libby-book-monitor

What This Skill Does

The Libby/OverDrive Book Monitor is a powerful, lightweight automation tool designed for avid readers who utilize public library digital resources. It allows users to track the availability of specific books across OverDrive-supported libraries. By interacting with the underlying APIs used by the Libby platform, this skill enables you to search library catalogues, maintain a personalized watchlist, and automate availability checks. It is designed for efficiency and is built using Python's standard library, ensuring it is lightweight and requires no external dependencies.

Installation

To install this skill, use the clawhub tool from your terminal. Ensure you have your OpenClaw environment initialized, then run: clawhub install openclaw/skills/skills/alexpolonsky/libby-book-monitor Once installed, you can configure your default library by editing the generated configuration file at ~/.libby-book-monitor/config.json. You can set your preferred library using the subdomain found on your library's OverDrive website.

Use Cases

• Personal Reading Lists: Track books you want to read and get notified automatically when they become part of your library's digital collection.
• Academic & Research: Monitor the availability of reference materials or textbooks across multiple library systems.
• Automated Alerts: Integrate the skill into a cron job to receive daily notifications about new book arrivals, ensuring you never miss a chance to place a hold as soon as a book is added.
• Multi-user Management: Use the profile feature to manage separate watchlists for different family members or research projects.

Example Prompts

• "Check if the book 'Project Hail Mary' is available in the Tel Aviv library catalogue."
• "Add 'Kafka on the Shore' by Haruki Murakami to my library watchlist."
• "Run my daily check for new books on my library watchlist and notify me of any updates."

Tips & Limitations

• Limitations: This is an unofficial tool; it does not have the ability to place holds or borrow books for you. It only tracks whether the library owns the item.
• Rate Limiting: The script includes a 1-second delay between API calls; please respect this to avoid excessive load on library servers.
• Profiles: Use the --profile flag to keep your personal watchlist organized if you track books for multiple people.
• Notifications: For cron jobs, always use the --notify flag to suppress output unless new books are discovered, keeping your logs clean and relevant.