New widgets, save your searches and track your popularity
Here's a roundup of the latest enhancements to WorldCat.org. You may have already noticed a few of them, as you've been using the site lately.
New keyword search widget
The latest WorldCat widget is now ready for your download: Keyword Search. Weighing in at 300 pixels wide, this beauty is perfect for subject-specific Web pages and blogs. You customize it with specific search terms initially, so that relevant materials available through WorldCat.org are automatically displayed to your site visitors. You can play around with it, here.
Save your WorldCat searches
If you find yourself repeatedly crafting searches around something specific like a hobby or large-print editions, this new feature will be a real time saver. Just do a search and refine your query as usual. Once you have the results set you want, click the "Save this Search" box in the upper right of the results screen. Now you can see at a glance if new materials are available in a WorldCat library.
Cover art now on brief results
Hooray, check it out!
Profile enhancements: popularity tracking
You may not think your activities in WorldCat are interesting to anyone else, but now you can know how popular your profile is through a new ticker. Having a robust profile helps people know more about you when they look at one of your lists or reviews.
Get ready for big changes to the site design, look and feel in April. After extensive usability testing, WorldCat.org is getting an extensive update to make it easier and more intuitive to use.
On April 7, 2009 at 9:42 PM Graeme Williams said:
I like the widget a lot!
It seems to have a problem with ' (i.e., single quote, or apostrophe). If you search for Zoe's+Tale, you'll get nothing.
Also, with only eight results returned, you need to be very liberal about discarding duplicates. The first two result when you search for Zoes+Tale are the book by John Scalzi, and exactly the same book by Scalzi, John.
On April 8, 2009 at 12:51 PM Laura
said:
Hi Graeme,
Thanks for your feedback! I wasn't aware of the apostrophe issue in this widget but will certainly look in to it. Good point on the duplicates too; we're always working to enhance our FRBR algorithm and if all goes well, this type of occurrence will work itself out with those updates.