders - This will remove any empty folders during disk scan

Importing

Skip Free Space Check - Use when Readarr is unable to detect free space from your author root folder
Minimum Free Space - Toggling this will prevent import if it would leave less than this amount of disk space available
Use Hard links instead of Copy - Use Hard links when trying to copy files from torrents that are still being seeded (for more information on this click here)
Import Extra Files - Import matching extra files (subtitles, nfo, etc) after importing a file

File Management

Ignore Deleted Books - Books deleted from disk are automatically unmonitored in Readarr
Propers and Repacks - Should Readarr automatically upgrade to propers when available? (see link for explanation on Proper and Repack)
- Prefer and Upgrade - will prefer proper/repack if one is available (gives it a higher rating)
- Do not upgrade automatically - This will not allow it to upgrade automatically but will still be rated accordingly.
- Do not prefer - Use 'Do not Prefer' to sort by preferred word score over propers/repacks, essentially putting the proper/repack lower on the list
Watch Root Folders for file changes - Rescan automatically when files change in a root folder

Rescan Author Folder after Refresh
- Always - This will rescan author folder based upon Tasks Schedule
- After Manual Refresh - You will have to manually rescan the disk
- Never - Just as it says, never rescan the author folder.

Allow Fingerprinting - Use fingerprinting to improve accuracy of book matching
- Always - This will analyze the file when matching
- For New Imports Only - This will analyze only new imports
- Never - just as it says, never fingerprint the book

Change File Date
- None - Readarr will not change the date that shows in your given file browser
- Book Release Date - The date the book was released

Recycling Bin - Designate a location for deleted files to go to (just in case you want to retrieve them before the bin is taken out)

Recycling Bin Cleanup - This is how old a given file can be before it is deleted permanently

Permissions

Set Permissions - This will allow Readarr to set the given file permission when a given file is imported or renamed
chmod folder - This is the permission level that Readarr will set for a given file on import or rename (more information HERE)
- The drop down box has a preset list of very commonly used permissions that can be used. However, you can manually enter a folder octal if you wish.
chmod Group - This only works if the user running Readarr is the owner of the file. It's better to ensure the download client uses the same group as Readarr.

Profiles

Quality Profiles

Here you'll be allowed to set profiles for which you can have for the quality of series you're looking to download.
When selecting an existing profile or adding an additional profile a new window will appear
- Name - Here you'll select a UNIQUE name for the profile to which you are creating
- Upgrades allowed -
  - Audio Books - If you tell Readarr to download a MP3-320 file as it is the first release of a specific episode then later somebody is able to upload a FLAC then with this selected Readarr will automatically upgrade to the better quality
    Note: This is only if you have FLAC higher than MP3-320 within the Qualities section
  - E-Books - Quality settings are based upon preferences, if you want an ePub over Mobi file format
- Qualities - For definitions for qualities please click HERE
- Edit Groups - Some qualities are grouped together to reduce the size of the list as well grouping like releases.
  - Qualities higher in the list are more preferred. Qualities within the same group are equal. Only checked qualities are wanted
  - Audio Book Qualities are set higher than ebook qualities however this does not mean an audio book will be downloaded before an ebook

Metadata Profiles

Here you'll be allowed to set profiles for which you can have for the releases of a given author
When selecting an existing profile or adding an additional profile a new window will appear
- Name - Here you'll select a UNIQUE name for the profile to which you are creating
- Minimum Popularity - Popularity is average rating * number of votes
- Skip books with missing release date - Readarr will skip any books that do not have a release date to them
- Skip books with no ISBN or ASIN
- Skip part books and sets - Readarr will skip books that are broken into parts or sets
- Skip secondary series books - ???
- Allowed Languages - Set which languages Readarr will look for

Delay Profiles

Delay profiles allow you to reduce the number of releases that will be downloaded for an Book, by adding a delay while Readarr will continue to watch for releases that better match your preferences.
- Protocol - This will either be Usenet or Torrent depending on which download protocol you're using
- Usenet Delay - Set by the number of minutes you'll want to wait before the download to start
- Torrent Delay - Set by the number of minutes you'll want to wait before the download to start
- Bypass if Highest Quality - Bypass the delay profile if the highest quality for that Book is found and grab once the first instance of the highest ranked quality is found. Otherwise wait for the best quality release until the end of the delay period.
- Tags - This is where you'll select any relevant tags that you'll be using for this scheme
Wrench icon - This will allow you to edit the delay profile
Plus icon - Create a new profile

Example: Some media will receive half a dozen different releases of varying quality in the hours after a release, and without delay profiles Readarr might try to download all of them. With delay profiles, Readarr can be configured to ignore the first few hours of releases.

