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Connecting to a server

BookOrbit is a client for your own self-hosted BookOrbit server — the app doesn't talk to anything operated by the developer. On first launch, you'll be asked for your server's URL.

Server URL​

Enter the full address of your BookOrbit server, including the scheme, for example:

  • https://books.example.com for a server exposed over HTTPS
  • http://192.168.1.50:3000 for a server on your local network

Cleartext HTTP is permitted (self-hosted servers are often plain HTTP on a LAN), but prefer HTTPS whenever your server is reachable from outside your network.

Connecting to a local dev/test server​

If you're running a BookOrbit server locally for development or testing:

  • Emulator: the host machine is reachable at 10.0.2.2, so enter http://10.0.2.2:3000.
  • Physical device: use your machine's LAN IP, e.g. http://192.168.1.50:3000.

Signing in​

Once the server URL is set, sign in with:

  • Username and password, if your server uses local accounts, or
  • OIDC / SSO, if your server administrator has configured an identity provider.

For OIDC to work from the mobile app, the server must whitelist the mobile redirect URI bookorbit://oauth2-callback (the OIDC_MOBILE_REDIRECT_URIS setting on the server, which includes this by default).

Switching servers​

You can sign out and connect to a different server at any time from the app's account settings. Signing out clears locally cached credentials but does not affect any data stored on the server.