I built Parker — a self‑hosted comic server (CBZ/CBR) with a fast web reader, smart lists, OPDS, and parallel scanning
**Hey everyone! I’ve been working on a personal project for a while, and it’s finally at a point where I feel comfortable sharing it.**
**Parker** is a self‑hosted comic book server for CBZ/CBR libraries. It focuses on speed, a clean UI, and a “filesystem is truth” approach — metadata is parsed directly from `ComicInfo.xml` inside archives.
I’ve been a longtime Kavita user, but I wanted to tailor certain things to work the way I prefer — so Parker grew out of that.
\*EDIT\*: Added pre built docker images for ease of use.
\*EDIT\*: I had the day off today and made many improvements to the codebase and slipped a couple new features in. Check the releases page for details!
**\*EDIT3\* Fixed a bunch of authentication / boot up and Dockerfile issues that cropped up in recent builds. When I increased the workers processes in Uvicorn last night I didn't fully grasp some of the ramifications of doing it. Really sorry about that. I really shouldn't be committing code at 1 am in the morning. Really really sorry about that everyone!!!**
\*EDIT4\* I've added a lot of features to Parker in the last 20 days and cleaned up a bunch of rough patches I encountered when I first launched. If you had any launch issues, I'd invite you to take another look as I've ironed out all those issues and added some more features along the way. Thanks!
# Highlights
* **Fast parallel scanning** so large libraries import quickly * **Netflix‑style home page** with content rails (On Deck, Up Next, Smart Lists, Random Gems, Recently Updated) * **Context‑aware Web Reader** (series, volumes, reading lists, pull lists) * **Manga mode**, double‑page spreads with smart detection, swipe navigation, and zero‑latency page transitions * **Smart Lists** (saved searches that auto‑update) * **User‑created Pull Lists** with custom ordering * **OPDS 1.2 support** for external readers (Chunky, Panels, Tachiyomi, etc.) * **Reports Dashboard** (missing issues, duplicates, storage analysis, metadata health) * **WebP transcoding** for bandwidth savings * **Multi‑user support** with per‑library permissions * **Auto‑generated Reading Lists and Collections** from `<AlternateSeries>` and `<SeriesGroup>` metadata
# Tech Stack
FastAPI, SQLAlchemy, Jinja2, Alpine.js, Tailwind, SQLite (WAL) with FTS5, Docker
**Repository:** [https://github.com/parker-server/parker](https://github.com/parker-server/parker)
It’s early but stable, and I’d love feedback from the self‑hosted crowd. If you try it out, let me know how it goes.
