August 12th, 2024

Show HN: I built an animated 3D bookshelf for ebooks

The 3D Bookshelf project on GitHub enables interactive browsing of ebooks in 3D, integrating with Calibre for metadata and cover art, and adapting book dimensions based on cover and page count.

Read original article

ExcitementAdmirationCuriosity

Show HN: I built an animated 3D bookshelf for ebooks

The 3D Bookshelf project on GitHub offers a visually engaging way for users to browse ebooks in a 3D format. It draws inspiration from a CSS animation and another project related to Calibre, a well-known ebook management tool. The application retrieves ebook metadata and cover art from a Calibre library, adjusting the height of the displayed books according to the cover image's aspect ratio and their thickness based on available page count data. Key features include the display of book cover images and metadata, the use of Calibre's `comment` metadata for back-cover text, and the inclusion of download links. The interactive 3D rendering enhances the browsing experience. To install and use the project, users need to execute specific commands in their terminal, and there is an option to install a Calibre plugin for additional functionality. The project acknowledges authors who publish DRM-free works and organizations that offer well-typeset public domain ebooks.

- The 3D Bookshelf project allows for interactive ebook browsing.

- It integrates with Calibre to pull metadata and cover art.

- The design adapts book dimensions based on cover and page count.

- Installation requires running specific commands in a terminal.

- The project supports DRM-free works and public domain ebooks.

Writebook: Instantly publish your own books on the web for free

Writebook is a free software for publishing books online independently. Users can create various book types, collaborate with co-authors, and publish publicly or privately. Requires own domain, web server, and technical skills. No direct book selling.

Introducing Writebook

Writebook simplifies web-based book publishing with easy creation of covers, title, picture, and text pages in HTML format. Users can self-host it, customize with Rails code, and publish books independently for free.

Read Hacker News on Kindle (2022)

Daniel Nguyen created KTool to send online content to Kindle for offline reading, focusing on Hacker News discussions. It supports various content types, maintains comment styles, and enhances the reading experience.

Foliate: Read e-books in style, navigate with ease

Foliate is a Linux e-book reader supporting EPUB, Mobipocket, Kindle, and PDF formats. It offers customization, touchpad navigation, annotations, word lookup, translation, text-to-speech, and advanced rendering features. Open-source under GNU GPL, users can install it on Linux or access the source code. Support options are available.

ASCII 3D Renderer for JavaScript

The GitHub repository features an ASCII 3D Renderer in JavaScript, with a live demo available. Installation requires `pnpm`, and the project is licensed under the MIT License for open use.

AI: What people are saying

The comments on the 3D Bookshelf project reflect a mix of enthusiasm and constructive feedback.

Many users express excitement about the project's concept and design, noting its visual appeal.
Several commenters suggest improvements, particularly regarding usability and readability of book titles.
There is interest in potential extensions of the project, such as virtual libraries and integration with other media.
Some users inquire about licensing and the availability of a live demo to experience the project without installation.
Comments also highlight nostalgia for similar past projects and the desire for more interactive features.

38 comments

By @vessenes - 4 months

Nice! Many, many years ago, when Shelfie was shutting down, I was imagining we might want VR bookshelves one day, and I convinced Brewster to store Sheflie's spine and cover images over at the archive. Might be worth reaching out to see if they still have them. Spine images are a little hard to get; they're not part of the Amazon API, for instance.

By @pelcg - 4 months

Not a bookshelf, but it reminds me of something that Stripe did something similar here which is equally as cool.

https://press.stripe.com/

By @JoeDaDude - 4 months

Something very similar was done a while ago by Petar Gyurov:

https://petargyurov.com/bookshelf/

By @cdrini - 4 months

Very cool! I love the animation. I worked on a similar interface inspired a while back for Open Library: https://openlibrary.org/explore . You have to go to "Settings > Book style > 3d-spine" to enable the effect

By @zzimbler - 4 months

Super cool - reminds me of the Stripe press website https://press.stripe.com/

By @hi_hi - 4 months

I do not own many leather-bound books, nor does my apartment smell of rich mahogony, but this gave me a wonderful idea for visualising what my many ebooks might look like through an AR or VR virtual library experience.

