Tic-toc of new list improvements

I'm starting this to put smaller list improvements, so I don't need to keep creating topics.

I've added pictures to the list lists on the home page—active lists, recent lists, lists what you'd like:

How can I get only my own lists onto my home page?

Thanks! What other improvements are planned?

>2 SqueakyChu: There's a module for your lists under "About You" that can be moved to the dashboard.

> 4

That doesn't work. I don't want to see the lists of others. I want to have the lists that only I started*. That is not currently one of the options.

*...or, at minimum, only the lists to which I've added entries.

>4 LShelby: Sorry. My mistake.

No problem. Just sending out a suggestion to Tim! :)

Probably not what you wanted, but I put links in my notepad for anything on the site, including lists and talk threads.

That doesn't work. I don't want to see the lists of others. I want to have the lists that only I started*. That is not currently one of the options.

There are three things, I think:

1. Ones you started
2. Ones you contributed to
3. Ones you favorited

>9 timspalding: Do you mean three things that exist, or three things that should exist? Is there currently a way to see ones we started?

> 9, 10

Yes. Those four! I'd like all of them. :)

1. I've added the home page items:

Lists You've Started
Lists You've Favorited

Your Lists already existed.

They should both be on "About you" ( http://www.librarything.com/home#aboutyou ). If they aren't, you've made edits to that page, and they are on "Unused" ( http://www.librarything.com/home#unused ).

2. List lists now look different:



Not all browsers will see it this way.

If your browser is seeing it in some ugly way then let us know. We'll whip up a fix for it as quickly as possible.

I love the new little pictures besides the lists. It perked up my morning to log in and see those!

Thanks for making all the improvements. I love the lists feature and use it way too frequently.

I get this message in both new modules:

Some sort of error just happened. The error was logged and Tim has been alerted. If problems persist, email timspaldingAT SIGNlibrarything.com

In most cases, the problem can be fixed by using this link.

The reported error was:

Problem with the concurrent query manager in the LibraryThing Bureau of Garbage Collections.
We have an entire room of trained monkeys working to solve the problem..

The link is: http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?shelf=list&sort=title but clicking it doesn't solve everything.

>16 divinenanny:

Same for me, on XP using Chrome. The link for both modules brings me to My Books, with the refresh / recycle animation going non-stop in the Chrome tab.

ETA not sure I've actually created or favourited any lists, incidentally.

Mine are perfect! Thank you, Tim. :)

FYI: IE 10 with Windows 8

Fixed. Sorry.

(It wasn't handling it right if you hadn't favorited or started any lists.)

That's it.
I have no list because I've yet to see the use of them (in the LT implementation, in real life I LOVE lists)

I like these modules, they remind me to review lists I've found, perhaps also look for lists new to me.

One things they don't do: indicate what sort of activity might have occurred since I last looked. I know I can sort them on activity or when a new title is posted, but the icon / text itself gives no indication of what or when that might be.

Don't have a vision of how that might work, just noting here that it's something I'm missing as I review the lists populating my modules.

Suggestion:

One thing I would like to see is for the list feature to be more prominent on LT. I don't think our members can find them easily or use them enough. Maybe a different list could be highlighted each month on LT's State of the Thing?

Lists are an interesting concept (although I have none of my own, and that will probably remain true for the foreseeable future), but I really would like to be able to manage what I see. When viewing various threads (or whatever they're called here) under Talk, I can use the option to "ignore" that topic, and from then on, it's invisible to me.

I recognize that lists may be built in such a way as to make this difficult to do, but it would be nice to see the occasional new list without having to wade through all those that I don't find interesting.

21: You can have them sorted by activity, though, of course, you don't know what activity has caused them to pop to the top.

23: You can set them up so only the newest 9 or so appear.

>22 SqueakyChu: I like this idea! I'll definitely look for a place for it in SOTT.

I understand that the deleted lists aren't actually *deleted*, but is there a way to prevent them from showing up on a book's page as a list that the book is on, since they were intended to be deleted? For example, I see on The Circle page that it's on Shannon's Possible Reads list, which is a list that I believe I deleted.

I don't even know how to get to lists.

librarything.com/lists

http://www.librarything.com/lists

Which just got a redo, but may not get an explanation from me for a few hours.

Ahhhh, vertical scrolling again. Can we have a two-column option like on the home page?

Vertical scrolling is good? Bad?

Bad. We just lost half of the information that was previously visible above the fold.

I do like the pictures, though.

> 31

Bad. Previously, one could see all three possibilities immediately upon going to the page. Now, you can see only two, and have to scroll down to discover the third.

(P.S. I also bitched at the NYT about their new website re-design today, for similar reasons. So you're in good company!)

Here's the old, in case you want to do comparisons: http://www.librarything.com/lists_old.php

>35 timspalding: Thanks for the comparison. I could have sworn the old font was larger, but it's close enough.

I really prefer having more information available without scrolling, but the new display of individual lists is definitely prettier.

Maybe you could do 4 boxes in the new style, two above and two below, though that would limit the number of lists that fit. I'd personally still prefer columns, either 3 or 4, with a different list of lists in each column.

I think I'm okay with scrolling down to see the "recent" lists. The odds of finding an interesting recent list above the fold were pretty low anyhow.

The old page was visually more cluttered and not as easy on the eyes. IMHO

> 35

Yes, with the old you can see that there are three sections: Active Lists, Your Lists, and Recent Lists.

The new page shows just Active Lists and Your Lists; unless you scroll down, you won't see Recent Lists. It's quite likely that someone unfamiliar with the page would not bother to do that and never know that Recent Lists exists.

ETA: this is really a comment on my view of vertical scrolling generally. I don't use the Lists page often enough for it to make much difference to me in this specific instance. But it is also one of the reasons I don't use the Home Page as a rule. I want to know what's on a page as soon as I land on it, without having to move it all around.

>37 LShelby: Well, the old page also had a lot of weird inconsistencies (some lists had covers, some had number of items, etc.), and I think it would be possible to keep the streamlined look of the new page while switching the orientation. It should be possible to combine nice-looking individual elements with efficient organization :)

Am I incorrect in thinking we can add each of those lists as modules on whatever homepage (or sub-home) we want? So some of these concerns about above-the-fold / avoiding scrolling can be managed there.

