Saturday, September 17, 2005

Change tags implemented

I've implemented a Del.icio.us-like "change tags" feature, available under the tags tab (also improved) and in the catalog under "power options." You can also delete tags and change one tag to many. The latter is useful for disambiguation, ie., change "un" to "u.n." and "united nations."

A "mass edit" feature will come tomorrow, allowing you to add tags or make other changes by ticking off books from a basic but complete list.

QUESTION:

Currently the tags are unsorted. If you enter "zebras, apples" it stays that way, and you can sort by it, making the first tag a sort of "primary tag."

Making it always alphabetical would be easier and in some way more elegant. What is the norm? What do people want?

19 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'd like alphbetical

9/17/2005 7:08 AM  
Blogger Greg Schwartz said...

I like having the control. The user can always choose to alphabetize, but I prefer to have a more hierarchical arrangement.

9/17/2005 8:08 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We would really like to keep the first tag the primary tag. We enter our first tag as our primary tag. It indicates the shelf location, which is very important for us in our large cross-disciplinary research library.

9/17/2005 10:34 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'd like to be able to alphabetize mine without doing it piecemeal, since I can always grab the tag and get a list of all with that tag- but sounds like you have people preferring both ways, and I can see the point of the other. Is it possible to make it user preference?

Thank you for the changing tags feature--- after a couple hundred books tagged one way, I changed my mind on what I wanted. (Of course.) Question: I know I can click the tag to get a list of all books with that tag--- is there a way to get a list of all books without a particular tag?

By the way, I love the tag clouds. Applying it to books is a wonderful idea. It's useful, being in alphabetical order... and it's fun to look at. :)

9/17/2005 12:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A printable page that doesn't include the icons? And perhaps makes including images an option?

9/17/2005 12:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It would be nice to have the flexibility to arrange tags in various ways according to individual preference: hierarchical, alphabetical, primary

9/17/2005 12:32 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I may be making this comment as a novice user. That said, it would be nice to have a way to autoselect tags instead of having to type each one. Unless, of course, no one has previously used a particular word or phrase as a tag.

Prevents typos, speeds the entry process and makes them more searchable, as a result.

It would, also, be convenient to tag multiple books at once with a new or additional tag.

9/17/2005 12:39 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I vote for having a tag sorting/not preference.

9/17/2005 3:08 PM  
Blogger Tim said...

Well, I guess the answer is pepperoni AND onions. It will stay the same for now, with the option to alphabetize considered later. Thanks for all the feedback!

9/17/2005 5:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Minor formatting glitch: under Social Data, Users, it actually says "&mdash"

"...(library) &mdash tags:..."

9/17/2005 5:30 PM  
Blogger Jenn said...

I would like to have it alphabetical.

9/17/2005 6:21 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I like alphabetical, unless there's going to be explicit use of the first tag as primary (ie, it gets more weight for some sort of comparison).

On another note, when I add a book to my catalog with the icon from someone's else's listing, I'd like to go to the edit page, so I can tag it immediately. It surprised me when that didn't happen.

9/17/2005 7:22 PM  
Blogger Zette said...

Many of my books are too old to have ISBNs, but they do have Library of Congress numbers. Is there a chance of getting those checked? Not a big deal -- I'm finding most of them anyway. I'm just looking for an easier way to do things. (Though, at the rate I'm going, I'd probably not need it anyway.)

This is site is wonderful, and way too much fun. Don't worry about what more you need to add. anything I say is just a suggestion for in the future. We seem to be doing quite all right with what we have. (grin)

9/17/2005 7:38 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Am I doing something wrong? I click on change tags (on my main catalog screen) and nothing happens. What should happen and any idea how to fix it? Love this site!

9/18/2005 1:09 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Similar to what shawna asked, I'd like an advanced search of my catalog, too. So I can, e.g., search for books that are tagged "novel" and "fantasy" but not "short stories". (Ideally, such a search would also allow me to search for all "short stories" by whatever Author.)

9/18/2005 1:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I like alphabetical, too, but if it never becomes implemented, I'll just do it on my own...:-)

9/18/2005 12:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'd love an "I'm not organised, please alphabetise all my tags" button, if auto-sorting isn't implemented.

I'd also like a "not tagged" tag, that isn't a tag, but which lists just the books that *aren't8 tagged, in the same way existing tags work. If you see what I mean.

And *THANK YOU* for adding in multiple book tagging!!

9/21/2005 11:16 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm finding that many of my tags are duplicated - not sure if this has come from my combining use of both the autocomplete feature and manual entry. I've tried to remove duplicates or change them, but am not having any luck.

9/24/2005 5:40 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

hiya -- love the thing! staying up way past sensible bedtime playing with it.

where do we report bugs? here? like the previous responder i am having problems with changing/deleting tags -- one of my tags has a hidden "+" prepended (i am looking at the URL), and i cannot get rid of it, nor change it. of course i promptly had to create a tag with a non-hidden +, which suffers the same problem.

oh yeah, as to your question: prefer hierarchical with choice of alphabetising.

also, do you have a place for making suggestions?

9/29/2005 4:25 AM  

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