Delay profiles are also helpful if you want to emphasize one protocol (Usenet or BitTorrent) over the other. (See Example 3)

How Delay Profiles Work

The timer begins as soon as Readarr detects an Book has a release available. This release will show up in your Queue with a clock icon to indicate that it is under a delay. Please note that the clock starts from the releases uploaded time and not from the time Readarr sees it.

During the delay period, any new releases that become available will be noted by Readarr. When the delay timer expires, Readarr will download the single release which best matches your quality preferences.

The timer period can be different for Usenet and Torrents. Each profile can be associated with one or more tags to allow you to customize which shows have which profiles. A delay profile with no tag is considered the default and applies to all shows that do not have a specific tag.

NOTE: Delay profiles start from the timestamp that the indexer reports the release was uploaded. This means that any content older than the number of minutes you have set are not impacted in any way by your delay profile, and will be downloaded immediately. In addition, any manual searches for content (non-RSS feed searches) will ignore delay profile settings.

Examples

For each example, assume the user has the follow quality profile active: PDF and above are allowed MOBI is the quality cutoff * EPUB is the highest ranked quality

Example 1:

In this simple example, the profile is set with a 120 minute (two hour) delay for both Usenet and Torrent.

At 11:00pm the first release for an Book is detected by Readarr and it was uploaded at 10:50pm and the 120 minute clock begins. At 12:50am, Readarr will evaluate any releases it has found in the past two hours, and download the best one, which is MOBI.

At 3:00am another release is found, which is MOBI that was added to your indexer at 2:46am. Another 120 minute clock begins. At 4:46am the best-available release is downloaded. Since the quality cutoff is now reached, the Book no longer is upgradable and Readarr will stop looking for new releases.

At any point, if a EPUB release is found, it will be downloaded immediately because it is the highest-ranking quality. If there is a delay timer currently active it will be cancelled.

Example 2:

This example has different timers for Usenet and Torrents. Assume a 120 minute timer for Usenet and a 180 minute timer for BitTorrent.

At 11:00pm the first release for an Book is detected by Readarr and both timers begin. The release was added to the indexer at 10:15pm At 12:15am, Readarr will evaluate any releases, and if there are any acceptable Usenet releases, the best one will be downloaded and both timers will end. If not, Readarr will wait until 12:15am and download the best release, regardless of which source it came from.

Example 3:

A common use for delay profiles is to emphasize one protocol over another. For example, you might only want to download a BitTorrent release if nothing has been uploaded to Usenet after a certain amount of time.

You could set a 60 minute timer for BitTorrent, and a 0 minute timer for Usenet.

If the first release that is detected is from Usenet, Readarr will download it immediately.

If the first release is from BitTorrent, Readarr will set a 60 minute timer. If any qualifying Usenet release is detected during that timer, the BitTorrent release will be ignored and the Usenet release will be grabbed.

Release Profiles

Quality

Quality Table Meanings

Title - The name of the Quality in the GUI (configurable)
Max - The maximum Kilobytes per second (KB/s) a quality can have.
Kilobytes Per Second - Self Explanatory
Min - The minimum Kilobytes per second (KB/s) a quality can have.
Preferred - The preferred Kilobytes per second (KB/s) a quality can have.
Quality - The scene quality name (hardcoded)
Size Limit - Self Explanatory

Quality Definitions

Unknown - Self Explanatory
PDF - A PDF file is a multi-platform document created by Adobe Acrobat or another PDF application. The PDF format is commonly used for saving documents and publications in a standard format that can be viewed on multiple platforms. In many cases, PDF files are created from existing documents instead of from scratch. With that being said PDF isn't a book format it is originally designed as a printing format so a lot of features you'll find with other formats will not be available.
MOBI - A MOBI file is an eBook saved in the MOBI format, a format originally used by the Mobipocket Reader but now supported by several different readers. It contains an eBook and may incorporate DRM copyright protection to prevent copying or unauthorized viewing. MOBI files are supported by various eReaders, tablets, PDAs, and desktop computer applications.
EPUB - An EPUB file is a digital ebook saved in the EPUB format, an open XML-based format for digital books and publications. It provides a standard digital publication format for publishers and consumers. EPUB files can be viewed with supporting software programs and hardware devices, such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble NOOK.
AZW3 - An AZW3 file is an eBook created in the Kindle Format 8 (KF8), Amazon's successor to the .AZW format. It supports newer features such as HTML5 and CSS3 support as well as many other formatting capabilities. AZW3 files often include DRM protection and are used as the download format for many Amazon eBooks.

MP3-320 - An MP3 file with a 320 kbps bitrate
FLAC - A FLAC file is an audio file compressed in the Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC) format, which is an open source lossless audio compression format. It is similar to a .MP3 file, but is compressed without any loss in quality or loss of any original audio data.

Indexers

Once you're here you'll be adding the indexer/tracker that you'll be using to actually download any of your files. If you're curious on how Readarr works with your indexer/tracker click HERE

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