User talk:Stoecker/Archives/Archive01

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This is an archive of old discussions from User talk:Stoecker. Please do not change it.

Discussion

Welcome!

Hello, Stoecker/Archives/Archive01, and welcome to the ISFDB Wiki! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

Note: Image uploading isn't entirely automated. You're uploading the files to the wiki which will then have to be linked to the database by editing the publication record.

Please be careful in editing publications that have been primary verified by other editors. See Help:How to verify data#Making changes to verified pubs. But if you have a copy of an unverified publication, verifying it can be quite helpful. See Help:How to verify data for detailed information.

I hope you enjoy editing here! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will insert your name and the date. If you need help, check out the community portal, or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! Mhhutchins 22:16, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Die Große Explosion

Submission adding this record to the database was accepted, but a few changes were made for it to comply with ISFDB standards (there's a link to the help pages in the Welcome section above.)

The link to the cover image on Wikipedia was deleted, because they don't allow other servers to deep-link to their files. Please consider "stealing" a copy to your hard drive and then uploading it to the ISFDB server using the "Upload Cover Scan" link on the publication record.

Don't need to steal. It's my file, but wikimedia has finer possibilities for licence and credits, so I though to link to it. You should reach a deep-link agreement with them. :-) --Stoecker 09:01, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
The last I heard they don't allow anyone to deep-link and don't make such agreements. Maybe they've updated their policy since? Mhhutchins 16:35, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I also added a space between "DM" and the number, per ISFDB standards.

Also, are you certain of the series numbering? That number is very high for a 1965 publication.

It would fit into this series, maybe just 'Terra' would be right? (But then the price would seem to be too high) Stonecreek 06:55, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
I submitted a fix now. I misunderstood the meaning of the field and took the ISFDB number of the series. 101 is correct. --Stoecker 09:01, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Also, the cover gives the title as Die Grosse Explosion, and not Die Große Explosion. How is it given on the book's title page? (This is where all credits should taken from.)

In German until some years ago there was no upper-case "ß", so in upper-case "ß" became "SS". So ß is correct, only debate could be if a big "G" is correct. The book has upper-case on the title page also. Thought as this is a name the uppercase is correct and also the common way to write that title. --Stoecker 09:01, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
But which letter(s) (ß or ss) are used on the title page? Regardless of its use, the ISFDB records title and author credit as they appear on the book's title page. You can use standard German capitalization for the initial letters, especially if the title is presented in all capitals on the title page. Mhhutchins 16:35, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I translated "Deutsche Übersetzung von Gisela Stege" in the Note field to "German translation by Gisela Stege". Even though we accept records for non-English publications, this is an English language database, and all notes should be in English.

One last thing: you made a submission to create a variant title at the same time as the submission for the publication record. This creates two title records because the submission for the pub record automatically creates a title record. So I had to reject the submission to create a variant title. Now that there's a title record for the German edition in the database, I've made it into a variant of the English language title record. Thanks for contributing. Mhhutchins 22:28, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm learning. This was my first test. I want to get Russell as complete as I can do, so many more are missing :-) --Stoecker 09:01, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
Sounds great! And it did go very well for a first edit (ISFDB has its trapdoors nearly everyone is bound to fall into). Thanks, Stonecreek 09:18, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
Yes, I agree. For a new editor, you're doing exceedingly well. Please continue to contribute. Mhhutchins 16:35, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Image uploading

First, let me remark that the best place to ask questions is the Help desk, not the Note to Moderator field, which contents are lost after handling (and may be forgotten to answer).

Second: You did nearly alright and the error message isn't a fault, but built in inherently. The reason is that every computer server has its capacities (which have boundaries) and so we limit the size of images in any case to less than 600 pixels along its largest dimension, if at all possible. (You may wish to crop or rescale the image.) It is possible to upload larger scaled images, but these should be limited to very special cases (some wrap-around covers, for example). Therefore an error message is shown for large images. But one image doesn't do too much harm and so Die Große Explosion has now a cover image attached to it: thanks for adding that one. See also the last item referred to in the start and help links above. Stonecreek 10:57, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

If this is the case, it should made be clear (best on the upload page if possible). I only found a rule, that file should not exceed 150KB, so I scaled it down to a size of about 100KB. The error message at [1] sounds more like an installation issue, than anything really wanted. From my point of view as software developer and admin it looks like ImageMagick is not installed properly. As I found no real "Bug Report" link anywhere and bug reports usually aren't correct in a help desk, I simply added it to the note in assumption, that moderators know better what to do. The error is still there BTW. --Stoecker 13:31, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
Well, I am no software developer, but you should be able to see the cover image on our wiki by clicking on the 'Full resolution' link below the message. The address of this is to be copied into the corresponding publication's field, regardless of the message. If that doesn't work for you in the future, please ask at the help desk. Thanks, Stonecreek 15:21, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
Also, go to your "Preferences" page, and under "Files" change the display menu to its top limits (description page to 10000x10000px and thumbnail to 300px). Mhhutchins 16:24, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
A classic workaround :-) --Stoecker 16:54, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Gedanken Vampire

Are both artists given in the cover art field of this record credited with the artwork? If one or the other is the designer, that credit should go in the Note field. Thanks. Mhhutchins 16:42, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Even the publisher does not have any papers about that time anymore (I asked them about Die Große Explosion), so you ask me? I fixed it according to the little info the book gives. Didn't find out thought, who "Fawcett" really is. --Stoecker 16:57, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
If "Fawcett" is how it's credited in the book, that's the way the ISFDB credit should be. If we later discover the full name of the artist we can make this a variant of a parent record. (There are a couple of possible artists with that name.) Mhhutchins 17:16, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Entering notes

When adding notes to the Note field, add an HTML break (<br>) at the end of each line when you want to start a new one, otherwise they run into each other. Also, when adding a non-catalog number (or other database record number) in the Note field, use the format "XXXX: NNNNNN". So a record from Worldcat would be entered as "OCLC: 12345678", or from the British Library as "BLIC: 12345678", or Library of Congress Control Number (or Catalog Number) as "LCCN: 12345678". The same applies to sources which number their entries, like R. Reginald's Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature reference, i.e. "Reginald1: 12345678", or Amazon's id number as "ASIN: 12345678". These numbers all go in the Note field, not the ISBN/Catalog # field. This format will aid the transfer of the data to a dedicated field, if and when the need arises to do so. (There are off-and-on discussions about the possibility of adding new fields to the record.)

