Bookshelf

Scan — choose what a scan does: Add to my books, Add to wishlist, or Do I own it? Press Start camera (the browser asks for permission the first time) and hold the barcode inside the box. Tick Keep scanning to work along a shelf: each new book is added as soon as its code is read, with a beep, a short buzz and a message; a book you already have gives two low beeps and a warning instead, and is not added twice (Add another copy if it really is a second copy). Fill in Shelve new books in (room, bookcase, shelf) first and every book scanned goes there. 🔦 Light turns on the phone’s torch where the browser allows it. Photo of a barcode… reads the code from a picture instead.

Do I own it? — for bookshops and sales. A scan answers at once, in large type: You own this (and on which shelf, and whether it is lent out), On your wishlist, or Not in your books. Once the details arrive it also warns when you own another edition of the same title by the same author. From there, add it to your wishlist, or move it from the wishlist to your books when you buy it.

Type an ISBN — ISBN-10 or ISBN-13, with or without hyphens. It is checked as you type: a wrong check digit is caught and the right one suggested (most typos change one digit or swap two). It shows both forms: an ISBN-10 becomes 978 + its first nine digits + a new check digit; only 978 ISBNs have an ISBN-10, and 979 ones never do.

No barcode? Search Open Library by title or author, and add a result to your books or your wishlist — or Add a book by hand. Books from before ISBNs (about 1970) need one of these.

Books and Wishlist — a list or a wall of covers. Search everything (title, author, series, tags, notes, publisher, subjects, shelf, ISBN), filter by reading status, and sort by date added, title, author (by surname), year, rating, pages, date read, series, or location — which groups the list by room › bookcase › shelf. The search box also takes filters: author:austen, title:emma, year:1890s, year:1950-1959, year:<1900, rating:4 (4 or more), rating:=5, tag:"to sell", room:study, case:tall, shelf:2, loc:study, subject:poetry, series:discworld, lang:fr, publisher:penguin, condition:good, lent:sam, isbn:978030, and is:lent, is:signed, is:first, is:rated, is:pending, is:notfound, is:nocover, is:unshelved. Tap a book to edit it.

A book holds its ISBN (Look up fills empty fields from Open Library and Google Books without touching what you typed), title, subtitle, authors, series and number, publisher, year, pages; reading status with the dates started and finished (set for you when you change the status) and a rating; room, bookcase and shelf; tags and notes; this copy’s condition, price, date bought, Signed and First edition; and its loans.

Loans — lend a book from its page (Lend to, due back after 28 days unless you pick a date) or with Lend a book. The tab lists what is out, overdue first with the number of days, a red count on the tab when anything is overdue, and who borrows most. Returned keeps each loan in the book’s history.

Stats — books owned, read, reading and unread; pages read; books and pages read by year (from the finish dates); top authors and subjects; books by the decade they were published, by room, and by your rating. Tap a bar to see those books.

Goodreads — on Goodreads, My Books → Import and export → Export library gives a CSV file. Import it here: the Exclusive Shelf sets the status (read, currently-reading, to-read), other shelves become tags, My Rating, Date Read, Private Notes and My Review (as notes), series in the title — The Colour of Magic (Discworld, #1) — and the ISBNs (which Goodreads writes as ="0306406152") come across. Choose whether to-read books go to your wishlist or to your books as unread (a row with Owned Copies above 0 always goes to your books), and whether to skip books you already have. The export has no covers: they are looked up afterwards.

CSV export — every book, with Goodreads' column names first (so a spreadsheet or another catalogue lines the main columns up) and this tool’s own after them (shelf, condition, price, loan, subjects and the rest).

Backup — one JSON file with every book, including the deletion markers that sync uses. Merge or Replace on import.

The catalogue is in this browser only, unless you sync. Safari can delete a site’s data after seven days without a visit; Ask to keep it, sync, or keep backups.

Covers are links to Open Library and Google, not copies: without a connection they don’t show.

Open Library is edited by volunteers. Details for one edition are sometimes those of another (page counts and publishers especially), and author names may be in a different form (Tolkien, J. R. R.). Check the book in your hand.

ISBN-13s are shown as 978- and the rest, without the group, publisher and title hyphens, which depend on the ISBN agency’s range table.

An ISBN identifies an edition, not a copy: a second copy of the same edition is a separate entry (Add another copy). Some publishers reused ISBNs, and some old books have none.

Reading the barcode from a glossy or curved cover is easier in good light, held flat, with the barcode filling about half the box. Very small or damaged barcodes may not read: type the ISBN.

Vibration works on Android; iPhones do not let web pages vibrate, so there is only the beep (switched on by the tap on Start camera).

Sync merges whole books: if you edit the same book on two devices before they sync, the later edit wins entirely (its notes and its shelf), not field by field.

The Goodreads import was written against Goodreads' documented export columns and tested with made-up files, not with a real account’s export.