Interim post on multiple libraries
I'm going to blog tonight about a bunch of new features and the addition of some thirty libraries, now working well with language support. Before I do I wanted to ask if people are able to figure out the "more libraries" feature, and whether the libraries added to the experience. Do you use them? Is the user interface confusing? Do you want more ability to customize? Do you miss the little divet that used to give you the cataloging info for a book? (I do.)
So, the floor's open for multiple-library issues...
So, the floor's open for multiple-library issues...
posted by Tim at 6:10 PM
29 Comments:
That's mostly above my head, so can't help you there. I did find the UK access helpful last night--- that and the hint that the ISBNs are different. Hadn't even known I had any UK paperbacks til I tried to enter it. Something odd happens with LOC numbers though. I enter a LCCN number in LT, and it's not found in LoC or Amazon. I go to LoC's website, search on it with that same number, and find it. I go back to LT's search page, enter the exact same number again, and lo and behold, it finds it. I've done that on 20+ books so far, and just helped someone else do the same. (These are pre-ISBN books.)
Oh, something else I noticed that may or may not have something to do with linkmeister's question... there seems to be newer books with ISBNs that do not show up in LoC. I had thought they were all supposed to be in LoC, but apparently not.
More info on the weird LoC thing. The second time I enter the number, (the time it works), because I've been copying and pasting it, instead of typing it, there is a leading blank space... and that is the difference between the two entries. This number "78100903" does not work as it would be normally typed it, but does work when you hit the spacebar once before entering the number. Yup, I'd say weird covers it pretty well. :)
thank you, yes. the UK and French libraries are helping immensely, and the speed is delightful.
Query on adding the Gutenberg database? I have over 1000 ebooks, many from there, that I'll want to catalog once I've waded through the dead-tree editions. Which may raise a new and fascinating question: what's the ISBN for an ebook? Is an etext really said to be published? Seems like it ought to be.
Curious to hear others' thoughts.
Oh my gosh, Tim, you did it! I can now grab books out of Amazon Japan directly and they enter my catalog correctly. Thank you so much!
Sara
Amazon lists something as an ISBN on at least some of the ebooks it sells... though so far I haven't found one that is searchable. I tried audio cassettes just to see if the ISBN listed is searchable, and it is... but then, it's a normal-appearing ISBN, where the ebook one isn't. I have tons of ebooks I plan on entering, also... but I think most of them will have to be manually done, much like books that were never recorded anywhere. (Older crochet and knitting books, and I'd imagine other craft books, are notorious for that.)
Oh, yes. And have you checked out the "dvd", "vhs", and "cd" tags yet? I wondered how long that would take to start.
From a publisher: ebooks are supposed to be assigned normal ISBN's. But supposed to be and actually are not exactly the same...
linkmeister asked how a book might end up in a US library but not the Library of Congress. If a new edition of a book has not changed since the original, there's a good chance it won't be in the Libary of Congress; they don't collect every edition of every book. That's why I can very rarely find any of my mass market paperbacks in the LoC - if they have the originally published hardback, there's no reason for them to also have the paperback. So, other libraries might be more likely to have newer editions of books. Other libraries might also have foreign editions that the LoC doesn't have.
I am quite confused! On Books I entered before the new libraries added, I can click on the little 'card' icon to get info on the book. At the bottom, it displays library cataloging data that looks just like a card catalog card. On new books, it just displays the 'marc' info which means nothing to me and I much prefer the old card style look. Any chance of this being returned? (I hope)
On the LC, I'm no expert, but I do know that the LC doesn't have every book you might think it had. Until recently you had to send the LC a book to get a copyright, but that doesn't mean they kept it. (It still doesn't.) Nor did the rule apply to foreign books. Since GATT copyright no longer depends upon such "formalities" (although there are still some limited legal rights to be gained from complying with them), and the LC is no longer guaranteed a copy.
I'm sure some librarians know more about this.
Being able to draw information from additional libraries (especially those of the University of California) has been very helpful. The subject cataloging information is really important to our library which is largely composed of non-fiction books. We're very much looking forward to being able to search the subject cataloging information.
On the edit page in the "Library Cataloging Data" area we liked having the information display as a catalog card. The "Marc" information, which displays on the more recent records we've entered, is way too dense and confusing.