I took the "A HREF" style from another existing entry (make it as others do :-). So I should replace that by simple <BR>OCLC: ... or still add the href? --Stoecker 16:59, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
The "A HREF" attribute is used to link to a webpage on another server. Use either <BR> or <br> to start a new line in the Note field of an ISFDB record. Mhhutchins 17:13, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

One last thing: when entering a publisher-assigned catalog number (which is not an ISBN) in the ISBN/Catalog # field, add the character "#" before the number. I've done that in this record. At one point this was necessary to prevent the system from trying to determine whether the number was an ISBN or catalog number. I think the software has become more sophisticated since that time, but we continue the practice. Thanks. Mhhutchins 16:54, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Which function to use

I had to reject the submission which added the contents to this record. If I had accepted it, you would have had to merge all of the newly created records with those which were already in the database. (It's not automatically done by the system software.) It actually would have been better if you'd cloned the first printing, which would have moved over all of its contents as well. Since the record for the second printing is now in the database, the best way to add the contents is to import them from the original record.

  • Go to the pub record for the first printing and copy the record number of that publication. It's in URL of the record and also displayed in the upper right corner of the record: 264814.
  • Go to the pub record for the second printing and click on the link "Import Content" under the Editing Tools menu.
  • On the next page, enter the record number of the record from which you're importing the contents. If the page numbers are the same in both printings, leave the box checked.
  • Click "Import Content" and the next page will appear. On this page you can add new content (if necessary) and change the page numbers (if necessary), but you can not change the titles of the imported contents.
  • Click "Submit Data".

If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask here or at the Help Desk. I've written a Beginner's Guide on how to determine which function to choose to add a pub to the database. It's a beta draft and has not been linked to the ISFDB help page. I'd be interested in getting your opinion about how it reads to new editors and any suggestions for improvement. Thanks. Mhhutchins 21:24, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Looking over the Beginner's Guide, I see that some of the suggestions have become moot, since the software was updated only a couple of weeks ago to allow the editor to provide source data and primary verification of the record at the time of the submission. Please overlook those parts. I'll try to update it when I get the opportunity. Mhhutchins 21:31, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Workflow in general is highly improvable - e.g. I'd join different input masks, make them more web2.0-interactive and at the end cause only one request for a new entry and not multiple. But that would be major reworks and I don't have time to start programming for yet another project :-) So I'll stick to adding data and suggest smaller improvements when I understand it better. I'll give feedback after some time. Until then I'll get bolder and bolder and try more functions each time. --Stoecker 21:37, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Notifying primary verifiers of changes to PV'ed records

It is ISFDB policy that editors of primary verified records be notified of changes to the records. If you're adding notes or a new cover image, in most cases, all you need to do is leave a note on their talk page, and then make the submission. (Most active editors have a notification preference posted at the top their talk page.) If you're changing or adding data in any other field, you should discuss it with the editor before making a submission that edits the record. I'm holding the submissions to update this record and this one, until you've had a chance to discuss the changes with the primary verifier. Both submissions change the catalog number to an ISBN, and add a price. Thanks. Mhhutchins 13:19, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

This is very cumbersome. An automatic process is required for such things. It takes already too much time to enter a single books - more than I want to spend. So I'll probably stop mainly after I finished Eric Frank Russell and probably Alan Dean Foster. --Stoecker 13:39, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
It would be nice for it to be automatic, but I'm not a software designer and can't respond to how it could be done. If you have the time, please post a message on the ISFDB:Community Portal and present your concerns to the software people. Thanks. Mhhutchins 13:55, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
And changes quite often really do need a discussion, for example adding a cover artist, which can be of various sources, not all of which are very reliable (most retailers aren't). Stonecreek 14:21, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
No problem with that. But when change requests would be passed to verifier first for inspection (i.e. moderation helper) and he says yes, then discussion is time-wasting. Only when he says no/don't know, then discussion should start. I'm no real collector and only have a small library of about 1000 SF/F books. Most of them still missing or incomplete here. It takes approx. half an hour to enter a book ATM (get book, make photo, prepare foto, enter data, revise data, answer talk page,...). Additional discussion then will take approx. another half hour. That means I would need a quarter or half a year to enter these books when working full time. Too much. --Stoecker 14:31, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Artist attributions

Noticed the credit for [this cover] and recognized the artwork as coming from [this] Heinlein edition, which credits the artist as Steele Savage. I know a lot of artwork was 'purloined' by European publishers, Digit was infamous for it. Obviously you recognized that it came from another source but entering an artist as ACE isn't correct, as they are NOT the artist. There is another one [here] that credits the publisher Fawcett for what I recognize as a Gene Szafran cover [not sure which book]. That credit needs to be changed. If you know the book the cover was lifted from, just add that to the notes and use the artist [if noted] with that as the source. Also [here], another cover I recognize but can't quite place the book or the artist. Other than this your edits are fine! Good work. Cheers! --~ Bill, Bluesman 16:17, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, I can only enter the text from the small information in the book. And usually it is not clear if the cover designer, the painter or someone else is meant. In the 50's to 70's nobody cared. Sometimes it is even a complicated task to get the original English title of an entry. If you know better, feel free to change - I don't care about cover artist, I'm only interested in the book contents :-) --Stoecker 16:24, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Fair enough, but it would be easier not to have to track them down. If the credit is not to a person I would ask that you just leave the field blank or put in a note as to what the credit is. Cheers! --~ Bill, Bluesman 16:31, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
I'll add them in note in future except it seems clear who is meant. --Stoecker 16:38, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Appreciated! --~ Bill, Bluesman 16:44, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Die besten Stories von 1941

