System and method for publishing and displaying digital materials

1. A non-transitory computer readable medium having computer executable program code embodied thereon, the computer executable program code configured to cause a computing device to:

provide an ePub publishing module comprising a mechanism for publishers to upload ePub files, wherein the ePub publishing module comprises a mechanism to publish ePub files in accordance with a free and open e-book standard, whereby the content of a file is indexed upon uploading and publication, and upon access by a user, is displayed in a meaningful way with a table of contents;

provide a user management module providing a means to add, edit and remove end users from the system;

provide a bookshelf module for organizing the user's content in order to create a logical grouping of content, wherein the bookshelf module tracks the content that the user has checked out, whereby the user can interact with the checked out content by reading the content, annotating the content, downloading the content, printing the content, and searching within the content; and

provide a reading content module for reading content after the user has been mapped to the content.

2. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to cause the computing device to provide an annotating content module for annotating user selected text.

3. The computer readable medium of claim 2 , wherein the user selects an annotation tool within the annotating content module and annotates the content by adding highlights, notes and bookmarks.

4. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to cause the computing device to provide a downloading center module for downloading content in a specific format to a specific device.

5. The computer readable medium of claim 4 , wherein the device comprises the user's PC, a reader, a handheld phone, or a handheld computer.

6. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to cause the computing device to provide a searching module for searching across content, or in a public library, for content that matches user selected search terms.

7. The computer readable medium of claim 6 , wherein the searching module permits searching within a specific content, which provides anchor links for the user to interact with the search results and view them when clicked.

8. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to cause the computing device to provide a sharing module for sharing annotations and comments.

9. The computer readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the sharing module allows the user to choose sharing properties, wherein all shared content becomes available in the public bookshelf.

10. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , wherein the sharing properties comprise one or more of audience and permissions.

11. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the program code is further configured to cause the computing device to provide a virtual content module for creating a virtual content item.

12. The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the user management module provides a means for an administrator to add, edit and remove end users from the system.