Does anyone else use Collectify to track your collection? Perhaps another similar software or excel perhaps? Collectify is great if you have individual higher valued items but does not appear it was designed for common items or bulk purchases. I purchased the software really to help my family in case they have to dispose of the collection, so they don't get ripped off or sell at a garage sale. I'd be interested how others deal with the same concern (if you even worry about it). I don't have anyone else in the family that is even remotely interested in the hobby, so I felt like I had to do something a little extraordinary. BtW - As a software program it is pretty good and allows you to embed pictures and pdf's but it was not cheap. If I recall was around $200. It also allows you to add other collectibles like baseball memorabilia, jewelry, etc. Sent from my STH100-1 using Tapatalk
I use Excel. You can use nested groups to record additional information as necessary about a particular coin. I also use collectivecoin.com to be able to quickly view high resolution photos of my collection when I'm out at a show or auction.
I also use Excel; when you design it, you understand it, right from Day One. Some of you may not know that you can add a "comment" (which you can edit) into each cell. It does not clutter up the spreadsheet - the only sign it's there is a tiny red triangle in the upper right corner of the cell. Go to "insert," select "comment," and a box pops up, ready to type. My version of Excel puts my name* at the top of the comment box, which is a nuisance, but it's easy to delete by backspacing. The "comment" feature lets you reduce the number of columns in your records, which makes it easier to read. However, they are not visible unless and until you hover the mouse over the triangle. You can also enlarge the Comment box by pulling down the corner with your mouse; I never tried a long comment, but it looks like you could write hundreds of characters; it is ordinary text. I do not know if comments are searchable with Ctrl-F. *I assume this is default so that a large number of persons can add their comments to a single spreadsheet (then you know who to blame).
Is there anything a collector might want out of collection tracking software that a simple Excel sheet can't give you? I can understand maybe a mid to high-volume dealer might want some more advanced features, but I think Excel pretty much does it for the individual collector.
I use Excel, but I put this on my Christmas wishlist every year hoping someone will want to spend a few bucks on me. Though I do not use this software, I have seen it in person and navigated it. It has the ability to spit you out a "need list" for coins you do not yet have. Frankly, I find it fascinating and I'm of the understanding the software developer can upload your Excel files so you don't have to start all over. Here's the link: http://www.exactchange.info
Using Excel you can also link each item to a photograph so you can keep your written inventory and pull up a picture too.
<whistles> Wow. That is some pricey software. $80... Hmm... I think I'll just stay with Excel and wait with you for someone to buy it for me, too ;-)
That's pretty featureful, but it still can't encompass my modest collection due to not having good support for ancients or exonumia, not to mention stock certificates and bonds. I'd have to do almost as much work entering half my collection as I would with Excel. :/
I have an iMac computer and the problem I've come across is that the user base is smaller than Windows users. In addition coin collectors are a very small subset of Mac users. So the specialized software I've used in the past has usually ended up being discontinued or no longer developed/updated. I know Windows users won't have quite the same issue. The reason I'm pointing this out is I decided, a while ago, to just go with Excel. Excel has been around for a long time and I don't see it going away anytime within my lifetime lol. Just my opinion
I'd be sure any software you use can save data in a file format that can be read by other programs. The Excel xls format is well known, and dozens of other programs can read the files. If one were really thorough, worksheets should be saved occasionally in CSV or txt format as well as xls. I haven't seen the need. However, if you use a program with a proprietary format, your files could be orphaned someday. I have some data files from the days of DOS and early Windows that cannot be read by modern software. The programs were discarded, and the format they used was proprietary. Later some data files that hadn't been converted were discovered. I suppose if I looked really hard on eBay for the programs and setup a computer with a 16-bit or 32-bit OS, I could read the old files. Fortunately, they're not critical. Data files in common MS formats (xls, ppt, doc, csv, txt, etc.) will probably be readable decades into the future. There are some less common MS formats, like vsd for Visio, that may not last. Cal
To clarify a little bit, here's a note on Excel images I had kept: "Excel allows you to set up graphics so that they are associated with cells and even stay with the cells when the cells are sorted. But what about when you filter the list? Here's how to make sure that the graphics are no longer visible when the list is filtered."
I use Apple's Numbers app on my Mac, iPad, and iPhone. My spread sheets are pretty basic. I'm only tracking what I have, what I still need for each series, and the basic stats on each entry (known mintage for that specific coin, date of acquisition, price paid, grade if graded, etc.). Excel is much more powerful and I may export over now that MS has good iPad and iPhone versions. Being able to automatically pull in information from the internet would help with tracking pricing trends over time. I'm curious. What are all the different things people are categorizing in their spread sheets? What are your rows and columns?
I have used a couple software programs. ProCoin until they went away. The last one I used was CoinManage. I have used excel also but if you have a large collection, depending on the information you want in your database, it is very time consuming starting off. I don't mind paying a little money for a software program as most times, all you have to add is the coin and your own pics. All the rest of the info is usually built in such as mintage, designations, grades, values, etc... I guess it just depends on how much time you have to start your collection database. Another thing mentioned was companies dying. Most formats I've seen can be exported as excel format. Another thing to consider with software programs is if there are update charges.
Understandable. The nice things about this though, are that the World Coin Book databases are available and they will tell you mintages, metal compositions, allow you to search, use the world coin books as digital references, etc. I mean, the product is pretty neat, I just hate having to spend almost two months of my coin budget. Christmas list it is
Thanks for the link, but didn't find something that I could use. Problem is with some old Lotus and QuattroPro files. Some old versions of these programs had a compressed format version of data files. It was great when 40 MB was considered a huge hard disk. Problem is that they dropped the format, and newer versions can't read it. However, you can't just download the old versions because of copyrights. If I were serious, I might be able to locate old versions on original distribution disks for sale on eBay. Haven't really needed the old data yet, so easy to let it slide. Cal
Coin Elite is a great program. It's been around for many years. It's worth the price. http://www.trovesoftware.com/products.html
I wish I would have know about Coin Elite before I purchased Collectify! Sent from my STH100-1 using Tapatalk
