Ratings As An Experience Tracker

ASUNDER · 2025-03-08T03:18:56+00:00

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Logos doesn't have any way to tell me what's going on with my books so I'm having to use the Ratings metadata as my flags to show me my relationship with a book. It pops up in all the tooltips too so I don't have to go hunting for that info.

5 stars: Reading it and I own it
4 stars: Reading it and its a Logos subscription book
3 stars: Not reading it yet and I own it
2 stars Not reading it yet and its a Logos subscription book
1 star Reference textbook or I otherwise don't plan on reading through it

I'm thinking the point about prioritizing "It's a Logos subscription book" is I have no idea that in the future if I would have the money to resubscribe or something, so those books are more risky to leave on the shelf than the ones I've bought. So it's probably a good idea to read those ones first. And to make sure I don't accidently snatch a book (export) that isn't mine.

I'll probably make a reading list, in order of priority. I want to read them all, but I should probably put them in a chronological order. And having a daily habit. A daily read might be: 1 - prayer of the day, 2 - devotional of the day, 3 - Bible read, 4 - extra (luxury) reading. In that order, doing the least important last, in case my motivation or time runs out.

So since my personal ratings isn't an accurate reflection of my opinion of the book, it's good to numb my ratings from the public ratings pool, so that it doesn't poison the well.

And you guys should think about how your book organization and passage lists are pretty bad in several ways. I'm having to ask around other apps for a decent database program, because I can't even sort my passage lists; there's no columns or anything. I would already be using MS Access for these tasks, but hell will freeze over before I invite Copilot onto my personal computer.

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John

Most people would be using collections. I have a collection called “to read”. Very simple, but you could make it as complicated as you wanted.

ASUNDER

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1361606#Comment_1361606

You have to start the collection by giving it a filter. Then you have to take away from the collection.
This is a bizarre and overly complicated way of building a simple list.
I spent probably half a day removing books from my newly created collections, to divide them into genres. Now that they are in genres that doesn't give the ability to divide into the categories, "read/unread, mine/not mine, ebook/reference"

I've built a huge favorites list, dividing books using folders, but then again there's so many books that I will need to create a short list out of that too. What would be ideal is to have these bits of info follow the book around with it; a type of metadata. Tags are a good option but they don't show up in tooltips either, or book icons don't have any status indication; colour or something.

If it were me I would probably make a little colored line beside a book. Something like that. We could set up our colours. I would make green = reading and is mine, blue = reading and is not mine etc.

Collections don't show up in the tooltips or have any icon or indication of the collection.
And the 'Reading Lists' are some kind of public domain… thing. I have no idea what that's about, but again it's not a basic private reading list feature. I can't even use it, not having any of the books that are listed there.

John

@ASUNDER

You have to start the collection by giving it a filter. Then you have to take away from the collection.
This is a bizarre and overly complicated way of building a simple list.

That is one way you can start a collection. But you can create a collection with a single book.

Donovan R. Palmer

Thanks for sharing. My rating system is a bit different.

Everything receives a two-star rating by default, which indicates my neutrality.

If I engage with a resource and find it poorly written, I downgrade it to one star.

If a resource is good, I upgrade it to four stars.

If I find an outstanding resource, I upgrade it to five stars.

I then have a collection that combines all the five-star resources together. I consider this the cream of the crop that I don't want to lose sight of it in my library. This is kind of like my favourite books bookshelf.

Your system has merits, too. Good logic.

ASUNDER

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1361612#Comment_1361612

You mean dropping on the '+ Plus These Books' section? I tried that, won't work.

ASUNDER

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1361637#Comment_1361637

When I get a decent database system figured out I'll probably post a video about it.

xnman

I'm a bit more simple. I have two collections…. "This" and "That" All the books I use and trust is in "This" all others is in "That". I take time and read from "This" and "That" and every once in a while, I'll change a book from "That" to "This" or vice-vesa. I don't try to categorize my books other than "This" or "That". But like someone once said, "simple things for simple people" LOL 😎

Yasmin Stephen

I don't track anything in Logos; it would be useless for the types of data I want to track about my books and my reading. I use Calibre to manage all my books (print books, regular ebooks, Logos books, audiobooks) and I do all my tracking in there—books I've bought, read, plan to read, did not finish reading, etc, etc. I rate the books I've read and write up 'reviews' for them, all in Calibre. And I tag, tag, tag to my heart's content.

The only books not in Calibre are cookbooks, craft books, and some professional reference books. Everything else is in there, and multiple times this has prevented me from buying the same book twice.

DMB

Yep … the single rating system just invites confusion. Also Asunder's is over-lapping characteristics … reading vs owned/subscribed.

Tagging also for me.

The feature I wish they had, was a note field in the book's library-world. I can understand how that might become confusing. But after I finish a book, I like to rate it with a blurb as to why so good (or not). So, I use the series field (leaving any indexed 'real' series intact).

ASUNDER

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1361656#Comment_1361656

Ya, Calibre is on my short list of possibilities. I'm reminded of certain apps where people maintain libraries of their music or movie collections. Apps that are dedicated to this purpose. Calibre might be good for this. Although Logos itself has close to that level of book library management (so far as I can tell). My query on other forums, they got back to me with the answer of 'Obsidian'. I'll look into that too.

The thing is I'm wanting to build multiple databases, and using the same app for all databases will be ideal. I can cross reference information, each entry having ID numbers etc. to build any type of mixed lists / queries / reports out of it. It may prove very efficient when I need to quickly compare or grab a bit of info.

Planned databases:

Home Inventory (with licenses, value, proof of ownership etc)
My Books + reading list, ratings, reading history etc.
My personal doctrines (passage lists, sermons etc.)
Business contacts, mailing list, contacts, history of relationships
My Music
My Audio Sample Library
My Important Docs, License Info, Credentials etc. (not passwords)

There is also Project management, internet bookmarks, habit tracker.
Lots of these things I've already set up with other apps, but a master controller + library (database) would be perfect.

For the "important docs" I think it was Quicken or EaseUS that offers a document security vault feature. It will keep your special docs encrypted and safe, but you can still share or access the docs with your phone or computer. Not having to get out the paper copy and manually type in details. The problem is it's a subscription fee. I'm not paying $10 a month for one single feature. I would be using Winzip Studio too, but it's a subscription fee. Um no. The only reason I'm willing to pay monthly for Logos is it carries the most important book library; more important than anything else in this life.

Same with the Home Inventory. I already found the best app for that, but it's a subscription fee. Not a chance.
Maybe if I were rich or famous, and these costs were a tiny ratio of my finances. But the USA, who have just uprooted their government over economic issues, pay on average $300 a month in subscription fees. Bunch of geniuses over there.

Thanks for the tips guys.