CollectAny - Useful collecting software

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Hi,

 

(Thanks to the forum admin for letting me mention my app on the forum)

 

This is just to mention that for anyone needing a simple way of cataloguing your coin collection you could try our 'CollectAny' Windows software at www.collectany.com. Free 30 day trial, very easy 'one-click designer' feature for new users.

 

One example here : http://collectany.azurewebsites.net/RomanCoinsExample

 

You can easily get a more comprehensive design (more fields) through the one-click designer (just type what you want, for instance 'UK coins' or 'US coins' or 'Roman Coins' etc) :

http://collectany.azurewebsites.net/OneClickDesigner

 

Plus there is the abilty to go further and configure the app however you wish.

 

All the best

 

Jeremy Leach

WarmBreeze software

 

[1949threepence 3,368]

Anybody got any thoughts about this? 

Not for me personally, but doesn't look too bad if you want to showcase your coins. 

  

[jaggy 528]

I'm a Mac user so Windows software is not relevant to me.

One of the problems with Mac is that developers have to keep pace with new operating system releases and, if they don't, you can find that the application no longer works after an upgrade.

As a result of experience, I would emphasize the importance of the ability to export data in a format readable by standard software such as Excel. That way, if the worst comes to the worst, you can always read the data into a new application and not have to rekey. I appreciate that this tends to be less of a problem in the Windows world but it never hurts none the less.

[Rob 3,241]

That presumably is the dilemma for all users. Once tied to one or the other, you have a load of unusable files if you try to change. Plus, I'm not sure I would be popular if I printed all the things I would want to keep - it's bad enough printing out all the ledgers for the year end.

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Hi,

It's good to get any feedback on the app and I can understand concerns about data.

 

We had to focus on Windows as that's where our skills are so unfortunately it's not a Mac Product.

 

Just to mention that there is a facility to export all the raw data from the CollectAny app (File > Export selected records > As raw data). This exports the data to a .CSV file that can be opened in EXCEL (and other apps that can read CSV files). It also exports photos to JPG files. We recognised that some collectors might well need to get their data out of the app at some stage to avoid the re-keying issue. (There is also the reverse ability to import from CSV).

 

I've added a short video to the example link above to show the basics of using CollectAny in case it helps people. Also available here :

 

 

I very much see you guys as the experts and us just trying to provide what is hopefully a useful tool to some people - so I'm interested in any comments you might have. It all helps us try to get a better product.

 

Thanks and all the best

Jeremy

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Example of pasting from CollectAny into the forum 

 

Just as some additional info for this thread, here's an example of text and photos that have been pasted directly from the

CollectAny app into this forum post. It's a very basic coin but only used as an example !

 

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Coin : Elizabeth II Penny

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

 

 

[1] Obverse -Inscription -ELIZABETH.II.DEI.GRATIA.REGINA.F:D:

[3] Reverse - Inscription - ONE PENNY 1967

 

 

 

Description :

The Penny dates back to before the formation of the English nation. Copper was first used in the striking of the Penny during the Reign of George III in the year 1797. Bronze was used as a more hard wearing, longer lasting alternative in 1860 and was used until the Decimal Penny was debased in 1992 using copper plated steel as the bronze had a higher value than the face value of the Penny.

 

Elizabeth II Pre-decimal Pennies were struck from 1953 until 1967. Their were two different types on account of their being two different inscriptions. The first type was only struck 1953 and the second type was struck from 1954 to 1967.

 

The obverse was engraved by the sculptor Mary Gillick. In keeping with tradition Elizabeth's portrait faces to the right, in the opposite direction to his predecessor. Elizabeth's portrait depicts her wearing a Laureate (A Crown of leafs).

 

The reverse device is of Britannia seated facing right, holding a Trident in her left hand and her right hand is resting upon a shield which is emblazoned with a Union Flag.

 

 

Condition notes :

Fine condition - very slight signs of wear.

 

Grade category : Fine

Numeric grade : 62

Year or period : 1967

Country : England

Minted by : London Royal Mint

Diameter : 31 mm

Weight : 8.5 gr

Metal composition : Bronze

Paid : £3.25

Bought when : July 2016

Bought from : eBay CoinBazaar

Sold for : £0.00

Stored in building : Main

Stored in container : Box 12

 

 

 

 

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Created using CollectAny software www.CollectAny.com

[Jeremy Leach 1]

With a follow-up video showing how the last post was made ...

