How to Create a Book Card Catalog

Books have the power to change the world, especially if they are well organized. If you are a semiprofessional librarian working on behalf of an organization, or if you are simply the owner of a sprawling book collection, you will probably want to create a book card catalog. Fortunately, tools exist online to serve the needs of both a book aficionado as well as a professional librarian. A passing familiarity with the Dewey decimal system can help any person make the most of these tools to create his own customized library catalog.

Instructions

1. Refer to existing online library catalogs. One of the most common sense steps to creating a book card catalog is to observe the online catalog for local libraries. Compare these sites and determine what they have in common as well as how each is different. Specifically, pay attention to how they list their holdings. For example, do listings cite how many pages are in a book, the ISBN number and the Library of Congress number?

2. Gain a familiarity with the Dewey decimal system (see Resources). If you are creating a book card catalog, the Dewey decimal system is bound to become your new best friend. It is already very widely used. If you catalog books in a way that is compatible with other online catalogs, you will be able to refer to these competing catalogs if you are ever vexed about how a particular book should be filed into your system.

3. Use categories and subcategories to organize your materials. The Dewey decimal system is broadly divided into 10 classes (such as religion, technology or philosophy and psychology), which each contains nearly as many subcategories (called divisions). However, this is just the beginning. The subcategories themselves have subcategories (called sections), and this system ends up being so specific that every item can be neatly organized into your collection.

4. Consider using free software to store your catalog online. If your goal is to create a book catalog of your personal library, you may appreciate the free application LibraryThing (see Resources). When registered on this site, you can enter titles and find other users who share the same taste in reading. Anyone who is interested in creating a professional-quality library catalog should also learn about the Evergreen open-source software, designed to help library users manage, catalog and circulate materials (see Resources). It is free and is presently being used by many community libraries.

5. Learn how to make your catalog user friendly and interactive. Many local libraries invite member participation in their online catalogs, allowing one to renew materials or place holds. When your catalog is in its infancy, amenities such as these may be difficult to offer; however, users are certain to appreciate them. One way to solicit participation from users of your catalog is to invite them to place requests to you through email. Furthermore, consider inviting moderated user ratings and comments of books in your collection in the style of Amazon.com. If possible, you may even be able to provide links to excerpts of books in your collection.

Tips & Warnings

• If you work with students, teaching them to create sample card catalog entries can be a perfect way to introduce them to the benefits of searching through and accessing a library's holdings.

• Realistically assess your manpower. If you hope to catalog hundreds of books by yourself, you should not expect to complete your task in a few hours, but should devote several weeks to the chore.

Resources

• The Dewey Decimal Classification System
• LibraryThing
• Evergreen Open-Source Software