| Title - As you key in the title, all titles starting with the letters entered thus far will be displayed in a drop down list below the title. By clicking on one of the titles from the list, the movie's information will be displayed on the screen. You may change the title by entering in a new name. Be sure to press 'Update Database' to update the information in the movie database.
Find - If you press this button when the 'Title' field is empty, all movie titles in the database will be displayed as a link. When you click on one of the movie titles, the movie information will be displayed on the screen. If you enter a keyword in the title field then press the 'Find' button, all movie titles containing the keyword will be displayed as a link.When you click on one of the movie titles, the movie information will be displayed on the screen. When entering multiple keywords, each keyword must be separated by a comma. |
| Date Added - This field contains the date that you added the movie to your movie database. You may change the date by entering in a new date in the format of mm/dd/yyyy. Note: All months and days must be entered as two digits. |
| IMDb Id- This is the unique movie id associated with the movie on IMDb.com. It is retrieved from IMDb.com when the movie is first added to the database if you chose to 'Get IMDb Info'. If a IMDb Id is not displayed in the IMDb Id field, you can find the number by clicking the search link next to the 'Get IMDb' button. It will open a new browser window to IMDb.com where you can search for the movie. When you have found the movie, look at the URL in the Address bar in your browser. The IMDb Id will be located after the title/tt. Ex. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0126029 In this example, I have highlighted he IMDb Id in red. You can copy and paste the IMDb Id into the IMDb Id field.
Get IMDb - If there is a title in the 'Title' field, when you press the 'Get IMDb' button, the movie information for the title in the 'Title' field will be retrieved from IMDb.com. If an exact match on the title is not found, a list of all the closest matched titles to select from will be displayed. Beside each title is a link to that title's movie information on IMDb.com so you can preview it before you select it. If you do not see a match you can select "Skip Selection" from the bottom of the screen and you will be returned back to the 'Edit' screen. Once the title is selected, the movie information is displayed on the 'Edit' screen. If there is no title in the 'Title' field, the 'IMDb Id' number will be used to look up the movie and retrieve the movie information from IMDb.com One example where this feature is very useful is when the wrong movie title is selected when doing a 'quick add' when importing a text file. You can type in the correct title, press 'Get IMDb', select the correct title if multiple titles were found, then 'Update Database' with the new information. |
| ASIN- If the movie was added by a UPC number and the movie was located at Amazon.com, then an ASIN number, which is Amazon's product number, will be displayed in this field. If an ASIN number is not displayed, you can find the number by clicking the search link next to the 'Get Amazon' button. It will open a new browser window to Amazon.com where you can search for the movie. When you have found the movie, look at the URL in the Address bar in your browser. The ASIN number will be located after the detail/-/. Ex. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00005JMQZ/qid=1112721346/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-7764047-0101714?v=glance&s;=dvd In this example, I have highlighted he ASIN in red. You can copy and paste the ASIN into this field and press the 'Get Amazon' button to retrieve the Amazon movie info.
Get Amazon - If there is a ASIN number, then when you press the 'Get Amazon' button, the movie information for the movie corresponding to the ASIN will be retrieved from Amazon.com. |
| Path\filename (Browse) - This is the path and filename of the movie file. If you have changed the name or location of the movie file, you can browse to the file and select it. Be sure to press 'Update Database' to update the information in the movie database. To delete a path\filename, you must enter :: for the path\filename. When you 'Update Database', it will be cleared out. |
| Seen - Check whether or not you have seen the movie. Be sure to press 'Update Database' to update the information in the movie database. |
| Personal Rating - This is your personal rating of the movie on a scale of 1 - 10, 10 being the best. Be sure to press 'Update Database' to update the information in the movie database. |
| User Rating - Imdb.com keeps an overall average of their users' ratings for each movie on a scale of 1-10, 10 being the best. |
| Location - The location is where the media resides. The location field can be added to the movie information in three ways. Either by entering the location on the Edit screen, when a movie is added by importing from a text file or when a movie is added from the Add -> Multiple screen. When importing from a text file, if you do not specify a location for the movies, the location field for each movie will be blank. (On the Add -> Multiple screen, this is equivalent to leaving the location field blank.) If you want all the movie files to have the same location, on the first line of the text file add :location where location will be added to the location field for each movie. (On the Add -> Multiple screen, this is equivalent to entering a location in the location field or selecting a location from the drop down menu.) If you want some movies to have a different location, each movie can have a location specified for it by appending |location| to the end of the title, movie file name or UPC number. The |location| will take precedence over the :location if one was added. (On the Add -> Multiple screen, the |location| will take precedence over the location field.) A list of possible locations can be maintained on the the Options -> Miscellaneous screen. When a movie is added from the Add Multiple or Import Text screen and a movie location is provided, the movie location is automatically added to the locations list on the Options Misc. screen if it is not already there. Also, from the Edit screen, if a movie location is entered in the text field it is automatically added to the locations list on the Options Misc. screen if it is not already there. An additional feature on the Options Misc. screen allows you to search your existing movie database and it will automatically added to the locations list on the Options Misc. screen any movie locations found that were not already in the list. Each location name can be no more than 15 characters long. |
| MPAA - Each movie that has had the imdb information imported will have a rating certification given by the Motion Picture Association of America. If a rating was not provided when imported in, an "undefined" rating will be issued to that movie. You can give the movie any rating you wish.
