vetz wrote on 2021-05-21, 16:04:

I have been using Excel up untill now, but its so inconvenient when you want to add photos.

So true. I ended up keeping Excel, but inserting the filename instead of the photo itself

What about Libre Office, or is that too cumbersome ?

I think perhaps good old AcdSee might work for this. It allows for tagging, labels and alot of metadata on the photos.

vetz wrote on 2021-05-21, 19:38:

I think perhaps good old AcdSee might work for this. It allows for tagging, labels and alot of metadata on the photos.

Oh. I had totally forgot about AcdSee! I haven't used it in many years but I remember loving it now that you remind me!

AcdSee is much better than what I remember, especially for managing a photo collection. Unfortunately it comes a bit short for my hardware and software collection. The main issue is that you can't set categories/metadata on folders, only on the files themselves. So if you have a graphic card and you have 10 photos of it, it shows up 10 times in the exportable list.

I'm now trying out Multi Collector from Lignup. One time fee of 40 USD for the pro version (basic is free). Seems very customizable and can handle any type of collection. Downsides is that it is desktop only, so won't be able to access it on my phone.

https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/

General and adaptable CherryTree!

After using MS Office 2003 Excel and OppenOffice.org Calc for many years I switched to HTML, maybe this also something for you!?

One, two years ago I started to convert the data and created a list (OK, some tables) with HTML 4.01 Strict with the goal to integrate it into my website. So it can be viewed from any HTML supporting device (OK, not so good from a mobile/phone - no responsive design).

advantage:
you can style it like YOU want to have it, almost no restrictions

disadvantage:
you have to code everything by your own

kind regards
soggi

vetz, since you mentioned AcdSee , could XnViewMP be used ? Please tell me, if I am out of my league. I mentioned Libre Office, and when it was Open Office, before it was bought out and it was split into Libre Office and all that jazz, there you could make your own website through it, hence the reason why I mentioned Libre Office.

I use Word documents to organize my stuff. Easy to paste pictures. Easy to search for items by serial numbers, MAC addresses, and the like. Use different headings (e.g. expansion cards -> video cards -> PCI video cards) and then Outline view to see simple lists of items.

OT: this reminds me, why is Windows Search so terribly bad in Windows 10? I am still using Windows 8.1, and this is one of the main reasons why. Windows Search works perfectly in 8.1, better even than 7, but is completely broken in W10. Why did Microsoft do this? How do people work around it? (I know about 'Everything' but that doesn't search file contents, which is essential.)

ETA: OK here's an example:

• In Windows 8.1, I press WINKEY+F to search documents and type "SLGJL" and immediately get two file hits, the document above, and a PDF of the eBay auction where I acquired the CPU.
• Now I'm booted into Windows 10. Exact same contents of the Documents directory. The WINKEY+F keystoke has been removed so I type WINKEY+S to search everywhere, type "SLGJL", and get a bunch of web hits. No files. I then click on Documents to search documents, and still get no document hits. Next I open Windows Explorer at the Documents directory, type "SLGJL" into the search box, and I get only one hit - the PDF file. The DOCX file does not appear. Indexing is fully complete. Both PDF and DOCX files are being indexed by filename and contents.

WHY MICROSOFT WHY

I wrote my own system about 10 years ago as my collection had gotten to the point where it was impossible to keep track of what I already had. I had gotten in to several situations where I had managed to buy duplicates of what I already had without realising it! Spreadsheets and text files just wouldn't cut it anymore.

https://www.target-earth.net/vgdb/

It's written in Python, using the Django web framework, backed on to MariaDB. Most of the UI is done using Bootstrap/HTML5 so it's responsive for desktop and mobile use.

At some point I need to make the effort to extract all of my bespoke stuff that means it only works for me, tidy things up and put the framework up for download on Github, but that's one of those "one of these days..." projects 🙁