Before you use mstdn-ebooks to create your own ebooks bot, I recommend checking out [FediBooks](https://fedibooks.com). Compared to mstdn-ebooks, FediBooks offers a few advantages:
- Hosted and maintained by someone else - you don't have to worry about updating, keeping the computer on, etc
- No installation required
- A nice UI for managing your bot(s)
- Easy configuration
However, there are still a few reasons you might want to use mstdn-ebooks instead:
- Your data stays local to your machine
- More customisation potential - you can edit mstdn-ebooks to add functionality
- Replying more (in)frequently than FediBooks allows
Like mstdn-ebooks, FediBooks is free, both as in free of charge and free to modify, self-host, and more.
An installation and usage guide is available [here](https://cloud.lynnesbian.space/s/jozbRi69t4TpD95). It's primarily targeted at Linux, but it should be possible on BSD, macOS, etc. I've also put some effort into providing steps for Windows, but I can't make any guarantees as to its effectiveness.
While there is a Docker version provided, it is **not guaranteed to work**. I personally don't use Docker and don't know how the Dockerfile works; it was create over a year ago by someone else and hasn't been updated since. It might work for you, it might not.
Configuring mstdn-ebooks is accomplished by editing `config.json`. If you want to use a different file for configuration, specify it with the `--cfg` argument. For example, if you want to use `/home/lynne/c.json` instead, you would run `python3 main.py --cfg /home/lynne/c.json` instead of just `python3 main.py`
| site | https://botsin.space | The instance your bot will log in to and post from. This must start with `https://` or `http://` (preferably the latter) |
| instance_blacklist | ["bofa.lol", "witches.town", "knzk.me"] | If your bot is following someone from a blacklisted instance, it will skip over them and not download their posts. This is useful for ensuring that mstdn-ebooks doesn't waste time trying to download posts from dead instances, without you having to unfollow the user(s) from them. |
| learn_from_cw | false | If true, mstdn-ebooks will learn from CW'd posts. |
| mention_handling | 1 | 0: Never use mentions. 1: Only generate fake mentions in the middle of posts, never at the start. 2: Use mentions as normal (old behaviour). |
| max_thread_length | 15 | The maximum number of bot posts in a thread before it stops replying. A thread can be 10 or 10000 posts long, but the bot will stop after it has posted `max_thread_length` times. |
| strip_paired_punctuation | false | If true, mstdn-ebooks will remove punctuation that commonly appears in pairs, like " and (). This avoids the issue of posts that open a bracket (or quote) without closing it. |