Along with the MPAA rating, the Motion Picture Association of America also gives many of the movies a brief explanation on why it was given that rating. |
| Year - This is the year the movie was released or for home movies or slide shows it was the year the movie was shot or the pictures were taken. |
| Time - This is the length of the movie in minutes. |
| Language - This is the language the movie was released with. You can select multiple items by holding down the Ctrl key when you select the item. |
| Country - This is where the movie was produced. You can select multiple items by holding down the Ctrl key when you select the item. |
| Plot - This is a short description of what the movie is about. |
| Genres - Each movie can have up to five genres defined for it. For example, Shrek has 5 genres defined: Adventure, Romance, Animation, Fantasy and Family. Some movies only have one. There are 19 genres pre defined by IMDb and you can define your own additional genre on the Tools -> Options -> Miscellaneous screen. You can select multiple items by holding down the Ctrl key when you select the item. |
| Media - The Media field contains the list of media types defined by you. When a movie name is imported from a text file, the media type can be defined on the first or second line of the text file in the format of '::media type'. If the movie name is a movie file on your hard drive then the media type will default to the file extension if no media type is defined in the text file. When adding a movie with a media type that is not already defined in the media list, the media type will automatically be added to the list for you. When you add movies from the Add Single or Add Multiple screen, you are required to select a media type for that movie. If the media type you want is not in the list, you can add it to the Media Types list from the Tools -> Options -> Miscellaneous screen. A movie can have multiple media types defined for it. You can select multiple items by holding down the Ctrl key when you select the item. On this field you can define additional media types for the movie. |
| Actors - Up to 10 actors can be defined for each movie. You may add one actor per line. If you wish, you can specify the role the actor played by separating the actor and the role with the word 'as'. For example, Jack Black as Hal would be on one line. |
| Director - The name of the person who directed or created the movie. |
| Cover Location- When movie information is imported from IMDb.com or Amazon.com, the DVD cover image is also imported and stored in a central directory for all users to share. If the cover image already exists in the central area, it does not get imported again.
Get IMDb Cover- When you press this button, as long as you have an IMDb Id, the cover image will be retrieved from IMDb.com and updated in the database. This way you can keep your original movie info you retrieved from Amazon.com but use IMDb.com's cover image. If a IMDb Id is not displayed in the IMDb Id field, you can find the number by clicking the search link next to the 'Get IMDb' button. It will open a new browser window to IMDb.com where you can search for the movie. When you have found the movie, look at the URL in the Address bar in your browser. The IMDb Id will be located after the title/tt. Ex. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0126029 In this example, I have highlighted he IMDb Id in red. You can copy and paste the IMDb Id into the IMDb Id field then press this button to retrieve the cover image. Note: The IMDb Id is not updated in the database. To save the IMDb Id you must press the 'Update Database' button.
Get Amazon Cover- When you press this button, as long as you have an ASIN number, the cover image will be retrieved from Amazon.com and updated in the database. This way you can keep your original movie info you retrieved from IMDb.com but use Amazon.com's cover image. If a ASIN number is not displayed in the ASIN field, you can find the number by clicking the search link next to the 'Get Amazon' button. It will open a new browser window to Amazon.com where you can search for the movie. When you have found the movie, look at the URL in the Address bar in your browser. The ASIN number will be located after the detail/-/. Ex. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00005JMQZ/qid=1112721346/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-7764047-0101714?v=glance&s;=dvd In this example, I have highlighted he ASIN in red. You can copy and paste the ASIN into the ASIN field then press this button to retrieve the cover image. Note: The ASIN number is not updated in the database. To save the ASIN number you must press the 'Update Database' button.
