#Amazon scraping tool

[iwebdatascrape]

Amazon product data scraper | Amazon scraping tool

Improve product design, & find the correct prices using our Amazon product data scraper. Use the Amazon product scraping tool to create a perfect marketing campaign.

[iwebscrapingblogs]

Which are The Best Scraping Tools For Amazon Web Data Extraction?

In the vast expanse of e-commerce, Amazon stands as a colossus, offering an extensive array of products and services to millions of customers worldwide. For businesses and researchers, extracting data from Amazon's platform can unlock valuable insights into market trends, competitor analysis, pricing strategies, and more. However, manual data collection is time-consuming and inefficient. Enter web scraping tools, which automate the process, allowing users to extract large volumes of data quickly and efficiently. In this article, we'll explore some of the best scraping tools tailored for Amazon web data extraction.

Scrapy: Scrapy is a powerful and flexible web crawling framework written in Python. It provides a robust set of tools for extracting data from websites, including Amazon. With its high-level architecture and built-in support for handling dynamic content, Scrapy makes it relatively straightforward to scrape product listings, reviews, prices, and other relevant information from Amazon's pages. Its extensibility and scalability make it an excellent choice for both small-scale and large-scale data extraction projects.

Octoparse: Octoparse is a user-friendly web scraping tool that offers a point-and-click interface, making it accessible to users with limited programming knowledge. It allows you to create custom scraping workflows by visually selecting the elements you want to extract from Amazon's website. Octoparse also provides advanced features such as automatic IP rotation, CAPTCHA solving, and cloud extraction, making it suitable for handling complex scraping tasks with ease.

ParseHub: ParseHub is another intuitive web scraping tool that excels at extracting data from dynamic websites like Amazon. Its visual point-and-click interface allows users to build scraping agents without writing a single line of code. ParseHub's advanced features include support for AJAX, infinite scrolling, and pagination, ensuring comprehensive data extraction from Amazon's product listings, reviews, and more. It also offers scheduling and API integration capabilities, making it a versatile solution for data-driven businesses.

Apify: Apify is a cloud-based web scraping and automation platform that provides a range of tools for extracting data from Amazon and other websites. Its actor-based architecture allows users to create custom scraping scripts using JavaScript or TypeScript, leveraging the power of headless browsers like Puppeteer and Playwright. Apify offers pre-built actors for scraping Amazon product listings, reviews, and seller information, enabling rapid development and deployment of scraping workflows without the need for infrastructure management.

Beautiful Soup: Beautiful Soup is a Python library for parsing HTML and XML documents, often used in conjunction with web scraping frameworks like Scrapy or Selenium. While it lacks the built-in web crawling capabilities of Scrapy, Beautiful Soup excels at extracting data from static web pages, including Amazon product listings and reviews. Its simplicity and ease of use make it a popular choice for beginners and Python enthusiasts looking to perform basic scraping tasks without a steep learning curve.

Selenium: Selenium is a powerful browser automation tool that can be used for web scraping Amazon and other dynamic websites. It allows you to simulate user interactions, such as clicking buttons, filling out forms, and scrolling through pages, making it ideal for scraping JavaScript-heavy sites like Amazon. Selenium's Python bindings provide a convenient interface for writing scraping scripts, enabling you to extract data from Amazon's product pages with ease.

In conclusion, the best scraping tool for Amazon web data extraction depends on your specific requirements, technical expertise, and budget. Whether you prefer a user-friendly point-and-click interface or a more hands-on approach using Python scripting, there are plenty of options available to suit your needs. By leveraging the power of web scraping tools, you can unlock valuable insights from Amazon's vast trove of data, empowering your business or research endeavors with actionable intelligence.

[actowiz-123]

Amazon Product Reviews & Ratings Scraper | Product Reviews & Ratings Scraping Tools

With Amazon scraper, extract Amazon products reviews. Use Product Reviews & Ratings Scraping Tools to scrape data like ratings, etc. in countries like USA, UK, UAE.

[web-scraping-tutorial-blog]

Way to download Amazon thumbnails

Amazon is a multinational technology and e-commerce company based in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994, it started as an online bookstore and has since expanded into a wide range of products and services. Amazon is one of the world's largest online retailers, offering a vast selection of items, including books, electronics, clothing, home goods, and more.

Introduction to the scraping tool

ScrapeStorm is a new generation of Web Scraping Tool based on artificial intelligence technology. It is the first scraper to support both Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.