Is Martin H. Greenberg credited as the co-editor on the title page of this book? Thanks for confirming this before I accept the submission. Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:40, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Neither Asimov nor Greenberg are. But they are credited for the English original. :-) --Stoecker 18:02, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Translated books are difficult. In English you have different editions, publications, .... Translation adds another level of obscurity :-) --Stoecker 18:04, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Translation or not, it's ISFDB policy to enter authors/editors as credited. If the editor is not credited on the title page, but elsewhere in the book, you can use that. From the cover it appears only Asimov is credited as selecting the contents, which is sufficient to credit him as the editor. Unless Greenberg is credited as well, the record should remain as it currently is. There should be no attempt to make the publication's record conform with other printings or editions. Thanks. Mhhutchins 18:18, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
The "Isaac Asimov's" is typical for many publications, even some, where he is not involved at all. The title equals the English "Issac Asimov Presents:". English original is by both authors and the inner page gives credit to both for English original. So either both are correct or some unknown German editor (as it is a stripped variant of the English there must have been a German editor as well - I doubt Asimov edited a German release himself :-). --Stoecker 18:30, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Then I misunderstood your previous statement when I asked about who is credited and you responded: "Neither Asimov nor Greenberg are." Now you say both are credited. And the cover states "ausgewählte von" which means (if Google Translate is correct) "selected by". When an anthology is translated the original editor is almost always credited as the editor of the translated work, regardless of whether he can speak the language. And even if there was an uncredited German editor, that's irrelevant. Anyone who is uncredited remains uncredited, because, as I said above, we use the book's stated credit. So can you confirm that somewhere in this book Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg are credited as the editor/selector/presenter? Mhhutchins 19:06, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
Yes, for English original they are. --Stoecker 19:10, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Merging translated titles

We only merge translated titles if we are certain that they are the same translations. In some cases, there's no way to know that. Recording the translator in the pub record helps. Recording it in the title record is even better which helps in determining if the titles should be merged. Neither are mandatory. Mhhutchins 19:26, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

And in the case of Die imaginäre Größe cloning the publication automerged the new item with Der Robotspion when it is in fact a different (variant) title. I unmerged the new publication and varianted the new title to the original anthology for you. In this case creating a new ANTHOLOGY and then importing the contents would have been the right way (this is one of the trapdoors I also fell into ;-) ). Stonecreek 10:01, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Hmm, this I don't understand? Die imaginäre Größe is an identical reprint with different cover/name by another publisher. Where is the different between a clone and what you suggest? --Stoecker 10:05, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
The only difference is in fact the title. If you take a look at the summary page of E. F. Russell you'll see a handful of titles published in English as variants, for example Three to Conquer as Call Him Dead. As far as we know, they are identical in text. Cloning is meant for re-issues under the same title.
Another thing: I see that you have Pioneer 21 submitted as ANTHOLOGY, we'd consider this as MAGAZINE or FANZINE, I'd think, maybe with Galaxis SF as possible example. Is Elias Canetti: Die Befristeten really FICTION (it does sound a bit like an essay on the author Canetti). Stonecreek 10:24, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
It seems to be a review, as the author mainly wrote reviews. I don't have access to this myself, only to the "Eric Frank Russell" story inside (tried half a year to get it without success). --Stoecker 10:34, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Safari zu den Sternen

I added cover artist Karl Stephan based on your note. We do assign art not only by credit in a given publication, but also from other sources (which should be reliable, as for example artist's pages, other credited publications or, in this case, the signature). Thank you very much for this! Stonecreek 12:33, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Terra 489, 491 and 493 all three have the same sign. --Stoecker 12:35, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Yes, I saw and added the artist for them too. Sourcing the data is important (for example the next guy does come along and deletes a vital information because he doesn't know of the source), especially so for cover art. So, thanks for noting that! Stonecreek 13:58, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Menschen, Marsianer und Maschinen in Welten der Zukunft

I changed this title to COLLECTION to allow a variant to this collection. Thanks, Stonecreek 14:13, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Which is right, but result will be a collection without any entries, as the book joins the stories to a novel. --Stoecker 14:19, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Which in turn is perfectly okay, publishers do tend to take it easy sometimes. A note added to the title that it is presented as a novel would be fine, though. Thanks, Stonecreek 14:32, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Leben ohne Ende / Störfaktor

Please confirm whether the piece on page 377 in this book is correctly typed as a NOVEL. Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:05, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

No. It's not. --Stoecker 15:18, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Please make a submission to correct the type. Also, I'm holding a submission that changes "Störfaktor" from NOVEL to ESSAY. Is that correct? If not, please cancel the submission. Mhhutchins 16:00, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Why must the order of entries change between display and edit page. This provokes errors. --Stoecker 16:26, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
The contents of the edit page are presented in alphabetical order, not entry order. Either way, wouldn't you have to read which entry you're editing? If it can be changed (and I don't know if it can, present your argument on a community page. Maybe one of the software designers can answer it. Mhhutchins 16:45, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Ccheck the page, third entry is wrong, click edit, modify third entry and catch the wrong one. As there is no "Preview" as usually exists for Wiki-Style software there will be errors. I'm not a robot and don't intend to become one. --Stoecker 16:51, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
No. But maybe a robot would expect the same record to be in the same place every time he looks. A human adjusts his expectations based on the facts. Mhhutchins 17:20, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
For the other one there is no italian version. Maybe one digit was missing from the reference. As there is no chance to see the effect of changes before they are applied it is very hard to prevent errors! --Stoecker 16:26, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
You linked it to this record, which is the title record for the novel length Italian version. (It was incorrectly entered with the English title, and I just corrected it. It seems that the novel was only ever published in Italian.) The German title is a translation of the original novella version, which you have now correctly linked it to. I've changed the German title record from NOVEL to SHORTFICTION with a novella length. Mhhutchins 16:45, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Strange. Anyway would have seen that's wrong when change would have happend. Again - No preview functionality. --Stoecker 16:51, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
I know how frustrating it can be to learn a new system. It's something we all went through at the start. And I think we've built a very fine database here with all the limitations we've learned to live with. But, there is no way to change how this software works other than to present your case to someone who can change it. I'm not that person. If you would post your opinions to the group you might actually talk to someone who can make changes. Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:20, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Handling "Jr" names

I've changed the way the author credits for Tiptree and Miller are given in this publication. The ISFDB standard is to add a comma after the name, regardless of how it's published. So "James Tiptree Jr." becomes "James Tiptree, Jr.", etc. Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:24, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

There are too many exceptions to the rules. The general rule to write as it is, is violated in some many cases, that its hard to follow any rules. --Stoecker 19:19, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Bad ISBN

The ISBN given in this record comes up as invalid. Please confirm it with the publication. If it was correctly entered add a "#" before the number in the ISBN field, and explain that the book prints a bad ISBN. Mhhutchins 17:26, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

