Book Festival launches innovative web app on sell-out opening weekend

The new mobile site, which is available at http://m.edbookfest.co.uk, allows users to discover more about authors appearing at the Festival, the books they will be speaking about, and also search and read related articles from the Guardian. Customers can also check whether the books are available in the Book Festival’s on site bookshops and buy e-books and tickets for events.

The app was originally created during a 24 hour Culture Hack Scotland event in May and uses open source technologies. The Book Festival are making the source code of the application freely available to developers in the hope that it will inspire similar applications from other festival and cultural events both in Edinburgh and further afield.

The launch of the app coincided with the Book Festival opening weekend which saw over 25,000 visitors flock to Charlotte Square Gardens to enjoy sell out events with authors including Alasdair Gray, Bettany Hughes, Sarah Brown and Caitlin Moran.