Preview of the scraped result

Export images to local:

1. Create a task

(1) Copy the URL

(2) Create a new smart mode task

You can create a new scraping task directly on the software, or you can create a task by importing rules.

How to create a smart mode task

How to import and export scraping task

2. Configure the scraping rules

Smart mode automatically detects the fields on the page. You can right-click the field to rename the name, add or delete fields, modify data, and so on.

How to set the fields

3. Set up and start the scraping task

(1) Run settings

Choose your own needs, you can set Schedule, IP Rotation&Delay, Automatic Export, Download Images, Speed Boost, Data Deduplication and Developer.

How to configure the scraping task

(2)Wait a moment, you will see the data being scraped.

4. Export and view data

(1) Click "Export" to download your data.

(2) Choose the format to export according to your needs.

ScrapeStorm provides a variety of export methods to export locally, such as excel, csv, html, txt or database. Professional Plan and above users can also post directly to wordpress.

How to view data and clear data

How to export data

[actosoluions]

Amazon Product Offers and Sellers Scraper | Scraping Tools

With Amazon Product Offers & Sellers Scraper, scrape Product Offers data. Use Scraping Tools to scrape data like seller pricing in countries like USA, UK, UAE.

[nowoyas]

Trying to make sense of the Nanowrimo statement to the best of my abilities and fuck, man. It's hard.

It's hard because it seems to me that, first and foremost, the organization itself has forgotten the fucking point.

Nanowrimo was never about the words themselves. It was never about having fifty thousand marketable words to sell to publishing companies and then to the masses. It was a challenge, and it was hard, and it is hard, and it's supposed to be. The point is that it's hard. It's hard to sit down and carve out time and create a world and create characters and turn these things into a coherent plot with themes and emotional impact and an ending that's satisfying. It's hard to go back and make changes and edit those into something likable, something that feels worth reading. It's hard to find a beautifully-written scene in your document and have to make the decision that it's beautiful but it doesn't work in the broader context. It's fucking hard.

Writing and editing are skills. You build them and you hone them. Writing the way the challenge initially encouraged--don't listen to that voice in your head that's nitpicking every word on the page, put off the criticism for a later date, for now just let go and get your thoughts out--is even a different skill from writing in general. Some people don't particularly care about refining that skill to some end goal or another, and simply want to play. Some people sit down and try to improve and improve and improve because that is meaningful to them. Some are in a weird in-between where they don't really know what they want, and some have always liked the idea of writing and wanted a place to start. The challenge was a good place for this--sit down, put your butt in a chair, open a blank document, and by the end of the month, try to put fifty thousand words in that document.

How does it make you feel to try? Your wrists ache and you don't feel like any of the words were any good, but didn't you learn something about the process? Re-reading it, don't you think it sounds better if you swap these two sentences, if you replace this word, if you take out this comma? Maybe you didn't hit 50k words. Maybe you only wrote 10k. But isn't it cool, that you wrote ten thousand words? Doesn't it feel nice that you did something? We can try again. We can keep getting better, or just throwing ourselves into it for fun or whatever, and we can do it again and again.

I guess I don't completely know where I'm going with this post. If you've followed me or many tumblr users for any amount of time, you've probably already heard a thousand times about how generative AI hurts the environment so many of us have been so desperately trying to save, about how generative AI is again and again used to exploit big authors, little authors, up-and-coming authors, first time authors, people posting on Ao3 as a hobby, people self-publishing e-books on Amazon, traditionally published authors, and everyone in between. You've probably seen the statements from developers of these "tools", things like how being required to obtain permission for everything in the database used to train the language model would destroy the tool entirely. You've seen posts about new AI tools scraping Ao3 so they can make money off someone else's hobby and putting the legality of the site itself at risk. For an organization that used to dedicate itself to making writing more accessible for people and for creating a community of writers, Nanowrimo has spent the past several years systematically cracking that community to bits, and now, it's made an official statement claiming that the exploitation of writers in its community is okay, because otherwise, someone might find it too hard to complete a challenge that's meant to be hard to begin with.

I couldn't thank Nanowrimo enough for what it did for me when I started out. I don't know how to find community in the same way. But you can bet that I've deleted my account, and I'll be finding my own path forward without it. Thanks for the fucking memories, I guess.

