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Browse and search your library

Once you're connected, there are four ways to find something to listen to: Home, the Library, Search and your Favourites. Tap any book to open its book page, where you can start it.

Getting around​

The layout fits the screen you're on.

On a phone (the iOS and Android apps, or the web player in a narrow window), a tab bar along the bottom has five tabs:

  • Home - the book you're on, and your shelves.
  • Library - everything on your server.
  • Search - find books, series, people and characters.
  • Downloads - books saved on this device for offline listening.
  • Me - You: your stats, Journal, Settings, household and account.

Each tab remembers where you were. Tap the tab you're already on to go back to its first page. The Up next button beside each tab's title opens Up next.

On a tablet or computer, the tabs move to a bar across the top:

The web player on a tablet: the top bar, the home screen and the player bar

From left to right:

  • The AudioSilo logo, which goes Home. Under it is the server you're using, with a warning if it isn't answering or needs you to sign in again.
  • Home, Library, Downloads and You. On narrower screens these are icons only.
  • A search field. In the web player it opens quick search. In the app on a tablet it opens the Search page.
  • Up next, with the number of books queued.
  • A gear for Settings.
  • Your profile button. Its menu switches between people on this device, lists your servers, and links to your Journal, Household, Settings and account. It also switches between light and dark.

The profile menu open from the top bar

Under the top bar, a slim row shows the page title, or Back once you've opened something. While a book plays, the player bar runs along the bottom.

In the web player, Tab moves between controls and Space presses the one you're on. The web player also has keyboard shortcuts. Press ? to list them.

note

The Downloads tab only appears where downloading is possible. In the web player that needs a secure (https://) address.

The home screen​

The home screen: the greeting, the book you're on, This week and the shelves

From the top, Home shows:

  • A greeting with the date and whether your progress has synced. If listening is still waiting on this device, it says how much (see Listening on more than one device).
  • Previously on - for books with recaps in the community database. When you come back to a book after 12 days or more, a card reminds you where you were, with the latest recap you've already passed. Resume, with 30 seconds of overlap starts half a minute before where you stopped.
  • The book you're on - the chapter, a scale of the whole book, the time left at your speed, and when you'll finish at your pace. Resume carries on. Who's who and Story so far open its characters and recaps, which never show more than you've heard.
  • This week - books finished this year against your goal, hours listened this week, and your streak.
  • Continue listening - the other books you've started, most recent first.
  • Next in your series - what comes after the books you're on. A book you don't have shows as a pale "ghost" cover marked Not in your library.
  • Coming up in your series - preorders, new releases and missing volumes, with dates. See Upcoming releases.
  • New episodes - from podcasts you follow. See Podcasts.
  • Listening in the house - what others on your server are listening to, when you both share it. See See what others are listening to.
  • Smart shelves - filters that keep themselves up to date, such as Finish what you started, Short listens and Added this week.
  • Recently added, Favourites and Recently finished, each with See all.
tip

Connected to more than one server? Home combines them. A book from another server carries a small flag with its name.

The Library​

The Library tab holds everything on your server. Its sections are Books, Authors, Series, Narrators, Collections and Folders. On a phone, swipe the row of sections sideways.

The Library's Books section: the sections and controls along the top, and the cover grid

If you have more than one library or server, use the Library picker beside the controls. Every section except Folders shows one library at a time. A podcast library has just Shows and Folders.

With more than one server, the picker names each library with its server, like Books · Home. Until you choose a library, the Library shows your first server.

Books​

Every book in the library, as a cover grid or a list:

  • Filters: Not started, In progress, Finished, Downloaded, and a length (Under 5 h, 5 to 15 h, Over 15 h). Clear removes them.
  • Genre and Tag, when the library's books have them. Tapping a genre or tag on a book's page opens this view filtered to it.
  • Sort by Recently added, Title, Author or Length. Sorted by title, an A to Z rail jumps to a letter.
  • Grid or list. On a tablet or computer, the list adds columns for narrator, length and progress.
  • ... beside them, for an admin: Find on LibriVox adds a free book to the library (see Add free books from LibriVox).

The Genre filter open over the Library's books

The book menu​

Every book has a menu of actions. To open it:

  • tap ... on a book in a list;
  • press and hold a cover, or right-click it in the web player;
  • with a keyboard, press the Menu key or Shift+F10 on a cover. A screen reader offers it as More actions.

The menu holds:

  • Play or Resume.
  • Add to Up next or Remove from Up next.
  • Add to collection...
  • Download for offline, or Remove download.
  • Send to watch, in the iPhone app with a paired Apple Watch, or the Android app with a paired Wear OS watch.
  • Mark as finished or Mark as not finished, with Undo.
  • More in this series.

Authors and narrators​

Each person gets a card showing how many of their books you have and their total length. Tap a card to open their page: a shelf for each of their series, their other books, and the narrators who read them (or, for a narrator, the authors).