 

[UPINSMOKE 456]

I have been having a look at this software and I quite like the concept. Did add a couple of coins to it with photos and all seems good. Although there are a few question I would like to ask. Firstly is there any way you can add any other fields to this. The coin grading is not as good as it could be. Could really do with them being expanded or the option of being able to put our own grading terms into the field.

These are most of the terms we use in the uk or though there may be others on this forum that will put me right.

Grade	Category
78 - 100	Uncirculated
75 - 77	Almost Uncirculated
60 - 70	Extremely Fine
40 - 55	Very Fine
20 - 35	Fine
8 - 15	Very Good
1 - 5	Good

I also noticed that you had a field of price paid and price sold but not a current value which would help as what you have paid for a coin is not always what its worth i.e you may buy a coin for say £10 at a bargain prive when in reality it may be worth £30. It would also help as a comparison what you paid for the collection and what it maybe worth now. I presume that all the money columns add up the totals for you. But why in the numeric grading column does that add up as it does not need too.

It would be useful if you could add your own fields or perhaps I am missing something with the software. If these area's were ironed out I may just go and buy this. Other than that it looks very good.  

[PWA 1967 2,269]

Mick those numbers are off the scale mate 

[azda 983]

16 minutes ago, UPINSMOKE said:

I have been having a look at this software and I quite like the concept. Did add a couple of coins to it with photos and all seems good. Although there are a few question I would like to ask. Firstly is there any way you can add any other fields to this. The coin grading is not as good as it could be. Could really do with them being expanded or the option of being able to put our own grading terms into the field.

These are most of the terms we use in the uk or though there may be others on this forum that will put me right.

Grade	Category
78 - 100	Uncirculated
75 - 77	Almost Uncirculated
60 - 70	Extremely Fine
40 - 55	Very Fine
20 - 35	Fine
8 - 15	Very Good
1 - 5	Good

I also noticed that you had a field of price paid and price sold but not a current value which would help as what you have paid for a coin is not always what its worth i.e you may buy a coin for say £10 at a bargain prive when in reality it may be worth £30. It would also help as a comparison what you paid for the collection and what it maybe worth now. I presume that all the money columns add up the totals for you. But why in the numeric grading column does that add up as it does not need too.

It would be useful if you could add your own fields or perhaps I am missing something with the software. If these area's were ironed out I may just go and buy this. Other than that it looks very good.  

Some people also like to add different prices from various up to date publications which then would give them an average price for grade, so being able to add columns for various books such as spink, CCGB and coin year book, they'll all have different prices for the same grade, being able to develop the internal mechanics of the software should be a must have IMO, but then again, i use a MacBook lol

[UPINSMOKE 456]

27 minutes ago, PWA 1967 said:

Mick those numbers are off the scale mate 

So don't know what you mean Have I got them wrong.

 

22 minutes ago, azda said:

Some people also like to add different prices from various up to date publications which then would give them an average price for grade, so being able to add columns for various books such as spink, CCGB and coin year book, they'll all have different prices for the same grade, being able to develop the internal mechanics of the software should be a must have IMO, but then again, i use a MacBook lol

Good point I did not think of that. I quite agree with your comments 

[azda 983]

2 minutes ago, UPINSMOKE said:

So don't know what you mean Have I got them wrong.

 

Good point I did not think of that. I quite agree with your comments 

Perhaps the ability to add notes on a coin, so if there's provenance you'll be able to include this also

[PWA 1967 2,269]

You make your own decision on grade but 70 A/Unc and coins graded 80 or above from circulation should be nice so forget about circulated coins above 88.

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Hi,

Thanks for the comments they are really interesting. It is possible to make a collection have whatever fields you like. When you first use CollectAny it guides you to what is called a 'one-click designer' which takes your written description of what you want (could just be the word 'coin'!) and then automatically generates a collection. However this collection design is just a suggestion.

 

(I will make the suggested coin collections include some additional fields in line with your comments and release an update in the next week).

 

However when you get to know the app a bit more you can also design your own collection. What's good is that you can import an existing design into the designer as a starting point and then edit that. Once you've created a new design with exactly the fields you want you can then import data from your old collection into the new one.  The import feature is powerful and lets you map the fields from the source database to the ones in the destination and the app initially makes a very good automatic guess at the mapping before you begin. This means that you could also import data from one of your friends collections even if their collection design wasn't quite the same as yours. You don't find this ability very often in other databases.

 

I will create another short video soon to show the process of modifying an existing design and the import of data. It sounds involved but really it's a quick process once you get the hang of it.

 

Thanks for the comments, they are very useful.