[miltonsamuel]

First Aid Kits in BC: Building the Right Kit for Your Home or Car

A well-stocked first aid kit is an essential safety tool, whether you're at home, on the road, or exploring BC’s great outdoors. Having the right supplies can make all the difference in an emergency. This guide will help you build the best first aid kit in BC, tailored to your needs.

Why You Need a First Aid Kit

Emergencies can happen anywhere, from minor cuts and burns to more serious injuries. A first aid kit helps you act fast and properly, stopping problems from getting worse before professional help comes.

Key Benefits:

Immediate care for minor injuries

Prevention of infections and complications

Preparedness for unexpected emergencies

First Aid Kit Checklist for Different Situations

Each environment requires a slightly different set of first aid supplies. Below are essential items for home, car, and outdoor adventure kits.

1. Home First Aid Kit

A home kit should be well-stocked for common household injuries like cuts, burns, and allergic reactions.

Essential Items:

Adhesive bandages (various sizes)—for minor cuts and scrapes

Sterile gauze pads and adhesive tape—for larger wounds

Antiseptic wipes & hydrogen peroxide: To clean wounds

Antibiotic ointment helps prevent infections

Burn cream or gel: Treats minor burns

Tweezers & scissors: For removing splinters or cutting bandages

Digital thermometer: Monitors fever

Instant cold packs reduce swelling from sprains or bumps

Pain relievers (acetaminophen, ibuprofen): for headaches, fever, or pain relief

Antihistamines: Treats allergic reactions

CPR face shield & gloves protects against contamination during CPR

Emergency contact numbers include local emergency services and poison control

2. Car First Aid Kit

A car kit should prepare you for roadside emergencies, including minor injuries and delays in remote areas.

Essential Items (in addition to the Home Kit):

Emergency blanket: Provides warmth in cold conditions

Triangular bandages for immobilizing injuries

Tourniquet: In case of severe bleeding

Reflective safety vest & flashlight—for nighttime visibility

Whistle: Helps signal for help

Bottled water and non-perishable snacks—in case of being stranded

Duct tape: multi-use emergency tool

3. Outdoor Adventure First Aid Kit

If you’re hiking, camping, or exploring BC’s backcountry, you’ll need a lightweight but comprehensive kit tailored to outdoor risks.

Essential Items (in addition to the car kit):

Moleskin & blister pads prevents and treats blisters

Emergency bivvy sack: Provides shelter if stranded

Water purification tablets ensure safe drinking water

Snake bite kit: for treating bites in remote areas

Tick removal tool removes ticks safely

Electrolyte tablets prevent dehydration

Bear spray essential for wilderness safety

Maintaining Your First Aid Kit

Once your kit is stocked, it’s important to maintain it properly.

Check expiration dates on medications and ointments.

Restock used supplies immediately.

Store in a waterproof container to protect items from moisture and damage.

Review emergency contacts periodically to keep them up to date.

Where to Buy First Aid Kits in BC

You can purchase pre-assembled first aid kits at:

Pharmacies (Shoppers Drug Mart, London Drugs)

Outdoor stores (MEC, Canadian Tire)

Online retailers (Amazon, Red Cross Canada)

For those looking for a customized first aid kit, consider assembling one based on this checklist to match your specific needs.

Final Thoughts

Being prepared with a first aid kit ensures you can handle minor injuries and emergencies wherever you are. Whether at home, in your car, or out in BC’s wilderness, a well-stocked kit can provide peace of mind and potentially save lives. Check your kit regularly, update supplies, and stay ready for any situation.

[athena-gundampla]

I was thinking about getting into models cuz I like puttin stuff together y'know, so where should I start with this kinda stuff? Like any specific model shops or suggestions or swagever

I'm not sure I can reccommend any specific model stores as I'm not sure what's most accessible and cheapest where you're living.

In terms of where to start, I think the best place to start is probably with some of Bandai's snap kits. Bandai's sprue engineering is pretty great, and their snap kits are all mostly colour correct from the get-go, with a few colour correction stickers depending on the kit. I think the simplest place to start is probably the Bandai Pokemon Quick Model Kits - these are designed to be pressed rather than cut out of the sprue/runners, and snap together very quickly, usually within 15 minutes.

I think most hobby stores with model kits should have some of these, and they're reliatively inexpensive.

