Drag & Drop from the Web

You can use drag & drop to catalog older titles that may not have an ISBN, UPC or LCCN, you can also catalog titles as you surf the web.

Suppose you are surfing the web in your favorite browser, checking the new releases section at Barnes & Noble. You find a new book by a favorite author. This is a must have item so you want to add it to your Readerware database. Simply drag the page from your browser and drop it onto Readerware. The book (or album or video), is now cataloged, it's that simple.

You can drag & drop to the main Readerware window. In this case the item will be added to the database. You can also drag & drop to the Want List. In this case the item is added to the database and to your want list.

Let's take a closer look. In the location bar of your browser you will find a little icon that you can drag. You may have already used this technique to add a shortcut to your desktop. The location and image of this icon varies from browser to browser and platform to platform. These days it is often the padlock icon indicating whether you have a secure connection or not.

Microsoft Edge
Windows 10

Mozilla Firefox
Kubuntu Linux

Google Chrome
Kubuntu Linux

Apple Safari
macOS
Note: The Safari browser displays an abbreviated URL. You must first click in the URL field to display the full URL and the drag icon. Then drag & drop.

To import the contents of the current browser page into Readerware, simply drag the icon from the browser to the Readerware drop target icon, the Drag & Drop button at the end of the search bar:

To perform the drag & drop, click on the drag icon in your browser, hold the mouse button down and move it until you are over the Readerware drop target. The mouse pointer will change to indicate that Readerware will accept the drop. Finally release the button. Readerware will popup a dialog while it reads the data, extracts the information and adds the item to your database.

That's it, you're done, you have just added a new book, album or video to your Readerware database.

Site Overloaded Error

Sometimes a website can block Readerware requests by returning an HTTP status code of 503.

The official definition of a 503 status code is:

The server is currently unable to handle the request due to a temporary overloading or maintenance of the server. The implication is that this is a temporary condition which will be alleviated after some delay.

This status code is returned by the server Readerware is trying to connect to, we have no control over this unfortunately. If you get this error you can drag & drop from another site or you can save the page to a file using your browser and then drag & drop the file. More

Drag and Drop Tips

Believe it or not, it can get even easier.

Many browsers support the ability to drag a link, so you can catalog an item without actually displaying the page in your browser.

Imagine you are still on that new releases page at Barnes & Noble. You see a new album, you could click on it to display the detail page, listen to some samples and then catalog it by dragging it to Readerware (Music).

But there are some titles you just have to have. So you can simply drag the link from the new releases page and drop it onto Readerware (Music). Readerware (Music) will retrieve the contents and catalog it even though you can't see it in your browser.

Drop Actions

So far we have been adding new items to the Readerware database by dropping the page onto Readerware but there are a number of actions you can perform using drag and drop:

Add - Add a new record to the Readerware database. Readerware will extract the data from the web page and add a new record to the database. This is the default drop action.
Replace - Replace the currently selected record with data from the web. Readerware will extract all the data from the web page and replace the existing database contents with the new data. If there is data in fields that were not available on the web, the database field contents are unchanged.
Update - Update the currently selected record with data from the web. Readerware will extract all the data from the web page but only database fields that are currently empty will be changed.
Get new images - Readerware will extract images from the web page and add or replace the current database images.

Hold down the Ctrl+Shift keys as you drag and drop, Readerware will display the drop action popup menu when you drop the item:

Readerware drop action popup menu

Using the clipboard

Most browsers support drag and drop but there are some exceptions. If you cannot drag and drop from your browser to Readerware, you can use the clipboard instead. Start by selecting the URL in your browser and copying it to the clipboard. Select the Edit->Copy menu item in your browser. There are typically other more convenient ways to do this, but they will vary by browser.

Now switch to Readerware. Instead of dragging the URL to the Readerware drop target, the Drag & Drop button, right click on the button. macOS users should control click on the button. The drop action popup menu will be displayed. Select the appropriate action and Readerware will retrieve the URL and process it just as if you had used drag and drop.

Supported Sites

You cannot drag from just any site, Readerware needs to know how to find and extract the data from the web page. For a complete and up to date list of supported sites go to the Readerware Search page. You access the Readerware Search Page from within the product itself. Select one of the Web->Search menu items and Readerware will open your browser at the Readerware Search Page. You can then look at the drop down list of supported sites.

Searching the Web from Readerware

You can search the web from within Readerware. Select one of the Web search menu items and Readerware will open your browser automatically and take you to the appropriate Readerware search page.

The Readerware search page is an easy to use page that enables you to search any of the supported sites. The Readerware search pages offer:

Search by ISBN or UPC, you can even use your barcode scanner
Quick search by book author, album artist or video title
Direct access to the search page of each site, when available
Direct access to the book, album or video home page of each site

So the Readerware search pages are a great starting point for your web searches. You can also use them outside of Readerware, just bookmark one or more of the pages, you can even make one of them your home page.

Summary

Readerware offers a very convenient and easy way to catalog your books, music and videos as you surf the web, just drag and drop! The Readerware search pages make it easy to find what you are looking for.

But you don't have to use the Readerware search pages, use you favorite search engine. It doesn't matter how you get to the page, once you have displayed an item at any one of the supported sites, simply drag it to Readerware and it is cataloged. It's that simple.

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