Chapter 1

INTRODUCTION

Sharing books is the most basic form of sharing knowledge. But, sharing books manually may be
tedious and not always convenient. The project aims at providing an electronic medium to share
books and provide readers with a platform for discussing books .It uses the basics of day to day
social transactions and incorporates them into a business model. It majorly delves into the system
of customer to customer business model to create a conducive and beneficial environment for
both the user and providers. The system provides a platform for any user, who has a book that is
not needed anymore and would like to share it with another user that may have the need for it.
This shall be accomplished by developing a cross platform app that incorporates the leading web
technologies of today.

Every year there are many students who are busy with finding textbooks that they want to use in
the beginning of new semesters/quarters. Since the prices for textbooks are pretty expensive,
quite a lot of them choose to borrow or buy used books from libraries, classmates, friends or
anyone in their network. Because of the low capacity of libraries, most of the time you are put in
a long queue, which might take you a long time to wait for the item you want. And also, it’s not
easy to buy a used book just by your connections. So our idea here, is to provide a Book Sharing
System which will help students to get used books easily and cheaply. By using this online
mutual-help system, people can get books they’re looking for and share own resources to others
as well.

The reason for choosing the genre of textbook over novel and fictional books was because of the
factor of necessity a textbook brings with it compared to that of other genre. Share E-Book is the
interface between the students and Librarian. It aims at improving the efficiency in the Issue of
books or magazines and reduces the complexities involved in it to the maximum possible extent.
Customizable Bookshelf System maintains the details of the books. Books are portable, consist
of text, and are readable on computers, mobiles or other electronic devices. Using this
application a user can post messages on Facebook, and a ‘bookmark’ is used to move quickly to
a particular chapter or subsection. The features provided should make the mobile reading
experience complete and rewarding. The system has reading features such as Day/Night mode,
Text-To-Speech, modify the book details. Today the use of cell phones has become an amazing
part of daily life.
Libraries have been playing the role of a provider of learning resources to the learning
communities. Drastic changes in the technology and the way internet is evolving has changed the
attitude of users towards learning resources. The role of libraries as a facilitator by providing
access to the electronic resources like e-journals and e-books using the modern technology is
widely encouraged. E-books provides many advantages, views Armstrong. There is no need of
physical space and hence the problem of shelving or re-shelving doesn't arise.

E-books cannot be damaged or mutilated; stock taking or missing will not be a problem. The
most important advantage is that, the same book can be used by many at a time. If the ebooks are
made available through library the portal, users need not have to visit the library to access books.
There are many applications for managing music, pictures and documents online or at one's
desktop. But, E-book management applications are very rare. People usually store their e-books
as files in computer or storage devices. When, the collection of books grows, retrieval and
classification becomes a nightmare. Managing e-books as a personal collection or in a library is
not an easy task.

An eBook is a non-editable, reflowable book that is converted to a digital format to be read on

any digital device such as computer screens or mobile devices. For starters, eBooks are files that
you can read on a digital device – a tablet, smartphone, computer, etc. But again, considering
other files can be read on digital devices (i.e. word documents) eBooks have specific
characteristics that differentiate them. One distinct characteristic of an eBook: the text should not
be editable. An eBook should always be converted into a format that ensures it’s uneditable.
With thousands of people having access to it on digital devices, people could potentially change
any content without the author’s permission.
So, in order to qualify as an actual eBook, text should not be able to be changed in any way, just
like a paperback book. Another important characteristic is that true eBooks should be reflowable.
This means that no matter what the size of the screen you’re viewing the eBook on, it will
always fit your screen; text will remain formatted with line breaks and chapters and images will
resize to fit the proportions of the device you’re reading on.
There is one exception though: PDFs. Considering PDFs can’t be edited, but they aren’t
reflowable, they technically don’t qualify as eBooks according to the characteristics that
differentiate eBooks. But with businesses taking advantage of the ease of PDF downloads and
distribution, PDFs have become “unofficial” eBooks and are still widely used eBook formats.
An eBook can be read on a variety of digital devices; any digital screen really. Below are a few
of the most popular devices that eBooks are viewed on:
 Computers

 Tablets

 Smartphones

In recent years though, a device called an eReader (electronic reader) was developed specifically
for reading and storing eBooks. An eReader is simply a handheld device that eBooks can be read
on. Some of the most popular eReader devices include:

 Amazon’s Kindle

 Rakuten’s Kobo

 Barnes & Noble’s Nook

Some of these devices were made with built-in lighting so that readers can continue to read once
they no longer have access to light.

Unfortunately, some of the models don’t have this feature. For convenience, companies like
Amazon and Kobo created apps that allow you to continue reading from any device that has the
app downloaded. This means that you can start reading from your eReader and when it gets dark,
you can finish on your computer, smartphone, or tablet if needed.

 
 

You might be thinking, “Why purchase an eReader when I can easily use my smartphone or
tablet?”
Well, there are a few perks eReaders have that those devices don’t.
1. They have great battery life. In fact, their battery life can last for weeks depending on usage.
2. eReaders can hold thousands of books! I don’t know about you, but my iPhone storage fills up
pretty fast. There’s no way I could store all of the books I want to read and then some. This isn’t
a problem if you have an eReader.
3. They’re easy to read outside. Ever been soaking up the sun while trying to read an article on
your computer or smartphone, but you can’t because the LED is basically unreadable? Yeah,
eReaders don’t have that problem.
Quite possibly my favorite benefit of eBooks. The book-printing industry consumes 16 million
tons of paper each year; that’s 32 million trees. And don’t get me started on the amount of
pollution that factories release into the air. Talk about an enormous carbon footprint. With
eBooks making up around 30 percent of book sales, they not only save energy and reduce
pollution, but they also save approximately 9.6 million of those 32 million trees annually! A win
for everyone.