You "corrected" the ISBN field. That's not the usual way to handle bad ISBNs. Were there two numbers in the book? Mhhutchins 19:12, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Huh? I told exactly as you wrote above - fixed the wrong ISBN and added a note in the book entry. Older books have bad ISBN's in many cases, as the ISBN has not been really used at that time. For Ullstein its pretty easy to spot the error, as the serial is directly used in ISBN. Give me a chance to get data correct. If I need to enter an answer for each modification I make I'll never get that stuff done. --Stoecker 19:16, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, I do not understand your response. No one has asked you to "answer for each modification" you make. I'm advising you how to handle common situations that arise in the record entry process. (You need not respond here, just make the suggested edit.) There is no way to offer this advice other than at the point at which it is needed, that is at the moderation step. I did not tell you to "fix the wrong ISBN". I informed you of the method to keep the stated ISBN as part of the record, while removing the error message from the record. Perhaps my communications skills are failing and I am unable to give clear advice. Mhhutchins 03:52, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories 53

A book which contains stories by one author is typed as COLLECTION, and the author is given credit for the book. I've updated this record, and added the editor credit to the Note field. Mhhutchins 17:35, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Entering contents from the title page and not the contents page

Your note to the moderator in the submission to add more contents to this record ("forgot second page") sounds like you're entering contents from the contents page. Because so often there are differences in story title and author credits between the content page and the title page, the IFSDB policy is to record contents from each story's title page and not the contents page. Thanks. Mhhutchins 21:02, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Importing contents

Yes, you can import the three separate sets of contents for [this] but you can opt, in the import process, NOT to use the existing page numbers and then enter them at the same time. Saves an extra edit for each import. I understand your frustration with some of the 'odd' ways data is handled here. Some/most of that is software driven, the rest has been arrived at by consensus or default [the line's a little thin at times]. We're all volunteers, we just try to help the new editors work their way around the DB. Learning curve is always a little steep at first, but you're already light-years ahead of most newbies. Just be a little patient! ;-)) --~ Bill, Bluesman 00:58, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Author credit change

Submission to change the credit for [this] story raises a question. Which way is the author credited in the book? The original entry [which you made??] has the author as Rachel Cosgrove, the submission would change that to Rachel Cosgrove Payes. Are you changing it because the original credit was wrong or to make it the same as the credit for the english version? We do enter authors as credited in the book. As you've seen we have this extremely [in my opinion] difficult-to-understand Variant/Pseudonym system set up to handle 'Canonical' versus 'other' names. In this case the first name is already a pseudonym of the second. Cheers! --~ Bill, Bluesman 01:25, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

It was a typo which I detected during verification. --Stoecker 09:28, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Titan

I changed the publication series to Heyne Science Fiction & Fantasy: this is what is stated on the respective copyright pages and what's meaningful considering the ongoing numeration. Also take a look at this. Thanks, Stonecreek 08:23, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

In this case you also must drop most of the other Heyne series, e.g. this one: Meisterwerke der Science Fiction. These are subseries of the generic "Heyne Science Fiction & Fantasy" with continuing numbering. Not all Heyne series have own series numbers. And If I'm right even this series Bibliothek der Science Fiction Literatur matches the same "06/" naming scheme for SF probably using older unused numbers (in the beginning SF was in "Allgemeine Reihe"). "Science Fictions Classics" is clearly marked different than other normal Heyne SF-Books. Also this series is not limited to Titan: See [2]. I think there is a policy to "ask first" here. Seems this policy is not used by yourself. It took some time on my side also to verify if a new series matches the current structure or not and my result was that it fits the current layout of ISFDB. --Stoecker 09:46, 19 July 2013 (UTC)
If you look closely, you'll see that 'Meisterwerke der Science Fiction' was established after the end of 'Heyne SF & F' (there may be some overlap but none that I'm aware of — but it may in fact be the case for unverified publications). I should have noted that this step was initiated by this publication, which has only the pub. series 'Heyne SF & F', not 'Heyne SF Classics', and is regarded as the 'official' guide for us, for obvious reasons, I'd think. So it may fit into the structure of ISFDB (which was the reason the submission was accepted), but not into the structure of the publisher Heyne, laid out by the publisher itself. In addition, as I stated out, the pub. series including numeration is stated on the copyright page (for 'Titan 23' at least). Sorry that I didn't ask first, but time was running out and it wasn't the first time that this was thematized. See also the part on series and sub-series by Heyne in this argument. It'd be better to use the copyright page for vital information (apart from author and title for which we use the title page) and to source the data so that moderators who aren't too accommodated with german publishing can judge on their own. Thanks, Stonecreek 14:59, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

8 Science Fiction Stories and Martin Greenberg

Hi. You did (correctly) one of three things needed to fix up 8 Science Fiction Stories to refer to the appropriate Martin Greenberg. The publication itself had to be modified to use the same credit (the publication entry and the title entry for the publication each have their own author credit). And then because Martin Greenberg (1941-2011) is already a pseudonym/alternate name for Martin H. Greenberg, the now-credited-to-"(1941-2011)" title made from the acceptance of your first edit needed to be made into a variant title credited to Martin H. Greenberg. You would not have been able to do this until after a moderator approved your change, so it is not something you failed to do, I'm just mentioning it because.... I did both of those things to save you some more edit-and-approve cycles. See how it looks. --MartyD 11:07, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

The double entry pub and title is clear. But why the variant title "http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1619957"? As far as I know there is no such thing as this title. --Stoecker 16:47, 19 July 2013 (UTC)
We create parent title records for pseudonymously credited works so that a title will appear on the canonical author's summary page. Even if there were never any books published under that credit. In this case the publication itself remains under the title record which credits Martin Greenberg, which is then varianted to a parent record credited to Martin H. Greenberg. Mhhutchins 19:16, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

When you have a "content" title that is the same as an existing entry

I saw your comment for the addition of "Im Banne der Farben" to Terra Sammelband Nr. 6. This something that happens frequently when working with collections, anthologies, and omnibuses. Handling it is a two-step process. First, you have to add the content (as you have done). When that addition is approved, then someone must do a "merge" to combine the newly-added title record with the existing title record.

The simplest way to do this is to go to the Jürgen Wolf's summary page (where you will already see two instances of the same title listed) and click on the "Check for Duplicate Titles" link under "Editing Tools" at the left. Click the check boxes next to the titles you want to be combined into a single title record and click on the "Merge Selected Records" button. This will bring up a screen that compares all of the information in the records being merged and allows you to choose which piece of information to keep in cases where they differ. Review this carefully. Merge tries to be smart, and most of the default choices for what to keep will usually be appropriate, but not always.