For some of us Barnes and Noble shoppers, we own books that were published by Barnes and Noble. Obviously, Amazon won't carry them, and the LoC seems to be lacking in some of them, such as the newer ones. Any plans to incorporate B&N info into the database??
The addition of all these libraries is fabulous! In terms of customizability, would it be possible to provide a list of the libraries with checkboxes so that we can choose which libraries we want to search, rather than be limited by the few choices provided by the drop-down listbox?
Another thing: The search currently seems to be doing only an exact word match, i.e., searching for "castle" brings up only books with "castle" in the title and not the ones that have "castles" in the title.
Deposit libraries have always been eccentric in their collections, even though acts of Parliament/Congress/whatever say they should get everything they are entitled to refuse to accept any title. It also takes a long time to catalogue new items so a backlog of several years isn't unusual. This is why British commenters, for instance, have been requesting all the UK copyright libraries (Oxford, Cambridge, Scotland, Wales, British) as each has things the others don't; particularly when it comes to overseas collections and incunabula. Although I doubt many of those will be listed here. :)
Could you add Amazon.com to the list of Amazons in more libraries?
I usually start with the UK ones, but some of my second hand books seem to have come over from the states.
(also amazon.co.uk would be more useful with an ISBN search, but Scotland seems to works well enough instead)
Dave: Thanks for the suggestion. I added it.
Quick question: Does anyone have a good list of libraries by size. It would need to be a special list or a very very long list, because I want to figure out where LibraryThing fits. I've been searching and there just aren't enough FAQs at municipal libraries along the lines of "How many books does xxxx have?" Sheesh, do librarians avoid the issue?
http://www.allsearchengines.com/libraries.html
Not comprehensive (US-only) but it's a start.
OULS (Oxford): 'more than 11m' (2005)
Cambridge: 'over 7m' (2005)
British Library: 'more than 12m' (inc. sheet music) (2005)
National Library of Australia: 'over 5m' (2005)
http://www.libraryspot.com/lists/listlargestlibs.htm (1990s data)
Well, I, for one, miss the little 'divet'! (Wasn't sure what your technical name for it was, so thanks for asking. :D)
Well, I need more like Sheboygan—X thousand... I did find online that LibraryThing is now larger than the University of Wyoming's collection... That's a little sad, I think. It's within spitting distance of Cambridge, MA--the municipal library, not the total number of books within city limits, nor probably the books in any square acre.
Now that LibraryThing is growing bigger, I should probably stop saying unsafe things. So, for the record, I am a big fan of the state of Wyoming and applaud its hard-working librarians.
The new libraries are great! I tend to find things in the NL of Scotland more often than amazon.co.uk, and California seems to have a lot of my old sf paperbacks.
That's good to know. Maybe I should look into finding some non-academic libraries—for the paperback problem. I think I saw that Ann Arbor's public library was open. There are probably others.
Incidentally, did LibraryThing get mentioned somewhere in print today? It's getting a lot of visitors this morning who didn't come from another site.
I find the Canadian Library addition useful! And the UK ones as well - a lot of my books are pubbed there, rather than in the US.
Ladymink -
I too have some B&N editions, and the Amazon database seems to be finding them with no problem. It may be that they have some but not all if you are unable to find them...I say keep trying.
A lot of non-standard titles come up via Amazon because of the 'used and new' resellers. That's how I've found a lot of pre-ISBN titles or specific OOP editions.
I do indeed miss the "little divet".
It would also be nice if LT could search itself as an option; I know somebody else must have the same old mass-market edition of some of those science fiction books that I do, and this way only one of us needs to manually enter the data.
Dear Mr Spalding,
I quite appreciate the angelic nature of your ceaseless efforts on everyone's behalf, but so long to see the author cloud fixed. I wonder if you could fix the author cloud soon.
Miss Sylvia Drake
Library size. Hmm. You're ten times the size of the library at Maine College of Art, and just narrowly ahead of the Portland Public Library's total book collection (it's 600,000 volumes, but half of those are "government documents", and I doubt many of those are entered here). Those might prove a more useful way to keep a grasp on the size of things, since you can go and look at them for context...
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