By @randomcatuser - 4 months

This is awesome!

If we want to extend this to be a whole virtual library, are there datasets that people know about for book covers?

One thing that would be cool is book spine datasets!

By @cyanmagenta - 4 months

Looks great! One thing to consider would be adding some more specular lighting. Books in real life are shiny, and the render looks a bit flat.

By @abraae - 4 months

Looks great. Though while I love me some skeuomorphism, it goes too far when it is plainly detrimental to usability, which it is here - I have to crane my neck sideways to read the titles. In a virtual world, the books could be stacked horizontally so that the titles are readable with user head upright.

By @Aeolun - 4 months

You just… built exactly the thing I was working on. Except it looks better.

I’ve had this before, but I figured this project would be small and niche enough that it‘d never happen. Crazy shit.

By @2OEH8eoCRo0 - 4 months

I've wanted something like this so that I can have a custom bookshelf behind me in teams calls. I was tempted to make one but had no clue where to find book spine artwork.

By @Jemaclus - 4 months

I read almost exclusively on Kindle, and one of the downsides of an e-book library is that it's not really browsable by your friends and family when they come over. I've long envisioned a movie poster-sized touch screen that shows my library almost exactly like this, so people can touch it, scroll through my library, and interact with books (ie, animate it sliding out and displaying the cover + description). When it's not interacted with, it just looks like a painting on the wall.

I have zero idea how to pull this off, but I'd love to do it, and this visualization of the shelf is exactly what I had in mind!

Amazing job. I'm very impressed!

By @jorshman - 4 months

I can imagine this being used to design a better Goodreads UX where you can see your friends' libraries. Super cool!

By @bejd - 4 months

The thickness of the book being calculated from its page count is a really nice touch.

By @quirino - 4 months

Very cool!

I've wanted to build something similar to this for music. Some virtual environment where you can organize your albums on shelves and play them on a turntable.

You could even extend this so you have to walk to a store to buy new albums etc.

By @foobarbecue - 4 months

Great. Back when quirky.com was a product idea site, I proposed a piece of furniture that would be a bookshelf for ebooks (large e-ink screen cabinet).

By @drumdance - 4 months

Nicely done. Years ago I had the idea of projecting my Kindle library onto the wall to look like a bookshelf. Stopped at the idea stage.

By @wccrawford - 4 months

Very nice! It's a shame that Calibre doesn't have pics of the book spines to work with on something like this.

By @hamza__nouali - 4 months

Nice idea and implementation, would love to see a live demo without having to install this on my machine.

By @101008 - 4 months

Very nice. I can imagine a publisher website using something like this to promote their books.

By @flykespice - 4 months

Here is a tip to attract users: Add screenshot(s) showing how your bookshelf looks like.

By @macshome - 4 months

I miss all the cool animations and loving touches like this in Apple’s iBooks.

By @wolfhumble - 4 months

Looks nice! What is the license for this project – I can't find it on the project?

Thanks!

By @westurner - 4 months

Digital Bookshelf screensavers for streaming boxes would be cool.

By @chadhutchins10 - 4 months

Brandon Sanderson ftw!

By @chrisco255 - 4 months

Is there a live demo or do we have to clone it to see it?

By @GNOMES - 4 months

I wish Plex included something like this

By @roshankhan28 - 4 months

i would love if someone could create the same for the ps3 emulator games which run on emulator on my pc.

By @bufferoverflow - 4 months

Looks: nice

Usability: useless

By @AdmiralAsshat - 4 months

How are the books sorted?

By @nerfherder777 - 4 months

Pretty cool!

By @nerfherder777 - 4 months

[dupe]

By @dheera - 4 months

Reminds me of Microsoft Bob