What's new in Book Collector? 2017

NEW: Fully Automatic CLZ Cloud Syncing!

The free CLZ Cloud service is at the center of all our cataloging solutions (desktop, mobile and web), the glue that binds them all together.
Tens of thousands of users are using the CLZ Cloud syncing every day, to transfer data between their desktop, Connect and mobile software, to update their online collection list, or simply for keeping an online backup of their precious database.

Now, it is time to take the CLZ Cloud to the next level, with automatic syncing:
Add or edit books in Book Collector and these changes will auto-upload to the CLZ Cloud instantly. Did you make changes using CLZ Books or directly in Book Connect? Just start your software and changes will download automatically.
No more need to go to the Sync with CLZ Cloud screen, ever.

With “Sync Automatically” switched on…

1. Your online cloud backup is always up-to-date.
2. Your cloud viewer always shows the current state of your collection.
3. All your CLZ tools (desktop, mobile and Connect) will always be in-sync.

Automatic Cloud Syncing is an optional feature, switched OFF by default. If you don’t want to auto-sync, or don’t want to sync with the CLZ Cloud at all, just leave it switched OFF.

Revamped Edit Book screen

A huge refresh of the Edit Book screen, bringing the look and feel more in line with the recent Add Books from Core screen. But it’s not all just cosmetic changes, here’s what’s new:

• Button bar is now at the bottom of the screen
  With OK button high-lighted in blue, nice Next/Prev arrow buttons, etc…

• Re-designed user interface for adding and editing Authors
  • The Author list in the Edit Book screen is now a cleaner list, showing just Display Name and Pseudonym.
  • To add an Author, click the Add button top right. The new Select Author screen appears, showing your current Author pick list. Use the search box to find the author you’d like to add, typing just a few letters will make it appear. Select it, then click the big blue Add Author button at the bottom right. If your author is not in the pick list yet, use the New Author button to create it.
  • Right-click to Modify the name and sort name of an author in the list.
  • Drag the icon in the first column to change the order.
  • Click the “x” in the last column to remove entries.
• Clearer blue + buttons for checkbox list fields (like Genres and Subjects)
• Same blue + buttons for dropdown fields (like Publisher, Country and Language)
• Revamped Edit screen for pick list items
  Button bar at the bottom with blue OK button, smaller generate buttons, etc..

Simplified: Edit Multiple Books screen

• Now use checkboxes to explicitly indicate which field(s) you want set.
  Safer and clearer, no more unexpected changes.

• To clear a field, just click the checkbox and leave the box empty.
  The box will highlight in red to indicate the CLEAR action. No more hidden F8 keys.

Simplified screens for selecting Column, Sort and Folder fields.

The ability to select your own Columns for the List View is an important customization feature of our Book Collector software. The same holds for selecting the sort order and the folder fields for the folder panel.

However, the “field selection” screens for doing these customizations have always been an area of confusion. So for v18 we decided to re-imagine both the field selection screens and the system for creating/managing your own presets.

• Simplified Field Selection screen:
  • Available fields are now grouped, like the tabs in the Edit Book screen.
  • Easily find the field you want with the search box top left.
  • Use checkboxes on the left to select fields.
  • Use the “x” button on the right to remove fields.
  • Drag and drop fields on the right side to change the order.
  • Rename the field set at the top right.
• Simplified system for managing your field presets:
  • Just click the Columns or Sort Order button to EDIT the current preset.
  • Click the little arrow to the right of the Columns or Sort Order button to open the preset menu and switch to a different preset.
  • Choose Manage Presets from the preset menu to edit your presets and create new ones.

NEW: “Clean” template for the details panel, in Light and Dark styles

A complete refresh, based on the recent Connect/Cloud details page updates. Clean, clear and modern, with some fresh layout ideas:

• Cleaner look, in both Light and Dark styles.
• Re-designed and more compact Author panel at the top.
• Clearer display of Genres and Subjects.
• Now uses the book cover image as a subtle background image. Or opt for the “Plain” style for a “quieter” background.

No more Standard edition: Pro-only features now available for everyone!

Since last week, we stopped selling the Standard edition of Book Collector. From now on, the Pro edition is the only edition we sell, and will just be called “Book Collector” now.

Our gift to all users on the Standard edition who have a valid Update Plan:
Starting with v18, you now get access to all Pro-only features:

• Batch editing with the Edit Multiple feature:
  
  Save time by editing multiple items in batch, e.g. to fill in a field value for many items in one go.

• Customizable pre-sets for sorting, columns and folders:
  
  Create your own pre-set field combination for sorting and columns. Define your own folder options, even multi-level folder combinations.

• User Defined Fields:
  
  Create your own fields (text, number, pick list, checkbox or date) and rename pre-defined fields.

