Software Application
I am excited about a software app! Beside Halo 2, I mean. I am holding off on Halo 2, mainly because I'm still working through Doom 3. I don't have the vast quantities of time available to devote to my gaming obsessions that I once did. It takes me much longer to finish games now, since I usually get about 4-6 hours a week of time in. This is a far cry from my younger days when 4-6 hours was a daily average. My undergraduate transcripts reflect this, believe me.
Anyhow, I have found a program called Readerware. It is a specialized database program that runs a nice GUI up front and an SQL database in back. The primary purpose is to catalog books, but versions exist for CDs and DVDs. I'm sure some of you are thinking "Big deal". Well, the part that I find really cool is that all you need to give the program is the ISBN or the UPC. It will then go out on the web and check for that number and populate the remaining database fields. It pulls from a number of different databases, so in theory most items should come up. This is pretty cool. It is also compatible with bar code scanners so that you can scan a barcode directly and go from there.
My current plan is to try it on the books first using the 30 day trial functionality. If that works well, I'll chump off and buy the package and continue. At some point I'll get a barcode scanner to use on the CDs and DVDs. J and I started cataloging the books a while back, in preparation for the boxing and eventual relocation of YPS Manor. We didn't get very far, because it's a tedious damn process. Pull down a book. Read aloud the relevant information while J types. Place in box. Repeat. Something to automate the process would be a great help, because we have a lot of books.
It will also be nice because we can then export selected fields to a spreadsheet suitable for carrying around on our PDAs. We constantly run into the problem of trying to remember what DVDs and CDs we have while shopping. It's less of an issue with books for some reason.
Right now, I have some minor qualms. I foresee issues with SciFi Book Club compilations. I don't think they put ISBNs in those. We also have some older stuff that I was unable to find manually when I tried, but perhaps I was looking in the wrong place. However, even given these issues, if we can get 75% of the collection in the database this way, I figure it's worth it. Since J does the typing, I have no doubt she'd agree.
Anyhow, I have found a program called Readerware. It is a specialized database program that runs a nice GUI up front and an SQL database in back. The primary purpose is to catalog books, but versions exist for CDs and DVDs. I'm sure some of you are thinking "Big deal". Well, the part that I find really cool is that all you need to give the program is the ISBN or the UPC. It will then go out on the web and check for that number and populate the remaining database fields. It pulls from a number of different databases, so in theory most items should come up. This is pretty cool. It is also compatible with bar code scanners so that you can scan a barcode directly and go from there.
My current plan is to try it on the books first using the 30 day trial functionality. If that works well, I'll chump off and buy the package and continue. At some point I'll get a barcode scanner to use on the CDs and DVDs. J and I started cataloging the books a while back, in preparation for the boxing and eventual relocation of YPS Manor. We didn't get very far, because it's a tedious damn process. Pull down a book. Read aloud the relevant information while J types. Place in box. Repeat. Something to automate the process would be a great help, because we have a lot of books.
It will also be nice because we can then export selected fields to a spreadsheet suitable for carrying around on our PDAs. We constantly run into the problem of trying to remember what DVDs and CDs we have while shopping. It's less of an issue with books for some reason.
Right now, I have some minor qualms. I foresee issues with SciFi Book Club compilations. I don't think they put ISBNs in those. We also have some older stuff that I was unable to find manually when I tried, but perhaps I was looking in the wrong place. However, even given these issues, if we can get 75% of the collection in the database this way, I figure it's worth it. Since J does the typing, I have no doubt she'd agree.
posted by T at 4:24 PM
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