>40 elenchus: Well, except that the homepage also requires lots of scrolling. I look at way fewer different modules than I used to there.

I'd love to see some official automatic lists (that update on their own). I don't know if either of my ideas are even feasible, but I think they'd both be fun.

* A groups list, where for any group that isn't private (or possibly for any group that turns it on), you can see a list of all of the books for the people in that group, ranked by how many people have the work. I think that would be more doable than a group library that some people were talking about in another thread before.

* An LT read in xxxx list for the years since the site has been here. Any book that was listed as started or finished reading in a given year gets put on the list for that year, again ranked by the number of people who read it. With 2014 and years going forward, it populates as people mark books as having started or finished reading, so there's a mostly real time way to see our reading habits.

Any list like this wouldn't have to be calculated every time someone looks at it. Maybe daily or weekly, or even monthly.

42> * A groups list, where for any group that isn't private (or possibly for any group that turns it on), you can see a list of all of the books for the people in that group, ranked by how many people have the work.

That already exists. Just go to the group page and click on group zeitgeist in the upper right-hand corner.

43> That's limited. I haven't seen one group with more than about 140 books in their Zeitgeist. Here is the Zeitgeist for Science Fiction fans with almost 6000 members http://www.librarything.com/groups/sciencefictionfans/groupzeitgeist There are 147 books in the characteristic works, and 100 in the most held works. I can look at most held, which never gives more than 100 books, or at characteristic, which gives up to 50 more, but in an order that is based on popularity vs members in the group, so the books move around more. In the most held works for that group, I've read 40 of the top 50. In the most characteristic I've read 35 of the top 50. Those small lists don't help me find new books, they just show me books I already know about. If there were one that showed all of the books, I could go to page 5 or 10, and find many good books that aren't quite as well known.

44> But that would be basically the same as a group library.

#29

I quite like the new look but can see that those with smaller vertical resolutions may not. I would take the excessive margin-top off the "see all xxx lists".

Some other things that might be addressable. I guess most of these are feature requests.

Make the list dashboard re-orderable

Lists say "started December 2013" (for example). What's wrong with a proper date (and maybe a time if you have it)?

List activity. Is it possible to have some indication of how active a list is?

In the list http://www.librarything.com/list/64/all/Best-roleplaying-books items in position 13 to 17 inclusive all have the same score - they were all picked as third choice by one person. It seems that they are then ordered by the book id from the LT database! I find that a pretty non-transparent choice of ordering. Would it be possible to put all those books on 13=?

>42 bestem: I'd love to have lists based on reading year.

I think group libraries (or similar) may be a lost cause; there were technical limitations that led to a very watered-down group search feature. It would certainly be nice if the Characteristic Works list could be expanded, though.

13 -- Sorry, I can't find these:

Lists You've Started
Lists You've Favorited

Let me rephrase. How do I get to lists through the website without having to type in something? It's ridiculous to have to type something in to get to a website's feature. There needs to be a link.

>49 Morphidae: You can also get there via one of the homepage modules.

Dear lord, okay. I never use the home page except to see if there are new blog posts but I guess it's better than nothing.

I've changed the lists page, to set defaults for whether to show the covers, show the work information and show information about your contribution. So, for example, it omits the covers for "your lists" in order to show more of them, and it omits your contribution data from "recent lists" because you probably don't need your memory jogged about that.

See http://pics.cdn.librarything.com/picsizes/d0/75/d075c116a4b8a8a636f416a6941434b4...

Or go to http://www.librarything.com/lists

Let me rephrase. How do I get to lists through the website without having to type in something? It's ridiculous to have to type something in to get to a website's feature. There needs to be a link.

What would people feel if the whole list feature were exported as a single page to the home page. So it was



Basically, this would make lists a series of modules available from the home page. I'm not entirely sure I like that, but I don't want to give it a tab. And lists are "discovery."

52: If we can still put distinct modules (like recent lists) on the dashboard, I like that fine and think it will be easier for other folks.

Couldn't you add it to the More tab?

I think it makes sense under Discovery.

>52 timspalding: That seems reasonable. I like the thought of rearranging and customizing the list modules.

Okay, it's now on the home page.

I'm working on what happens if you're not signed in.

Does "Your Lists" mean lists you have participated in, i.e. voted on?

Right. Any time you participate in a list, you're adding something to your list for that.

1. I've added it to your home page.

2. It exists at /lists if you're signed out.

3. I've added one for "Popular lists," based on member participation:

I'm not seeing the Popular Lists module.

If you reordered, check http://www.librarything.com/home#unused

No, that was the second place I looked.

Sigh.
This isn't going to work for an ever-changing TBR list. I just tried to remove a book so I could replace it with the correct one, and while it removes it from my version of the list, it keeps it on there so as to really annoy me. This means any book I read from this list cannot be removed and that's not the point. The point is to churn the unread books until I read one and then kill it.

Oh well, it was a nice experiment while it lasted.

Right. It's for communal lists. Collections are for what you're describing.

Yeah but there is no community or voting in collections. No visibility. You see?

What you could do, bookmarque, is remove all the books from your list. Then the votes of the crowd will set the order. As you read, vote for the book to mark it as read. If you decide not to read it for any reason, thumbs down. If you decide to run the experiment for 2014, for instance, by the end of the year, your list will nicely reflect your year's reading.

Just a suggestion, to do with as you will.

Right. It's for communal lists. Collections are for what you're describing.

I think all these new improvements are making people want lists able to do everything, and forgetting that that's what we have Talk for. New toys are fun, but it's not meant to take over the site! You can make threads with lists of "Best of Genre X" and have people comment on whether they agree with titles or not and why, and suggest their own, etc. You can make threads with "Help me pick what to read next" and have people put forth suggestions and discuss. And so forth. And then there's no worries about these things not showing on other users' lists.

#68

I still think that there is value in having an even better lists feature. I may want to comment on one of your choices without either agreeing with it (I would need it on my list), or by disagreeing enough to thumbs down it.

