

Ask HN: Rate my summer project - BookShout - haon99
http://www.bookshout.com

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sundarurfriend
Another vote for a search box in the home page. I've so gotten used to one
that it felt odd to be in a page without one, I was subconsciously searching
for it for some time.

Also, I was initially confused by the "find and recommend books about logic"
line staring at me, wondering whether this was a niche site for logic books or
something. Only because I gave it more time I realised it changes to other
topics. There must be a better way to indicate that this is what is happening,
that it's gonna animate to other topics, try to think of one.

All the best.

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Deejahll
How is it different from <http://www.librarything.com/> ?

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asanwal
Really like this idea. Find Amazon recs for books that teach you about a
specific topic are very hit or miss or you have to sift through lots of
reviews to figure it out. Time suck.

Some thoughts/ideas:

1\. May be focus on really good recommendations on a handful of verticals to
start. Always find focus in beginning is a good thing and see where those
people/users take it. Speak from personal experience not having done this in
my own startup (trying to be everything to everyone - not good).

2\. What about different levels of learning? What if you're looking to learn
about negotiation but you're not a beginner and so want 'intermediate'
resources? I find this is also a pain point as it's tough to determine what is
for beginners vs intermediate or advanced practitioners.

Look forward to seeing how this evolves. Nice start.

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adammichaelc
This is the sort of thing that I currently search certain sites for. Like if
I'm looking for book recommendations on a certain programming language, I
search HN (eg. site:ycombinator.com rails programming books)

I could see this type of thing being really useful. Maybe you could partner
with some of the online-learning sites to have the students and teachers rate
books that are used for teaching/learning subjects... Good luck with the
project!

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nhebb
I've thought about this idea for a while, so it's nice to see someone
implement it. Amazon tells you that people who bought A also bought B, C, D,
... But what they don't tell you is whether the people actually _liked_ any of
the items. This idea could be parlayed into similar music and movie sites.

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Angostura
Looks very nice indeed. The only thing I would suggest is to add a star-rating
system, so that you can see the distribution of opinion. Currently you can
only vote for "Good", there is no "despite what others say, this really sucks"
function.

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mdhv
I really like it. A great idea.

Personally, I think it would be better if the landing page had a search bar so
you could just get down to business. And maybe random hot topics as well.

Awesome idea, I can really see myself using this.

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sahillavingia
Can I help you with the design? I'd love to spend a few hours. Email in
profile.

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TamDenholm
Personally i like the concept, i also like the animation aswell. I'd perhaps
tone down the cartoonyness in the rest of the design though, remove the
rounded corners and bold text etc. Pretty good though.

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talonx
Maybe you should separate out search by topic and search by book title? On
searching for something which is not there yet, how about an option to create
(suggest) it? Good stuff, otherwise!

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long
It'd be more coherent if fashion was actually a topic on the site.

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awfulcoder14
Really cool idea.

Only little detail that bothered me is the animation at the beginning- being
unable to move it left/right.

Other than that i'd definetly use it!

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araneae
FB connect is broken ^-^ Cool idea though.

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rokhayakebe
I love. I love your TOS.

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pghimire
Great idea. You probably need to keep soliciting feedback to tweak specific
areas of the site. Like awfulcoder14 mentioned I did not like not being able
to scroll through the animation back and forth on hompage.

One Bug: I could not login using FBConnect. Tried a few times, FB login popped
up, logged in and when the page was trying to reload/redirect -> error.