Another place to start is with Bandai's Entry Grade kits. They've got quite a few, with 5-6 gundam themed ones, but also some from other anime franchises. The Entry Grade kits are a little more time consuming and complex, but completely novice friendly. I think pretty much all you need for those is a set of nippers, and maybe a modeling knife to scrape off mould lines and the little nubs left from where you cut it off the sprue. Again, what kits you get will depend on what's available near you, but I reccomend the EG Lah Gundam and the EG Build Strike Exceed Galaxy, which I feel are the highest quality. I've got reviews for both of these kits as well.

You should be able to get the correct set of nippers from the same store, usually you can find packs or just a few types of nipper individually. Bandai does an "Entry Grade nipper" but it's not really worth the cheap price as it's not really going to last. You can get these super cheap gunpla tool sets off Amazon, and those will definitely last a decent amount of time. I'm still using a lot of the tools I got from that initial set, and it cost me like $14.

If you want to step up from the Entry Grade kits, I think the best place to start with HG kits is the Witch From Mercury line, like the HG Lfrith. These are also pretty beginner friendly, but they're also more complex. Other HG gunpla is a little more difficult, requiring a lot of mould line removal, super close attention to detail when following the instructions, and in the older ones, a lot of colour correction painting. You can note older gunpla or bandai kits in general with the red rather than blue logo.

Definitely don't pick up any Real Grade or Master Grade kits as a beginner - I've seen some people reccommend MG as a beginner kit due to the larger scale, but I feel like the pieces aren't necessarily bigger and they're also pretty complex. RG kits have very small pieces and can be pretty difficult to put together as well.

If you're looking for non-gunpla kits from Bandai, they do a lot of Star Wars figures and vehicle models, as well as a few poseable Dragon Ball Z and Kamen Rider figures, and some static Demon Slayer statues. The Star Wars ones definitely aren't the *best*, as you've got to paint them a decent amount, especially the vehicles. The included stickers for the Star Wars kits are atrocious, and aren't worth the effort.

Otherwise, I think once you've tried model kit building with some of the Pokemon Quick Kits or an Entry Grade, Aoshima also does a few car snap kits, which also require pretty minimal painting.

If you're game to paint entire kits, I think the next level of complexity would be tank kits, affectionately referred to as "armour models". Tamiya's tank kits are definitely the most beginner friendly, as they dont require you to glue together each individual track link, but they do require you not only to cut out each piece from the runner, but to sand and file pieces to fit, and to remove flashing and mould lines that are a little more prominent. They're also not snap kits, which means rather than friction-fitting together like Bandai's kits, you need to buy plastic cement as well to glue the kit together. For a basic starter kit I think the best one is Tamiya's 1/35 M41 Bulldog, which has a pretty low parts count and shouldn't be too expensive. Tank kits are generally much more expensive than HG or even some RG gunpla, however, even ignoring the extra cost of tools and paint.

I know this is a suuuuuper long reply, but I hope you (and other curious beginnners) find it helpful!!

[legacysam]

so, with amazon getting more and more evil about not letting you own the things you buy from them, I finally went ahead and scraped the drm off my kindle books. while it did require a bunch of setup, the process itself was pretty easy and less intimidating than I had feared, so I want to share some helpful tools I used if you want to do the same but aren't sure where to start:

An excellent step-by-step video guide

Calibre (the main program you will need)

The de-drm extension you'll want to add to Calibre

A guide to downgrading the kindle for pc app to a version that makes this easier

[iwebscrapingblogs]

Various web scraping tools will help you to extract Amazon data to the spreadsheet. It is a reliable solution for scraping Amazon data and fetching valuable and important information.

For More Information:-

[mariacallous]

Considering Perplexity’s bold ambition and the investment it’s taken from Jeff Bezos’ family fund, Nvidia, and famed investor Balaji Srinivasan, among others, it’s surprisingly unclear what the AI search startup actually is.

Earlier this year, speaking to WIRED, Aravind Srinivas, Perplexity’s CEO, described his product—a chatbot that gives natural-language answers to prompts and can, the company says, access the internet in real time—as an “answer engine.” A few weeks later, shortly before a funding round valuing the company at a billion dollars was announced, he told Forbes, “It’s almost like Wikipedia and ChatGPT had a kid.” More recently, after Forbes accused Perplexity of plagiarizing its content, Srinivas told the AP it was a mere “aggregator of information.”

The Perplexity chatbot itself is more specific. Prompted to describe what Perplexity is, it provides text that reads, “Perplexity AI is an AI-powered search engine that combines features of traditional search engines and chatbots. It provides concise, real-time answers to user queries by pulling information from recent articles and indexing the web daily.”

