Comixology Backup

Do you like Comixology? Me too!

Are you annoyed that you can't download all the comics you bought in a standard format? Me too!

This is a Chrome/Chromium extension, that allows you to do just that. After installation you are able to download comics from any publisher. It should work on any OS where Chrome works.

IMPORTANT: Do not use the extension for piracy! Only create private backups! We do not intent to compromise ComiXology. Downloaded comics always have your username included. Distributed comics can be tracked back to you!

Installation

The installation is slightly complicated (since I don't want to add this to the Chrome Store). There are two ways of installing the extension.

IMPORTANT for Windows users

If you are using Chrome 35+ on Windows you have to use the second possibility! Using packed extensions, that aren't from the Chrome Web Store, does not work anymore.

First possibility

The first way is by this help page. This does not work on Windows with Chrome version 35+.

In Chrome, click on the settings icon on the right (looks like three vertical lines on top of each other)
Select Tools > Extensions
Drag and drop the CRX file from your disk to the extension page
Now you just open your comics in the Comixology reader and you should see an orange panel, asking for back-up.

Second possibility

The second way is without drag-and-drop, https://developer.chrome.com/extensions/getstarted#unpacked

This works for Windows with Chrome version 35+!

In Chrome, click on the settings icon on the right (looks like three vertical lines on top of each other)
Select Tools > Extensions
Select "Developer mode"
Click on "Load unpacked extension"
Select the "source" folder
Now you just open your comics in the Comixology reader and you should see an orange panel, asking for back-up.

Updates

If you want to be notified about updates you can add an update server in the extensions options. You get there by opening the extensions panel in the settings and then click on "Options" right to the Comixology Backup extension. The options should open and you can click on "Set update server".

The update server URL is: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Cortys/comixology-backup/master

Copy it exactly like that.

Why it's not on Chrome Store?

I am fairly certain Comixology will, unfortunately, try to remove this extension from Chrome Store, because it goes around their DRM.

How to use

Open your ComiXology library by clicking on "My Books" in the menu.
If this is your first time using the extension you will see a red "Activate Scan" button next to each comic.
Click one of the red buttons and a new tab should be opened.
In there a scan will be created. This basically means that the extension will ask you to click on some element of the reader. The things you are asked to do (switch view mode, open thumbnails...) are operations you can accomplish with one click. So only perform ONE click in each step or the setup won't work.
After you completed all tasks the extension will use this information to determine how to exploit the reader for backups.
Then you are asked to modify a setting in the web reader. Please do so!
If everything worked fine you will get a success message and may start to backup your comic library now.
To start a backup simply click the "Scan Comic" button, that should now appear next to each comic.
Some comics also offer a direct PDF and CBZ download. Those are official high quality downloads available for a selection of publishers.
Sometimes backups of comics with many pages (~200+) fail. To circumvent that you can enable single image container compression in the options and all the pages of the comic will be downloaded as separate images. To get a CBZ you then have to zip the images manually.

How it works

You can look at the source code - but basically, it fetches the pixels of the canvas elements that compose the opened page, puts them together, and then it downloads those zipped using zip.js or as single image blobs using JavaScript-Canvas-to-Blob.

About, licence

Project started by SpergLord Enterprises, LLC and continued by other awesome contributors.

If you have problems with the software/have an idea, add an issue on Github via Issues.

The code is under GPLv3 licence. Code uses zip.js by Gildas Lormeau and JavaScript-Canvas-to-Blob by Sebastian Tschan.

League Gothic by Caroline Hadilaksono, Micah Rich, & Tyler Finck is used.

wandabastyle / comixology-backup