I wrote this utility to extract the most value from two services I love dearly:

• Goodreads
• My local public library

Whenever I come across a title I'd like to read some day, I store it on my Goodreads shelf. When I'd like to visit my local library branch, I visit biblio.dcain.me to see which titles are available to be checked out.

My local library branch does not have the most extensive collection. Instead of meandering the stacks until I find a book I like, or fruitlessly querying the catalog to see if that interesting new book is on the shelf, I'd much rather have a script do the hard work for me.

The web interface currently supports San Francisco & Seattle, but if you live near one of the ~190 public libraries using the BiblioCommons system, then running this software locally should work for you. It relies on undocumented APIs, so your mileage may vary.

1. Apply for a Goodreads Developer Key.

2. Obtain your Goodreads user id

3. [Optional] Set both these values in your .bashrc

   export GOODREADS_USER_ID=123456789
   export GOODREADS_DEV_KEY=whatever-your-actual-key-is

4. Run the script!

   ./lookup.py --biblio seattle  # Set to your own city!

Make sure you adhere to the terms of Goodreads' API, and have fun.

You can choose to show only titles available at your local branch, select titles from another Goodreads shelf, etc. Pass --help to see all options:

usage: lookup.py [-h] [--branch BRANCH] [--shelf SHELF] [--biblio BIBLIO]
                 [--csv CSV]
                 [user_id] [dev_key]

See which books you want to read are available at your local library.

positional arguments:
  user_id          User's ID on Goodreads
  dev_key          Goodreads developer key. See https://www.goodreads.com/api

optional arguments:
  -h, --help       show this help message and exit
  --branch BRANCH  Only show titles available at this branch. e.g. 'Fremont
                   Branch'
  --shelf SHELF    Name of the shelf containing desired books
  --biblio BIBLIO  subdomain of bibliocommons.com (seattle, vpl, etc.)
  --csv CSV        Output results to a CSV of this name.

• The bibliophile Python module does the legwork of querying Goodreads & BiblioCommons (respectively, these are the services needed to find which books I'm interested in, and which books are available at the library).
• The Python module is deployed as a serverless function on AWS Lambda.
  • The function is configured with an API Gateway to enable a REST API.
  • serverless provides automated deployment & configuration on AWS.
• A React application provides the user interface on biblio.dcain.me.
  • The React application is hosted as a static site on S3.
  • The static site is deployed behind CloudFront (for speed & HTTPS).