This is the download mirror for Library Icon Changer:

Unzip the folder and launch the tool from the .exe file. You are immediately greeted with a window containing various icons and a list of libraries.

To change the Libraries icons, highlight one of the icons in the right pane and then choose one of the icons in the left pane. When you have found the icon that you would like to replace the Library icon with, select it and then click the button at the bottom of the left pane: “Select Icon from dll”. Notice that, after selection, the icons are changed in the right panel and they are changed in the main Library window as well.

There it is. It looks a little better now. You can use any of the icons and change them as desired. You may also restore the default icons by clicking “Restore default Icon” in the main interface for Library Icon Changer. This is the easy way to change Library icons. Now we can take a look at how to change them manually without using third party software.

Changing Library Icons Manually

All it takes it Notepad to change these icons manually. Copy and paste the following line into the Start menu search box. You may also paste it in the Explorer location bar. Either way will work.

%appdata%\microsoft\windows\libraries

Now drag any of the icons from Windows Explorer over to the Notepad window and this will open the file.

The iconReference line will be visible in the file. In the event that it is not there, you will need to add one. For example, it would look something like this:

<iconReference>C:\Windows\System32\shell32.dll,301</iconReference>

Check for the data in the middle of the path. Look for either the .ico file or to reference a DLL files, it is necessary to add the comma and include the number position of the selected icon in the file itself.

Now you know two ways to change library icons. The software method using Library Icon Changer is probably best for the average user. The manual method is better suited to the advanced user or someone learning how to change program files manually to make adjustments to appearances and applications. Both ways get the job done.

One of the things that irritated me for quite some time was the default save folder for pictures. Word always defaulted to saving the picture in the My Pictures folder under the currently logged in user’s user directory. I need to add that I’m using Word 2010 under Windows 7, and that it may be different on other systems.

This meant a lot of switching as I was using a different default folder for pictures and image editing.

I first tried to find a way to change the default save picture folder in Word 2010, but failed to find a suitable setting. The only setting available was to change the default document folder, but that had no influence on the picture saving in Word.

You find that setting under File > Options > Save.

I knew that it was possible in previous versions of Word to change additional default directories, including the directory where the pictures were saved in.

The reason for those missing options is the new library feature of Windows 7. Microsoft has moved the default save folder settings to each individual library. Here is how you make use of that new feature to change your default file save as locations under Windows 7.

Open Windows Explorer and click on the Libraries folder in the sidebar. It should look like this.

You will only see libraries for Documents, Music, Pictures and Videos by default, but can add your own folders as a library.

Right-click a library and select Properties from the options. In my case, I had to right-click the pictures library. You will see a listing of all folders making up that library. One of the folders has a check mark next to it. This indicates the default save location for files of that type.

To change that location do the following. If the new default folder is already listed select it, and click the Set save location button. If it is not listed yet click the Include a folder button and add the new folder to the library. Select that folder afterwards and click set save location to make it the default file saving location. The check mark should now be visible next to that folder.

If you go back to Word you will notice that the new save location will be suggested whenever you save pictures in the program.

You can use the same technique to change the default save locations for documents, videos and music.

You can alternatively use the Windows 7 Libraries Management Tool or the Win7 Library Tool to make those changes.

I’m not sure how this is handled under Vista or Windows XP. If you use Word 2010, or another Office program and run Vista or XP let me know.

Users have options to create new libraries, and add storage locations to existing libraries. That’s however not as comfortable as it may sound, as it requires to right-click on the library in Windows Explorer and to selected Properties from the menu. If this has to be done for multiple libraries, or regularly, then it becomes a nuisance.

Librarian is a specialized tool to manage Windows 7 Libraries more effectively. The program displays all existing libraries in the user interface.

windows 7 libraries

The main controls in the program can be used to create a new library, rename or delete an existing one, or change the properties of the selected library.

A double-click on a library in the listing opens the settings of that library. Here it is possible to change a library’s icon, revert to the default icon, switch the library type, add additional storage locations and select if it should be displayed in the navigation pane in Windows Explorer. Finally, the default save location for the library can be set here as well.

edit windows library settings

The default save location is indicated with a checkmark on the icon. All options provided in the software are also available in the operating system. The major difference is their accessibility. Users who regularly work with libraries, or need to configure them extensively may prefer to use Librarian, as the software makes it a tad easier to do so.

