Just a few thoughts...

[vinylmaster]

OK...I've been at this a while now...I'm nearing on 4,000 albums catalogued...just albums, have not begun the CD's or 45's yet...I may well have another 4,000 LP's to go, and I haven't even begun to get to my favorites...Anyway, this software has made things a lot easier for me...One thing I love is the "text search" option. When I'm looking for a particular "cover" song, it'll find me every known version of the song I have. Even if the tracks are not listed in "Track Properties" (I'm manually typing in a lot of track listings, as Discogs, Amazon, and Freedb are just no use when it comes to some of my albums...There's nothing listed...Several times, the album is so obscure, there's no mention of the album, let alone artwork, anywhere online, so I've had to get creative.), it will still find ANY track listings that may be in the "notes"...I do like putting the actual tracklistings off the albums in the "Track Properties", just for my own easy reference. In the track properties, though, one thing I like is being able to change the case from lowercase to uppercase, or leading capitals...I guess I'm anal in that I like things to be uniform-looking. Any thoughts as to why that option isn't available on the "General" tab, The "Notes" tab, or ANY of the other tabs? I usually have to fix that stuff manually.

Another question...and maybe this has been asked or answered....What about being able to copy all the tracklistings, at one time, from the "Track Properties" tab, so that I could paste them all in another tab. For instance, say I have a copy of a particular album in one database, pretty rare...no tracklistings online to be found, so I type them in manually...what if I had a better copy of that album in a separate database...can I copy and paste the ENTIRE tracklist from one album to the other without having to type each song in manually, or cut and paste individually...I've been using my notepad, too, (plus, a lot of cutting and pasting) but it gets a little tedious for two-or three-LP sets...Maybe I'm a little "lazy" there, but I have a lot more albums to list...Is there a shortcut I'm just not seeing in this program???

Another thing I was wondering...what about this program for books, games, memorabilia, sheet music...I've actually catalogued a few music-related books and games, too...The book or game title in the "title" space...The author in the "artist" space, the publisher or game maker in the "label" space...the subject in the "category" space...You see what I mean...This program would seem to work well for books, DVD's, magazines, sheet music...finding an online database for artwork (book jackets, magazine covers, etc.) for such things can be trickier. I've had to search out a few other sources for photos, but if there was a database for books and movies like there is music, this would be even better...Maybe there's a better way to do this...Any of you guys got any thoughts regarding all this? Suggestions? Other Ideas? Shortcuts? Let me know, as I love this software...I'm still figuring out some of the kinks, though...

[Jazz_North]

For the case issue, if you go to Properties -> Tracks -> More (in the lower right corner) there is an option to change case. Whether this meets you needs I can't say for sure but it seems it would.

I use a program called Readerware for my book collection ([url]www.readerware.com[/url]). It looks up book details using a variety of search tools. The most useful one, of course, is ISBN since that is unique for each book. Readerware allows the user to choose which of many databases (Amazon, Powells, Library of Congress, Alibris, etc.) to use. Readerware automatically imports all available data for that book from that database - rather like OCD. But as OCD doesn't have the API for these databases (and that would be a major task for Andrei) it is still going to be manual entry. I am sure there are other book cataloging programs. I have been using Readerware a long time and am not sure I remember why I chose it, but it works fine for me.

one thing I like is being able to change the case from lowercase to uppercase, or leading capitals...I guess I'm anal in that I like things to be uniform-looking. Any thoughts as to why that option isn't available on the "General" tab, The "Notes" tab, or ANY of the other tabs? I usually have to fix that stuff manually.


Another thing I was wondering...what about this program for books, games, memorabilia, sheet music...I've actually catalogued a few music-related books and games, too...The book or game title in the "title" space...The author in the "artist" space, the publisher or game maker in the "label" space...the subject in the "category" space...You see what I mean...This program would seem to work well for books, DVD's, magazines, sheet music...finding an online database for artwork (book jackets, magazine covers, etc.) for such things can be trickier. I've had to search out a few other sources for photos, but if there was a database for books and movies like there is music, this would be even better...Maybe there's a better way to do this...Any of you guys got any thoughts regarding all this? Suggestions? Other Ideas? Shortcuts? Let me know, as I love this software...I'm still figuring out some of the kinks, though...

[vinylmaster]

For the case issue, if you go to Properties -> Tracks -> More (in the lower right corner) there is an option to change case. Whether this meets you needs I can't say for sure but it seems it would.

I use a program called Readerware for my book collection ([url]www.readerware.com[/url]). It looks up book details using a variety of search tools. The most useful one, of course, is ISBN since that is unique for each book. Readerware allows the user to choose which of many databases (Amazon, Powells, Library of Congress, Alibris, etc.) to use. Readerware automatically imports all available data for that book from that database - rather like OCD. But as OCD doesn't have the API for these databases (and that would be a major task for Andrei) it is still going to be manual entry. I am sure there are other book cataloging programs. I have been using Readerware a long time and am not sure I remember why I chose it, but it works fine for me.

I know I can change the case from upper to lower or vice versa on the "Tracks" tab in "Record Properties", either by going to "More", or by right-clicking on an individual track, and it will change the case on all the tracks. That I get. My concern is more with the artist, title, and label on the "General" tab, maybe having that option for the "Notes" tab, especially when getting all my info from Amazon or Discogs...The listings are rarely uniform, sometimes misspellings occur...that I pretty much have to fix manually...I don't mind doing it all manually, but at least for the artist and title, being able to change the case on the "General" tab would be a cool feature...I can do it for all the tracks, which is cool, but it would be nice to at least have the option in the right-click window to change case...Maybe if someone had their tracklistings in the "Notes" tab, that option would be cool, too...Of course, you can always "undo" something, if you're not pleased with it. I do notice that with Amazon, there are a lot of tracklistings in the "Notes" tab...Another cool thing would be able to "highlight" all the tracks at once, and be able to copy them all at once, instead of copying one track at a time...like right-clicking on one track, and going down and highlighting all the others...then I could copy them to a notepad or insert them somewhere else, like if I have the same album, but in a different database...Say I have two copies of a pop singer's Christmas album...I have a database for "Pop albums" and one for all my "Christmas" stuff...And maybe the album is so obscure, I have to type the tracklistings in manually...Is it too much to ask to be able to highlight ALL THE TRACKS, inserting them into the separate listing, instead of re-typing them all over again, or copying each track one by one? Being able to highlight them all at the same time, would be a great time-saver, but I guess I can still get by OK by being a little creative, if that's not an option...Still, it would be nice...I'm just sayin'...

By the way, thanks Jazz for the Readerware idea...I might have to check that out...I wonder if it works for magazines, too...A program and/or database for "sheet music" or "comic books", say, would also be nice...