So how do you use this thing anyway? First, Use Firefox if you can. The other browsers should work but are not tested as thoroughly (for example deleting locations is quirky in IE at the moment). If you find issues, or would like to contact us for any other reason, click here, comments or feedback are greatly appreciated.

The books that are in CodexMap are tagged with location data, called Locations. They've either been created by an automated process, or some person has tagged them manually. You can do the same if you go to the book page for a particular book (more on that later). The basic idea of CodexMap is finding books on the map. There are a few different ways to do that.

The simplest way to find books on the map is to move the map using the standard Google Map controls to move to a region of interest, and then hit "search map". This will show you all the books tagged with a location that's inside the display window (note that books can exist in more than one location).

Locations

Another way is to look at the Locations tagcloud displayed over on the right side of the screen. The tags shown are the most popular locations for the current list of books being displayed. For example, if you zoom in to a region and hit "search map", the Locations will update to show the list of most popular Locations of books in the current result list. Or you can select a Location from the list. That will move you to that location on the map, and change the results list to show books tagged with that location. If you just want to move the map, but not change the book result list, hit the globe icon ()next to the Location. You can add locations to books in the database - more on that later.

A 3rd way to find books is to just double click on a region of the map - that will zoom in on the map, and re-filter the booklist to include only books in that region.

Looking at Books

If you click on one of the Markers on the map, you'll get a popup that shows you the title and coverart of the book - if you click through on the title, you'll be taken to the page for that book. You can also just click on the title of book in the Booklist.

Searching

You can also search - the search box will search on Location, Title, Author, and return any matching books. As you type, if you pause for a moment, the system will show candidates that match your search so far, and will indicate whether the suggestion is a Location, an Author, or a Title. Also if you type in a location the system recognizes it will move the map to that location.

As you search, navigate, or select tags, the system will leave a breadcrumb to show you what you've done (shown in the window banner at the top of the screen).

With any action you take, the Booklist and the Locations lists will be updated. You can hide/show the Booklist and/or Locations windows by clicking on the Booklist button or the Locations button, respectively. As you drag your cursor over the Books shown in the Booklist, you'll get a popup of the book's cover art, if we have it. If you click thru, you'll go to the Book page for that book. By default, the Booklist is sorted by the date the book was added to our database; if you select on the Title or Author button, the Booklist will be resorted according to those attributes of the book. By the way, if you don't like the locations of the Booklist or the Locations, just click-n-drag them somewhere you like better.

The Redisplay button will re-display the book markers for the current screen area, if you have been moving the map around manually - but it won't change the Booklist or the Locations. The Add button does - well, you can figure out what it's supposed to do - but right now it only works for me.

Book Pages

Once you get to a book page, you'll see lots of information about the book. There's links to other interesting books sites (Amazon, LibraryThing, Googlebooks), as well as a list of the Locations known about the book. Some of these locations may look wrong - if so, feel free to correct them! If you click on the location, you will pivot back to the main Booklist page, as if you had selected that location from the Locations list. The red X ()deletes this particular Location from this book; the globe () moves the map at the right to that location, and the W ()takes you to the Wikipedia page for that location. If you want to add a location, go to the search box, type your location, and hit enter or the Search button. You should see a green balloon show up in your location. If it's the one you want, hit Save - te screen should refresh and you will see your new location added, and now people can find this book based on the location you added! You will also see on this page the Amazon book description for this book. And some ads which we hope are of interest (hey we gotta pay for this somehow!).