Forum

My 30 day trial ended a couple of days ago, and I've noticed that no new books have been indexed during that time.  I just signed up for a lifetime membership, but I must admit that I'm a little disappointed that it's been over a month and no more books have been added, even the ones that say "index soon".  So, I'm wondering when we might expect to see some new ones added?

Thank you!

As noted on the Blog, we have had to take a break from indexing while we build a completely new interface on the website that allows our indexers to enter data directly into the database.  Previously we had to email databases back and forth, with all the issues of data updates that ensued.  So while we were changing the data entry system we could not import any new databases. 

The new indexing interface is almost finished, I hope today or tomorrow and our indexers are all champing at the bit to get restarted.  There are currently 52 books assigned to indexers and we plan to take on more indexers as soon as we are happy with the way the new interface works.  So you will see all the Index Soon books appearing in the indexed books list very soon and a lot more books being indexed in coming months.  Remember, if you have any books that you particularly want indexed then click Request Index to move them further up the indexing chart.

When we are really happy with the indexing interface we will then be opening it up to members to index their own books if they choose.

Thanks, Jane! 

Looking forward to it! is it possible to see a list of the Index Soon titles? Did I just miss it somewhere? Also looking forward to being able to contribute to the indexing.

I suppose that when I get all of our books entered, I will be more anxious to see new indexing, but at this point in time I am most interested in your ability to index magazines, followed simply with my getting more books into the system. A third ranking interest is to get non ISBN books into the system.

schambers - there isn't a list of Index Soon books available on the website now but it is something we will be adding when members can select books for indexing.

warner - indexing of magazines and non-ISBN books as well as adding all the books members have tried to import that are not yet in the Library, are all on our to-do list.

Yes, the plan is that any books or magazines that are indexed will be available for all members.  The only indexing that will be private will be your own individual recipes - family recipes, clippings, etc.

Yea! I see that the count of indexed books has been going up in the last week or so. I'm glad to see the visible signs of progress in that area again. Check it out--some of your books might be among them.

Jane,

Is there any way you could create a basic template and let us index our books, upload covers, etc? We could help you while the site is still in beta.

Just a thought!

Lucy Zoe

Welcome Lucy as a new EYB member.  We do plan to allow members to index their own cookbooks and to upload covers.  That is in development now.  We have created an indexing interface on the website for our paid indexers which is workng well but we will have to add lots of enhancements before we open it up to members.  So I can't give you a date for it happening but it is a priority for us.

Here's another thought: would it be possible to open up private indexing of individual recipes to a "friends and family list"?

Interesting idea - we'll have to work out how it could be done.

The indexers have been very productive in the last month. Every time I come back to the site, there seems to be at least one more title added to the Indexed Books and sometimes it is four or five. Most of them aren't my books, but it is still exciting to see the progress.

As a new member, I'm definitely looking forward to having the ability to index the books in my own collection (and thereby hopefully help other members who may have older/more rare titles as I do.) In uploading a good portion of my library yesterday, only 12 of my 82 books that were in the system are indexed (and I had at least 20-30 books not show up at all), which does limit the site's usability for me at the current time. There does seem to be a heavy emphasis on "celebrity"/FoodNetwork-type chefs in the books indexed so far (seriously? All those Rachael Ray books before other chefs? I'm disappointed) - which makes sense from a popularity standpoint, but I'm certainly hoping to see more classics and just actually useful books added in the future.

All that said I absolutely LOVE the idea of this site and it is entirely what I need! I'm always collecting  cookbooks, and just combined libraries with my fiance, plus inherited a pile of my grandmother's old cookbooks. And I hate that it's so overwhelming that I can rarely find the recipe I want to use based on the ingredients I have at home at a given time.

Welcome Nicole

We have various criteria when we are indexing books:

• How many members own the book - Rachael Ray and the FN stars are very popular and a lot of EYB members own and use their cookbooks


• How many index requests we receive


• If the book is new and important - even though it may not be owned by many members yet we anticipate it will be


• If we are building our indexed books list from a country in anticipation of launching there e.g. Australia and the UK

We are definitely indexing lots of classic cookbooks as well as more popular titles. If you look through just the latest 50 indexed books (the first two pages that come up in the Library) you will see books by Stephanie Alexander, Elizabeth David, Clifford A. Wright, Anne Willan, Diana Kennedy, Rick Stein, Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz, Julia Child, Rose Gray & Ruth Rogers, Nick Malgieri, Chris Schlesinger & John Willoughby and Neil Perry, all great cookbook writers.

We index the books our members own but that covers a wide spectrum so I think you will find that more of your books are indexed all the time.  And when we open up our indexing to members I think you will really find it makes a difference to the number of books indexed.

I think what would be great with books that aren't indexed is maybe a way of showing like where books are in your queue and also maybe a way of letting users indicate how much they want a book to be indexed. For example when I joined I just clicked request index for all of the books I own that weren't indexed already, but maybe if you had something like points that you could allocate to different books according to how much you want them indexed or a way of ranking them, something like that? Then you'd get a better impression of what people want the most.

Another thing that would be terrific would be if you could get sent a notification when a book that you own is indexed, as simple as an automatic email maybe?

The site's excellent by the way, very useful!

Thanks for your feedback jameswm.  We plan when we open up the indexing to members to have a chart so you will be able to tell how close a book you plan to index is to being indexed by EYB.  Maybe a points system is something we could add in the future.

As part of our improvement of the social networking on the site, we do plan that you will be informed on your My EYB page when books you own are indexed.  For now you can follow us on Twitter or become a Facebook friend (Links on the Community page) as we announce every newly indexed book there.

anastasia.woolmer - there seems to be a problem with your post not showing.  We're fixing that now.

I am wondering if there is a way to see which books are in my "to import" list and which ones have been added? When I created my EYB database last year, I had 150+ books that didn't show up in the main database so when you added the ability to import a list of ISBNs I did that. I'd love to be able to know which ones have been or are being added as it happens so I can update the bookmarks (I use the bookmarks also to identify where my books are as I have a lot and they're on several different bookshelves. I need to be able to find them!)

Also, I'd love to have a "wish list" icon/button along with the "+bookshelf" & "buy book" buttons. Often I am scrolling through the main database & see an interesting cookbook that I may want to add later or keep track of but I'm not able to buy right then. 

And it would be great to have an email alert when a post here gets a reply or a topic gets updated! More immediacy would probably make the forums more used... thx! Otherwise love having this database! Have definitely used it to search for recipes all the time now!