This is a moderated operation: A moderator will review the proposed merge once you are finished making your choices, so you cannot do any harm. Please give it a try (I did not do this one for you, so you can try it and see how it works). If you need help, just ask. Thanks. --MartyD 11:20, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Cover of Science Fiction Stories 2

You add a cover for this Pub Science Fiction Stories 2, but in the first printing the names of the authors are absent on the front cover. It seems that you add the cover of the second printing. Please modify it. Thanks! Rudam 04:56, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

There is no indication in my book, that it is a second printing or different, though as you wish I cloned it. You should upload a cover yourself. --Stoecker 10:46, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
Is there a stated date of publication for this later printing? Would it not have a different date than the first printing? Thanks. Mhhutchins 22:50, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
No. It has price, ISBN and according to above text the cover is different. Otherwise there is no visible indication of a later printing. Due to the changes in the series itself in book 3 and 4 the printing may be maximum one year later I think, but very likely in the same year - thought as already said, For me only the stories count - I don't care for different nearly identical releases. --Stoecker 18:36, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
Later printings without a stated date of printing are entered as "0000-00-00" which displays as "unknown". I'll adjust the date field of the record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 18:42, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Russell's "Meeting on Kangsham" and "...Kangshan"

I rejected the submission to change the language of this title record from English to German (it appears in an English language publication). Also, you note that it should be merged with this record is incorrect. The titles have different spellings and so are valid variants. Thanks. Mhhutchins 23:14, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

The "German" is a bug in webinterface. I wanted to send an empty request with the note only. --Stoecker 09:59, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
Yes, that's a bug. Any update to a record which has no set language automatically defaults to the preference language of the user. BTW, you shouldn't make a submission which makes no change in the record. Any questions, concerns, or problems should be presented on the ISFDB:Moderator noticeboard. Thanks. Mhhutchins 14:38, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
You rejected correction of year of "Meeting on Kangsham". Well. While the typo itself appeared in that year, the book itself credits the story to "March 1965" (on page 330). If I understand IFSDB guides correctly, then my submission to correct the date to "1965-03" is valid and not the date 2003. --Stoecker 18:43, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
The first appearance of a variant title should get the date of that publication. Look at the list of variant titles under this title and you'll see each has a different date. This has been an evolutionary change in ISFDB policy due to updates in how variants (and translated titles) are displayed. At one point, they all had to have the same date, but now that both the original title and the first publication date is displayed next to the variant title in the publication record, it is unnecessary that the variant title have the same date as the original title. There is significant value in knowing when a variant title was first published. Unfortunately, the help pages are not updated as frequently as the software, and they often contradict the current ISFDB standards. That is a failure on the part of the help pages. If you can please point out the area of the help pages concerning this matter, I will update it. Thanks. Mhhutchins 19:59, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
Where is the sense in this? When only a typo in the title creates a new variation (with identical story text), how can I then distinguish real variant, where the texts have been modified (i.e. Strange Playfellow and Robbie by Asimov)? --Stoecker 20:04, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
We don't create variant title records based on changes in text. A variant is created when the title of the work changes or the author credit changes. Mhhutchins 22:08, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories 91

Is the story on page 60 of this publication credited to "Stephan Tall" or Stephen Tall? Thanks. Mhhutchins 14:47, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

It is "Stephan Tall". Both in contents and in the story title. Very likely a typo (not the first one in the books I have), but as the policy here is to add it as it is I did not correct it. --Stoecker 18:31, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the confirmation. I usually ask just in case the typo is in the submission and not the publication. Submissions accepted. Mhhutchins 18:39, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Sternenschiffe 1 & 2

You uploaded the same file under two names. Here and here. This is easily corrected. Go to the first link and click on "Upload a new version of this file" and follow the directions. You'll get a warning about duplicate files which you can ignore. You will not have to update the publication record because the new image will now appear on the publication record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:08, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Suspect variant link

I'm pretty certain that this title record shouldn't be varianted to this one. If you agree, please cancel the submission, and make a new submission to variant the title. Thanks. Mhhutchins 19:45, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Ooops. Used the pub ID instead of the title id. They should use different number spaces... --Stoecker 20:00, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

»Android« heißt »menschenähnlich« by Leibscher or Liebscher

Can you confirm the spelling of the author credit for this story? Thanks. Mhhutchins 22:45, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

And is this one by "Ray Russel" and not Ray Russell? Mhhutchins 22:51, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Gefährliche Possen

Is there evidence that the translated stories published in this 1998 publication were first published in 1997? Thanks. Mhhutchins 03:46, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

It's the data from the "Quellenverzeichnis". I assume the publisher knows what he says. --Stoecker 09:59, 25 July 2013 (UTC)
Some of the other, non-1997 date choices appear odd to me, too. They are not the first publication date of the original title, either, so what are the dates? Thanks. --MartyD 09:13, 25 July 2013 (UTC)
They are the first publication of the German translation, as these stories are unmodified reprints. --Stoecker 09:59, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Cover credit for Menschen, Marsianer und Maschinen

Hi. I see you cited "Cover: Atelier Heinrichs and Bachmann" in your notes on Menschen, Marsianer und Maschinen and gave no cover artist credit on the record. I see we have Atelier Heinrichs & Bechmann as an artist on a variety of covers. You could do the same here, if you wanted to. A cover artist does not have to be a person or identifiable set of people. --MartyD 12:46, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories 3

I accepted your submission of Science Fiction Stories 3 but deleted the ISBN, because you stated, that there is No ISBN inside the book. Look at our discussion here. I've also added some additional data. Rudam 16:38, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories 5+6

I hold your submission of this two publications, because you stated that 1970 is the publishing year and you also add for this publishing year an ISBN number, which is unusual. On every copyright page of the Ullstein 2000 series are always two annual data: The year of the translation (Übersetzung©) and the year of the printing (Printed in Germany), which always differ. Did you perhaps mixed the years? Rudam 18:03, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

