i was just looking at my empty mytags column in my library and wondering what a good strategy would be for their use....
What is YOUR strategy for using mytags?
Robert Pavich
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Mostly categories how i use them
I use these sometimes in my Collections or when i am searching
Also since my son may not have the same books in his library, i categorized some sets (e.g. L4, L3, eBible, etc). So i know when sending him links if he has them or not.
Also have one for Purchased books, so i can see what i have already purchased
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until better management of tags is provided I'm holding off creating them. There needs to be a tag manager tool of some kind.
I use them for multiple things:
1) I use some tags for creating collections that would be hard to describe by tweaking the rule just right. For example: Arts, Classics, Ecology, Fiction, Geog, JewishBkgnd, etc.
2) I use AppComm, CritComm, HomComm, and LangComm for the four classes of commentaries that Morris Proctor suggests.
3) I use various tags to let me know how and when I acquired each resource:
There is some overlap between all of the above, though I don't bother putting the acquisition date on base packages. I did all this work in order to trace every resource I owned and make sure I had everything I thought I was supposed to have. I found some missing ones this way. I've kept the habit up since then. It's nice to be able to sort my recently aquired books in chronological order and see which ones I'd like to spend some more time in familiarizing myself with them. And I can use the "Bundle" tags to limit searches too; that comes in handy sometimes.
4) I sometimes use tags temporarily to fill in for missing series metadata, until Logos fixes it.
5) I use tags when I want to create an abbreviated series name, since there isn't a field for that (for example, ECF for my Early Church Fathers set). It's just easier to assign a new tag than to edit all the abbreviated title fields one by one adding ECF in parentheses after them, which would have also accomplished the same purpose.
6) I use tags to create series out of books that were sold as different collections but all form part of a larger in-print series (JSOTSup and JSNTSup being the only such that I know of at the moment).
7) I use TOREAD, READING, and FINISHED to mark books that I'm planning to read in the near future, ones I'm in the middle of, and ones I've read already, whether in Logos or in print in the past.
I now am in the habit of tagging every book with whatever tags I think it should have as soon as I download them, and then immediately assigning a 2 star rating (which means I've tagged this already but don't know how much I value the book yet). Later I assign a different star rating once I've determined wither it's not very useful but still not bad enough to want to hide (1), pretty good (3), very good (4) or outstanding/essential (5). Most of the books in my library remain at 2 stars, a decent default, as I haven't gotten around to spending enough time in most of them to make an assessment.
I use mytags: extensively in creating collections, sometimes combining this with other filters. For example, my Systematic Theologies collection rule is:
((type:monograph AND (title:"systematic theology" OR title:"dogmatics" OR subject:"theology, doctrinal") ANDNOT (title:magazine OR subject:"Sermons--Outlines" OR subject:theologians))) OR mytag:("Christian Foundations",Systematic)
This allows me to pick up any books that were missed by my tweaked rule by just adding the tag Systematic, and all the books in the Christian Foundations bundle (Donald Bloesch's set) are systematic theology books, whether they come up that way in a filtered library search or not. Presumably Logos will someday add series metadata series to these.
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Philip Spitzer:There needs to be a tag manager tool of some kind.
Yes, there needs to be an easy way to rename a tag without removing all the other tags assigned to the books that have that tag. Currently that's the only way, or else go through them all one by one and edit that tag field. Blecchhh!
I do not know if this is the best use of tags, but here are two examples of how I use them.
1. I use to unify the books of homiletical, preaching and sermons in one category. In this case my tag in portuguese is "pregação" (preaching). Now, if I want to make a collection with these books just need to use "mytag:pregação"
2. I use to unify books about the life of someone. You can see that there is no way to put them together by subject. In this case I create a tag in portuguese named "biografia" (biography), as you can see in the last column.
In both cases the tags help me to simplify the elaboration of collections.
Romulo Corrêa
Brasília - Brazil
Using tags was a big mystery to me, Rosie, a terra incognito. Your post helped me to understand the benefits of taking time to tag resources. Thanks!
Robert Pavich: i was just looking at my empty mytags column in my library and wondering what a good strategy would be for their use.... What is YOUR strategy for using mytags?
RP:
FWIW, I use Tags in lieu of Collections. Not that the auto Collections is bad but you are always relying on the opinion of someone else as to how it should be categorized and, if you follow the forums, you have already seen several discussions about mis-categorizations. I have approximately 3100 resources and despite what many people think, it really isn't so difficult or laborious to tag them all. L4 does have single and multiple tag capabilities, Title edits, and Short Title edits. A couple of hours and you have them categorized the way YOU want them and according to the way YOU think they should categorized. Then, after new resources arrive, a minute or two and they are tagged and ready to go (instead of looking for where L4 put them).
And, I like the ability to have multiple tags on any single resource. Princetoniana, for example, is tagged as AAHodge, Biogr, and M&MR (Monographs and MiscReading)
My basic system is simple: First letter indicates TYPE and next four letters further define the type. C=Commentary B=Bible L=Lexicon J=Journal G=Grammar For example, "C1Cor" is Commentary, 1st Corinthians. Other categories are self-explanatory ... "Warfield" = BB's works, for example.
How blessed is the one whom Thou dost choose, and bring near to Thee. (Psa 65:4a)
JRS:
What's UGH? Books you really don't like?
Rosie Perera: What's UGH? Books you really don't like?
Actually, yes. I used to hide them but then I thought, "Well, you never know when there might be some small pearl of wisdom or insight". So, they are no longer hidden but they are relegated to the "UGH" pile.
And before anyone asks for the titles in my UGH folder, I won't disclose, lest I be accused of starting a flame war.
JRS: Rosie Perera: What's UGH? Books you really don't like? Actually, yes. I used to hide them but then I thought, "Well, you never know when there might be some small pearl of wisdom or insight". So, they are no longer hidden but they are relegated to the "UGH" pile.
Ha! I actually have resurrected a few of those "UGH" books from my hidden resources in order to use them as section headers in my Prioritization panel so that I can group it into Bibles, Commentaries, etc. I renamed the books and used the tag field in them to record what their original name was (prefixed by renamed). So yeah, that's another use I make of the tags field. See my description of this clever hack here.
Robert Pavich:What is YOUR strategy for using mytags?
Strategy? What strategy? :-)
My main uses for tags:
a) To work around metadata limitations (e.g. the real year the book was published, or where a Series entry is omittted.)
b) If I search for a book by a term and don't find it, I will generally add that term as a tag so I can find it next time.
c) In some cases, I added tags purely for scanning the library (e.g. adding the book name as a tag in Wiersbe's "Be..." commentary series, or tagging a theology book as "Reformed" to identify its perspective.)