I'll play with it, but I don't know. I was pretty psyched to use it, but now not so much.

>69 andyl: I think being able to comment on lists would be good, but people seem to want loads more functionality and have all sorts of features on them that just seem, well, we already have places to do that, why not focus dev time on something more useful?

#71

I've been saying that since the whole feature was being created.

I don't think there's anything wrong with them, lists can be fun. I just think now people want too much of them, and to continue along that line will be taking time from other projects.

Oh, no. This has been the same requests, expectations, and such since they started development. That hasn't changed.

why not focus dev time on something more useful?

Lists have their strengths. People wanted them. Some other sites have them. So I made them. I'll make improvements as needed. But the feature is indeed close to completion now, and I don't plan to expand it significantly beyond what it does now.

>75 timspalding: I'll make improvements as needed.

I'll admit I haven't paid much attention to lists until a group I joined started using them for voting. But for what it is worth it immediately became one of those features I found hard to navigate. It took me almost fifteen minutes to figure out how to create a new list because I didn't see a "create new list" link anywhere on my lists page.

Yeah. That's better now, I think.

>75 timspalding: It doesn't hurt to ask. :-)

I'm enjoying all the new improvements, and the primary additional fix I'd like to see is not to show deleted lists on the work page with all the lists that a particular book is on. In fact, I wouldn't think that deleted lists would show up anywhere even if they technically still exist.

>75 timspalding: I didn't mean the previous time spent, I just meant all the "can't we have lists do XYZ??" posts being throw around now, I don't think need to happen.

75> "I'll make improvements as needed."

Surely a needed improvement is to have Search functioning properly so that we can add the works we really want to add to a list!

Tim, I saw that you added a picture to one of my lists. Thanks!

How do I go about adding a picture to my other lists?

Never mind. I figured it out! :)

I still think lists could be made a lot more powerful, in ways that other features don't currently duplicate. The pre-fill options in particular are currently very limited, and an extension of that would allow members to do all sorts of interesting things with LT data.

I'd also still like to see filtering by group membership: how does the favourite books of the year list differ for different groups, etc.

You can now decide whether to turn this stuff on or off:

I changed my Best Fantasy Novels list to be unnumbered and that worked for most of them but I get down to #28 on the main list, The Lions of Al-Rassan, it says I have it as number 9.

I think the number 9 is based on your personal list, not based on the full list. You'd have to rearrange in the right side bar if you want it somewhere else. Or add more books to your list that you'd put above it.

But I made my personal list unnumbered, and indeed if I look at the full list for one of the other books on my personal list I see myself listed with no number:

Lists: sandstone78 (1), lovelyluck (5), briarhills (6), Quaisior (6), Julilla (7), GreenVelvet (8), navelos (10), mkjones (10), al.vick (13), Cecrow (14), LisaMaria_C (15), kgodey (16), Jarandel (42), jjwilson61

Yet when I look at The Lions of Al-Rassan, on the full list, I see:

Lists: snurp (1), DeltaQueen50 (3), rstaedter (4), laketa (5), calm (8), jjwilson61 (9), clong (10), souloftherose (12), Cecrow (13), anglemark (18), cthulhuslibrarian

9 is where it is on my list, but it should be treating my list as an unnumbered, not a numbered, list.

I'm also finding the whole UI of lists confusing. It took me forever to figure out how to add a book to a list and found it in the upper right-hand corner above Your List. Perhaps it should be incorporated into the box containing Your List since that is what you are adding it to.

Then it took me forever to find out how to remove a work from a list. I can see the use of being able to remove it while your looking at the main list, but there should also be a link for removing a book from a list in the same area as you add books to the list. It just makes sense.

ETA: One other thing. If it's a list that's been set up so that people can't add new works to it, like the OLOB ones, then I think some text in the place where you used to be able to add works, above Your List, would help. Something like, Add works from the main list.

I've changed how it looks when you look at someone's list.

As you may know, it doesn't normally change the URL and load a new page when you do that. The interaction is designed to be quicker than that, using the technology called "Ajax." However, having a "hard" URL is useful if you want to link to a particular member's version of the list. That existed before, but it wasn't obvious.

Here's what it looks like now:

>88 timspalding: I'd rather see the ugly string hidden behind something prettier, though I guess it doesn't really matter.

Also, I still can't find the Popular Lists module.

#88 by @timspalding> You can accomplish all this with URL hashes. You get AJAX and you get permanent links without having to resort to your kludge.

We do that on home, as you probably see.

I dislike it for public pages—pages that are going to be crawled by search engines, etc. But perhaps that's how it should go.

86> I think I've figured it out. When I switch a numbered list to an unnumbered one, then it changes all the entries on the main list where I've added it to my list from "On your list (#)" to just "On your list". But if I then add more by clicking on "Add to your list", it changes it to "On your list (#)".

So I understand a numbered list (people put things where they want on their own lists, and using the score from that puts it onto the main list), and I understand unnumbered lists (people put things on their own lists, and it puts it on the main list using a score based on number of people who have it on their own lists).

I don't understand what a numbered and unnumbered list is, though. To me it looks as though it's just the same as a numbered list. I'd love one that was numbered for the personal list (just so I can see how many books are in my list) but behaved like an unnumbered list for the overall list.

I believe it just makes a difference in the score. When it's your list is numbered it gives a larger bump to the work on the main list for the works high up on your list than those lower. When your list is unnumbered it gives the same bump to all the works on your list.

94> So you're saying that individuals choose numbered or unnumbered for their personal lists, but the main list will always be numbered for the "Numbered and unnumbered" option? That's the opposite of what I'm interested in, but ok. At least it makes sense now.

Is anyone else unable to "drag and drop to reorder" on his or her list? I've been unable to do that today (IE10 - W8).

93: Yes, "numbered and unnumbered" works the same as "numbered". It's one of those beta things. It can only be set for the list as a whole. There is no way to set it for "My List"

96: Are you reordering after displaying "My List" or are you trying to reorder in the right-hand column?

If you look at the individual list that has more than 100 works, like aviddiva's on Favorite Childhood Books it shows you 100 but there's no more like to see the rest.

