How it works
One computer runs the library. Everything else connects to it.
The architecture is deliberately boring, because boring is what survives a school network. Here is precisely where your data lives and what talks to what.
Setup
Five steps, one afternoon
This is the whole deployment. There is no step six where you call somebody.
- 01
Install Bookleaf on one Windows PC
Run the installer on the librarian's computer. There is no database to set up and no web server to configure — the whole system, including the part that serves other devices, is inside the app you just installed.
- 02
Create your institution and an admin PIN
On first launch you name the library and create the admin account. That account can add librarians, and librarians can add members. Roles are enforced everywhere: admin, librarian, member.
- 03
Bring your existing list in
Upload the Excel or CSV file you already keep, and map your columns to Bookleaf's fields. If you have MARC records from a consortium or a supplier, import the MARCXML directly instead.
- 04
Connect the library to your Wi-Fi
The PC announces itself on the local network every few seconds. Patron phones on the same Wi-Fi find it automatically; if your network blocks that, they can type the address shown on the dashboard.
- 05
Patrons install the app and log in
Students and teachers open the Bookleaf app on their own Android phones, pick your library, and sign in with their ID number and PIN. From then on they can search, hold, renew and check due dates themselves.
The details
What is actually happening on your network
Your catalog is one file
Bookleaf stores everything — titles, copies, members, loans, fines, gate logs — in a single SQLite database file on the librarian's PC. You can see it, copy it to a flash drive, and back it up like any other document. Nobody else holds a copy unless you make one.
Patron devices are thin
The phone app keeps no catalog of its own. It asks the librarian's PC over the local network and shows the answer. That means a student's phone never holds another student's data, and losing a phone loses nothing.
Discovery is automatic, with a manual fallback
The server broadcasts a small announcement on the local network every three seconds, so patron apps list your library without anyone typing anything. School networks that suppress broadcast traffic are common, so the dashboard always shows the address as a fallback.
An Android phone can be the server instead
If there is no PC to spare, the same system runs on an Android device: it holds the database and serves the other phones exactly the same way. The desktop app is the fuller librarian experience, but the phone is a genuine option, not a demo.
Staff can work from a second device
Librarian and admin accounts are not tied to the machine holding the database. Signing in from another device on the same network gives you the management screens there too — useful when someone is processing returns away from the main desk.
Nothing is sent anywhere
There is no telemetry, no account server, and no sync. If you unplug the router's WAN cable, every feature described on this site keeps working, because none of them ever needed the connection.
Before you deploy
Read the security page first
Bookleaf is built for a trusted school network, and there are real limits to what version 1 protects against. We publish them rather than burying them.
Try it on your own catalog this week.
Download Bookleaf and run the full system free for 7 days — every feature, no card, no account needed. If it fits, the software license is ₱1,499, one time.