Keep track of all your books and prevent making duplicate purchases

[BruceS]

Even though amazon informs you when you ask to buy a book for your kindle that you have already purchased for the kindle, anyone who has bought a kindle should be an avid enough reader that they have many desktop books as well.

Book Collector available from http://www.collectorz.com/book/ allows you to keep track of all books that you own, both DT and kindle as well as audio.

When you enter a new book, it can search by bar code, author/title, or Library of Congress Classification.

When it finds a match, it downloads pictures of the book cover, the name(s) of the author(s), the publisher, the publication year, and a synopsis of the plot as well as other useful information.

After the download is done, you can edit the entry and enter things like the price, purchase date, format, location where you keep the book, and other useful information.

For those of you with very large collections, you can keep track of which bookcase and shelf you keep the book on. This makes it much easier to find a book when you need it.

There is also an iPhone app available that allows you to download your collection to your phone. If you are still buying hard covers or paperbacks, this can prevent duplicate purchases.

I also use their application Movie Collector to keep track of all of my VHS, DVD and Blu-ray movies.

In case you have collections of other things, they also have versions for your music, game, comic, mp3 and photos as well.

[Diana]

Thanks Bruce, it sounds like that would be a worthwhile thing to at least organize the books I have on Kindle so I can make better decisions about what I want to read next.

[BruceS]

I forgot to mention, that you can also keep track of whether or not you have read that particular book.

You can keep track of whether a particular book is in your collection as well. This way if you don't trust the internet, but still want to browse it to look for potential purchases, you can have a list of ones you want ready when you go to your local book store.

[Chad Winters]

similar program for Macs is Delicous Library http://delicious-monster.com/ that uses the built in camera on your computer as the scanner.

Typing in your Kindle versions for either one would be time consuming. I use Calibre for that because it organize and keeps copies of the ebooks

[Athenagwis]

That looks neat.  I just use a spreadsheet right now, which seems to be working great.  Though I can see the value in having a program that checks if you own the book for you automatically.  Right now I just sort by title and check if I have it or not. 

Thanks for sharing!!
Rachel

[r0b0d0c]

similar program for Macs is Delicous Library http://delicious-monster.com/ that uses the built in camera on your computer as the scanner.

Typing in your Kindle versions for either one would be time consuming. I use Calibre for that because it organize and keeps copies of the ebooks

I tried my Delicious Library, but you can't just drop the Amazon item into it, as you do with DTBs, CDs, DVDs and videogames. You can manually type them in, and then copy/paste the book cover in, but that's a PITA.

Unfortunately, it looks like you must buy the "Pro" version of "Book Collector" ($50 vs. $30) to be able to "export" the list to iPhone/iPod Touch.

Edit: Woah - and if you want to export/sync to iPhone/iPod Touch, it looks like you need to buy the $10 iPhone app, in addition. Pretty expensive for a data file - guess I'll just manually add these into Delicious Library for now.

[ruggie]

Delicious Library looks very slick!  I wish it were available for the PC. 

[auntmarge]

I use LibraryThing (www.librarything.com), which has an add-on feature for transferring any title to your LT list, including titles you don't own but want.  The only problem is that you have to do it from a DTB page, so ebook-only titles have to be added by hand. 

[melissaj323]

I'll have to look into it....since Dec 2002 I have been writing it all down in a notebook......then a few years ago I created a spreadsheet. I still write it down in both b/c I would hate to have my computer crash and lose my book log. Hmm, an app for the Iphone....I could really use that. Off to go exploring everyone's suggestions!

[L.Canton]

Thanks for posting these sites, they look quite handy. My ebook collection isn't massive yet, but I can already tell it's going to be.

[Luvmy4brats]

I need to do something to keep track of my books (ebook, audio, DTB). It's getting out of hand. I'd also like somewhere to keep track of the samples I've downloaded and whether or not I've read them. Then to also tell me if I liked it or not.

I started a spreadsheet yesterday, but it's not what I'm looking for yet. I'll keep working on it.

[pidgeon92]

Delicious Library does bring in all of the information from Amazon.... I usually just input the ISBN.

[Athenagwis]

I'll have to look into it....since Dec 2002 I have been writing it all down in a notebook......then a few years ago I created a spreadsheet. I still write it down in both b/c I would hate to have my computer crash and lose my book log. Hmm, an app for the Iphone....I could really use that. Off to go exploring everyone's suggestions!

Use www.Mozy.com to back up your files offsite and then you don't have to worry about anything.  It's 4.99 a month for unlimited space, and I think you can have up to 2 GB for free even!!  It's worth a looks!   I currently have over 100 GB on there and I love it!

