Catalogue your home library using your phone and Claude AI.
Take photos of your shelves with your phone — one shelf per photo, straight on. Zip them by bookcase, upload to Claude, and BookBinder does the rest. Claude reads every spine and generates the SQL to import straight into your database.
No manual data entry. No barcode scanning. Works on any bookcase, any collection size.
The sidebar lets you jump straight to any bookcase or category. Categories with sub-categories have an expand arrow — click it to drill down. Medical breaks into Anatomy, Osteopathy, Physiotherapy and more; Sailing into Pilot Books, Almanacs, Cruising Guides — whatever sub-cats you assign.
The search bar finds titles and authors across your whole collection, or within a bookcase. Sortable column headers let you view by title, author, category, or bookcase.
Log in as editor and the ✏️ button on every row opens an inline edit form — no separate page, no losing your place in the list. Fix a category, assign a sub-category, or add a note. Changes save instantly and the list stays put.
Browsing is open to everyone. Editing is behind a password you set yourself.
BookBinder runs on your own server — Docker on your home machine, or any shared PHP/MySQL hosting. Your book data stays yours. No subscriptions, no cloud accounts, no third-party access to your collection.
Docker users get a one-command install. Manual install takes about ten minutes.
BookBinder was built to catalogue a large, varied home library — over 700 books across 15 bookcases covering fiction, sailing, medical, cookery, TEFL, music, poetry, games and more. It handles stacked books, unclear spines, binders and journals, duplicate titles, and books on tables as well as shelves.
Claude flags any spine it can't read clearly so you can check the physical book and correct it later.
Docker Desktop is the only dependency for most people — free, runs on Mac, Windows and Linux. Download the BookBinder zip, run one command, and it's live at http://localhost:8585.
Or drop the app/ folder onto any PHP/MySQL web server. See the How To page for both options.
BookBinder uses a two-level category system. The default categories are a starting point — you can use whatever makes sense for your collection. Sub-categories work for any category, not just Medical.
BookBinder v1.0.0 — a SoulTrade Software project.
Built with PHP, MySQL and Docker. Catalogue powered by Claude AI.