An author's page: the stat tiles, a series shelf and their other books

Series​

Each series gets a card with a small shelf of your books and a line such as "4 of 6 · 1 in progress". Gaps show where a number is missing. Tap a card to open its series page.

The Library's Series section, one card per series

A book in more than one series appears in each. Guards! Guards!, for example, is Discworld book 8 and City Watch book 1.

Collections​

Collections are lists of books you make yourself, such as "Road trip" or "Book club". This section shows your Favourites, your own collections, any shared with you, and New collection. Collections belong to a server, not a library, so here the picker chooses a server.

To add a book, choose Add to collection from its book menu or its book page. You can add it to several collections at once, or create a new one there.

A collection's page: its name, description, the owner's buttons and its books

On your own collection you can:

  • Edit its name and description.
  • Share it with people on the same server. They can see it but not change it.
  • Delete it. The books stay in your library.
  • Reorder or remove books, from each book's menu in the list view.

On a collection someone shared with you, Leave removes it from your list.

Folders​

Folders shows your libraries exactly as they're organized on the server, usually author folders holding book folders.

  • Tap a folder to open it, or a book to open its page.
  • Breadcrumbs at the top take you back up.
  • Big folders get a filter box and an A-Z rail.
  • A book the server hasn't scanned yet shows as Not scanned yet. You can still open and play it, because the server reads it on the spot.

You see only what an admin has shared with your account. If something is missing, see Limit what someone can see.

Series pages​

A series page lays the series out like a bookcase.

A series page: the progress track, the bookcase of spines and the list of every book

  • At the top: the series name, the author, how many books it has and how many you have.
  • A progress track: finished books in green, the one you're on in pink, missing ones hatched.
  • A reading-order switch (Publication, Chronological or Recommended), for series with more than one order. Your choice is remembered per series on that device. The book page's Series tab shares your choice.
  • The bookcase: a spine for each book, in order. Books you don't have are pale "ghost" spines. One that isn't out yet shows its release date.
  • Under the shelf: the chosen book and one action, such as Resume, Queue it (adds it to Up next), or View on AudioSilo Meta for a book you don't have.
  • Every book in the series, listed below.
  • Keep ahead offline, a shortcut to Keep the next books ready.

The ghost spines and reading orders come from the community database, AudioSilo Meta, so your server needs community metadata switched on. Without it, the page shows only the books you have.

An omnibus numbered as a range, such as books 1-3, fills the places of the books inside it (see Numbering an omnibus).

The Search tab finds books, series, authors, narrators and characters, across every library and server you have. Before you type, it shows your recent searches and cards to browse Authors, Series, Narrators and Collections.

Search results for "holmes", grouped into Books and Series

Results appear as you type, grouped into:

  • Books - matching titles, authors, narrators, series, genres and tags. A book on more than one server shows once. A Chinese or Japanese title is found by any character or word in it.
  • Series - each opens its series page.
  • People - authors and narrators.
  • Characters - from books you've started.

Tap a result to open it. Going back returns you to the same results.

Characters only once you've met them​

Character search can't spoil anything. It only looks at books you've started or finished, and only names characters you've already reached. It uses the same rule as the Characters tab. A quiet line counts any matches it hid. Character search needs community metadata switched on for your server.

Quick search in the web player​

In the web player on a tablet or computer, the search field in the top bar opens quick search. It finds a book or does something, without leaving the page. Open it from anywhere with ⌘K on a Mac, Ctrl+K elsewhere, or /.

Quick search open over the home screen, with matching books and series

Results are grouped:

  • Actions, such as Pause, Sleep in 30 minutes, Open the full player, Open Up next, or switching light and dark.
  • Books - the same search as the Search page. Before you type, this shows the books you're partway through.
  • Series, Authors, Narrators and Characters.
  • Go to - Home, Library, Downloads, your listening, Journal, Settings and Household.

Use the arrow keys to move, Enter to open and Esc to close.

Favourites​

Favourites are your personal shelf:

  • Tap the heart on a book's page, or on any row in Folders. You can favourite a whole folder too, such as an author or a series.
  • Find them on Home's Favourites shelf, in the Library's Collections section, or at the top of Folders.
  • Tap the heart again to remove one.

Favourites belong to your account, so they follow you to every device.

Good to know​

  • Older servers. Authors, Series, Narrators, Collections, Up next, This week, Next in your series, Mark as not finished, Listening in the house and the Cast button need a recent server. On an older one they don't appear. Ask whoever runs your server to update it.
  • A server that doesn't answer. The Library and Folders say so, with Retry. If your sign-in ended, they offer Reconnect instead. Your other servers keep working.
  • More than one server. The Library stays on the library you chose, even while its server loads or doesn't answer. It never shows another server's books in its place. To browse another server meanwhile, choose one of its libraries in the picker.
  • No connection. Pages show You're offline and load again by themselves. See With no connection.
  • Sharing a collection isn't offered on a demo account.