A WIRED analysis and one carried out by developer Robb Knight suggest that Perplexity is able to achieve this partly through apparently ignoring a widely accepted web standard known as the Robots Exclusion Protocol to surreptitiously scrape areas of websites that operators do not want accessed by bots, despite claiming that it won’t. WIRED observed a machine tied to Perplexity—more specifically, one on an Amazon server and almost certainly operated by Perplexity—doing this on WIRED.com and across other Condé Nast publications.

The WIRED analysis also demonstrates that, despite claims that Perplexity’s tools provide “instant, reliable answers to any question with complete sources and citations included,” doing away with the need to “click on different links,” its chatbot, which is capable of accurately summarizing journalistic work with appropriate credit, is also prone to bullshitting, in the technical sense of the word.

WIRED provided the Perplexity chatbot with the headlines of dozens of articles published on our website this year, as well as prompts about the subjects of WIRED reporting. The results showed the chatbot at times closely paraphrasing WIRED stories, and at times summarizing stories inaccurately and with minimal attribution. In one case, the text it generated falsely claimed that WIRED had reported that a specific police officer in California had committed a crime. (The AP similarly identified an instance of the chatbot attributing fake quotes to real people.) Despite its apparent access to original WIRED reporting and its site hosting original WIRED art, though, none of the IP addresses publicly listed by the company left any identifiable trace in our server logs, raising the question of how exactly Perplexity’s system works.

Until earlier this week, Perplexity published in its documentation a link to a list of the IP addresses its crawlers use—an apparent effort to be transparent. However, in some cases, as both WIRED and Knight were able to demonstrate, it appears to be accessing and scraping websites from which coders have attempted to block its crawler, called Perplexity Bot, using at least one unpublicized IP address. The company has since removed references to its public IP pool from its documentation.

[helloenee]

Matlock (2024) (up to 1x09) 

Kathy Bates as the emotionally broken grandma who has somehow convinced herself and her husband to exact justice by... using a fake identity based on a 90s murder mystery show and infiltrating the law firm that contributed to her daughter's death?

I love Matty’s inappropriate grandma schtick. No one takes her seriously and the times where she does drop the mask, it’s like, oooooh. Matty is ruthless and she is so so aware of gender and age and people’s perceptions of her. But she’s also so vulnerable and she’s just an ordinary lady at the end of the day who decided to pursue this larger-than-life mission because she misses her daughter so much. I think her ordinary-ness makes her story so compelling. Her tricks are just manipulation and deceit and whatever techy tools her grandson gets her from Amazon. Quite frankly she’s always just scraping by by the skin of her teeth 

Matty is indeed very easy to talk to and I know it’s a real part of her - the compassion and empathy that she shows to others. Yet something within her is so broken up and twisted that she’s using that compassion and empathy (and all her wits and IMPROV SKILLS) as tools of her mission. Her and Edwin struggle every episode with this moral quandary - does the end justify the means? Are we in over our heads? Should we just… get a therapist? Let all this go in the past? Properly grieve our daughter instead of this… revenge mission? Matty is the driver of this mission and Edwin and Alfie have been convinced to be part of it. But how messed up is it that you are dragging your own grandson into your grief-striken spiral? Oh, Matty. 

I like that Matty is so good at using kernels of truth to lie. And those kernels of truth reveal so much about her. 

Commentary about women in the workplace - especially from someone with Matty’s life experience. There was a plot point where she lied about having to leave for a doctor’s appointment when it was for Alfie’s play. I forget the details of this story, but I remember being so stricken by Matty’s explanation of her deceit when Olympia confronted her. When Matty was in the workforce, women had to hide their familial obligations so as to not invite doubt about their commitment to work or their competency. It was survival tactic and Matty’s been so ingrained with this practice that she still does so when the workplace is a lot more understanding of family life. This wasn’t the only time Matty brought up the prevalent sexism in the workplace in the past. I like that this series doesn’t forget the life experiences of older women and always always reminds us of the progress that has been made. I think this series always puts such gravity in these moments, and it really touches upon the dignity of work, the self-preservation needed for success. I also just remembered - the casual harrassment that impacted Matty’s choice of specialization - just to avoid the abuser. The lost dreams of women who needed to make these choices.

Matlock is such a good show and it’s quickly becoming a comfort watch. 