> 97

I'm trying to reorder in one of my individual lists in the third column (right hand side) which says: "Drag and drop to reorder". I tried the third column even under the setting of under My List", but that doesn't work either.

It's not working for me in IE10-W8. It does not even appear as an option if I go to my FF browser. :(

99: Not saying it's not a bug, but you might try clicking on My list at the top of the list (left hand side) and seeing if you can re-order that.

I already tried. It didn't work. :(

It took me almost fifteen minutes to figure out how to create a new list because I didn't see a "create new list" link anywhere on my lists page.

I've added "Create new list" to the top of the home page's "list" page.

It's not working for me in E10-W8. It does not even appear as an option if I go to my FF browser. :(

In your account now.

Thanks. Let me know when I should try again.

I think it also might have to do with where you put your mouse. If it is over the number or over the name of the book. I also found it a bit tricky and had to play around for a while before I could reorder.

The number doesn't "pick up" the book title. The book title moves, but it won't stick anywhere other than the position from which it originated. It still does not reorder.

Sorry about that. I am in Safari, MacOS 10.7.5 so maybe different. FF works too, so might be a Windows 8 thing?

FF does not work for me. It has no third column with numbered book titles!

Oooh! Now I have the list (third column) on FF...and it works! I have work to do now to rearrange my lists. See you later, W8!

The left hand column now works in FF as well. Thanks, Tim!

Ok. So I've read the one voted to the top now I don't want it there anymore. What to do?
http://www.librarything.com/list/1048/all/Vote-Bookmarques-Teetering-TBR-Tower

Read the one in second place?

Realize that what you're using it for isn't what LT lists were designed for?

>110 Bookmarque:

Which one—Harry Potter, or the Goldfinch?

Harry Potter.
Don't worry. I'm done.

Well, the point is that you made a list and other people voted on it. They voted HP to the top. That's what lists are.

Sigh. Never mind.

Suppose you could create a collection with the same titles as the list: as you finish a title, you remove it from the collection, then refer to the list for which title to read next.

The collection tracks the books to be read; the list tracks the order in which they are to be read. A variable order, since voting will go on as you read. And when a title you've already read appears, you just ignore it.

But I hear you: not as elegant a solution as what you thought you had.

116: You could PM all the people who voted for the book and ask them to remove their votes. Then you can remove the work from the list. But, at the end, it's not designed to do what you wanted to do.

This is what I meant about people wanting them to do everything under the sun. It's just a list, it's not supposed to do anything like that. There's no sense getting all grouchy and crap just because it can't be twisted to serve every function.

119> Well, to be fair, it's not a list, it's Tim's version of a social list. If it were just a list then each person would have their own and they would be able to add and subtract from it and order it at their convenience. The fact that it's called a list, but it isn't a list makes using it confusing to a lot of people, including myself.

Everyone does have their own. You can add, subtract and order your list at your convenience. Go to town with it. You can't change everyone else's list.

Here's my list for "A Child's Book Tour of Greece" : http://www.librarything.com/list/1087/timspalding/
Here's casaloma's : http://www.librarything.com/list/1087/casaloma/A-Childs-Book-Tour-of-Greece
Here's the combined, all-members list : http://www.librarything.com/list/1087/casaloma/A-Childs-Book-Tour-of-Greece

120, 121>

You're talking past each other, here.

What Bookmarque wants, and what PolymathicMonkey is saying is asking for lists to be all things to all people, is a list that only the original list creator can add items to or remove items from, and that everyone else can vote on the order of the fixed set of items.

Basically Bookmarque wants to crowdsource the order of their TBR pile.

I don't think it would be completely crazy to allow people to view their own version of the list sorted in other ways, including by the ranking on the main list. It wouldn't be my top priority, though.

Or to allow more fine-grained options for the Your Collections view—people might want to look only at the ones they've read, for example, not all the ones they've catalogued.

Basically Bookmarque wants to crowdsource the order of their TBR pile.

Okay, but you CAN do that. You set your list to only be add-able by you.

>125 timspalding: The issue was that you couldn't then eliminate a book after you'd read it.

If nobody else has voted on a book, you can eliminate it. If they have, it's part of their list. But, yeah, if you want to control a list completely, but have others vote on stuff until you take it away, lists aren't for you. (People would hardly love their explanations going away…) But I don't see "vote on my TBR pile" as a common desideratum.

Okay, I've officially given up on something I wanted to do—to put all explanations under "see all X explanations" when you're looking at your list. The code just doesn't work that way, and it's hairy enough that the ROI on the change isn't worth it. I think it's a minor drawback, but I acknowledge it is one.

>127 timspalding: "(People would hardly love their explanations going away…)"

People probably wouldn't love me changing the question to which the books are the answers, but I'm permitted to do that!

In the case of what BarkingMatt is asking for, it is actually a bit "weird" in terms of either a private list or a social list (no offense, Matt). He's asking for both at the same time. He wants a social list because he wants people to vote on the items and move them up and down so he can see which ones to read. But then when he reads the top one, he wants to edit the list globally (meaning everyone's copies) and delete that top item off of ALL the lists.

I think there is a good use case for a truly private list, but this isn't it.

(And this is what I get for forgetting I'd last loaded this thread a while before I came back and started posting...)

None taken. But since I haven't posted to this topic before I am puzzled as to what you're referring to.

I'll just be over here by the blackboard.

(Bookmarque is not BarkingMatt.
Bookmarque is not BarkingMatt.
Bookmarque is not BarkingMatt.
...)

>128 timspalding: Fair enough.

What about the ROI on additional pre-fill data, and combinations thereof? We could generate a lot of really interesting lists if we could draw on more LT data and combine two or three conditions.

People probably wouldn't love me changing the question to which the books are the answers, but I'm permitted to do that!

It's like Heathers!

I think there is a good use case for a truly private list, but this isn't it.

I can add those, if people really want them. Although there's two options--private secret and private non-secret.

I'd say private = secret, and personal = non-secret.

Neither is a priority for me; I'd rather see lists making more use of social data. (I'd still like filtering by group membership, for example.)