 

Regards
Jeremy Leach

WarmBreeze software

Edited November 13, 2016 by Jeremy Leach

[jaggy 528]

I built my own database so here are the fields I have:

Monarch

Date

Photo Obverse

Photo Reverse

Mintage

Grade 

Rarity

Comments

Bought From

Date Bought

Auction ID

Lot No.

Provenance

Cost

Estimated Value

Reference 1.

Reference 2.

Obverse Details

Reverse Details

Size & Weight

Hammered or Milled

Raw or Slabbed

Certificate No.

[jaggy 528]

When I think about my own software, once the data is in there, these are the key factors (for me obviously).

Ability to manage the look and feel on the screen including displaying individual records or all (or a subset of) records in list format.

Ability to search on any term (e.g. 'Heritage', 'PCGS', 'Victoria')

Ability to export into standard formats

Standard backup functionality

Ability to print.

Ability to clone/duplicate a record and then modify the cloned record.

Edited November 13, 2016 by jaggy

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Hi Jaggy, thanks for that. The fields that catch my eye in your list are these :

Rarity - How do you rate this?
Auction ID - Is there any standard format?
Lot No.
Provenance - I'm not very clear what this means
Hammered or Milled - ?
Raw or Slabbed - ?
Certificate No.  - Is this of the authenticity?

Sorry for my ignorance (I am genuinely interested though - I did start a small collection many years ago and this is getting me interested again !). I'm just trying to make sure I capture fields that most collectors would find useful and don't want to miss any important ones  (so the 'suggested' collection designs in my software get it pretty much right first go for most collectors even though you can go on and modify the designs).

Cloning records isn't something our app currently does but it's a good idea and we can add it on the enhancement list.

Jeremy

 

 

[Paulus 1,980]

Can I add some fields in addition to Jaggy's suggestions that I would like to see?

• Sold to
• Date sold
• Net Sale price

If bought through auction, additionally (auction house would be the seller):

• Lot number
• Hammer price

 

• If slabbed, the name of the TPG

For me, provenance would be a (large) text area field to type in details of previous owners and sales of the coin

Are any number of images supported, together with image captions?

Is it available as an app on smart devices?

Does it have a web front end with a web site to publish to (so I can share and view from any on-line device)?

Thanks, Paul

PS I would be happy to trial it and give feedback, is that is of interest

Edited November 14, 2016 by Paulus

[jaggy 528]

2 minutes ago, Paulus said:

Can I add some fields in addition to Jaggy's suggestions that I would like to see?

• Sold to
• Date sold
• Net Sale price

If bought through auction, additionally (auction house would be the seller):

• Lot number
• Hammer price

 

• If slabbed, the name of the TPG

For me, provenance would be a (large) text area field to type in details of previous owners and sales of the coin

Are any number of images supported, together with image captions?

Thanks, Paul

 

Good comments Paul!!!

I have a separate Excel file for coin sales. Might be a good idea to integrate that into the main database using the fields you suggest.

I don't record hammer price separately but add shipping costs to my hammer price to get an overall cost. While my currency of record is the pound sterling (for coins), obviously I sometimes buy coins in dollars so recording the exchange rate used might be another field.

Auction Id. is the name or number of the auction.

If a coin is slabbed then I type 'slabbed NGC' (or PCGS) into the raw/slabbed field.

Both my comments and provenance fields are text areas which expand as more text is added.

I don't support image captions but I can add an unlimited number of photo  fields.

[jaggy 528]

31 minutes ago, Jeremy Leach said:

Hi Jaggy, thanks for that. The fields that catch my eye in your list are these :

Rarity - How do you rate this?
Auction ID - Is there any standard format?
Lot No.
Provenance - I'm not very clear what this means
Hammered or Milled - ?
Raw or Slabbed - ?
Certificate No.  - Is this of the authenticity?

Sorry for my ignorance (I am genuinely interested though - I did start a small collection many years ago and this is getting me interested again !). I'm just trying to make sure I capture fields that most collectors would find useful and don't want to miss any important ones  (so the 'suggested' collection designs in my software get it pretty much right first go for most collectors even though you can go on and modify the designs).

Cloning records isn't something our app currently does but it's a good idea and we can add it on the enhancement list.

Jeremy

 

 

Hi Jeremy.

For rarity I use the standard ESC format (C, N, S, R) plus any other information available from the various references. So it is a text field.

Auction ID is the name of the auction I have bought the piece from. That could be a numerical id (e.g. Auction 151) or it could be a name (e.g. 2017 January 8 - 9 NYINC World Coins Signature Auction - New York #3051). All part of capturing provenance.

