Books Review: The Virtual Bookshelf
- Multiple Web ISBN Databases
- Plugin architecture
- iSight scanning process can be slow
Data entry is a chore. Punching in your credit card information on the web is a drag. Entering passwords and even typing can be a burden when cataloguing information. We’ve come up with barcode scanners, voice-recognition software, biometric fingerprint readers, and everything imaginable to avoid all that manual labor, but don’t you wish you didn’t have to pay for those expensive devices? Books, a cataloguing app, helps users avoid all of that data entry when they bring their bookshelf digital.
Books displays titles in a gallery view with a summary box below
Books is a great solution to make your own digital book information database. With Books you can scan your entire collection using your Mac’s built-in iSight camera. Simply hold a book’s barcode in front of the red scan lines in the iSight window, and Books will read the ISBN number. Then you have the option of calling a number of different databases, including Amazon.com, to fill out the rest of your book’s information.
The info fields can be filled automatically by iSight scan or by hand
One downside I found is that while overall accurate, the built-in iSight scanning wasn’t always perfect and took longer than I’d like with some barcodes. I’d recommend scanning books in a well-lit room to give the camera optimal light to read the barcode.
The app has a robust extensions engine with a number of fantastic plug-ins written for it. One plug-in allows users to generate a website with just a few clicks. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that the generated site came equipped with a built-in search feature, and a really slick interface.
Books can generate attractive web libraries with just a few clicks
Books serves as a great personal catalogue, and also has functionality to work as a check-in, check-out system. I could see it being useful for used book stores interested in creating a web catalogue, or professors who wanted to create a catalogue online or library system for checking their books in and out. Then of course there’s always the book enthusiast who wants to keep their own personal catalogue of what they own, or what they’ve read.
While the app could use a little polish here or there, overall Books is a pretty incredible application. With an extensive pool of extensions, users who work with book databases will surely find use for it. Plus Books comes for the best price: free.
Books is a great tool– I use it regularly, and appreciate its function as you highlighted. Thanks for this review.
Another option for putting data into Books is the Cue-Cat barcode scanner. You might remember a decade ago when Radio Shack gave these away free; many folks realized that they could be hacked to have broader usage, and the “Neutered” Cue-Cat came into the world. You can pick up a Neutered Cue-Cat on eBay for probably $10, and it will scan all of your books’ barcodes far faster and more reliably than an iSight (which is espcially great if you don’t have a built-in iSight!). The last time I moved my office, I scanned every book before it went onto the shelf– all 1400 of them– with a Cue Cat.
You missed the fact that Books can import data from a wide variety of sources, which you get to choose from a plug-in menu. It will also export in a variety of formats as well. This was handy for me when I wanted my whole library to be available in Bookends for citation purposes (a missing feature for Books that would really put it over the top as a power tool)– I exported data from Books in BibTex format, then just imported it straight into Bookends.
Another thing you missed about Books: currently in v 3.x, it IS free, as you mentioned– and the developer has promised that v 3.x will always remain free. However, the long-promised (and soon coming?) v 4 will NOT be free. There are some features that have been hinted at or outright promised that many will be looking for, and the cost might be a compelling reason to look at Delicious Library or another competitor more seriously before settling in.
This is an incredible program.
1. Free
2. The information interfaces with Spotlights index. When you do a global search for a topic on you computer recommended books will show up in the Spotlight list. You can also tag each book.
3. Scans the books through iSight, mine works fast and is much faster than typing. I don’t know how you could speed this up.
4. Smart list
5. GUI is consistent and clean, not bland. Anything more would just be clutter.
6. Also the lending catalog ties into Address book for information on each borrower.
7. I love a program that plays well with the existing tools in the operating system. This does it well!
A+
@Ed – I didn’t know about the Cue-Cat! Thanks for the tip, that would be a much easier way for people to scan titles! I realize that there are some great Import and Export features in books, but they’re plugins, which I mention as the extensive plugin architecture. I’ve come to expect that programs come with a number of import and export options, as many of the best do. I personally find the website export (or the Books server) plugin to be more useful, so I chose to highlight it. The developer does say on his site the that next version wont be free, but for now we can all enjoy the benefits without the price tag.
@William – You highlight a bunch of great features! Books is an incredibly extensive program, I had to be selective on what I chose to focus on. I do agree that the GUI is consistent and clean, but I personally think it’s a rather unattractive interface in comparison to other similar apps such as Delicious Library. It’s a functional interface, but with an app where you’re trying to show off a Book collection visually, I feel it’s important that there be some polish. I gave the app the B+, because I feel that while it has a number of great features, they could be organized and displayed better.
Dave–
I agree about the interface– that is a good reason for your rating, with which I concur.
As for the upcoming version: as I noted in my first comment (and you seconded), the forthcoming v 4 will not be free. However, the developer has promised that v 3.x will remain available even after the release of v 4, and for free– so there will always be a free version of Books, even if it is not continually in development.
Is there a way to export the information to End Note?
If there is….I’m sold.
One more thing? Is there another application you’d recommend if I already have a method of scanning bar codes?