#134 by @timspalding> I think if you pick only one, private secret should be it. Because that will cover the most bases. If it's a tiny bit of extra work and doesn't make the UI terrible, then I'd say private non-secret as well.

#135 by @_Zoe_> Personally, I have a gut feeling that personal/private lists will actually make social lists work better. Right now, everyone is forced into the same pool. Other than Bookmarque's public voted TBR list, I think personal TBRs probably have no business in the social list space and will only clutter it up, diluting the value by making the truly social stuff a little harder to find.

ETA: Plus is pretty much cuts out anyone who doesn't want to broadcast their reading choices to the world.

I've been thinking that these options are multiplying, and I should roll them into a number of basic types that imply the settings.

I think Zoe's private/personal/social naming scheme is a pretty good one. It's not perfect but I'm not sure such a thing exists.

ETA: Hmmm, thought just occurred: private/public/community. "Social" might be a little too inside baseball. "Public" would emphasize that other people can see it. Still not perfect, but maybe better?

Personally, I have a gut feeling that personal/private lists will actually make social lists work better. Right now, everyone is forced into the same pool. Other than Bookmarque's public voted TBR list, I think personal TBRs probably have no business in the social list space and will only clutter it up, diluting the value by making the truly social stuff a little harder to find.

The reason why I haven't made them is, however, that I don't want members using lists for things that would better be handled in your catalog. I know some members don't want to catalog their wish lists, but putting them in lists means that they won't be searchable the way the catalog is, etc. Pretty soon we'll have members saying they cataloged their library as a list, and now want it to appear in their catalog, etc.

#140 by @timspalding> Yeah, I get you. I think it will solve itself, though.

It depends on your definition of "would be better handled in your catalog." I'd much rather have mine as a list because I feel that THAT is better handled for the use case. Wishlist items in your regular catalog can have many undesirable features that have been discussed ad naseum.

Optimist.

I edited my message to expand. I'm optimistic people will pick which way works better for them, yes. :D

ETA: And now I'm editing this. I've seen people remark time and again that they keep their wish list outside of LT altogether (I keep mine on amazon) because of the annoyances. Lack of list features is not driving them towards using their catalog.

So, it's about:

Who can add and remove works?
Who can participate?
Who can see?

The "participate" is tough. Basically, look at OLOB—a fixed list people can "vote" on. Maybe I should create a list "type" that's a "voting list." In that case, the wording would be changed--not "add to list" but "vote." The effect would, however, be the same.

#144 by @timspalding> Yeah, I guess I'd just wonder what lists in reality would fit that category of vote-only lists. This wouldn't be Bookmarque's, would it? Would the vote-only lists allow the list "owner" to nuke items later? Do we have any other list we think will actually be created to use such a class of lists?

>137 brightcopy: That's a good point. But if personal lists (or whatever they're called) are added, I hope we'll be able to exclude them from recent lists etc.

I think people can figure out for themselves what tools work best for their purposes. Don't hold off on feature production because of that. Personally, I think the wishlist ship has sailed; I started an Amazon wishlist shortly after the release of Collections, and too much time has passed for me to bring it over to LT now.

Basically, look at OLOB—a fixed list people can "vote" on. Maybe I should create a list "type" that's a "voting list." In that case, the wording would be changed--not "add to list" but "vote." The effect would, however, be the same.

I'm much more concerned about the functionality than the terminology. I'm sure there are use-cases for lists with fixed items that aren't a matter of voting: maybe people will want to create a list of the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die, and mark on their personal lists which ones they've read/want to read, or whatever.

What if the owner could "hide" a book? So it still shows up on individual lists, and explanations are not deleted, but it only shows up at the end of the full list, or under a link that says "show hidden books"

I still use the Wishlist collection but it's a poor fit. I'd switch to a personal or private list in a second. Maybe if you wanted to add features like most wishlisted book, you could have the ability to mark such a list as a wishlist.

147> Actually, I think the best solution would be what Zoe suggested, to be able to rank your My List in the Social List order. That way BookMarque would be able to remove the work from her My List and see the new list in the social order but without affecting anyone else's My List.

Yeah, I guess I'd just wonder what lists in reality would fit that category of vote-only lists.

The OLOB lists, and others have been springing up. Sometimes you want people to vote on a list.

Personally, I think the wishlist ship has sailed

You think it's sailed for you personally. That's not the same thing as "personally, I think…"

I'm much more concerned about the functionality than the terminology.

Oh, the terminology is key. When we asked people to vote on the three books, a certain number were paralyzed by the lack of "vote" options.

I still use the Wishlist collection but it's a poor fit. I'd switch to a personal or private list in a second. Maybe if you wanted to add features like most wishlisted book, you could have the ability to mark such a list as a wish list.

Case in point for why I don't want to do this.

What did I say? I assumed that the reason you were reluctant to let people abandon the Wishlist collection was that you had plans to base some new feature off it. I guess I was wrong.

If it means that you won't consider personal lists then I take it all back.

I still think you should have a button for removing an item from your Your List just above the list where the button for adding to it is. Currently, if I want to remove an item I have to find the item in the Social List, which may be very long.

I can totally see both sides of this issue. I use three wishlists (one here, one at BookMooch, and one at BookCrossing). They never match! :(

Why I would favor a private list:
I could get the three collections of books I want to acquire for others out of my personal catalog.

Why it's better not to have the private list:
I would lose all the categories and descriptions of those books I want to acquire for others.

If you make a private list, please allow somewhere for either checkmarks or notes for the individual book entries. That would make it most useful for me.

Currently, if I want to remove an item I have to find the item in the Social List, which may be very long.

No, just look at your list.

I think that's the deep problem here—people don't understand that they have their own lists. That is surely my fault for making a UI with both social and personal lists jostling for mental attention.

#151 by @timspalding> Case in point for why I don't want to do this.

I'd START using LT for my wishlist if I could use a private list for it (You may notice I have one, but it was aborted after it started messing things up. Now when I notice it mess something up, I just go in and delete it from the wishlist. I've just been lazy and haven't deleted them all. In fact, I might as well go do that now.)