No. I did not mix the years and also that would have no effect as for SF Stories 5 both are 1970. For SF-Stories 6 it is 1972. As I can't look into the submission I can't verify it, but my own dataset says correctly 1972, so I assume the submission is ok as well. --Stoecker 20:55, 27 July 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for rechecking and conforming your data. I'll accept SF Stories 5 as you've submitted it. I'll submit SF Stories 6 and correct the data from 1970 into 1972. Further discussion here Rudam 07:30, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
BTW: You stated in your verfied pub Science Fiction Stories 2 that the publishing year is unknown. Is there no Printed in Germany on the Copyright page? Rudam 18:03, 27 July 2013 (UTC)
I rechecked it again and really overlooked it. Added it now. --Stoecker 20:55, 27 July 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for rechecking and correcting! I also overlooked sometimes. Now we have also two identical submissions of this publication. I'll delete my submission and will verify your submission. Rudam 07:30, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Dragon Slayer

I hold your submission to change the publishing year of the Dragon Slayer. You forgot to name the original publisher. Please add it. Thanks! Rudam 19:44, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

What do you mean by "I forgot to name the original publisher"? It was first published in German translation 2002 for Feueratem. So actually the translation is published 2002 and thus the original also must be 2002. --Stoecker 20:42, 27 July 2013 (UTC)
Sorry my fault, but I overlooked that the german publication was prior. Rudam 07:48, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
This is really nice. It's an republished English original work for a German book. So while English is original language the first English publishing is behind the first publishing. :-) --Stoecker 13:20, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Bannsänger-Zyklus

You want to add the novels of the Bannsänger-Zyklus, but there is a discrepancy in every publication between the publishing year and respective the price. According to the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek is either the year or the Price irregular. Perhaps you use again the first publishing year of the title and not the printing year of the publication. ISFDB is a accurate bibliography, which catalog not only all editions but also every printing of a publication. Could you please check your data again Thanks! Rudam 20:54, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

That may be the case, but as long as there is no entry in the database I cannot check and correct anything. If YOU want to add any books, then please do so, but when each and every change I do is held and I need to explain dozens of times BEFORE data is in the database and I can work on improving it, then my motivation sinks a lot. If your accuracy expectations aren't meet, than you need to consider if
  • You want a 100% perfect database which has nearly no contents or
  • A maybe not 100% perfect database, which has contents and can be improved.
Currently the way of handling submissions especially by the German controllers are extremely discouraging for any contributor, I have less trouble with the English stuff.
So what about simply accepting new submissions in a acceptable time and if you think something may be wrong then ask to fix it afterwards or add a note to the publication. Data can be improved later and perfection can be reached over the time when basic data is there.
I agree that more restrictions apply when existing data should be modified, but the policy for new data is not worth contributing at all ATM. To much discussion and only little progress. --Stoecker 21:16, 27 July 2013 (UTC)
I'm sorry that you are frustrated. It was no intention to slow down your immense data input, only a advice for a little bit more accuracy. You are right, that a database without a content is futile. But an incorrect and imperfect database is also completely useless and it takes a plenty of unneccesary time to adjust all the errors and omissions which are submitted in the past. That is sometimes also frustating. I'll pass on your submissions and you can recheck your data. Rudam 09:05, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
Its a matter of detail. For a plain book collectors purpose all the fine details probably matter somehow. For me they are useless - I want a list of authors and stories, so I don't buy same stuff again and again only because the translation has a new name again. So if the database is wrong in finer details it may not be as useful as you wish, but neither is it "completely useless". I'll do my best to add all the meta data correctly, but for me they really don't matter. If you want to get a high quality database you need to attract MANY people caring for the entries and not a few people doing everything perfect. There is to much to do for a few people. If enough people work on the DB, then errors will be spotted by many eyes. Currently there is one reliable source for German SF/F titles (not ISFDB), and all I know is in my own DB. Still I add the data as my hope is that ISFDB can be like other collaborative works (Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, ...) and benefits from many eyes. But to get people to help you need to encourage, not discourage. One of the biggest points is to show appreciation for the efforts instead of criticism. Every sane newbie understands that his submissions aren't perfect. He accepts comments and notes requesting review or whatever is necessary for improvement - but as it takes lots of time to make entries an "hold and fix first policy" is the worst you can do. I participate in many projects, leading some myself. The successful ones are always of "accept first, fix later" policy even if that means the chance that quality is not 100%. --Stoecker 13:21, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
There seems to be a fundamental difference in your perception of what the ISFDB should be and what it actually is. It is not the goal of the ISFDB to be complete, because that's an impossible task. It is the "finer details" that distinguishes the ISFDB from other websites which are merely a "list of authors and stories". A list is not a database. It is the goal of the ISFDB to be as accurate as possible, even in its incompleteness, and that the quality of the data makes up for a lack of coverage in some areas (such as translated publications.) If we have not made that goal clear to our fellow editors, it's the moderators' failure, not our editors. Any belief that we should take on the Wikipedia paradigm is misguided. It doesn't work in this case. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears that you don't believe in the moderation process. "Accept first, fix later" (meaning "no moderation") just will not work for the ISFDB, because the odds are against the errors ever getting corrected. Without moderation, the database may become more "complete" but will be exceedingly less accurate. The overwhelming majority of submissions to the ISFDB are accepted without question. The overwhelming majority of the remaining submissions are accepted and then questioned. Only a small fraction of the remaining submissions are held for discussion with the editor. Very few editors have problems with this process. Here I must make it clear that these are just my opinions, and have no more or less weight than any other editor's opinions. You might find more sympathetic listeners if you post a message on the ISFDB:Community Portal page, which would reach all current editors, describing your feelings about the moderation process and how it can be improved. We do appreciate your submissions and all of the effort that it takes to make them. Our messages to you should not be considered criticism of your efforts, only a means to improve the quality of the database. If we have not made that clear, I apologize. Mhhutchins 23:33, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

You misunderstand what I wrote. There is nothing against seeking perfection, but I'm against overweighting perfection. Also I'm not against moderation. But there are different ways. Some of the encouraging, some discouraging. Entering lots of data and then beeing held for multiple days only because maybe a date entry is disputable is discouraging. Accepting the publication and adding adding a note that maybe date must be fixed is encouraging. If you seek a perfect database which covers only a very small part of the existing data, then the database is useless. Nobody searches a database when he 99% of time wont find the required information. So you need to attract people who enter data. And I see a lot of imported data which is by no means EXACT. You shouldn't give higher minimum standards to new editors than you already have in the database. --Stoecker 19:38, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Euro symbol

