Google Book Shell

Search Google Books from command line window.

Video of "How to Install & Use Google-Book-Shell"

How to Install

npm install -g google-book-shell

If you have already installed it before (Thank you 😇), update it as shown below.

npm update -g google-book-shell

Link to Google-Book-Shell NPM page.

How to Run 🏃‍

Type gbs

dance2die@LELOUCH c:\misc\sources
> gbs
google book search$

Usage

Type help for the list of commands

google book search$ help

  Commands:

    help [command...]  Provides help for a given command.
    exit               Exits application.
    search <book>      search for a book in Google Books
    open <number>      open # in searched book list
    view <number>      view detailed description of the book
    print              print searched books

Commands

search

• USAGE: search <book name> (book name is required).
• ALIAS: s
• DESCRIPTION: Searches for the book on Google Books.
• If the name has a space, use a double/single quote around the name.
• EXAMPLE

google book search$ search "Grokking Algorithms"
01: Grokking Algorithms
02: Grokking Deep Learning
03: Algorithms For Dummies
04: Algorithms Unlocked
05: Data Structures and Algorithms in Python
06: Essential Algorithms
07: The Algorithm Design Manual
08: The CS Detective
09: Algorithmic Puzzles
10: Python Algorithms

open

• USAGE: open [options] <number> (number is required).
• ALIAS: o
• DESCRIPTION: Opens the searched book by the search result order in a web browser.
• NOTE: Works only after search is run.
• OPTIONS:

Options:
    --help                        output usage information
    -a, --amazon                  open Amazon link
    -s, --strip-amazon-affiliate  strip affiliate query parameter

• --amazon (or -a for short): Opens Amazon Web Link with affiliate info

  • Amazon's Product API requires a developer to sign up as an affiliate so this was unavoidable.
  • So I added the following option (-s) to strip out affiliate info if you choose to do so
  • This flag calls an Azure Function, which needs to wake up after some inactivity (Takes about 10~30 seconds). It will work faster after the first call.

• --strip-amazon-affiliate (or -s for short): Strip out affiliate info (Please support me by not using this flag 👼)

• e.g.)

  • open 1
  • open -a 1 (or open --amazon 1)
  • open -a -s 1 (or open --amazon --strip-amazon-affiliate 1)
  • YouTube walk-through

  

view

• USAGE: view [number] (number is optional).

• ALIAS: v

• DESCRIPTION: Displays the description of the searched book in console by search result order.

• When [number] argument is missing, it will let user choose a book to view detail for

• NOTE: Works only after search is run.

• EXAMPLE with [number] argument.

• EXAMPLE withOUT [number] argument.

print

• USAGE: print
• ALIAS: p
• DESCRIPTION: Reprints searched book result
• Note: Displays nothing when no search was performed previously.
• EXAMPLE

google book search$ print                    
01: Grokking Algorithms                      
02: Grokking Deep Learning                   
03: Algorithms For Dummies                   
04: Algorithms Unlocked                      
05: Data Structures and Algorithms in Python 
06: Essential Algorithms                     
07: The Algorithm Design Manual              
08: The CS Detective                         
09: Algorithmic Puzzles                      
10: Python Algorithms                        

Demo using Aliases only

You can search, view details, and open browser much faster with aliases.

How to‍ 🏃‍ from the Source

1. Clone the source: git clone https://github.com/dance2die/google-book-shell.git
2. Install NPM packages/dependencies npm install or yarn
3. Run it using npm or yarn

• yarn start

  --or--

• npm run start

TODO

• Separate each command into different files.
• Use a plugin archiecture to dynamically load commands.
• ? Compare prices from Google Books/Amazon/Barnes & Noble?