Cataloging your home library -- this is WAY cool!

Barb D · Apr 3, 2009

ETA: Dale Emery suggests LibraryThing.com, which also adds the Dewey Decimal number. For now I'm going to switch from Gurulib to LibraryThing.

I recently found gurulib.com , which is a great website for creating your own home library catalog. You can type in titles, authors, ISBN, Barcode number, etc... Or better yet, buy your own barcode scanner and let it do the work! My barcode scanner just came in the mail, and works great.

Gurulib is free, and the barcode scanner cost me about $35 here: http://www.provantage.com/unitech-america-ms180-1ug~4UNIT079.htm
You may be able to find a better one, but this is the cheapest I found, and for my purposes it works fine.

The only thing that would make gurulib better is if they had the Dewey Decimal number for all books. They have it for some. But they do have the covers, genres, etc. and you can categorize your own library any way you want.

Dale Emery · Apr 3, 2009

Thanks for the pointer.

I haven't looked at gurulib.com. I've been using LibraryThing.

Another scanner (no longer manufactured, but still some inventory around) is the $15 CueCat. It works with LibraryThing. I don't know whether it works with gurulib. (And come to think of it, I haven't used it since I switched to Mac computers.)

Dale

Barb D · Apr 3, 2009

Dale Emery said:
Thanks for the pointer.

I haven't looked at gurulib.com. I've been using LibraryThing.

Another scanner (no longer manufactured, but still some inventory around) is the $15 CueCat. It works with LibraryThing. I don't know whether it works with gurulib. (And come to think of it, I haven't used it since I switched to Mac computers.)

Dale

This scanner is working fine with my MacBook. It comes with a USB connector.

I haven't heard about LibraryThing. I'll check it out, too...

ETA: LibraryThing includes the Dewey Decimal number! I'm going to switch over there...

Deleted member 42 · Apr 3, 2009

There are a bunch of us on AW using LibraryThing and Shelfari. I used GuruLib for my DVDs, but it's sorta flakey.

I admit that I heart LibraryThing; I'm a lifetime member (25.00) and I bought the 15.00 barcode scanner; I can just scan in the bar code on a book published in the last fifteen years or so, and it does all the work of filling in the bibliographic data.

I wrote a blog post about several of these services here.

zenwriter · Apr 3, 2009

I've been using BookDB by Spacejock software to keep track of my books. I love it.

Aquarius · Apr 3, 2009

Am I a geek in admitting that this is epically cool?

I used to be a library clerk and hope to continue on that career track in order to become a full fledged librarian. The mere thought of buying a scanner and using LibraryThing/GuruLib in order to keep track of my steadily growing collection of books is enough to make me laugh in fond rememberance.

At least, I will be able to move away from using index cards in order to keep track of both the books and who borrowed what. I'm not thrilled about the 200 books maximum for LibraryThing's free account, thought...

Anyways, thanks for the heads - up....

Gillhoughly · Apr 3, 2009

And I organize MINE by color!

ChaosTitan · Apr 3, 2009

Duuuuude, that picture is awesome!

DamaNegra · Apr 3, 2009

I use Spacejock's BookDB to keep track of my books, but at almost 300 books (only in my room, I've no idea how many books we have in total) I'm thinking of getting a barcode scanner, because it's hard to keep track of all the books. But $35? Daaaamn....

Deleted member 42 · Apr 3, 2009

Dale Emery said:
Another scanner (no longer manufactured, but still some inventory around) is the $15 CueCat. It works with LibraryThing. I don't know whether it works with gurulib. (And come to think of it, I haven't used it since I switched to Mac computers.)

Dale

LibraryThing still sells the CueCat for 15.00, and it works Just Fine with Macs.

CoriSCapnSkip · Apr 3, 2009

Gillhoughly said:
And I organize MINE by color!

Is that a real picture? I heard of a librarian once who freaked out on arriving to find an assistant had done this to the library books!

Gillhoughly · Apr 4, 2009

It's real and I WISH it was mine! NICE house!

I've been google image searching for bookcases, because my personal library is out of hand.

I very much like this unit, but don't have the $$ to buy four of them.

*sigh*

emilycross · Apr 4, 2009

Gill - oh i love the coloured books!! what an amazing idea. . . i'm soo doing that mwahaha

Lady Cat · Apr 4, 2009

zenwriter said:
I've been using BookDB by Spacejock software to keep track of my books. I love it.

Me too! I would love to get a bar code scanner though, I have a lot of books!

zenwriter · Apr 4, 2009

Me too! I would love to get a bar code scanner though, I have a lot of books!

I have just over 2000 and I don't have a bar code scanner either (I doubt it would even help -- I have a lot of old books). What I did is just catalog my books a shelf at a time until they were all done. It took a while, but boy was it cool to see them all in the database. It was a useful exercise, too -- I realized I had 4 copies of some books.

sommemi · Apr 9, 2009

THIS. IS. TOTALLY. WICKED.

I'm so going to look into this. We're hoping to buy a new house within a year and I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to scan in each of my books as I put them on my new shelves in my new house!!!

And dude... I don't care if they aren't in genre order or something, I'm totally going to sort them by color. I LOVE that picture!!!!!

emilycross · Apr 9, 2009

I found this amazing site (i know its slightly off topic) about creative bookshelves. I thought the criss cross one is amazing!!

http://freshome.com/2008/02/25/30-of-the-most-creative-bookshelves-designs/

SirOtter · Apr 9, 2009

This all sounds pretty cool, but with 10,000 books in my house, and probably half pre-barcode, I reckon I'm stuck with a plain ol' database.

Cataloging your home library -- this is WAY cool!

Barb D

Dale Emery

is way off topic

Barb D

Deleted member 42

zenwriter

Aquarius

Got the hang of it, here

Gillhoughly

Grumpy writer and editor

ChaosTitan

Around

DamaNegra

Mexican on the loose!

Deleted member 42

CoriSCapnSkip

New kid, be gentle!

Gillhoughly

Grumpy writer and editor

emilycross

is away with the fairies

Lady Cat

zenwriter

sommemi

Uses loquacious in sentences

emilycross

is away with the fairies

SirOtter

Il Cavaliere Marino

Cataloging your home library -- this is WAY cool!

is way off topic

Deleted member 42

Got the hang of it, here

Grumpy writer and editor

Around

Mexican on the loose!

Deleted member 42

New kid, be gentle!

Grumpy writer and editor

is away with the fairies

Uses loquacious&#8194;in sentences

is away with the fairies

Il Cavaliere Marino

Uses loquacious in sentences