Oh! Yes it is such a comforting show. Olympia takes on these cases to exact justice against entities that think they can get away with willful negligence, worker safety, murder, etc. And the good guys (Olympia et al) win. The good guys always win and justice is served (AND profitable). I enjoy all the case-of-the-week plots because it is so satisfying. Yet - here’s the push-pull again which makes this series so good - they’re working at a Big Law Firm whose typical clients are Evil Corporations. The fact that Olympia is helping the little guys is simply an experiment within this profit-driven environment. We hope she succeeds, but at the end of the day, Big Law Firm is the one who may have illegally hidden documents that contributed to Matty’s daughter’s death. So yeah. How much good can you do in this environment? How much of this good can balance out what the other side of the Big Law Firm is doing?

I should catch up with 1x10. I watched a bit - we get a bit more background on Sarah! I was wondering about her background and where her overachiever-ness comes from. Very interesting that she is not from an immigrant Asian family but rather an adoptee.

[animehouse-moe]

How I'm Tracking My Manga Reading Backlog

I'm bad at keeping up with reading sometimes. I'll read newer releases while still forgetting about some, want to re-read something even though I haven't started on another series, and leave droves of titles sitting on my shelves staring at me.

I got tired of that, and also tired of all these different tracking websites and apps that don't do what I want. So, with Notion and a few other tools, I've set out to make my own, and I like it! So I thought, hey, why not share how I'm doing it and see how other people keep track of their lists, so that's why I'm here. Enough rambling though, let me lead you through why I decided to make my own.

So, the number 1 challenge: Automation. In truth, it's far from perfect and is the price I pay for being lazy. But, I can automate a significant chunk of the adding process. I've yet to find a proper way to go from barcode scanning on my phone to my reading list, but I can go pretty easily from an amazon listing to the reading list. With it I grab: title, author, publisher, page count, and cover image.

So what do I use?

Well, it's a funky and interesting thing called 'Bardeen' that allows you to scrape webpages (among other things), collect and properly structure the desired information, and then feed it right into your Notion database. It's a little odd to try and figure out at first, but it's surprisingly intuitive in how it works! Once you have your template setup, you just head to the webpage (I've found Amazon the best option) and hit the button for the scraper you've built, and it puts it into Notion.

It saves an inordinate amount of time in populating fields by hand, and with the help of templates from Notion, means that the only fields left "empty" are the dated fields for tracking reading.

Thanks to Bardeen, the hardest (and really only) challenge is basically solved. Not "as" simple as a barcode, but still impressively close. Now, since the challenge is out of the way, how about some fun stuff?

Data visualization is incredibly fun for all sorts of people. Getting to see a breakdown of all the little pieces that make up your reading habits is very interesting. Sadly, Notion doesn't have the ability to build charts from your own databases, so you need a tool.

The one I ended up settling on was 'Grid.is', as it has a "direct" integration/embed with Notion.

Sure, it has its own "limitations", but they pose absolutely zero concern as to how I want to set up my own data visualization. You can have (as far as I know) an unlimited number of graphs/charts on a single page, and you can choose to embed that page as a single entity, or go along and embed them as independent links. Either way, the graphs are really great and there's a lot of customization and options in regards to them. Also, incredibly thankful for the fact that there's an AI assistant to create the charts for you. The way that Notion data's read in is horrendous, so the AI makes it infinitely easier than what it appears as at first.

And yes, all those little popups and hover behaviors are preserved in the embeds.

Well, I suppose rather than talking about the tertiary tools, I should talk about what I'm doing with Notion itself, no?

Alright, so, like all Notion pages it starts with a database. It's the central core to keeping track of data and you can't do without it. Of course, data is no good if you can't have it properly organized, so how do I organize it?

With tags, of course! I don't have a massive amount of tags in place for the database, but I am considering adding more in terms of genre and whatnot. Regardless, what I have for the entries currently is: Title, Reading Status (TBR, Reading, Read, etc.), Author, Format (manga or LN), Date Started, Date Completed, Pages, and Publisher.

In addition to those "displayed" tags, I have two tertiary fields. The first is an image link so that entries can display an image in the appropriate view. The second, and a bit more of a pain, is a formula field used to create a proper "title" field so that Notion can sort effectively (they use lexicographic, so numbers end up sorted as letters instead). This is the poorly optimized Notion formula I used, as I don't have much experience with how they approach stuff like this. It just adds a leading zero to numbers less than 10 so that it can be properly sorted.