• Export features:
  
  Export your database to a CSV or XML file.

Next week, Apple will release the new macOS 10.13 “High Sierra”.
If you are planning to update your Mac to this new OS, then we strongly recommend to update your Book Collector software to today’s version 17.0.5!

Book Collector problems on High Sierra:
We have been testing our software on beta versions of High Sierra for quite a while, to make sure we were ready for it’s release. We found that most of the software seems to be working as normal.

Unfortunately, we found a big problem in the Preferences screen, it does not open at all anymore, making it impossible to make any changes to program settings.

Luckily, our Mac developer Ronald was able to fix the Preferences screen to make it work on the new macOS. A fix was released today, in version 17.1.2.

Fixed

• Preferences screen didn’t load properly on macOS 10.13 “High Sierra”.
• Upload Cover to CLZ Core: Images were not always uploaded properly even if they were within the 500KB file size limit.
• Main Screen: Quick Search: Occasional crashes in the quick search when using the “Search-as-you-type” suggestions.
• Sync with CLZ Cloud: Sometimes crashed during the upload of covers.

Now sync your loan information to the CLZ Cloud

• Sync information about outstanding loans to the CLZ Cloud, directly visible in your CLZ Cloud viewer (just add the Loan columns to the list).
• Sync your loan history to the CLZ Cloud (only visible in Book Connect’s new Loan Manager)

New in Book Connect: a really nice Loan Manager feature!

• Loan books and return books, by scanning their barcodes with CLZ Barry.
• Check outstanding loans and loan history in the Loan Manager

( Coming soon: sync loan information to the CLZ Books mobile app )

Now sync your loan information to the CLZ Cloud

• Sync information about outstanding loans to the CLZ Cloud, directly visible in your CLZ Cloud viewer (just add the Loan columns to the list).
• Sync your loan history to the CLZ Cloud (only visible in Book Connect’s new Loan Manager)

New in Book Connect: a really nice Loan Manager feature!

• Loan books and return books, by scanning their barcodes with CLZ Barry.
• Check outstanding loans and loan history in the Loan Manager

( Coming soon: sync loan information to the CLZ Books mobile app )

Other tweaks

• Add Books from Core: Search Results list is now loading/refreshing faster, especially for long lists.
• New option for CLZ Barry: Auto-Connect. When enabled, the built-in Buddy for Barry automatically connects to the server when you start the program or open the Add screen.
• The Expire Date of your Update Plan is now always visible in the lower right bottom of the main screen.

Big changes today! The Add Books Automatically screen has been completely re-designed, to make it both easier-to-use and easier-on-the-eye (and it’s now called “Add Books from CLZ Core”):

• A simple two-panel design: Search Results on the left, Preview on the right.
• The Search Results now show cover images.
• Automatic Preview of selected result (no more double clicking).

See it in action:

Here’s the full list of improvements:

Read more

We’ve expanded the quick search box to now also allow “search-as-you-type” with suggestions for pick list fields.

How does it work?

In the quick search box top right of your screen you should see a “dropdown” button. Use this to select which field you wish to perform a search on. If “search-as-you-type” is available for that field, it will instantly work once you start typing in the box.

Example

You can now select the field “Author” in the quick search box, start typing an author name, and instantly see suggestions (based on what you typed) of authors you have in your database. Click on an author to see all his/her books.

Try it with the “Publisher” field too! Instantly see which books you own from a specific publisher you type in the quick search box.

Fixes in this version

We also fixed some issues with the program in this version:

• Images Popup:
  • “size window to picture” showed image slightly smaller
  • .tiff images were not showing

Quick Search: Search-As-You-Type suggestions

Instantly find and select a particular book in your local database:

• In the Quick Search box, just start typing the first few letters of the author or title you are looking for.
• While typing, a drop-down list will appear, showing the first five matching books.
  (for most books, it only takes 2 or 3 letters before it shows up.)
• Once you see the one you were looking for, use the up/down keys to select it, then hit Enter.
• The book will now be selected in your list, with the details showing in the Details Panel.

NOTE: this Search-As-You-Type feature replaces the old “filter-as-you-type” behaviour of the Quick Search box. If you want to go back to the old behaviour, you can do so in the Preferences screen, on the Behaviour page using the setting called “When typing in Quick Search box”.

Read more

Quick Search: Search-As-You-Type suggestions

Instantly find and select a particular book in your local database:

• In the Quick Search box, just start typing the first few letters of the author or title you are looking for.
• While typing, a drop-down list will appear, showing the first five matching books.
  (for most books, it only takes 2 or 3 letters before it shows up.)
• Once you see the one you were looking for, use the up/down keys to select it, then hit Enter.
• The book will now be selected in your list, with the details showing in the Details Panel.

Read more