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Provides: Management of book, music, movie and comic book collections

Format: Download

Developer: Deep Prose Software

Minimum Requirements: Mac OS X v10.4

Processor Compatibility: Universal

Retail Price: $49.95

Availability: Out now

Version Reviewed: 2.0.5

I keep the books I read. I'm not sure how common that is anymore, but having majored in English, I've spent a great deal of my money and time on a great many books. Most were read for enjoyment, a few out of curiosity, and some because I had to (note to freshman English majors...don't start with that class on Faulkner; dude's not the right way to begin the next four years of literary study). Whether I've enjoyed the book, if I finished it, I kept it. It's like a badge of honor to me. Unlike movies, which take no real investment, completing a book says something about me I want people to know. It's why we build personal libraries.

And so, although my library is not where I hoped it would be at this point (both in size and location; I'm moving in a couple of weeks, so all of my books are piled in boxes in the living room), I've still got a decently sized collection that can sometimes be difficult to manage. To whom did I lend the hardcover copy of A Confederacy of Dunces? Which Vonnegut books featured or mentioned Kilgore Trout? Exactly how many first editions do I own at this point? Keeping track of it all can be a daunting task, but there are numerous programs out there to help. My current favorite is Deep Prose Software's Booxter.

Booxter is billed as "A personal librarian. At your service." If you want your librarian to do is catalog and organizer your own library, then sure. At this, Booxter excels. You can set up four types of libraries: books, music, movies and comic books. Unfortunately, there's no convenient way to group them. For instance, I would like to create a library of my Flash Gordon collection, which contains numerous items in each of these categories. However, when you create a new library, Booxter will ask you for which single media type this should be customized:

The entry fields will the be tailored accordingly. For instance, comic books will allow you to search for your issue by UPC, Grand Comics Database or Comic Books Database number, kind of. More on that later.

But with books, you search by ISBN or LCCN. And, as you can tell by comparing the screen captures above and below, numerous other fields change as well.

So, you can't easily combine multiple media formats into one library.

Still, that's not a deal killer, considering how handy Booxter is when it all comes together. The main strength is its methods of retrieving the catalog information, especially if you happen to have a bar code scanner. If so, simply scan your UPC symbol, and most of the appropriate information should be added automatically. If you don't have a barcode scanner (and I'm assuming most of you won't), you can either enter the relative information manually. The trouble with this is that your book, CD, DVD or comic book is at the mercy of its database. With books, DVDs and CDs, this isn't much of a problem unless you get really obscure. Most of these are well documented.

With comic books, though, you'll most likely be entering everything by hand. None of my Flash Gordon comics have UPC numbers, so that wasn't an option. I therefore had to search by CBDB or GCD number, which I of course didn't have. So, I went to these websites to search for my comic books. CBDB not only was missing entire Flash Gordon incarnations, but contained no useful information for those that were listed, including the very CBDB number I'm supposed to get from there. GCD was a bit more thorough, and although it did list its GCD number, Booxter never had any idea what to do with it. I'd have the program search for the number, but it never turned anything up. Now, I don't know if this is the fault of Booxter or the databases, but it ends up being fairly useless, either way. Hopefully, this functionality will improve as Booxter and the databases grow. Until then, you're stuck entering the information by hand. Depending upon the collections of most comic book fans I know, that could be a monumental undertaking.

Regardless of how you get everything in, once it's there, Booxter provides a wealth of power for searching through your collection. I'll let the screen captures from the Deep Prose website illustrate this, first with filters, in which you sequentially select options to get to what you want (for instance, getting to the Beatles by selecting "Label" and "Capitol," as illustrated in the screen capture below:

And, if you've set up your tags properly, you can use them to see which volumes contain certain elements. In the screen capture below, you can see how the user is able to see which comic books contain certain characters:

It's all exceptionally handy for the librarian in all of us, provided you're willing to put in the work to make the database useful. It can only display the information you give it, after all. The rewards extend beyond searchability, however. With Booxter, you can also print single and multiple item details, and even labels if you're the type who wants to make sure people know from whom exactly they borrowed that Lou Reed album. To that end, Booxter even integrates with Address Book so you can easily contact that person before he breaks up with his girlfriend and leaves your CDs in her car. You can also export your database to a number of formats, including CSV, XML and HTML, and even directly to your iPod. And speaking of the iPod, Booxter includes a quiz game like the iPod's iQuiz, based on the items in your collection.

Just like your personal library, Booxter is a growing program that has some room to mature. I'd like to see tighter integration between libraries and media formats, and the input interface has a few quirks that could be addressed. As it stands right now with v2.0.5, though, Booxter is a tremendously powerful cataloging tool that's sure to please those who share my...we'll go with "fastidiousness," since it sounds so much more pleasant than "anal retentiveness"...for keeping track of books, music and movies. Comic book collectors will be left wanting, but at least aren't ignored.

Now, I just wonder if the kind folks at Deep Prose are willing to help me get my library unpacked at the new house.