Library Management System

Developed by :Prakhar Mishra

Age: 13 years

Class: Grade 8, Hong Kong

 

Brief Introduction:

When I was 10 years old I got introduced to an NGO named USHA KIRAN in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India.This was via my grandmother who volunteers for them and helps young, underprivileged children there with their after-school learning classes. In pre-pandemic times we used to visit my grandmother’s place in Noida and try to help these children in the NGO and as part of that engagement I was exposed to these lively children who had limited resources and were so eager to improve their education. During the pandemic period I was remotely involved with the NGO from Hongkong and last year, before the summer of 2021 I came to know that USHA KIRAN is planning to open a library for their children who can benefit from reading donated books. I also learned that USHA KIRAN was planning to run it manually and was looking for support from its volunteers. As the manual management of the library would be tedious and time consuming for the NGO given the shortage of the voluteers and other resources during the tough times of COVID-19, and the fact that I was highly inspired to follow my grandmother’s footsteps and contribute from my side to USHA KIRAN, hence I requested the owner of the organisation, Mrs Chhaya Sharma, whether I could help her develop a library management system for their library. Gratefully she approved, and I used my coding reportoire to create a Library Management Software which could help the NGO manage the books in a more organised fashion while simultaneously helping the children by making their experience easier as well as introducing new options such as having the ability to search for books of their interest by the book name, book ID, book author, and the book category. I sincerely thank Mrs Chhaya Sharma for believing in me and giving me this great opportunity to utilise my coding skills through this Library Management system in her organization which can benefit so many children. After having developed and implemented the software in USHA KIRAN’s library, it is really enthralling and satisfying to see how the software is currently running successfully and making a difference in the life of the children and NGO workers.

Benefits of this Software:

For librarians, the software has useful features such as the ability to record all books (in many ways such as the ID, name, author etc.) , monitor the books available in stock, monitor the books which have been borrowed etc. Another useful feature is the overdue books option which helps track and remind children to return the borrowed books on time. All of these features help librarians avoid a lot of manual work and create signicant efficiencies. For children using the library, it has several helpful search functions to help them quickly locate and borrow books of their interest. Overall, the user interface is very simple, thus it is easy for young children to navigate through.

Brief background of its development and softwares used / needed :

The software was created using Tkinter, a python Toolkit, for the front end, visual development of the system. Python was used as the coding language for the logic and functioning of the system and MySQL was used as a database for storing all the book data. In order to ensure that the application can run on both Windows and Apple IOS computers, I have created two different applications catering to each type. I have also made an implementation document which guides users step by step for the system’s installation process. The system has also gone through a rigorous testing process at my end to ensure that it is robust and hassle free. I acquired the knowledge for making the system through online courses and the final version of the system was created during my grade 7 summer holiday.

Thank you for taking the time to read this document.I have been tremendously encouraged ,delighted and humbled to see the implementation of this software in USHA KIRAN and this has also motivated me to continue in applying myself to find other ways where I can contribute to the society.

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