GoodBook.Reviews is a new platform for the STEEM Blockchain.
The aim of this project is to create a book review platform that is powered by STEEM encourageing people to write in-depth valuable reviews. Steemit & Busy are both general purpose blogging platforms, that means they are able to accommodate many types of content but specialise for none. I believe creating a specialised platform for books on-top of STEEM can foster a new community and bring value to the Blockchain as a whole.
GoodBook.reviews will feature custom design with books taking first place. Features like rating and genres being readily available allows an enhanced way to interact with data on the blockchain.
Choosing a Project Name
The name is currently a WIP, I spotted goodbook.reviews was for sale and thought that would be a good placeholder at-least while in the initial development phase. Although powered by STEEM I think this deserved it’s own name not STEEM-somthing.
Current Features
The project is build with Node.js powering an Express.js backend. Steemconnect for authentication. Steem-js for retriving Data from the Blockchain.
Gallery View
The primary view for the platform will be what I’m calling the Gallery/Library. This view can accommodate 6 - 12 books on one screen depending on screen size, allowing for a fast viewing experience. User can switch between the Latest, Trending, Featured and personal user feed (who they follow) easily. All but the featured feed pull directly from the STEEM blockchain using the steem.js API.
Generes have also been added to the sidebar but this has not yet been implemented and will require additional data before it become useful.
Single View
Possible the most important page, the actual review template. The intended result is to stick to a familiar format where the books cover is the featured image and displayed alongside the main content. Book metadata such as Title/Author/User rating is also displayed alongside.
The aim is to keep the reading experience minimal without sidebars, recommendations etc alongside the actual content.
Create Post
The platform requires additional information to create the expected experience and there allows and in future will enforce posting from the platform.
Along with the main content of the review the platform stores more information such as Book Title, Book Author and Rating as custom JSON. Storing this information on the blockchain allows other platforms to access this in future. Data is not silo’d to this platform.
Authentication
Authentication is with Steemconnect, the recognised standard for STEEM token based auth. Users can securely access the platform without putting their STEEM keys at risk.
Authentication is currently used to allow users to post directly from the platform with the create view. Voting + commenting is set up on the backend but not yet implemented in the UI.
Release Date?
This initial version is not hosted and is not intended for public use. There is no reason why it wouldn’t work but is subject to many changes over the coming releases. It is not recommended to post content until a more solid data structure is decided. I’ll open up a hosted platform shortly and ask for beta users to post content.
Roadmap
There is a lot of work to be done and I am working to bring this project up to speed asap. The tasks below are what I'm focusing on first but there are plenty outside of this too.
- Hosted version for Beta use
- Voting + commenting UI
- S3 hosting for book covers
- Non-logged in Landing page explaining the project
- User dashboard, where you can see/edit your own posts
- Recommendations at single footer
- genre search/tags
Contributions & Suggestions
If you watched the d.tube video you will have seen a sneak peek at this already. I am really interested to hear what you all think of the platform. There is a lot of work to be done to create the platform I am imaging.
Are there any key features you think the site would need?
What do you think the most important part of a book review is?
Posted on Utopian.io - Rewarding Open Source Contributors