Of course this list view isn't my default view though, the calendar from the top of this post is. Most of the time though, I don't have it set to the monthly view, but rather weekly. Following up that view though, I've got my "up next" tab. This tab's meant to track all the titles/entries that I'm about to read. Things I'm planning to read today, tomorrow, or the day after. Sorta a three day sliding window to help me keep on top of the larger backlog and avoid being paralyzed by choice. It's also the only view that uses images currently.

Following that, I've got my "To Be Read" gallery. I wanted to use a kanban board but notion will only display each category as a single column, so I chose this view instead, which makes it much easier to get a better grasp of what's in the list. I've been considering adding images to this view, but I need to toy around with it some more. Either way, the point is to be able to take a wider look at what I've got left in my TBR and where I might go next.

So overall, I've ordered these views (though the list view I touch on "first" is actually the last of the views) in order from "most recent" to "least recent", if that makes any sense. Starting with where I've finished, moving to where I go next, what I have left, and then a grouping of everything for just in case.

It's certainly far from a perfect execution on a reading list/catalogue, but I think personally speaking that it checks off basically all of the boxes I required it to, and it gives me all the freedom that I could ever want - even if it means I have to put in a bit of elbow grease to make things work.

[pcos-and-endo-awareness]

I've had so many pelvic ultrasounds (almost one a year for the past 15 years) due to my pelvic pain and period symptoms over the years and the only thing that ever shows up is an occasional cyst.

My doctor recommended against a laparoscopy because there has never been anything to imply endometriosis.

I am not sure if it would change anything if it turns out I have it but in a way that doesn't show up on ultrasounds.

Any recommendations for what to ask my doctor next? What to research? I feel so powerless because the best I've managed in 15 years on any given birth control is about 6 months of feeling better before it takes a sharp nose dive again, and I get pretty strong side effects from most birth control so swapping sucks really bad.

To be fair, it is nearly impossible to diagnose endometriosis WITHOUT surgery. Nobody ever suggested it to me, I had no idea what it even was, until the OBGYN who did my surgery said “wow that’s one of the worst cases of endometriosis I’ve ever seen.” My surgery was to remove a cyst, we had no idea my organs would be glued together with endometriosis adhesions. Laparoscopy might be necessary for you to determine if there is endometriosis. A surgery to remove the tissue will help (birth control should keep it mostly under control, but it can grow back. I’ve heard some women go periodically to get their insides scraped out.) I’d highly suggest pushing your doctor for it, maybe even finding a new doctor or specialist who will do it. This is the only thing that will remove the pain.

Honestly I so get you about the birth control. It works for a bit and then seems to wean off. Or makes you even more sick! I switched to the depo shot a few years ago and it is the LEAST amount of pain I have been in for YEARS. I personally have very little symptoms with the depo, but I know that isn’t true for everyone. I know swapping sucks but I feel like you’ll eventually find one that works well with your body specifically. I know there’s more medications to try like a cocktail: metformin, spironolactone, mounjaro, and ozempic to name a few. I haven’t tried these yet but it’s my next step! I’ve also taken lots of vitamin supplements to help with symptoms like anemia, fatigue, and inflammation. I take things like B12, fiber supplements, probiotics, and vitamin D. I really like this supplement specifically and recommend it to my friends (a bit pricey but better than buying all the supplements individually, and I only take it 2-3X a week): Herb Krave Cyster Glow Supplement - 9-in-1 Premium Myo-Inositol & D-Chiro Inositol Blend - Hormonal Balance & Healthy Ovarian Function Support for Women – 120 Veggie Capsules https://a.co/d/1uxZkUC

Have you tried pelvic floor therapy? I had a wonderful physical therapist I saw for years, who gave me tons of resources and tips and ideas. Things like a tens machine, pelvic floor yoga, mental health tools, a list of medications to try, doctor referrals, etc. I would highly recommend getting a connection like that, especially if they have endo and can really understand your pain. Even just having someone to talk to with your shared experiences and pain is such a relief. It’s so nice for someone to just listen and understand.

I’ve read many articles online (even the good ones all have opposing advice, so take it all with a grain of salt), and I’ve bought a few books (there’s tons on Amazon!). I can’t say there’s one thing that has been all correct. Even now I am still learning. Unfortunately endo is just under researched and misunderstood. These are two books I have that I’ve taken some things into consideration. There’s tons of more books I’d like to get my hands on though. If anyone has more recommendations please reblog and add to the thread!