Librarian is available for download at the developer website. It is only compatible with Windows 7 and available with an English and Russian interface. (via Beatmasters)

It may seem like a timely process, but software can quickly hasten the process and if you’re willing to pay $10-$20, you can buy hardware which will further minimise the needed time.

You must initially decide how you will input your possessions into whatever software you choose to own. Naturally, you can input the product’s details but this can be timely. Other options are to buy an inexpensive barcode scanner or some software even allows you to utilise your webcam as a barcode scanner.

With regards to software, there are options for every platform.

The de facto official cataloguing software for OS X has to be Delicious Library. Delicious Library allows you to search Amazon for items, through keywords, barcodes, titles, authors, directors etc., and then import the data, including the current price used versions sell there, straight into the software. Items can then be displayed in a number of ways, including an aesthetically appealing ‘shelf’ mode which shows the picture of each item on a shelf and is at the item’s size. One can also rate items inside the software. Supported input modes are typing, scanning barcodes with the iSight camera (to varied degrees of success) or using their Bluetooth barcode scanner (which costs over $100!). It also allows libraries to be shared over a local network. It costs $40.

MediaMan is similar software for Windows. It too grabs data off Amazon, displays it in a ‘shelf’-like view. It supports USB barcode scanners and webcams too. It works on XP and Vista, and also costs $40! Basically, it’s like Delicious Library for Windows!

GCStar is free and open-source cataloguing software, for Linux, BSD, OS X and Windows. The software can grab data from a host of sources.

I use a CueCat Barcode Scanner, which when modified works with all of the above software. It simply converts barcodes into keystrokes. You can pick one of these up for around �10, but ensure it’s modified or it won’t work.

Helium Music Manager

Are you the sort of person who likes to keep every piece of mp3 meta data correct? You have album art for every song in your music library and spend hours keeping your favourite artists’ Wikipedia entry up-to-the-minute?

Well it’s a shame then that many music jukebox applications don’t provide the functionality for people like you. If you’ve ever wanted to be able to browse your library by genre, sub genre, sub-sub-sub genre, music label and city of origin then I have found something in which you can do it.

Helium Music Manager provides a way to actually use every piece of data you have on an artist. You can have biographies, lyrics for every song, associated artists, see which bands individual musicians have been in and much more. Everything is analysed and collected into graphs and statistics, so you can see how much of your library was produced by EMI during the year 1970 if you so wished.

The biggest problem with Helium is just that it takes a lot of time to get your collection organized… there is no ‘batch tag’ option and for every artist you will need to go through and individually download and save data, lyrics, details, biography, reviews etc. However if you don’t mind that, or purchasing it, then I would defiantly recommend this as a music organiser alternative.

Conclusion, if you’re obsessed with your music this will let your organise it totally, however it’s not the most intuitive application at all and may cause some frustration for a lot of users.

With more than 2000 books and hundreds of CDs and DVDs it would just be a pretty boring process and I don’t want to waste that much time. Libra could be a solution for me. It is a free software that organizes collections offering several features that make it stick out of the masses.

The first is a unique one that I never heard about before. It can use a webcam to scan a barcode and identify the item by itself. No more typing and searching through the results to find the item that you bought. This is really useful.

Libra supports other search options besides keyword searches, those are: UPC, ISBN, EAN and Jan in case the barcode reader can’t be used or the item does not have a barcode which is the case for many of my books that I own.

Libra currently searches six Amazon databases which should be fine for most Books, Games, CDs and DVDs but could pose problems for older items. The search itself is very fast and displays covers as well as information about the item. All items are shown as if they were lying on a bookshelf which is also how they are shown in your collection.

Several other features include a way to keep track of borrowed items, print options, create web pages with your collection, import possibilities for existing collections and xml support.

External Links:

Libra Homepage

Now i don’t know how many readers work with websites, but maybe some of you can use this link. It’s an article on how to speed up sites using .htaccess file. It is quite a read but it looks promising, and the comment discussion there can also prove to be quite useful.

Ipodlibrary is able to import txt, doc, lit and html documents avoiding the 1000 notes limit of the iPod (by setting some to inactive which means that they do not count against the limit). It keeps track of the position that you are currently at which makes it easy to continue where you left of.