Case in point for why you should listen to your user's needs rather than always drawing lines in the sand like this based on your paradigm.

And done. LT now loses all information for any books I'd care to buy/read.

i like having having a Wishlist collection but I would also use a personal list if it would let me keep track of books that I'm not yet sure I want in my collection.

You think it's sailed for you personally. That's not the same thing as "personally, I think…"

So, do you have any thoughts on the actual content of anything I said?

What did I say?

I think the problem was that you suggested adding a List feature that would duplicate existing Your Books functionality (marking a list specifically as a Wishlist). Tim doesn't want to make Lists more like Your Books, because if you want any feature from Your Books, you should just use Your Books.

Oh, the terminology is key. When we asked people to vote on the three books, a certain number were paralyzed by the lack of "vote" options.

Is this a problem with Lists, or a problem with how the request was phrased? I don't see the benefit of spending development time on something that could be resolved with two sentences of explanation. Especially because, as I said in 146, people might want to do the exact same thing under a different name. Or are you going to give list-creators the option to customize all terminology on a per-list basis?

If lists becomes a general way to create wish lists:

1. The data will vanish out of catalogs.
2. The features built on that will vanish, like

a. searching your wish list
b. seeing what your friends want in an expected place
c. seeing overlap between you and friends' collections
d. checkmarks on work pages, author pages, tag, tag mash, subject, MDS, etc. etc.
e. excluding items in your wish list from recommendations
f. books existing in the system before members add them for real-sies,

And on and on through z and z100. All will vanish. Then:

1. Users will complain that their wish list sucks. After all, what use is a wish list if I can't search it, if I can't have its items exploded from my recommendations, etc. etc.?
2. I will have to duplicate the a-z functionality.
3. That won't happen, or won't happen completely, and there'll be endless threads about how to move your stuff between your library and your lists, and about how LT is confusing because there are two different systems for the same thing, and that Tim hasn't finished a feature.

I would consider moving books in my wishlist collection to a wishlist "list" for the simple reason that I could remove them from my catalog stats and totals. But this is perhaps just the kind of thing Tim would not want, since it also takes them out of all the potential relationships I have with those books on LT. That would be a plus for me, because I intend my catalog to be snapshot of my real world library, and I feel having wishlist items included dilutes that purpose. But if I were to move them, that's a bunch of data no longer accessible to LT, so it's probably a trade off.

>161 timspalding: Okay, we understand that you want to force everyone to use their catalogues for their wishlists, even though you can't actually force anyone to use LT for anything; keeping wishlists elsewhere is always an option.

We beat this to death years ago, and you're obviously not budging an inch, regardless of what members want. So let's move on with discussion of List features that might actually be implemented?

When it comes to wishlists, I'm very happy with my decision to have a separate account for it. The social data (and recommendations) it creates are useful and interesting and it doesn't contaminate my catalog of books I own with books I don't own. Win-win.

Well, so explain to me what you want. If you want the ability to slice your stats without certain collections, fine. If you want a new system for wish lists that will coexist with the old system forever, well, I have to question whether that's worth the time, and whether it'll be good overall.

Why don't you start a new thread for Wishlist discussion?

>165 timspalding:
If you want the ability to slice your stats without certain collections, fine.
I'd like this. Basically I'd like to be able to use collections to filter any LT feature that displays information based on my catalog. But the main stats page would be a top priority.

I have no interest in using any lists feature for my wishlist.

Yeah, I hate to be a downer but I agree with Zoe that it's been beat to death. Do you have a real commitment to actually doing anything about it if we spend the time to explain it to you all over again?

a. searching your wish list
How gigantic is the typical user's wishlist? Isn't this one of those edge cases you're always going on about how the feature shouldn't be designed around?

b. seeing what your friends want in an expected place
Yeah, you mean how when I look at people's stuff and only later realize it's a book that they don't have or have read but was just on their wishlist? That's one of the reasons I want it separate.

c. seeing overlap between you and friends' collections
Ditto the above.

d. checkmarks on work pages, author pages, tag, tag mash, subject, MDS, etc. etc.
I find these to be another annoyance because I don't actually HAVE these books. They are low value to me. No idea how representative I am of the typical user on this one but you should at least consider that it is a possibility before being married to the feature.

e. excluding items in your wish list from recommendations
If you cared about recommendations not suggesting stuff, you'd bother to tie it into the contained-in relationships. Users already get ridiculous amounts of suggestions for books they already own because they're contained in other books.

f. books existing in the system before members add them for real-sies,
Again, I think this is one that works out FAR better on paper than in reality. It's infrequent that when I add a book "for real-sies" that I don't have to put all new information in. So back when I tried using the wishlist, I'd just have to delete my wishlist item and Add Books the "real-sies" copy.

I'm not sure this list of amazing features that moving wishlists to Lists is as compelling as you think it is.

I'd add that lists are eating into awards—for example

NPRs Ultimate Backseat Bookshelf: 100 Must-Reads for kids 9-14
http://www.librarything.com/list/1035/all/NPRs-Ultimate-Backseat-Bookshelf-100-M...

Would have previously been listed as an award.

Chances are, I'm going to need a way to move the one into the other. But this is the same phenomenon I was describing with catalogs. Having multiple systems that users will choose to put data in, forces data fragmentation, user confusion and not finding stuff—and requires new features to be built. Sometimes giving group of users "what they want" has secondary effects LT should think about.

155> No, just look at your list.

Are we looking at the same page? On http://www.librarything.com/list/3/all/Best-Fantasy-Novels I see a box title Your List on the right. Below this it says that I can drag and drop to reorder followed by my actual list. Above this is another box with links for Add work to list, and Add to favorites. I don't see any option to remove an item from a list anywhere in there. What am I missing.

(A minor issue is that I don't think that Add work to list and Add to favorites belong together in the same box as one is an action that affects the contents of Your List and the other affects how this list displays in the Home Page module. I think Add work to list should be moved to the same box as Your List appears in and Remove work from list should be added after it).

>168 brightcopy:

Actually, I like pretty much all the things about the current wishlist that you don't like.

