Libraries

A library is a chiseled bookshelf you set up in your own claim. Every book on it is a real numbered copy of a published book, and each slot on the shelf can do one of three things.

Setting one up

Place a chiseled bookshelf inside your claim, look at it and type /library register, with a name if you like (/library register Corner Nook). A shelf has six slots, top row left to right, then the bottom row. To fill a slot, hold a numbered copy, look at the slot and type one of:

The author decides first. A book is only shelved for reading, free copies or sale if its author has allowed that where they published it, and an author can take the offer back at any time. Look at a slot and the action bar names the title, the author and what is on offer.

Visiting

Right-click a slot to read the book without taking anything. To take a free copy or buy one, sneak and click the copy, then sneak and click again within six seconds to confirm. You get that exact numbered copy and the slot is empty until the keeper, or a reserve, fills it. Nobody can pull a book off the shelf with a hopper, a piston or a click, and a shelf you break gives its copies back to its keeper along with the block.

A free book is limited to one copy per visitor each week. A purchase takes the money only when the copy is yours, and returns it if anything goes wrong on the way.

The shelf screen

Right-click the frame of a shelf, anywhere but a slot, or type /library browse while looking at it. You see all six slots with the book covers, what each offers and whether a copy is left. Click a book to read it, shift-click to take a free copy home or to buy one (you confirm before any money moves). Curators of the central archive approve or decline waiting books from the same screen.

Keeping it stocked

Put a chest or barrel in the same chunk and claim, look at it and type /library reserve. Put spare copies of the same book inside. When a free or shop slot has been empty for ten minutes the next copy moves in by itself. If the reserve is empty you get one message about it every twelve hours, and the label reads "out of stock" meanwhile.

/library clear brings a slot's copies back to you. /library list shows your shelves, /library info the slots on the one you are looking at, and /library unregister closes a shelf.

The central archive

The curators keep a central library for books that belong to everyone. Its slots are shown only after a curator approves them. Sales there go to the server rather than to a player.

Commands

Books themselves are written and published on the Books page.