hello Enders!

your WWEnd team has just pushed a new feature to the beta site that we're really excited about.  it's called novel tagging.  we hope you like it as much as we do!

novel tagging is a feature that let's you customize the reports in WWEnd to reflect your personal reading history and habits.  it helps you keep track of what you've read and gives you more tools to find the kind of books you enjoy most!

here's how it works:

STEP 1:  log in to the site.  novel tagging only displays when you're currently logged in.  we've added log in forms to most of the top level pages for your convenience.

STEP 2:  click on a report in the books section.  for example: click the button "Get the Winners List" from the main books page.

STEP 3:  on the reports page click any novel you like.  preferably one you've read.

STEP 4:  on the novel page click on "+ Member Section" under the novel details table to open the member section.  the member section will remain open every time you visit a novel page until you close it.  the open state will be remembered for up to 7 days.

STEP 5:  start tagging!  the member section will allow you to tag the novel in many different ways:

  - History:  tag the novel as Read, Reading (what you're reading corrently) or leave it marked as Not Read (the default setting).  novels you tag as having been read will be highlighted in green in all awards reports.  books you're currently reading will be in orange.  no change for the default.

  - Rating:  1-10 rating displays in the top section of the novel page as an average of all ratings by all members along with a rating count so you can see how many people rated a particular novel.

  - Sub-Genre Tags:  select up to 3 different SF/F sub-genres that you feel best fit the novel.  there are elements of many different subs in every book so we allow up to 3 choices.  click on the label to get a list of subs with descriptions to help you make your choices.  these tags are averaged from all members and the top 3 selections are displayed at the top of the page.  when we have enough data we'll use these tags as the basis for novel searches by sub-genre.  you'll be able to search for all books tagged as "Alien Invasion" for example.

  - Book Lists:  here you can add a book to your Favorites List  favorites are highlighted in blue in the reports pages.  use the Reading List tag to makr books of interest that you want to read for later reference.  these books are highlighted in yellow in the reports.

STEP 6:  repeat steps 1-5 for all the books you've read or have an interest in reading.  this is a bit time consuming to do if you've read a lot of books but in the end you'll have an accurate report of your reading activity within the 8 SF/F awards covered on WWEnd.

you can then use these personalized reports to see at a glance which books you've read and more importantly which you haven't!  if you're like a lot of SF/F fans, you may have an interest in reading all the Hugo winners.  now you can see which books you've missed in your quest.

click on the year in the left colum of any report and get all the winners and nominees for all the awards for that year in a single list.  maybe your goal is to read all the winners for a particular year.  now you can see which ones you've missed!

you'll be able to spot trends in your own reading history and you can use the reports to help you branch out to books and authors you've never tried before.

give it a whirl and let us know what you think!  thanks!

- WWEnd Team

hello everyone.  we've made some new updates with the novel tagging feature.

the color coding has been added to the novel page and the search page!  so if you are on a novel page you'll notice an outline around the image in the appropriate color for the novel.  blue for favorite, green for read, orange for reading and yellow for reading list.  the color follows through in the magnification as well.

we've made some other updates too, like the larger graphics on novel and search.  hope you like.

- dave

they say a picture is worth a thousand words.  so for anyone who has not seen the novel tagging feature in action check out my personal winner's list.

this is the winners list for all years as i see it when i'm logged into WWEnd.  i've read quite a few books as you can see but you'll also notice some scandalous oversights like Stranger in a Strange Land or Doomsday Book.  that's what the novel tagging does for you.  it helps you see not only the books you've read but shows you graphically what you've missed!

one of my goals is to read all the winners for all 8 awards.  no small task as the list gets longer every year.  i've got a long way to go but at least i can see where i'm going.

by the way, that view is part of some new features we're working on right now.  soon you'll be able to easily share your lists with each other and create your own top ten lists etc.  watch this space!

- dave