How do you guys organize your collections digitally?

Some people use things similar to spreadsheets to list everything in their collection. Can you guys tell me how you guys organize your coins *DIGITALLY*. ( I am often on the computer and thought it'd be cool if I could just open up a link and see everything in my collection.) Is google spreadsheet a good idea?

 

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I don't organize. I don't document what I have, or what I paid. I see no point in it.

 

I use Heritage's "My Collection" software. The only problem is that it is a little buggy. One of the big advantages is that you get the most current data on both population data and price guide data.

 

I use an Excel spreadsheet to keep track of my collection. Using anything like Google will work if you don't mind sharing such information with Google, and anyone they share with.

 

Breaking sabbatical.

One word, Flicker. https://www.flickr.com/photos/123595191@N04/

I'm done here.

 

I just use excel. One column for type, year, mint, grade, paid and value.


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Excel if course. PM me if you'd like to start with a template... you can use google or dropbox to access your spreadsheet from anywhere.

 

I built an Excel workbook with all the required spreadsheets and then not only included data cells, but also hot linked the cells to images.

 

I started off with a spreadsheet but am in the transition to CoinManage. All the new pieces I buy go into the software and I'm slowly transitioning my old items. It's not perfect; I looked at others and it seemed to have the best functionality for the spend. I just know know if it will be updated, since I sent a number of support email and never got a reply.

 

I use a spreadsheet with numerous tabs. The first tab has the entire collection organized by country, denomination, year, and mint mark. This tab includes numerous columns to record information on each coined acquired. The next series of tabs list the coin books that I have on each denomination and whether the hole is filled or not. I have also created tabs on proof sets, commemoratives, special issues, tokens, currency, and trading cards. Another tab summarizes the number and value of coins by country from the first tab. Another tab allows me to enter the information from coinflation, which is subsequntly linked to the market value of individual coins on the first tab. It takes the coinflation intrinsic value of the coin and adds a market valve to the formula. For instance, a 2014 bullion ASE might be $19.69 from coinflation plus $5 for its collector value. Another tab provides the currency rates from various countries versus $USD. It automatically updates foreign coin values, at least the ones without collector's value. I recently created a tab to list all the 20th century circulation coins and whether I have each one or not. One item on my bucket list is to have at least one of each 20th century circulation coins. I'm 93.06% of the way there. I also created a tab to summarize my coin purchases from each year and determine my current ROI. I've been collecting for quite some time and my ROI is 3.1276%. I do not consider it too bad for a hobby, as most hobbies cost you money.

 

There's so many ways of doing this. I upload my photos at omnicoin.com and for some of the better collection, I make digital coin albums like this.

http://issuu.com/gxseries

Down side to them is they take too long to make.

 

Offline:
I like using Excel spreadsheets because of the ability to customize them to no end and the familiarity of the software, if ever I should need to exchange files with others or work across platforms. Excel is nice for linking to URLs, doing quick calculations, and making links to image files of coins you have of your coins, as others have already stated.

Online:
To a limited degree, I use PCGS Set Registry for keeping an inventory of my PCGS certified coins and I like that I can upload an image of the coins there. Plus it allows you to see how the values are doing since they provide that data online. I don't use PCGS for building (or competing in) registry sets. The same thing can be done with PMG for certified banknotes. I use these services free of charge as these companies allow this access, without a paid membership.

I like what I see with Heritage Auctions', My Collection but I haven't really used it, yet. However, I often use HA for access to population and archived auction prices. They offer a great amount of information without having to pay other sites a membership to access it. FWIW, the NGC Research Price Guides are great tools available for use online, too.

Numismaster.com offers a coin collection inventory tool online that is pretty good, and even without the paid subscription, you can get a lot of coin specs, upload images and keep track of your coins for free online.

The Coinnection, is another nice website that I have enjoyed using and intend to use more. It was created by a CoinTalk member, too. And several members have registered free accounts there. It has one of the nicest interfaces I have seen for coin inventories online, and it's modeled to be a socially interactive site, allowing pier-to-pier grading of your collection.

