LibraryMySQL

A JavaFX desktop client for a MySQL library database — search books, view authors and genres, and rate what you have read.

Built with Ahmed El Yasini as a pair project for HI1030 Databasteknik at KTH.

What works

• Search by title, ISBN, author, genre, or rating. Title, author and genre searches are partial matches; ISBN is exact. Rating matches books whose rounded average equals the number you enter — it is an equality test, not a minimum.
• Book details on row selection: authors with birth dates, genres, and the reviews left by other users.
• Rate a book from 1 to 10, one rating per user per book, enforced by a database check before the insert.
• Add and delete books, with authors and genres attached at creation.
• Reviews — write a text review, read everyone else's.
• Accounts — register (username at least 3 characters, password at least 4) and log in. Book management stays disabled until you are logged in.

Under the hood: MVC with the controller depending only on BooksDbInterface, a singleton DatabaseConnection, and prepared statements for every query that takes user input. Long queries run on JavaFX Task threads so the window does not freeze.

Requirements

• JDK 21 — the POM targets 21, so JDK 17 will not build this.
• MySQL 8.0.16 or newer — the schema uses CHECK constraints, which older servers parse and ignore.
• Maven is not required; the repository ships the Maven wrapper.

Database setup

The schema, the two database accounts, and the seed data all live in one file.

This script is destructive. Its first statement is DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS LibraryDB;. If you already have a database named LibraryDB, it will be removed without warning.

It creates users and grants privileges, so it must be run as root or an account with CREATE USER and GRANT OPTION:

mysql -u root -p < Database/LibraryDB.sql

Do not pass a database name — the script creates and selects LibraryDB itself. It sets up eight tables (T_User, T_Author, T_Genre, T_Book, T_Rating, T_Review, T_Book_Author, T_Book_Genre) and seeds them with four users, five authors, seven genres and five books.

The application connects to localhost:3306 as the library_client account the script creates. Host, user and password are compile-time constants in src/main/java/se/kth/awad/bookdatabase/model/DatabaseConnection.java; changing them means editing that file and rebuilding.

Building and running

./mvnw clean package      # Linux / macOS
mvnw.cmd clean package    # Windows

The run goal is currently misconfigured and will fail. module-info.java declares the module as BookDatabase, but the javafx-maven-plugin's <mainClass> in pom.xml is se.kth.awad.bookdatabase/se.kth.awad.bookdatabase.App — the part before the slash must be the module name, not the package name. Running ./mvnw javafx:run as configured produces:

java.lang.module.FindException: Module se.kth.awad.bookdatabase not found

Correcting <mainClass> to BookDatabase/se.kth.awad.bookdatabase.App fixes the mismatch. There is no other launch path in the repository — no shaded jar, no exec plugin, no launcher script.

Once the application starts, connect with Database → Connect before using any other menu.

Known gaps

• javafx:run does not work as configured — see above. This is the one thing standing between a clone and a running application.
• Passwords are stored and compared in plaintext. T_User.password holds the raw string, the seed data ships readable passwords, and login() compares them in SQL. There is no hashing anywhere.
• Database credentials are committed to the repository, in both DatabaseConnection.java and Database/LibraryDB.sql. The script also creates an Admin account with ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* that the application never uses.

License

MIT