Bookpedia Gets An Update Too

In reading Clau Wolf’s excellent review of Delicious Library 1.6.4, I thought I’d share a quick review of the book cataloging application I use: Bookpedia, by Bruji. It’s a sweet, abundantly featured application that all book lovers and collectors should have.

About six months ago I was looking into purchasing Delicious Library, but stumbled upon Bookpedia and ended purchasing it instead, for a few reasons. First, I have to say I really like the design of Delicious Library. The application I think has won awards for its design and ease of use. But what I found lacking in Delicious I discovered in Bookpedia: namely, smart albums. You know…those iTunes, iPhoto, and Spotlight folders you can create based on particular parameters you set. Well, besides the cheaper price (Bookpedia is $18, while Delicious Library will set you back forty bucks), I see smart folders in any type of data collection as a smart little time saver.

Bookpedia offers a couple of dozen criteria for creating smart collections. Folders can be based on genres, an author’s names, publication date, ISBN number, and even custom criteria that you input into the system. These smart collections are automatically updated as you import new books that fit a collection’s criteria. So for instance, I have a smart collection that holds all the books I have or want that were published this year. This folder is updated each time I add a book that fits that criteria. 

Like Delicious Library, Bookpedia also uses Amazon.com and over 10 other international search sites to find the book you’re wanting to input. You simply put in the ISBN number for the book and it does the search. You can type in the number by hand or use Apple’s iSight or a digital video camera to scan in the books you already have on your shelf. But what else is great is that when you click on a book in your collection and get it’s metadata, you also get a list of other books that are similar to it. This nice short list feature provides a way for you to quickly add books to your wishlist or books that you already have in your library without having to input the ISBN number. 

If you have a .mac account, Bookpedia will create a template-based webpage(s) of books based on your collection or a folder in your collection. You can also export your collection to your iPod, as well as get statistical information about your collection.

There are several other features about Bookpedia that you can find out about on its website. 

The big drawback to Bookpedia is that you can only import book data into the application. If you want to keep a library of your DVD’s, games, or CD’s, you have to purchase one of Bruji’s three applications for the particular type of media you want to catalog. 

While I don’t find Bookpedia as attractive as Delicious Library, it does offer more features for the money. Either application serves its purpose for book lovers and collectors.

The choice is yours.