Your library and your books

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[edit] How do I review a book?

Find the book in your LibraryThing library, and click the "edit" icon next to the book. Type your review into the Your Review box, and click "save" to save it.

[edit] How do I rate a book?

Find the book in your LibraryThing library, and click the "edit" icon next to the book. Click on the dots beside Rating to choose the number of stars. For half stars, click a second time on the star. A third click removes the rating completely.

[edit] How do I change the order of my books?

You can sort by author, title and many other fields by clicking on the name of the field. Blue names are clickable; black ones are not. A little blue triangle will appear to the right of the column you're sorting by. Click again to reverse direction.

[edit] How do I subsort by a second column?

LibraryThing lets you subsort by the last sort. So, if you want to sort by author, and title within author, click "title" to sort by title, and then "author" to sort by author and subsort by title.

[edit] How do I see other fields, like ISBN or LC Call Number?

Click "edit" next to the display style choices on the navigation bar in the catalog view.

[edit] How do I show my books to my friends?

You can show your library to others by directing them to the URLs listed on your profile page. The links should look like this, where the UserName is actually your user name.

• http://www.librarything.com/profile/UserName (profile)
• http://www.librarything.com/catalog/UserName (catalog)

If you want to direct your friends to a specific subset of your books (i.e. books you've tagged "on loan"), search for that tag within your library, and then click on the " permanent link" at the bottom of your catalog page. The URL that appears in your menu bar can be sent to friends and will only pull up the relevant subset of books.

(Note: If you've set your account to private, your friends will not be able to view your library, but they will be able to see your profile page).

[edit] Can I set the display style for other people to view my catalog?

Yes. You can set a "Suggested display style for visitors to your library" by clicking "edit" next to the display styles in your catalog. Visitors then get this as an option to use this when they look at your library.

[edit] The title of my book is spelled wrong, can I change that?

Indeed, you can! You can edit almost all of the fields, either by double clicking in the appropriate cell in the list view of your catalog or by clicking the "edit" icon next to each book.

[edit] How do I change the book cover image, or add a new one?

Click the little "edit" icon. Now, in the box on the left hand side, you should see a blue link entitled "change book cover". Click that and change away! Note: Changing your cover to an Amazon cover also changes your book's ISBN.

[edit] What are the "Buy, borrow or swap" links on every work page?

The "Buy, borrow or swap" links (on every book page on the right hand side) are links to various bookstores and libraries, so that you can search for that book elsewhere online. Each member can customize which links show up under "Buy, borrow or swap", so you can easily connect to your local library or favorite bookstore.

[edit] How do I edit my "Buy, borrow or swap" links?

The "Buy, borrow or swap" links can be edited in two ways. You can customize the links that appear on your pages by choosing from a large menu of possible book links. You can also edit the link page itself, adding new links for you and others to use.

• Adding links to your pages. To customize the links that appear on your pages, sign on to LibraryThing and click the pencil link next to "Buy, borrow or swap" on any book page. Then from the "Book links" page, you can click the "add" link next to any of the links, and it will be added to the "Your book links" sidebar on that page, and subsequently appear on all your book pages. To remove links, click the 'x' next to the link in the sidebar, and use the up and down arrows to change their order.
• Adding links to the Book links page. Links on this page are all ISBN-based. To add a new link to the "Book links" page, click on 'add a link' near the top of the page. In the popup, select the link type from the drop down menu, then type in your link subtype. Links should be ISBN-based, not to the front page of a site. (Here's an example of an ISBN-based link: http://worldcat.org/isbn/0385504209). To add an ISBN-based link to the Book links page, substitute the word "MAGICNUMBER" (in caps, without the quotes) for the ISBN. So the above link would be added like this: http://worldcat.org/isbn/MAGICNUMBER

Try the Book links group for more help and suggestions.

[edit] What is PowerEdit Mode?

If you click the icon in your library, you enter what we call "PowerEdit Mode". PowerEdit lets you change and edit your book data en masse. You can add and remove tags to many books at the same time, alphabetize your tags within each book record, delete books, establish the languages your books are in, and find all the ISBN duplicates in your catalog. Make sure to hit the icon again to exit PowerEdit when you're done being powerful.

[edit] Can I change one of my tags, on all the books that I used it on?

Yes. Use PowerEdit to replace one tag with another. The best way to do it is to click on the tag to bring up the list of all books with that tag. Then in PowerEdit, add the new tag, and then delete the old tag. (If you delete before you add, the list of books tagged "x" will disappear!)

[edit] Why is some of the text in my catalog green?

Items in green represent educated guesses based upon other LibraryThing catalogs. Green data only appears when your catalog is silent. This technique is used for LC call numbers, Dewey Decimal numbers, Library of Congress Subject Headings and the "original language" field.

[edit] How can I change green text to black?

Green data in some, but not all, fields can be replaced by black data that you have recognized. Open up your catalog ("Your library"), pick a display style that shows the column you want to edit, and double-click in any field that has green text that you want to accept. Make any changes you want and then click "SAVE". The text is now "black".*

This works for the LC Classification (also called "LC Call No.), Dewey No., and Original language fields. It does not work for Library of Congress Subject Headings (also called "Subject").

[edit] Why don't all of my books have Dewey Decimal numbers?

If having call numbers, etc. is important to you, then you should try to add your books using the Library of Congress or another library (instead of Amazon) as your "source" when adding books. You also benefit from the records that other LibraryThing users have—see "green text" above.

If my books are listed under the Library of Congress system, can they be converted over to the Dewey Decimal system?

[edit] How do I link to a book page from my blog?

There are several ways to create a link to a book. You can either just copy the URL to the work page, or you can use the permanent link located at the bottom right hand corner of every page. You can also create links using the ISBN or even a "sloppy title." Read more about how to do that on the easy linking instruction page.

Or you can put a widget on your blog.

[edit] What's all this about "combining"?

LibraryThing lets users be librarians, editing and correcting book data as they see fit. This means combining two author names together (C.S. Lewis and Clive Staples Lewis, for example); combining two tags which are synonymous ("nonfiction" with "non-fiction"); and combining "books" of different editions into a more global "work". Read more about this on LibraryThing's Concepts page, or see this Talk post for some basics on combining and separating.

[edit] Can I have a wishlist that doesn't count as books I own?

We're still working on a wishlist feature, but in the meantime, feel free to add the books you want to your catalog, and tag them 'wishlist', if you like.

[edit] Can I make a part of my books or my tags or my comments private?

There are now two comments fields, one of which ("Private Comments") is only visible to you when you're logged in. As of now, there is no way to make a subset of your books or tags private while leaving the rest public.