How to move a book to another shelf without duplicating the book ??

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Thanks Terry for your answer but to me it still looks like that this is a bug not a feature ;)

Vladirmi-

I wouldn't call this a bug. The issue here is what exactly a "Shelf" is. What you want is a direct metaphor for physical locations - a single book can be in one place at a time. However, DL has always treated shelves as collections, exactly like an iTunes playlist. The same item, which exists once in your master Library, can belong to as many "playlists" as you want it to. That's why it isn't a bug; anyone wanting to use the same item in multiple shelves needs this behavior (categorizing one book in one shelf for "Fiction," one shelf for "Signed," and one shelf for "Recently Read," maybe).

What I recommend for you is to create a few Smart shelves, using the "Location" field as their criterion. One shelf for "Location is Bedroom," another for "Location is Livingroom". All you'll need to do is enter that data for the specific titles, something you can do with the existing standard shelves you have: go to your standard "Bedroom" shelf, "Select All" via the "Edit" menu, and enter in the appropriate "Location" info in that field. Repeat for Livingroom, and then from now on, if you move a title from one room to another, all you have to do is change that item's location field to match, and voila, you're set with automatically-sorted shelves, with each item in one place. The standard shelves can be deleted, and the smart shelves will stay up-to-date as long as you enter the data in the item.

If you have any trouble, post it here, and I'll be happy to help out some more.

Hutson - While I like your suggestion, I don't like the extra amount of work required. Things could be more intuitive than this.

I wish there was a separate container type (which I'd personally call shelves, because I think of them as physical things, vs. collections, which are a bit more abstract and nebulous) that when I dragged an item from one 'physical shelf' to another, it would automatically remove that item from its current location, and put it on the other. That is what I really wish the default behavior was.

Failing that, I'd ask for a modifier key that I could hold down to 'move' instead of 'copy', and maybe even a preference (or even just a 'defaults write com.delicious-monster.library2 FlipModifierKeyDragBehavior true' command ;)

My bottom line is, I don't want to remember where stuff is in my house, I want this program to. Heck, if I scan something *again* with the bluetooth scanner, I want to easily be able to tell the program, "*MOVE* re-scanned items to the current shelf instead of recreating or duplicating them." That would help me stay organized.

The default behavior will likely never be what you're asking for; it's such a radical departure for the DL2 "metaphor" of shelf as collection (leading most users to become very used to treating them like iTunes playlists with single entries in multiple shelves) that the DM team would be very hesitant to change it.

However, in a lot of ways, I agree with you; "Location" could do with a visual analogue, something more than just a text field. I imagine another section like the "Friends" and "Shelves" areas, called "Location." Then, you could do exactly as you ask; drag from one "Location" directly to another, with no duplicate entries.

This behavior is *very* close to the way "Friends" entries work; a title csn only be in one "Friend" at a time, and dragging from one to another moves it accordingly. Theoretically, you could just create "Friends" of your locations, and use those. Of course, this also checks out the item, so unless you're okay with your items being checked out/over due all the time, this isn't really an option. But that functionality is a solid model on which to base a location system, and worth suggesting in the feature idea section.

Done. Thank you!

Well, I guess I spoke too soon. Sorry everyone!!!

(and I'm very glad to hear your issue is going to be resolved, Thom)

Was this modifier key ever added?

If so, what is it?

And I suppose more generally, is there a list of the modifier keys available somewhere?