Image file management (online):
Image files are another realm of digital collection organization that can get kind of hard to wrangle after a while, especially if you have presentation images and others used to sell coins. It's important to come up with a file naming convention that works for you and helps you sort things out.

I like Photobucket (online and smartphone App) for the free accounts offered giving you a large amount of memory to store image files online. The other nice thing about that is their fast access to upload, caption, tag and generate URLs of your image files. On Photobucket, you can create albums and have a Library that you sort files by folders online. Image hosting on Photobucket also allows you to set image collection privacy (or public) settings. If ever you post an image on a forum such as CT, and later wish to edit the thread post but cannot, you can still delete the image file later on Photobucket effectively removing it from a forum post or if used on other sites.

Flickr was mentioned, and being a product of Yahoo it tends to be heavily managed and is more community based. It's a nice site for image hosting and photo sharing, but I've found they frequently change their interface (online and with the App) and upload speeds as well as download speeds for users vary greatly. Flickr has become more of a social media site than an image hosting interface (though some use if for that), plus Flickr requires an annual paid membership if you use up your bandwidth or image storage space on the free accounts.

Keeping image files organized is a chore, but a necessary one I think, especially if you should ever need to quickly access an image of a coin to show someone, sell a piece or use in a claim if lost/damaged.

Image file management (offline):
I create folders on a portable hard drive that are sorted by country and within those by coin type. File names for the images include (Krause numbers, Km#, for world coins), a coins date, mint mark, denomination, keywords (IHC, SLQ, ASE, etc.) if needed, and if certified, the TPGs certification number plus its grade. If more than one shot of the coin, I include "O" or "R" to distinguish obverse and reverse in the file names.

The same is done for paper money, using folders to store images, but those are arranged by Freidberg numbers, a note's series, and serial number in addition to denomination, grade, certification number, designation codes (PPQ, ChCU, etc. ) and keywords (if needed).

Essentially each coin and note gets a folder on a hard drive and any invoice information, research materials (other data files) and image files are contained in the folders.

I find there's no one way to go about it all, and it's more of a vast toolbox of options to use, apply as needed, taking data assembled from various web resources, books, and catalogs and depending on how you need to access any of it and/or share your collection, it's value, and so on, help you get what you need accomplished. I kind of like having redundant data across online and offline sources too, so if I should loose information somewhere, I can access it in another location, or remotely depending on where I am.

I think your own approach will be defined by your needs and evolve as does your collecting habits and cycles. I hope this gives you some ideas to think about.

 

I use the website Numista.

 

Why did you respond? He didn't ask why you don't. He asked what methods people who do to present them to him/her.

So your reading comprehension is literally non-existent or you are just trolling, again.

I thought this forum had strict rules regarding trolling?

 

I don't get it. He asked for methods used. You present a statement that you do not, why, etc. Thats not what the OP asked. It is so ridiculously disrespectful to the OP, the members, and the forum itself that you cannot adhere to rules; to the point of the thread.

And then you post a shnazzy GIF? I wish there was a way to link your posts on this forum to your ebay listings so that people who were about to buy from you could see who it is that is selling them a coin. And then sending the wrong one....pffft

 

I guess you get a little special treatment because you are a supporter...

 

I used to have a series of hand-typed sheets with an inventory created on a 1952 Remmington portable typewriter. They would be updated by hand with new coins until I would decide to type up new sheets. Today, I use a simple Excel system on my laptop which can be easily updated, expanded and corrected with a few keystrokes.

 

That's what I use. I like that I can access it from anywhere in case my computer fries or I'm away from my computer. The only thing is you will want to back it up somehow. I don't know if you can save it as a file that is compatible with other programs. I have been saving them as pdf files. That works for me now cause I dont have a lot of coins, but if you have a lot then you don't want to have to retype everything.