Re this record: Use the € symbol for books priced in Euros, (or ALT+0128 in Microsoft Windows). Thanks. Mhhutchins 23:52, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Ooops. I use EUR in my own database and am used to it. For other books I did right. This is anyway a strange book, I added some more notes to it. BTW. Why is there no space after $ prices, but a space after €? --Stoecker 11:40, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
I don't know. Asking the question on one of the Community pages might get you an answer from someone who may know. Mhhutchins 17:11, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
I think there should not be. I will find the discussion: If I remember correctly, somewhere we agreed there should be no space after symbols (notice the various symbol examples in Help:Screen:NewPub#Price), there should be a space after letters, and all currency indicators should be at the front. Looks like that did not make it into the help, though. --MartyD 10:54, 29 July 2013 (UTC)
Well, I guess I remember it because it was my suggestion. :-) See Rules_and_standards_discussions/Archive/Archive09#Foreign_currency_and_punctuation. One of many discussions we never followed up on and incorporated into the help. I will resurrect it and do something about it. --MartyD 11:09, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

8 Science Fiction Stories

Hello and FYI! I make some corrections and additions to this pub 8 Science Fiction Stories I corrected the name of the editor, the binding and the title and added some new contents (Vorwort and Einleitung) and make some new notes. Rudam 09:55, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Utopia-Magazin 20

Hello! If there are more than two interior arts in a novel or in one story from the same artist Bruck, then ISFDB number them with a square bracket behind the title. [Ich bin nichts [1], Ich bin nichts [2]) Rudam 06:39, 3 August 2013 (UTC)

Date on Science Fiction

I accepted your clone Science Fiction, but seeing your note about the statement "second impression 1970", I changed the publication date from 1975-00-00 to 1970-00-00. It looked to me like that accidentally carried over from the 1975 edition that you cloned. I apologize if this change was inappropriate. --MartyD 13:50, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

No thanks, the fix was correct. --Stoecker 16:19, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Aufstand der Gefangenen

Hello! I first accepted your submission of this pub Aufstand der Gefangenen. Only then I noticed my fault, that I forgot to point out you to a specific feature. If the content of a publication has the length of a shortfiction (Nuisance Value is a novella), ISFDB used the Pub type chapterbook and the shortfiction is the content of this chapterbook. The shortfiction and not the chapterbook is then the variant of the original title. I hope it's alright for you that I correct it. BTW at first I also had difficulties with the concept chapterbook. Rudam 18:37, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

See my note at the beginning of the page: "So if you think you know better or want to fix any of these details, feel free to do so." --Stoecker 18:41, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Bert Koeppen

Thanks for your helpful clarification of this long-established incorrectness. Rudam 18:47, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Der große Vorgarten (1982)

Hello! Sorry but I reject your submission. It's true that (1982) isn't a part of the title. But the addition of the pub year helps to distinguish identical titles with a differing content. For example: different translator, expanded translation, expanded content of title or revised content of title. If you have problems with this procedure you're welcome to start a discussion here Rules_and_standards_discussions Rudam 12:21, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Garen Drussaï

Hello! I've accepted your proper name changing for Garen Drussaï, but it seems that ISFDB could not handle a i trema. Rudam 12:56, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

FYI: The possibility of a correct spelling was found. Rudam 19:15, 13 August 2013 (UTC)
Now it is the other way round and "Garen Drussai" does not work anymore.--Stoecker 11:38, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

Dating magazine records

I'm holding the submission to change the date of this publication and all of its contents. Unless there is internal evidence of a contradictory publication date, i.e. inside the publication itself and not a secondary source, the date as stated in the issue should be the date of the ISFDB record. Because magazines are usually available before the stated date, and occasionally appear afterward, it is impossible to determine the exact date of publication. Even if that exact date can be determined, it would be difficult to keep track of contents published in those issues. For example, if you know that "Allamagoosa" was published in the May 1955 issue of Astounding, it would look strange to see the story is dated March 15, 1955, a very likely date of the story's appearance on the newsstands. So the ISFDB standard is to use the stated month of publication for periodicals and their contents. Exceptions can be made if the date is in error of more than several months. Thanks. Mhhutchins 20:39, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

According to issue 2 the magazine was released one month late. So it was designed and layouted for April, but published in May (due to printing troubles). Seems they got a lot of letters for that topic, so they explained it in next issue. The next issue is strange as well. It says both "June" and 7/8, but text itself explains, that it is released in July and not June. Strange it is, I agree. :-) Altogether there were only 5 issues, so maybe they were really incompetent. --Stoecker 10:59, 11 August 2013 (UTC)
I'll reject the submission to change the date, and added a note about the month of the issue's appearances. Mhhutchins 14:47, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Die besten Stories von 1941

Hello, the cover artist for this is not Oliviero Berni, but Carl Lundgren, as can be seen here. Lundgren's signature is on the cover. Thanks. Horzel 11:19, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

I agree regarding the signature, but the book states "Coverillustration: Oliviero Berni", thought this wouldn't be the first time such information is wrong. Feel free to fix it. --Stoecker 19:19, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Review link mismatch?

Hi. I have on hold your submission that proposes to link a 1966 review titled Now and Beyond to the 2002 cover art, The Lovely Bones. Something isn't right there. The review is also already linked to this title (which has no publications, unfortunately), so I'm not sure what you are trying to do. Thanks. --MartyD 10:43, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Mixed title and publication again. Now added a proper request linking to the title for Now & Beyond publication. --Stoecker 11:01, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Neues Leben

