Book and shelf labels

A book record can carry its Dewey Decimal number (813.54) and its Library of Congress classification (PS3527.A15 L6 1955). Like format, these are catalogue facts about the edition: they fill in automatically where OpenLibrary or the Library of Congress knows them, they are shared by every library that owns the book, and a value already recorded — whether it came from a source or was typed in — is never overwritten by a later lookup.

Each copy can also carry its own call number — the text you actually shelve it by: a simplified Dewey with author letters ("813 FIT"), "F BRO" for fiction, "J 597 SMI" for the children’s shelf, "B WAS" for a biography, or a full LC call number. Two copies of one book can shelve differently. When a copy has no call number of its own, the book’s Dewey or LC number stands in for it, so a library that shelves by plain Dewey never types anything.

1. To set a book’s Dewey or LC number, open the book and tap Edit — both sit beside Format. The Dewey field takes a class number only (813.54, 92); shelving text such as "F FIT" is refused there and belongs in the copy’s call number.
2. To set a copy’s call number, edit that copy and open Collector details — Call number is the first field.
3. To browse in shelf order, open the sort menu on My Library and choose "Shelf order — Dewey" or "Shelf order — Library of Congress". Copies are ordered by their effective call number, digit by digit the way a shelf reads (813.54 before 813.6, A15 before A2), with copies that have no number at the end. Recently added stays the default. The phone app offers the same two orders.

Editing the book-level numbers follows the usual review path: filling in an empty one applies straight away, changing one that already has a value is queued for review while your copy shows your value in the meantime. A copy’s call number is yours to change at any time and never goes to review. The three fields appear under the book’s Classification details only when set, travel in your CSV export and JSON backup, and the effective call number is shown to visitors of your public catalogue, where it is the number printed on the spine they are walking to.

Browse by classification (My Library → Library tools → Reports, or "Browse by classification" under Collection insights) shows what your library holds under each Dewey or Library of Congress class. Choose Dewey or Library of Congress at the top; each class reads "4 copies · 3 books" — copies because two copies of one book can be shelved apart, books because the list it opens shows each book once. Press a class name to go one level down, and the count to open My Library showing exactly those books in shelf order. The class then sits among your filters, combines with the others and can be kept in a saved view. Every member of the library can browse it, Guests included; it changes nothing. It is on the website only: the phone app shows the numbers on each book but has no browser.

The words beside a number come from public label lists, and the page and the book’s Classification details always say which. Dewey labels come from the Free Decimal Correspondence, a public-domain list based on the 1922 edition of Dewey, and are shown for the hundreds and tens only (306.7 is labelled "300 Social sciences"), because some of its finer 1922 meanings differ from today’s. LC labels come from the Library of Congress Classification Outline, down to the narrowest outline range that contains the number (HQ12 .F6813 sits in HQ12-449, Sexual life); Cutters and dates are never labelled. Where a number goes further than the labels do, the page says finer divisions are not in the label data. Your full number is always shown as you wrote it.

A copy is placed by its own call number when that is a number of the scheme, so "REF 220.3 ALE" browses under 220. A copy shelved under a local label such as "F FIT" is placed by its book’s Dewey or LC number instead, and the browser counts it as shelved under a local label. Numbers that are not a class — "[Fic]", a two-digit "92", "REF 220.3" when browsing LC — are counted under "Not recognised", with examples, and copies with no number at all under "No number"; both open the matching books so you can fix them. A book with copies in two classes appears under both.

Collection insights has a "By classification" section: how many books carry a Dewey or an LC number, and the classes with the most books, each opening the browser. It counts books; the browser also counts copies. With only a handful of classified books it says there is too little to break down yet.

Labels bridge the physical shelf and the app. A shelf label’s QR code opens your library filtered to that location — scan it to see everything meant to be there. Each copy gets its own book label, and each label prints a short copy identifier (like #4A7C2B), so you can tell apart several copies of the same title in the hand. A book label’s QR code now names that copy too: it opens the book’s page with that very copy picked out.

What a scanned book label opens depends on who scans it. An Admin or Member of the library that holds the copy, signed in, sees the book’s page with that copy’s card opened and outlined under Holdings, headed "The copy on the label you scanned". If the copy belongs to another library you are an Admin or Member of, the page says so and offers "Switch to <library> to open this copy" — the app never switches library by itself. Anyone else — signed out, a Guest, or someone outside your library — sees the ordinary public book page, with nothing about your copy, its shelf or your library; knowing a label’s code gives nobody access. A copy that has been removed, or moved to a library you are not in, simply opens the book: the page never picks another copy in its place.

Labels you printed before this change keep working exactly as before — their QR code opens the book’s page and you choose the copy yourself — so there is nothing to reprint. Print new labels whenever you want the QR code to go straight to the copy.

1. Open My Library → Library tools → Reports.
2. To print shelf labels for one location, filter the library to that location first, then choose "Print shelf label" (or "Print shelf label" in the Shelf actions row) — with no filter active, choose "Print shelf labels" to print every location at once.
3. To print book labels, filter the library to a location, then choose "Print book labels for this shelf" (or "Print book labels" in the Shelf actions row) — this prints one label per copy currently in that location and in the locations inside it.
4. On the print page, choose the label layout: Title / author (the default) or Call number, which prints each copy’s effective call number stacked the way library suppliers do — the Dewey number over the author letters, or an LC class over each cutter and the year — with the copy identifier and a small title beneath and the same copy QR code. Pick whether copies without a call number of their own fall back to the book’s Dewey or LC number; a copy with neither prints the title / author label instead, and the page says how many did. The choice applies to that print only.
5. Click "Print / Save as PDF" — this uses your browser’s normal print dialog, so plain paper, label sheets, or Save as PDF all work.