Use Your Own Cover- Each user has their own directory for their custom images. When you press this button, it will open a screen where you can browse to the thumbnail image on your local hard drive. Note that on the search result screens the image will be displayed as 96x140. Larger pictures will be squeezed and smaller pictures will be expanded. The aspect ratio is not preserved. The maximum size of the picture is 10K. The smaller the size, the quicker it will display on the search screens. You can change the image size of your photo in most any photo editor. Once you have browsed to your image and selected it, you must press 'Save' to upload your image to your personal directory on the server and update the the movie database with the new cover. You will immediately see your new cover image displayed on the Edit screen. Do not upload photos you do not intend to use as it takes up unnecessary space. Periodically, unused photos will be deleted from the server. If you cannot find a cover image on Amazon.com or IMDb.com, you can read this to find alternative locations for cover images. You can create your own cover images by
Irfanview is a very good free image editor that can accomplish all these tasks. To change the image size using Irfanview, select File -> Open. Browse to your image and select it. If you do not see your image, make sure the 'Files of type:' is set to either 'All files' or to your file type. Once the image is displayed in Irfanview, select Image -> Resize/Resample Image. Check 'Preserve aspect ratio' and select 'Set new size' using pixels as the unit. Set width to 96 and press 'OK'. Select File -> Save As and give the picture a new file name. Select Save as type JPG. In the Save Options box, select quality 50 and make sure all boxes are unchecked. Press Save. Check the file size to make sure it is under 10K. If not, edit the new saved picture and go directly to File -> Save As but this time decrease the quality and Save. You can repeat this until the file size is small enough. To capture a still image using Irfanview, select File -> Open. Browse to your movie file and select it. If you do not see your movie file, make sure the 'Files of type:' is set to either 'All files' or to your movie file type. Once the movie is displayed in Irfanview, press the black square stop button in the lower left corner. Now you can move the slider to select the frame you want to use as your cover image. Right click the command menu button located next to the stop/play button and press copy. Select Edit -> Paste. Now you need to crop the image to get it closer to the cover image proportions. While holding down the left mouse key, drag a rectangle around the portion of the image you want to keep. Then select Edit -> Crop Selection. select Image -> Resize/Resample Image. Check 'Preserve aspect ratio' and select 'Set new size' using pixels as the unit. Set width to 96 and press 'OK'. Select File -> Save As and give the picture a new file name. Select Save as type JPG. In the Save Options box, select quality 50 and make sure all boxes are unchecked. Press Save. Now you can add a title. Create a selection by holding down the left mouse key and dragging a rectangle area where you want the title. Select Edit -> Insert text into selection. Use a small text size such as Arial - bold - 8 where the text color will contrast the picture color. If you don't like the way it looks, select Edit -> Undo and try again. When you are satisfied, Select File -> Save As and save it like you did previously. Check the file size to make sure it is under 10K. If not, edit the new saved picture and go directly to File -> Save As but this time decrease the quality and Save. You can repeat this until the file size is small enough. To scan a cover image using Irfanview, select File -> Select TWAIN Source and select you scanner. Next, select File -> Acquire/Batch Scanning. Select single image and close dialog then press OK. Scan the image using a low DPI such as 75. Once the image is displayed in Irfanview, select Image -> Resize/Resample Image. Check 'Preserve aspect ratio' and select 'Set new size' using pixels as the unit. Set width to 96 and press 'OK'. Select File -> Save As and give the picture a new file name. Select Save as type JPG. In the Save Options box, select quality 50 and make sure all boxes are unchecked. Press Save. Check the file size to make sure it is under 10K. If not, edit the new saved picture and go directly to File -> Save As but this time decrease the quality and Save. You can repeat this until the file size is small enough. |
| Notes - The Notes field for each movie can contain any information you want associated with the movie, such as the quality of the DivX file or who you have loaned the DVD to and the date you loaned it. You have the capability of searching for movies based on keywords used in your Notes field. |