Provenance is essentially where you bought the coin, who you bought it from, who owned it previously (e.g. Willis) and where they bought it. Provenance helps establish authenticity and, for many, it is an aspect of desirability. My provenance field captures anything not already recorded about the auction and is a free form text field.

Hammered or milled: was the coin made by machine press or made by whacking the blank with a great big hammer (which is what they used to do in the olden days)?

Raw or slabbed. Is the coin 'loose' or is it encapsulated in a holder by a third party grading company such as PCGS?

Certificate is the number given by the third party grading company. It can be looked up by a prospective buyer/seller to establish authenticity.

Cloning records is handy if, for example, you buy another 1933 penny to add to the three you already have. You don't need to retype the whole record, just the fields which have changed.

Hope these comments help.

Edited November 14, 2016 by jaggy

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Thanks all, these comments are very helpful and I'll add fields to the default 'one-click designs' in the next few days and let you know !

 

Picking up on a few points though about the software:

 

Are any number of images supported, together with image captions?  Yes, you can add as many images as you like to a record. You can also choose one of the images to be the one that represents the record and is the first one displayed when you select a record. Images can be sourced from a file, by grabbing from the screen or getting them directly from a webcam. All images support captions. Captions can be displayed in reports if desired.

 

Just to mention that a record can also have links to websites or links to files (you might have for instance some in-depth information in a pdf about a coin that you want to embed into the record). You can add all sorts of file types and a copy of the file is embedded in the database.

 

Ability to add notes on a coin? Absolutely. A key point is that you can design as many full text fields as you like. I'll be tweaking the default coin designs to add 'Provenance' as a full text field now that you've kindly explained what it means. 

 

Is it available as an app on smart devices? Unfortunately not. That's a big undertaking and it's hard to give all things to all people particularly with the differences in technology that's out there. IMO desktop apps generally have richer features even though I fully understand the convenience of smartphones etc. Just to mention though - CollectAny works fine on a windows tablet (I use one a lot of the time). 

 

Does it have a web front end with a web site to publish to (so I can share and view from any on-line device)? Again it doesn't. Hosting other peoples data on a website is another big undertaking with possible implications (not all people would want to collect 'good' things). However one of the key ideas with CollectAny is to contain a collection in a single, portable (CollectionSet) file. These files are just like any other file in that they can be emailed, put on the cloud (GoogleDrive, OneDrive, DropBox etc), backed up etc. CollectAny can import from these files (i.e adding records into your existing collection) and if you want you can just export part of your collection (even just one record) to a CollectSet file. The concept is that this file type is in effect just a 'container' for transporting content-rich data.

Add different prices from various up to date publications which then would give them an average price for grade? Definitely do-able. This sounds like something that individual collectors would want to tweak in their own designs. CollectAny has a comprehensive ability to use calculated fields. So you could for example have a whole set of price fields representing the prices from a number of publications then have a calculated average field within the record that could automatically calculate the average price.  I think I need to add another video to our website covering this aspect too !

 

Finally I want to briefly mention that the app also allows a powerful 'sub-collection' ability. For example I've seen quite a few posts here where there is a lot of background information given about the monarch or royalty figure on the coin. In CollectAny you could have this sort of person-information as a sub-collection. The record for a coin could be linked to a record in the sub-collection that describes the person. The coin report could automatically indent this sub-record when displayed. I can give a better example if anyone is interested.

 

Regards

Jeremy Leach
WarmBreeze Software

Edited November 15, 2016 by Jeremy Leach

[azda 983]

Will there be a future MacBook version or are you sticking with just windows based?

[Jeremy Leach 1]

Hi, here's one of the videos I said I'd create (also in the tutorials section of the www.collectany.com website).  It describes the process of editing an existing design for anyone that's interested. Basically it shows how you can take the default coin collection offered by the 'one-click designer' and customise it however you like.

Also, to answer your question azda - unfortunately we don't currently have any plans to make a MacBook version.

 

Regards

Jeremy

WarmBreeze Software

 

 

 

[jaggy 528]

10 hours ago, azda said:

Will there be a future MacBook version or are you sticking with just windows based?

I built my own MacBook collecting program with a $25 product called Steward (out of the app store). It is essentially a database product that allows you to define the fields you want and call them what you want.

[azda 983]

11 hours ago, jaggy said:

I built my own MacBook collecting program with a $25 product called Steward (out of the app store). It is essentially a database product that allows you to define the fields you want and call them what you want.

Interesting, will have a look