rssLord, teach us to take our hearts and look them in the face, however difficult it may be. - D.L. Sayers
2006, March 22
Library Thing
LibraryThing - addictive
Go to LibraryThing.com and start cataloging. It is fun, an interesting way to compare collections, and a way to meet (virtually) other owners of favorite books.
Tim Spalding has put together a very attractive site, with a database that works with only occasional glitches, and a fairly intuitive interface. One thing that would be better would be a way to make the back-up option less hidden. In case the server crashes, which I take it did happen once, you should download your library as a text file, and keep it on your computer.
Then, to reconstitute the library online, you can just upload the books.csv file. To make the books.csv file, you go to the Extras tab at the top of the page, then Export Data. Click the "Export all data as text" link, and you will have a comma separated text file. It did not work for me in Excel as he suggests, but did load easily into FileMaker.
So far I have cataloged 300 books and am now taking a break to make graphics of covers not available, and perhaps to do some reviews. Tim says he is preparing to add a CD database; that will be at least as addictive.