>170 jjwilson61:
On the left side above the main list it should say "All members' list: 1 2 3 {etc.}| Your list | Your collections". Click on the "Your list" link.

Actually, I like pretty much all the things about the current wishlist that you don't like.

Right. Some people will switch, some won't switch and wonder why time is wasted on this. New users will divide between the two. There lie dragons.

>171 hailelib: And I find myself nodding Amen to each and everyone of those bullets.

>170 jjwilson61: I think this is what he means. On the same list, underneath its description, you see All Member's List plus numbers | Your List | Your Collections.

Click Your List just to see the books on your list. If you open this, you get all the options to remove, explain, etc, but not cluttered with everyone else's books.

Click Your Collections to see the books on the whole list that are also in your collections, whether you've added them to your list or not.

Edit: as I was posting this, someone else beat me to it.

For me, the main issue is that I want my wishlist to be a list of works I want to read, not a list of editions I want to buy. So every time I add a book to the wishlist I edit it to remove data from all the edition specific fields. And then when I have actually read the book from the library I add the specific edition to my catalog and then have to delete the wishlist work. I know that some people like their wishlist to be of actual editions that they wish to purchase and I guess having it in catalog works fine for them.

I, too, have also become accustomed to LT's way of dealing with wishlists as a collection, and it no longer bothers me.

172,175> I see. I still think it would be more intuitive to repeat the option in the upper right corner right below Add work to list.

I particularly like that I can print out a copy of the Wishlist collection from time to time to carry around with me.

edited to clarify.

#169 by @timspalding> I'd add that lists are eating into awards—for example

NPRs Ultimate Backseat Bookshelf: 100 Must-Reads for kids 9-14

That's a pretty poor example. At least, for your argument. It's a better one for mine. Those "awards" are the ones that have been discussed quite a bit in the CK groups:

http://www.librarything.com/talktopic.php?topic=147741
http://www.librarything.com/topic/156703

They're of the "are these really awards?" type. Every time someone writes up a list of books, is that an award? Consensus on those threads was that no, they aren't (and yes, this always has the limitations of not knowing what system-wide consensus is but whattyagonnado.) But we also didn't want to destroy the information. So... LISTS. Hey, they would be great to hold this data that doesn't really fit in the predefined box that we'd otherwise be stuck in.

But whatever. Seriously, WHATEVER. I think Zoe summed it up best with the comment that that ship has sailed. I'm done arguing it. That ship has sailed and Tim lit fire to the dock on the way out. ;)

Woah, this really blew up. Let me see if I can wade through what’s happened.

First, I’m not grouchy nor do I want lists to do everything and make me breakfast. I am bummed that the list function is less in line with what I want and that’s all. I’m not going to lobby for more changes. That’s what I was saying. If the list function isn’t going to fundamentally change I will try working with it as is or leaving it alone.

That being said, I’ve removed the book I read from my TBR list. It does remain on the list with all participants. If anyone wants to jump in there and vote, just make sure you’re looking at my version of the list, that way you’re not voting for something I’ve already read. It’s the wisdom of the crowd that I’m looking for here and it seems like I can get it if people pay attention.

In terms of personal lists cluttering up the universe, maybe we need to define them so that more universal/definitive lists can be found easier. I’m happy to mark mine as appropriate. My TBR list is mostly part of my catalog and is tagged unread, so it hasn’t affected my cataloging. What has is a huge bunch of ebooks (600+ mb worth) that I got by doing a stranger a favor. Some of them I’ll never read, but a lot of them I will and have. I don’t catalog them until I read them though. Would I put them in a list? Sure. Some are in my TBR list. Not all because then the list would be unmanageable.

Anyway...thanks for your thoughts, ideas and continued feature dev.

I'm unsure how the ship has sailed. I'm being asked to create private lists, so people can use them for wish lists. I am trying to discuss how to do so, and what effects it might have on other functionalities and social realities.

>168 brightcopy:
"b. seeing what your friends want in an expected place
Yeah, you mean how when I look at people's stuff and only later realize it's a book that they don't have or have read but was just on their wishlist? That's one of the reasons I want it separate."

Quoted for emphasis.

I don't use the wishlist, because I find that it's polluting the data in my library. I don't in general wish for specific editions and I don't particularly care to be connected to someone through books I might have nothing but mild interest in, so there are very few features of the catalogue that I would care for to have in a wishlist (reviews might be the only one I'd really miss, and they're easy to get to anyway).

Fine, so let's kill wish list collections and dump it all into lists.

>184 timspalding: Works for me.

>184 timspalding: It also might work-around the problems users encounter with the "add to wishlist" button on work pages. Like SqueakyChu, I'm used to collections —  though I can understand the change.

Yes, but then I'd just create my own Wishlist collection!

wanted to add -- What percent of active users currently use the Wishlist collection?

I've used the wishlist collection, but I've stopped adding to it for various reasons. Sometimes I have a book that comes up in my search and I don't remember it's a wishlist book, not one I own. A list would probably do just as well for me. And that's likely the only thing I'd use lists for. I've been following the discussions from the start, but am thoroughly confused. I guess I just don't see the attraction.

Other problems this would solve:

1. The inconvenience of being able to search your wish list.
2. The inconvenience of being able to sort your wish list by addition date, publicationdate, rating, members, etc.
3. The silliness of ever wanting books in a specific language or edition, when we all know all editions of a work are equivalent.

etc.

*popcorn*

You know it will be a productive discussion when Tim starts mocking members' preferences.

> 184 Fine, so let's kill wish list collections and dump it all into lists. Because having two separate systems is going to require duplication of lots of features.

I've been following along, more for entertainment than anything (since I removed the Lists from my account altogether, and don't intend to use it). I just hope that the statement you just made was said for emphasis, or was tongue in cheek, etc etc

I have precisely ONE book in the Wishlist Collection, and that's because, every now and then, I search all available places it might be for sale (I'd like to pay less than the $350 and up I've seen it offered at). Other than that, after realizing that placing a book on my Wishlist made it appear as though LT had two copies, rather than the single volume that actually exists, I determined to add no others.

Okay, that was it. Back to lurking...

> 184

so let's kill wish list collections and dump it all into lists.