Printing labels only reads your catalog and never changes it — it’s available to any library member, including guests.

Editing locations, copies, collector details, and photos is available to Library admins and members; guests can browse but not change them.

• Adding Books →
• Sharing a Library — roles →

There are two kinds of label, and they do different jobs. A shelf label goes on a shelf, a bookcase or a room, and its QR code opens your library showing just what is recorded there. A book label goes in one particular copy of a book: it prints the title and author (or a call number), a short copy id such as #4A7C2B, and a QR code that opens that exact copy. Together they let you go from the thing in your hand to its record, and from a shelf to the list of what belongs on it.

1. Give every place a location first — rooms, bookcases and shelves, nested the way they really are (see Rooms & shelves). A shelf label can only exist for a location, and book labels are printed shelf by shelf.
2. Record where each copy stands: on a book’s page choose its location, or put a whole batch on a shelf at once with Select (see Moving many books at once). A copy with no location is left off every book-label sheet; the "Missing: location" filter finds them.
3. Print the shelf labels. With no filter on, My Library → Library tools → Reports → "Print shelf labels" prints one for every location; filtered to one location, "Print shelf label" prints just that one.
4. Print the book labels one shelf at a time. Filter My Library to a shelf and choose "Print book labels" in the Shelf actions row (or "Print book labels for this shelf" under Library tools → Reports). You get one label for every copy recorded on that shelf and on anything inside it. Two copies of the same book get two labels, marked "Copy 1/2" and "Copy 2/2".
5. On the print page pick a layout — Title / author, or Call number if you shelve by Dewey or LC — then press "Print / Save as PDF".
6. In the print dialog set the scale to 100% ("Actual size"), not "Fit to page". A shrunk sheet still prints, but the QR codes come out too small for some phones to read.
7. Cut the labels out along their borders and put each one in the copy whose title and copy id it shows.

Sizes and paper: a book label prints 2.6 × 1.2 inches and a shelf label 2.6 × 1.1 inches, each with a thin border to cut along. They are not laid out for any brand’s pre-cut label sheet, so the borders will not line up with die-cut stickers. Full-page sticker paper that you cut yourself works well, and so does plain paper with tape, or a paper slip.

Where to put them: a shelf label on the front edge of the shelf or the end of the bookcase, where a phone can reach it. A book label inside the front cover or on the first blank page is easy to find and never sits on the spine where it would be rubbed off. For collectible or valuable books, and for dust jackets, don’t stick anything to the book: tuck the label in on a paper slip or bookmark, or use a removable, acid-free label, because an adhesive label lowers what a collectible copy is worth.

A book label belongs to its copy, not to its shelf. Its QR code names the copy, so when you move a book to another shelf the label keeps working: just record the new location. A shelf label names its location, so renaming the shelf does not break it either. You only need to reprint when a label is lost or damaged, or when you add books — print that shelf again and use the labels for the new copies.

• Rooms and shelves →
• Call numbers & shelf order →

Find a book’s record from the book in your hand: point your phone’s own camera at the book label and open the link it offers. Your browser opens the book’s page on the website with that copy’s card opened and outlined under Holdings, as long as you are signed in to the website there as an Admin or Member of its library. Sign in once in your phone’s browser and it stays signed in. The AllMyBooks app’s Scan tab reads the barcode on the back of a book, not the QR code on a label.

See what belongs on a shelf: scan the shelf label the same way. My Library opens filtered to that location, with the Shelf actions row for it — print its labels again, move books, or start a check. Compare the list with what is actually there.

Take stock with a shelf check: filter to the shelf and press "Check this shelf", then scan each book’s label, or type the copy id printed on it. Shelf checks run on the website, and the scan box reads what a USB or Bluetooth barcode scanner types. Book labels are QR codes, so the scanner has to read 2D codes (often sold as "2D" or "QR" scanners); many cheap barcode scanners read only the striped barcodes on the back of a book. With no scanner, type the copy id or press "Seen". A book label names its copy, so the check ticks off exactly that copy and never has to ask "Which copy?".

Lend and take back at the circulation desk (My Library → Library tools → Lending → Circulation desk): scan the patron’s card, then each book’s label, and the desk adds exactly the copy on the label — never another copy of the same book. When books come back, switch the desk to Return mode and scan their labels. Like a shelf check, the desk reads what a scanner types, so it needs a scanner that reads QR codes; the printed copy id can always be typed instead.

Tell copies apart: when you own two or more copies of the same book, the copy id on each label (#4A7C2B) matches the one shown on that copy’s card on the book page, so you always know which copy you are holding — the signed first edition or the reading copy.

When someone else scans a label: a visitor, a borrower or anyone who finds the book sees only the ordinary public book page — title, author, cover and description. Nothing about your copy, where it is kept or who owns it is shown, so a label is safe to leave in a lent book.

• Checking a shelf →
• The circulation desk →
• The Phone App — scanning a book label →
• Sharing Your Library — book labels are not a share link →