How-to...

As I have some time I wanted to reorganize my office...
this needs to fit into this
How do you organize your books and music and stuff? By authors, style, year of publication?
What kind of index system or software do you use to organize your collections?

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Well, turn your screen upside-down because the pictures are little bit messed up...

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I was gonna say that I usually start with upright room...:D

Oh, alphabetically, by genre, and media.

First by book style*, then genre, then alphabetically by author's name, then grouped by series if necessary and then alphabetical by title or series title.

*Book style meaning general size of the book. All the mass market paperbacks go together for both shelf efficiency as well as aesthetic purposes, even if I also have hardbacks by some of those same authors. Likewise, trade paperbacks are kept separately, and as we don't actually have very many of them, they are mostly organized by height for aesthetic purposes rather than alphabetically.

Also, we stack the mass market paperbacks two high on the shelves, because we have so damn many of them.

Books by general subject, music by genre.

Yeah, and an upright room. WHS

Hi Pi!

I like your shelves.

When you close your eyes and think about your collection, do you see/feel any sort of order?

I switched offices 4 months ago and still have trouble finding my stuff. I remember exactly where stuff was in my old office. I can visualize it perfectly. But I have to keep opening drawers and peeking inside to find what I am looking for.

With only three items I could clean up your entire space!

In just seven days I can make you a man

Hi Pi!

Good to see you again!

...

Only identifiable work: Iron Butterfly's In-a-gadda-da-vida

I tend to arrange books by subject matter (biographies, travel, novels, poetry) and would probably do film/video the same way. Music by genre but that's tricky because I disagree with a lot of genre classifications, so why not alphabetical by artist?
Or do the whole lot by colour and size, for a visually pleasing arrangement. You'll get used to it and find stuff easily!

Alphabetical by artist can be hard. Does Mark Knopfler go under K or D? You might want to put him with Dire Straits for obvious reasons, but his sound changed dramatically over time so he doesn't sound much like his old band. Does a super group like Traveling Wilburys get their own slot or do you lump them in with one of the members? I have no answers.

limey;969131 wrote:

I tend to arrange books by subject matter (biographies, travel, novels, poetry) and would probably do film/video the same way. Music by genre but that's tricky because I disagree with a lot of genre classifications, so why not alphabetical by artist?
Or do the whole lot by colour and size, for a visually pleasing arrangement. You'll get used to it and find stuff easily!

I use my own genre designatons rather than someone else's for that reason. It has to be how I think of it in order for me to find it. In some cases I don't even really have an adjective to describe the genre, but I'd put Liz Phair with Aimee Mann because I put them in the same group depending on how I feel when I want to listen to them. Jake Thackray and Jonathan Coulton would go together for me because their music is mainly about the story and lyrics for me.

So the genre should really be how it makes sense to you. Ravel would never go with Beethoven in classical because they are worlds apart. Ravel, Satie, Debussy, yes. Even Beethoven, Bach, and Mozart aren't really in the same category.

I have half a dozen or so, fairly broad, categories which are then sub-divided into size for the most efficient use of shelf space.
Eg. Cold War, Art, Wildlife, Modern British history etc. However, the biggest category is 'Everything else'.
Organising that section is a bit hit or miss and finding a particular book can be frustrating.

I use database software from Collectorz.com for both books and DVDs.
I bought a cheap supermarket type laser scanner for cataloguing.
Scan the ISBN bar code and an entry in your database is created.
Occasionally, recently published books might not be found but they can be added manually.

Mostly done... except some CD:s not showing up in Collectorz

Looks like a lot of dusting to me. :eyebrow:

Is that a sheep?

xoxoxoBruce;970113 wrote:

Looks like a lot of dusting to me. :eyebrow:

I'll do that in approx 4 years when I take everything out again to build new shelfes...

Gravdigr;970133 wrote:

Is that a sheep?

Yeah. That's Shirley from "Shaun the Sheep".