Library Thing
Some of you may recall that in a post last week about what I was reading I got sidetracked a bit about not having an easy computerized catalog of my personal collection. I left that blog with a thought of how easy such a piece of software that was web-based would be to develop. I further though with the general past open state of things like Amazon, I would be able to pull in a large amounts of data with relatively few pieces of search information for a particular title. I even spent the evening making some notes and looking at API calls that would be required. And then a friend of mine posted on here that what I needed was something like LibraryThing.
I went to have a look at this thing called LibraryThing that said friend recommended. First thing when I went to sign up for a free account, I ran into there already being the user name I typically use being registered. I found that just a little bit odd, as there is only one other place on the web that I have had the occur. So, I tried for grins, a standard old password I use for signing up on things I am not sure about and definitely do not trust at the point of signing up. Sure enough, it let me right in. Strangely, I had registered and apparently tested the site sometime nigh on two years back.
I am not sure what I found lacking in the site two years ago, but I will say that I am mostly pleasantly pleased with the site today. It is a free site to use up to two hundred books, which I am sure I will overtake as soon as I actually take the time to put my books into the system. Beyond two hundred volumes there are two ways to proceed, a lifetime membership for $25.00 or a one year subscription for $10.00. I think the value is there either way to be honest.
Putting in books that are in your library has never been so easy. You can provide any number of things as criteria, including partial title, author names, ISBN, or some combination thereof. I have had really good luck with all of the methods so far. It will pull in and find the rest of the information by searching places like Amazon, Library of Congress, and few other places. It stores things in two sections, the general work itself and the specific edition in question of the copy you have – which is great for those books that you have the first edition first print run or some collectible special edition.
LibraryThing has the capability to put it in a specific collection of your own. Default collections include library (or own), wish list, to read, currently reading, have read but do no own and such as that. I only plan on really using library or wish list, though it does have the ability to add collections. I may use that feature to specify a location, as to being at the house in my storage unit for the short-term. It also has the ability to add tags – which I am kind of thinking like subject tags in the old card catalog system. I am happy though, as the tags are what I use and meaningful to me. For example, original art and medieval are two tags used so far. I know that book has nice original artwork from the medieval time period contained within it. One drawback, a pull down would be nice on the tags instead of typing them each time manually, which introduces errors of course. I have used both horse and horses. I am sure librarians have a standard and hopefully I recall what I decided on going forward.
A couple of other nice features is the ability to import and export. Import can take on a variety of formats and can include that from Amazon wish list (I will be testing that one sometime soon) to a CSV, with several others in between. Exporting is similar and supports several formats as well. There is a tie in for adding things to the library (think wish list) with a bookmarklet. It supports a widget style display of the library in several formats and is universal enough to work on most any CMS system, such as WordPress. It also has a nice find for purchase feature, that first goes to Amazon but will look at other locations on a second page. Lastly and the most important feature, it supports browsing in several mobile formats – which means I can easily and quickly check my library to see if I have a book when I am out at the used book store and think I have found a great bargain on some potential new selection.
Other drawbacks aside from the tag issue noted above is the lack of ability to note any kind of pricing information. It is easy to see on say Amazon what things are selling for but it would be nice to know what I paid for a book when I purchased it and if it has appreciated in value (I do have a few that have since I have owned them). Further, the same would be true in regards to making an indication of what price I am willing to pay for something on my wish list. It would also be nice if there were a pull down tab (or tabs) for condition. Like a grade of 1-10 and another for things like rounded corners, missing jacket, minimal notes inside cover, etc. The drawbacks are nominal though and can be somewhat overcome with the comments section.
Overall I think the idea of what I had in mind is nearly represented in this piece of software. I would highly recommend it to anyone who is a kindred bibliophile and at the same suffers from liking to have things in neat orderly classifications. Though I will point, the neat orderly system of the library only exist for the virtual part of it, not the physical.
