Disclib - a library of your CD/DVD contents

[tomos]

Basic Info

App Name	Disclib
App URL	http://lyrasoftware.com/disclib/ http://lyrasoftware.com/
App Version Reviewed	Version 2 Build 50
Test System Specs	Basic! XP, 512MB RAM
Supported OSes	Platform - MS Windows (2K,XP tested)
Support Methods	forum: http://groups.google.com/group/disclib/  email: Q&A: Stamen Delikostov:   [email protected] or                                  [email protected] or                                  [email protected]
Ware	Freeware
Author Donation Link	Couldnt see any at their webpage

Disclib - a library of your CD/DVD contents


Intro:

Platform - MS Windows (2K,XP tested)
Add filenames from any folder tree (CD, DVD, HDD, floppy, any windows folder tree) to the catalog
Categorizing
Search, specify categories in search
Customizable exporting (reporting)
Parallel tree - better categorizing
Tags
Multilanguage (Customizable) [current available: English, Italian, Bulgarian, Russian, French, Galego, Polish, Spanish, Portuguese(Brasil), Portuguese(europeu),Danish, Swedish, Catalan, German, Czech, Hungarian, Korean, Romanian and Chinese Languages]
Free

Disclib is a CD collection organizer program. It may be used as a catalogue of CDs. After creating the catalogue, disclib stores file and folder names and tree, allows user to categorize folders and files, and allows searching all the files from the collection CDs without need to place them in CD reader. Disclib may place in the catalogue any windows folder not only folders on CDs. Disclib has a customizable Multilanguage functionality. The program also extracts mp3 info.

Basically, it scans your CDs & DVDs and saves a "Table of contents" in a database or databases.

Each database can be organised into different "collections".   
For example I have a database for general backup, which is divided into different collections by project/job.
I use a second database for photos.

The database is simply an alphabetical list of contents.
You can simultaneously view database ("Volume") list and "Collection" tree.


Then there's "Categories" whose main advantage seems to be that you can search just one.
"You can automate your searching in database by creating special list of categories"

There is what seems to be a reasonably good search facility - so far I've only done general searchs of the whole database, but you can search by category, date - I cant figure out if or how you can search by collection.
(I can't say I find the search intuitive, but to be honest I rarely use search facilities & am usually a bit daunted by them)


Who is this app designed for:

Anyone who wants to keep track of their discs, be they backup, music, photos ...


The Good

Easy to use - you simply dive in without too much reading/studying of help etc.
It's able to read contents of zip files


The needs improvement section

I am quite happy with it so far, but I haven't been using it that long & I have been using it in a fairly limited way - I dont use my computer for music so I have no idea how it works with mp3s etc.
".. does support mp3 tag information and more ...  The program also extracts mp3 info."

I'm struggling a bit with search - don't know if its me or the programme!
Definitely the help fails here (for searching)

What would be nice would be if it could make thumbnails of images (see How does it compare to similar apps below)


Why I think you should use this product

why not
... your inner senses will tell you if this would be of use to you ...


How does it compare to similar apps

This month CD Bank Cataloguer is among the great Donation Coder discounted software list
(September discounts for members).
CD Bank Catalogue does seem like a better application
and @50% off for DC members...

Storing files and folders list (name, size, date)
Calculation of all folders size
Multipage search results browsing
File previews and thumbnails creation:
For text files, for descriptions files like "file_id.diz", "descript.ion", "files.bbs"
For HTML and RTF files (extracting text)
For MP3 (reading author, album, genre, MPEG and other tags). Read more...
For pictures (creating the small preview for .bmp, .jpg, .jpeg, .gif, .pcx, .png, .tif, .tiff, .tga, .ppm, .pgm, .pbm, .psd image formats)
For ZIP and RAR files (reading archive contents)
For executable files (reading version information)

Program: CD Bank Cataloguer
Website and Info: http://www.qunom.com/
Discount Amount: 50%
Expires: 30th Sept 2006


Conclusions

I like it, its a great poor man's backup accessory (see also next post)


Links to other reviews of this application

Couldn't find any!
I heard about this programme in a newsletter from Gizmo:
http://www.techsupportalert.com

[tomos]

 Disclib makes a great backup accessory for anyone.

But, for those of us who can't afford new external drives,
& whose harddrives are rapidly filling up,
you can consider deleting stuff from your hdrive after backing it up a couple of times (I usually keep one disc copy at home & one at the in-law's)

Theres always the danger of discs degrading,
but if you use good quality discs, hopefully you can afford a new drive or even a new system before that!
At that stage you can either copy the discs onto the new drive, or use Daemon tools to copy the disc and mount it as a drive.

On a related note, but in a slightly different direction - my drive is filling up with photos.
What I've done is to firstly back them up twice,
then,
using the tiny & wonderful Resize (recommended by Zaine I think; it's free & doesn't need installation) I convert the images (jpegs) from previous years to a smaller size, say 640 pixels maximum dimension and save @ 50% quality. (Resize can preserve the exif data as well.)

My average photo-folder size goes from a few hundred to a few megabytes.

I generally save my photos in dated folders sometimes with additional info appended
Now I put those folders in a folder named by the year & disc number,  e.g.  2004-001 so I know everything in that folder is on disc of same name.
Picassa then generates thumbnails & I can also get to see a reasonable sized copy of image
and it's easy to track the original down if I need it.
(I dont actually use Disclib for my fotos anymore cause there's no great need with this system)

[mouser]

looks great so far! 
What's coming in part 2?

[tomos]

there you go - (Post number 2)

a poorman's backup guide

[zridling]

Nice review tomos, especially on the recommendation: "your inner senses will tell you if this would be of use to you." Ha!

[Lashiec]

Disclib is nothing spectacular. In fact, it has a lot of caveats and it seems like an unfinished project. Its interface needs a redesign and I don't feel right using it, it always missed something. I agree with your conclusions, they pretty much describe the program. I prefer Disk Explorer Professional, a far better program, free for personal use, which could be a tough competitor for CD Bank Cataloguer, which I still have to try. It also seems its developer is in good terms with Servant Salamander one, because most of the plugins used by the application come for that great file manager.

[tomos]

Hadn't heard of that one - plugin viewer for Total Commander as well.
Free for non commercial use but looks like it would be worth the $29

Damn, reviewed the wrong programme!
 
I'll add it to the similar apps section soon
tom

[mouser]

Disk Explorer Pro looks really nice, and free for personal use(!):

http://www.tjelinek....m/main.php?section=d

Disclib - a library of your CD/DVD contents

Definitely worth a try!

[mouser]

We could really use a review of these tools.

Don't forget
CD Bank Cataloguer - http://www.qunom.com (50% discount through donationcoder in september)
WhereIsiT: http://www.whereisit-soft.com/ (perhaps the best known and most respected?)
SuperCat: http://no-nonsense-software.com/

[Nod5]

Two more disc cataloging apps:
Broken Cross Disk Manager  -- http://bcdm.broken-cross.com/
Argentum MyFiles -- http://www.argentuma.com/myfiles.html