1/ One part of the #Fediverse which I think is still criminally underutilized is #BookWyrm . I, too, created an account months ago, only to ignore it for a long time. But now I'm finally making strides in indexing my library, and I want to share what I have learned about making this process as smoothly as possible.
First, of course, you will need your own BookWyrm account - the following website can help you with choosing an appropriate instance (as with Mastodon and other Fediverse platforms, there are multiple instances to choose from).
@juergen_hubert Thank you for that. I'd created an account on bookwyrm.social months ago, and just now I recorded the last four books I read and the one I'm about to start.
Is there some way to link my bookwyrm activity with my Mastodon timeline? Is that even a good idea?
@Uair Well, if you merely use it to index your books for yourself, it might be a bit boring.
On the other hand, I think it could be an awesome took to discuss your favorite books with others on the Fediverse, and not just on BookWyrm itself - simply by using the Comment and Quote functions and sharing them.
I'd love to be able to connect with other book people but haven't yet found that functionality. I use everything through a browser window--should i maybe get an app to interface?
Basically, you will need to search for your BookWyrm profile name in your Mastodon search bar. This will display your posts and changes of your BookWyrm in Mastodon, and thus makes them shareable.
I don't think#BookWyrm has a useful app interface yet, although I could be mistaken.
2/ As for importing your books automatically, you can try to use CSV files you've generated with other applications (I used L. However, be aware that this process is highly error-prone - I encountered lots of misidentified books, and many others weren't identified at all. You can save some time with it, but it's probably wise to double-check every single import.
As far as I know, OpenLibrary is the biggest "open" catalogue of books which BookWyrm can import. So if your book shows up in a search there, you can import it without much hassle.
(You should also create an OpenLibrary account while you are at it, for reasons I shall go into shortly.)
4/ The next step is to click on the OpenLibrary entry for that book, and copy its "OpenLibtary ID Number".
Copy this number into the search bar of your BookWyrm account, and search for it.
Soon, the search will return the book data from all linked catalogues - including OpenLibrary, but also all other BookWyrm instances that already have imported it.
Click on the "Import" button of whatever instance you want to use, and the data will be copied to your own instance!
5/ However, this only means that the book data is on your own local BookWyrm instance - it has not yet been added to your personal library!
To change that, you need to pick one of the categories listed beneath the cover illustration, such as "Want to Read", "Start Read", "Read", or whatever additional categories you've defined (such as "Books I wrote", in my case).
By default, a notification of this is posted into your BookWyrm feed. Feel free to add a comment regarding this book - don't be shy!
6/ But what if OpenLibrary doesn't yet have an entry for the book you are searching for? Well, then I'm afraid you will have to add one on your own. But I'll show you how to make this process as painlessly as possible.
(You could also simply add the book to your own BookWyrm instance, but I feel it's best practice to add it to the largest available catalogue - i.e. OpenLibrary. Others might disagree! But the end result is the same.)
7/ When you open up the form to add a new book to Open Library, you see a bunch of information you need to fill out:
Title
Author(s)
Publisher
Year of Publication
ISBN
While you can add a lot of further information on later pages, I consider that optional. But these are the basics that you'd really ought to add, if at all possible (though some books might not have ISBNs, either because they are from a time before this system was introduced, or because they were self-published).
But you don't necessarily have to type them all in from your copy of the book. Instead, go to
8/ Adding any further information is optional (and can always be added later). However, I strongly recommend adding a cover image to the Open Library entry - you do want the entry to look nice in BookWyrm, after all!
You can either use an URL to an existing image (and most books that are still sold today have a cover image online somewhere), or simply take your own with your smart phone. It doesn't have to be perfect - pretty much any image is better than nothing!
10/ And once you've added a few dozens of books to your own collection, it's time to interact with them! This doesn't have to mean a full-fledged review - a few short comments and quotes are good conversation starters as well! They will show up beneath your BookWyrm entries for others to see - and comment and share.
After all, we are here to talk about the books we read and love - so let's do so!
Also, consider sharing your comments on your main Fediverse account (whether Mastodon or something else) to increase awareness and spread their reach. Just enter your BookWyrm account name into your search bar, and you will find its feed like with any other Fediverse account.
As I've said in the first post, BookWyrm is still a fairly unknown part of the Fediverse, and sharing posts in this manner will help change that!
FIN/ These are all my insights for now. Feel free to share them - and if you want to post them on a tutorial website or something, you have my permission to do so as long as you give credit to me.
Oh, and follow my #BookWyrm account while you are at it!
@juergen_hubert Didn't think about this! So it doesn't work the other way around - if I add books to a BookWyrm instance, they will not be available at OpenLibrary? But will they be available in other BookWyrm instances? @kallekn
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