Rachel

[RavenclawPrefect]

I am also looking for something to keep track of my Kindle books.  I know I download books and then they get pushed back a few pages and I forget.  I would like to find a spreadsheet or make one that would keep track of:

books purchased, date, when read, samples downloaded, date, when read, why I didn't like it......this is just for starters!   I guess I would also like to be able to keep track of series I have read so I can be sure to be on the right book.  I am behind in the In Death series and have to figure out where I am still.

[MAGreen]

Wow, I feel so old fashioned. I just have a running list hand written in a notebook. I keep track of the title, author, price, date of purchase, and if it's been read. It works for me, although it can be hard to find a title now that my list is several pages long. I think I will have to enter it all into a spreadsheet when I get my new computer.

[Chad Winters]

I have been using Goodreads.com as well, it lets you search by keyword to add a book and then I have "To read" "To buy" "Finished" and "reading now" shelves

[Betsy the Quilter]

I use Readerware.  You can scan in paper books, and you can drag books from Amazon into it.  I then uploaded the file to Goodreads.com

www.readerware.com

Betsy

[happyblob]

Call me old-fashioned, but for me Excel is the only way to go. I've tried readerware, dropped it for LibraryThing.com, then went back to my spreasheets. It's second nature to me due to the work I had been involved in the last 10 years. I even keep my dream diary in Excel.

[RavenclawPrefect]

Oh, what do you have in your spreadsheet?  That is kinda what I was looking to use.

I did register over at goodreads and added in almost 200 books.  Now I need to move the Kindle ones to my Kindle shelf.

[Deb G]

I've been using Shelfari, they even have a Kindle Group.  Before that I was using a spreadsheet.  Shelfari is more fun

[Athenagwis]

Oh, what do you have in your spreadsheet?  That is kinda what I was looking to use.

I did register over at goodreads and added in almost 200 books.  Now I need to move the Kindle ones to my Kindle shelf.

My spreadsheet has the name of the author, title of book, if it's in a series, if it's on my kindle now, if it's saved to my computer, cost, date bought, date started reading, date ended reading, if I left a review, my rating for it (1-10) and if I would read the author again.    I try to put some detail in there, because after reading so many great books, they tend to run together a bit for me.  If anyone wants a copy of my spreadsheet, I'd be happy to send a blank copy along, just PM me your email address!!

Rachel

[chilady1]

I am looking for a way to combine my Calibre library, my LibraryThing library and the books I have on Amazon's media library.  I have tooo many libraries going on.  Any thoughts?

[Jaasy]

I use Readerware.  You can scan in paper books, and you can drag books from Amazon into it.  I then uploaded the file to Goodreads.com

www.readerware.com

Betsy

I also use Readerware.  It's a powerful piece of software.  I use it for Kindle as well as my DTBs...

[ak rain]

why do you have me thinking of this? enablers at it again. I do this for work. I have a goal of starting a journal and maybe I will finally start that.
sylvia

[melissaj323]

I just signed up with shelfari....if anyone wants to be "friends" request me! Would love to see what everyone is reading.

[LindaW]

All of these ideas are great, but for the Kindle wouldn't be needed if Amazon ever figures out how to add FOLDERS!  There I go screaming about folders again....sorry.

[tsemple]

Ok, I gotta ask: is it worth it?

We must have at least couple of thousand books, never had a problem with duplicate purchases, but sometimes have problems locating books. I bought Book Collectorz several years ago in an attempt to solve this latter problem but I was never able to able to get very far: many of our books don't have bar codes or ISBNs, and there was no built in way to generate labels with LoC numbers or whatever to keep them properly organized on the shelves. New books would arrive, we'd give away others, etc. It was too much work, and largely for books I'll probably never read again, even if I'm too emotionally attached to them to get rid of them.

Now that I've gone 99% 'ebook' going forward, the whole effort to organize stuff and keep it organized seems completely pointless and onerous, and costs me valuable reading time. If we get folders on Kindle, I'll be happy for the rest of you, but I don't need them, myself. Carpe diem!

I looked at Shelfari, too. Looks like fun, but I guess I'm not very comfortable with most social networking applications. Privacy may be a thing of the past, but I cling to the little I like to think I still have... 

[Rhiathame]

Ok, I gotta ask: is it worth it?

I use readerware and I find it worth it. I don't use it to keep track of what I have purchased to avoid duplicate purchases, I use it more to keep track of purchases that I have not yet read since Readerware allows me to indicate if I have read a book. Plus I like to know what I have in eBook and in DTB and which DTBs are duplicates that I can donate now.