I wouldn't mind that...but I'd sure like my private comments/public comments to go with it. You see, in my wishlist collection, I almost always make notes about who recommended each book and why. I'd hate to lose that information.

Guys, Tim is just trolling now. He's not going to take away the Wishlist collection, don't worry.

I used the Wishlist collection for a while, decided I didn't like it, and stopped using it. Then later I starting putting books I'd written/contributed to into it, so that they would get the purple checkmarks.

I would miss those purple checkmarks if Tim really did kill the Wishlist collection. But ultimately, I would much rather be able to assign checkmarks of whatever color to my custom collections, and get rid of the wishlist collection entirely.

I would only be willing to choose a catalog based wishlist over a list based one, if there were a lot of new features added to the catalogs. Like the ability to add generic editions, the ability to create an arbitrary sort using drag-and-drop, and the ability to save a sort as part of the catalog style settings.

189> 3. The silliness of ever wanting books in a specific language or edition, when we all know all editions of a work are equivalent.

So, Tim, exactly how do I add something to the wishlist collection to indicate that I want to read Ivanhoe in English? Should I add every English edition I can find? Or maybe I can just limit myself to ones that are currently in print.

#169

On Awards / Lists

I think those of use on the Common Knowledge talk group have identified a number of times Awards was used when a list would have been more appropriate. It is a fairly common complaint. So it cuts both ways.

#184 by @timspalding>

Separating out the wishlist collection over to lists would probably let me use it better. As already mentioned, it is unfortunate that the counts in the collection contribute to the total library size, etc.

For those who do use the wishlist collection, it would be useful to have a tool to migrate, of course.

I assume by this that each user get's their own lists that only they can edit for this purpose?
_____

A pony for me would be the ability to export the wishlist list (or any list) in OPML format to work with an app like Carbonfin Outliner for iOS. As I understand it, OPML is a standard for outlining programs. Items can be marked as "completed" which would be "in my catalog" in this case perhaps.

The goal here is to have something I can check on the road while visiting a bookstore to see if a desired book is in a list. For example, if I have some mystery paperbacks I seek, it would be helpful to have a list alpha by author so I can check each author against the inventory before me. I find that my mind glazes over when I see a mass of paperback mystery titles I don't recognize even when sorted by author. Too many sound alike.

James

#190 by @_Zoe_> *popcorn*

You know it will be a productive discussion when Tim starts mocking members' preferences.

Hey, save some for me! I gotta do something while waiting for Tim to finish deriding people for disagreeing, quoting only the people that agree with him as "case in point"s and ultimately deciding to implement things the way he wanted to in the first place. ;)

NPRs Ultimate Backseat Bookshelf: 100 Must-Reads for kids 9-14
http://www.librarything.com/list/1035/all/NPRs-Ultimate-Backseat-Bookshelf-100-M....

Would have previously been listed as an award.

Having started that list, and the other 4 NPR 100 best lists, I never ever would have considered putting that into an award spot before. In my head, awards are things like Newberry, Caldecott, Hugo, etc. Maybe I'm limiting myself, but a list made by NPR or Times or a random list I saw on the internet would not be an award.

More than that, though, I wanted to see the votes that people came up with. I wanted to see what books were in front, and maybe even though I glossed over them before, enough users here thought they were worth reading that I'd give them a second look. I also wanted to split up the series into individual books to see where they're split as far as voting.

I think it's time for a vacation/sabbatical, Tim. Now you're just throwing hissy fits.

Um, not to distract from the vital "kill the wishlist collection / keep the wishlist collection" debate, but ....

I think it would be lovely for a member (me) to be able to write up lists that other people can see, but not edit/vote on. I do not want to do them as wishlists. I want to be able to curate lists that *I* curate and am in charge of. For instance, "Laura's Best Books of 2013". "Laura's recommended copyright 101 reading list". "Laura's essential feminist SF". And so on! Personal to me.

Private is a good option, also. Then I can have "Laura's essential feminist SF (draft)" and "Books recommended by people I hate" and "Books read by people I secretly admire" and so forth.

@Bookmarque, if you can still edit the list description, you could add extra information, perhaps even note which books you've already read.

The wishlist collection works fine for me as a wish list because I want to have a record of the many specific editions that I wish to collect. This is more important to me than an ability to record generic titles that I wish to read although that feature would be useful to me.

Tim.

There is a slight bug in the lists code for display of the score.

I am looking at http://www.librarything.com/list/1/all/Best-Science-Fiction-Novels

I see a book with a score of 68.5
I click Thumbs Down and the score now reads 74.52
I click Remove and the score now reads 76.52
Refresh the page and the score now reads 68.5 again.

If I refresh after the Thumbs Down the score reads 66.5

202: Any books removed don't reappear on a refresh. I think the refresh might only add books that have newly acquired the tag since the last refresh. Never really looked into it, as I am perfectly happy that my monster lists haven't refreshed back to 1000.

207: The tag is only supposed to get things started. Very few people are likely to look through a list of more than a thousand things. You can get all the ULTBs by clicking through the tag ...

209: That's what I got out of the original announcement of the feature. I might have read that in. I often do stuff like that. But that is the way most of us are using it. We add the stuff that we want on the list that doesn't make if from the tag/CK.

My iOS 7 iPad doesn't see the spoilers as hidden either. It's just text, no tags or anything special.

But mine does.

#212 by @Bookmarque> See http://www.librarything.com/topic/164144#4483850

I think it'd down to one of two things.

Actually there's a third thing.
User error.
I thought this thread's OP had a spoiler tag in that message, but I was thinking of another thread, which I noticed while using the iPad and the spoilers as hidden text showed just fine.
Doh!

You know what might be nice, now that we have a VERY large collection of lists? Categories! Bugs have categories, so could we get something similar for lists?

Best of lists
Tag lists
etc.

Some way to better sort through the miasma that has become the listings? Cause once you become active in there, the mess is hard to navigate.

(Outside of that, Don't care about wishlists. @brightcopy and @_Zoe_ ate my popcorn, dang it!)

Or if we can't have categories, maybe just tags? Tags would be helpful.