Welcome to CATVids!

CATVids is a powerful database program designed to help you catalog and manage your video collection. CATVids works perfectly with all types of media, including DVDs, VHS tapes and Laserdiscs. It will keep track of not only your pre-recorded media, but also movies, television programs and home videos which you record. Using CATVids you can quickly catalog your movies by downloading information from the Internet. Designed for the Windows environment, CATVids is comprehensive, intuitive, and easy to use. For more information, see What is CATVids? and key features.

Before you can start cataloging your collection, you must open a database or create a new database. The first time you start CATVids, the sample database (Sample.mdb) is automatically opened.

The main window is divided into three parts: The menu/toolbar at the top of the window, the view bar to the left (if you can't see the view bar, choose View Bar from the View menu). The rest of the window is occupied by the active view. There are a total of six different views: the Explorer View, Video View, Contents View, Loan View, Lookup View and Want List View. In addition, you can create your own custom views, enabling you to easily access relevant information in your database (videos, movies, tv-series, actors, directors, etc.).

When you open a database, the program activates the Video view. To activate another view, click the view you want to activate in the view bar, or select from the View menu. For example, to activate the Explorer View, click Explorer View in the View bar (choose Explorer View from the View menu). The Explorer is a fully featured browser integrated into the main window that allows you to search/browse your collection.

You will probably use the Video view the most. This is the view you use when you want to add new videos. To active the Video view, click Video View in the View bar (choose Video View from the View menu).

All views, except the Explorer view, utilize the same layout. The main part of the view is occupied by the browse list. Above the browse list, there are three drop-down lists. (If you cannot see these lists, choose Lists -> Layout / Sort Order / Filter from the View menu.)

The drop-down list to the left includes available list layouts. A list layout contains information about which fields to display in the list. You can create as many list layouts as you want.

The drop-down list in the middle includes available sort orders. A sort order defines the order in which data are displayed. The data in the database remains the same; only the way data is being displayed changes.

The drop-down list to the right includes available filters. A filter is used to determine which records that are displayed in the browse list, and makes it possible to work with a subset of the database (for example, videos that you have purchased this year).

To the left of the browse list is the drop-down list which includes available grouping definitions. Below is the grouping values list. (If you cannot see these two lists, choose Lists -> Grouping from the View menu.)

The grouping feature is used to determine which videos that are displayed in the browse list, and makes it possible to work with a subset of the database (for example, only DVDs). Using the grouping feature is similar to using a filter, except that it is easier to change the value used in the filtering process.

To add a new video and manually enter the data, choose Add from the Video menu (or press Ctrl + N). To get the data from the Internet, choose Add - Download from Internet from the Video menu. To edit a video, double-click the video in the browse list. You see the 'Video Edit' window.

To close the data entry window, click the OK button. All changes are automatically saved.

If you need support, don't hesitate to contact us. If you want to order CATVids, please see our web site.

We hope you enjoy using CATVids!