For your proposed addition of Planet des Ungehorsams, should the publisher be simply Neues Leben and not "Neues Leben (Releasegruppe IV) Berlin"? If its name changed from Releasegruppe IV, we would not include that information in the name, but rather in a note on the publisher page. If that is the case, let me know -- I think I just saw a note somewhere that says non-moderators cannot edit Publisher records -- and I can add it. Thanks. --MartyD 11:04, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Neues Leben in Berlin is another wellknown publisher in the GDR. I don't really know how to name this "illegal" publisher, but Neues Leben is not a good name for them. --Stoecker 11:06, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
If you can edit the publisher, than maybe add above wiki link, as the two books already added there are from this publisher and not from the illegal group. --Stoecker 11:10, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
Ok, I added the link. But I don't understand about this book. Is it a pirated copy (by "Releasegruppe IV"?) of an edition that was published by the true Neues Leben? Is whoever published it trying to claim to be Neues Leben but is not? I may have to ask one of our European moderators, who are more familiar with German publishers, to help decide what to do with this. But thank you for any further information. --MartyD 13:47, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
No. "Neues Leben" is an east German publisher. This pamphlet is a pirated printing (no author names, no license) by something called "Releasegruppe IV" (in Western Berlin) who probably for this relase thought that "Neues Leben" is a better name. It seems to be an anarchistic private book producing. Something very special :-) Has nothing to do with "Neues Leben" publisher. I bought it as "Releasegruppe IV" published. To keep it understandable I have choosen the combined name. I wouldn't make it too complicated - I doubt they have made anything more interesting for ISFDB than this one. Everything else may be anarchistic and/or communist stuff. But I try to get Russell complete and they pirated a Russell writing. --Stoecker 16:33, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
Ok, I understand. So using "Neues Leben (Releasegruppe IV)" sounds like the best approach. But now, another question (I apologize): No author credited? Your submission credits it to Eric Frank Russell. If there is no author credit, we would use "uncredited" instead, and then make a variant to The Great Explosion (as we have done with this). So I will accept the submission, remove the "Berlin", and change the author to "uncredited" and make the variant. Does that sound correct? Thanks. --MartyD 18:54, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
Yes, nearly. I checked it and actually it is exactly the text of Keine Macht der Erde, i.e. a variant of the short story ... And Then There Were None instead of the novel. --Stoecker 19:29, 18 August 2013 (UTC)
That is helpful information. So what we have here is a CHAPTERBOOK, not a NOVEL. I approved the submission, changed the type to CHAPTERBOOK and added the novella, all with "uncredited" as the author. I also made the variants to Eric Frank Russell. See this result. Because we also have the novel-length Planet des Ungehorsams, I added a note explaining that the novella-length one is the same text as for "Keine Macht der Erde". See how that all looks. You are welcome to change anything that is not the way it should be. --MartyD 10:52, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

The other text is also for the novella and not the novel. I submitted 3 requests to fix this, but this is not enough, so either you do the necessary changes yourself or I need to add some more requests after these three get accepted. Missing: length for the shortfiction entry, chapterbook link to existing Russell, ... Why can't the novel be much longer, would be easier to distinguish! --Stoecker 17:30, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

I accepted the submissions and made one follow-up submission. There is a difference a publication that is a NOVEL and a publication that is a CHAPTERBOOK. All publication records are linked to a title record that represents the publication itself. For a NOVEL, that title record is performing two duties: It represents the publication, and it represents the work itself (the novel-length piece of fiction). A CHAPTERBOOK, however, is like a COLLECTION (of only one work). So you get the CHAPTERBOOK publication, its CHAPTERBOOK title, but now there's not title for the work itself, so a SHORTFICTION title must be included in its contents.
When you take an existing NOVEL publication and change it to CHAPTERBOOK and take the existing NOVEL title and change it to SHORTFICTION, the necessary CHAPTERBOOK title is missing. That is what I added. It is safer -- and clearer to the moderator handling the submissions -- to change a publication from NOVEL to CHAPTERBOOK and the title from NOVEL to CHAPTERBOOK and to add a new SHORTFICTION title to the publication (which you can do in the same submission where you change the publication's type). Then there is no mismatch. Anyway, that's just for your information, should you run into this situation again. You can fix these up as you wish. I am double-checking whether it's ok to merge the two Planet des Ungehorsams chapterbook records; I have in my mind that we don't do so, but I cannot remember why we would not. Thanks. --MartyD 15:29, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Horror 2

I accepted Horror 2 and made two small changes:

  • The author on "Das Tal der Untoten" was "elen Weinbaum)". I took a wild guess and corrected it to "Helen Weinbaum". :-)
  • It is ok to use a company's name as a cover "artist". So I gave the Atelier Heinrichs & Bachmann credit there. We have Atelier Heinrichs & Bachmann with several such credited covers.

Will you be making the variants? Thanks. --MartyD 11:21, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

Copy&Paste errors happen sometimes. Easy to find when I do the variants to English originals. --Stoecker 11:34, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

Russell's Plus X

Hello, Stoecker! I added the cover artist and an accompanying note to this publication. Stonecreek 04:01, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Foster's Body, Inc.

Re this record: You should remove Amazon as the source for the data in a primary-verified publication, unless there is specific data that is sourced from Amazon which can be noted in the record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:20, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Heyne: Titan series

Hello, tomorrow I will remove the title series from #23 of the series, which makes Evil Earths into a part of a german series. This was not intended by Aldiss as part of Titan and is as such misleading, because it does also show as part of the series on Aldiss's summary page. (In fact it is one of the trapdoors of ISFDB I talked of above.)

This also is the case for Titan 11, which features a selection from The Science Fiction Hall of Fame series. It could be made into a sub-series of that latter series, though, but should be renamed, because other volumes of Titan (#s 1-5 & 17-23) featured other original titles. Do you have any suggestion for renaming? Stonecreek 19:05, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

I have removed the title series from the anthology edited by Aldiss; I also added the essays, the month of publication and some notes to your verified publication (I also added month of publication and notes to Titan 11).
I thought hard about a possible name for the german SF Hall of Fame selections, but came with no better than Titan 6-16, because I think it's very difficult to give it a proper descriptive & relatively short name that includes the intricacies of this selection. I also think it's better to drop the publisher's name from any title series: improbable as it may seem it remains possible that some of the volumes are issued anew by some other publisher (it has been done for other titles, even anthologies). If you can come up with a better title, please propose it right away.
Let me add that I hope that you decide to stay! You have added valuable publications and progressed well. After all, the trouble really only was caused by mutual misunderstanding, in my opinion. Stonecreek 07:48, 11 September 2013 (UTC)
Stripping some books from the series makes it useless. So either all of them are in the series or none. --Stoecker 16:24, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
This would be true for a purely german db, but we also have to keep in mind where some titles are derived from: the original defines the parent series, in this case it is The Science Fiction Hall of Fame. But since at least one of the german Titan anthologies was put together by taking its material from two volumes of the original series, this seems to me the only way to represent this in our database. If you can come up with a better one, though, please let me know about it. Damn, if Wolfgang Jeschke had only anticipated our needs in the Seventies, we wouldn't have to come up with solutions that aren't that beautiful, which I completely agree to. Stonecreek 17:57, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories = Science-Fiction-Stories

Following the information on its title page I changed the title of your verified publication to Science-Fiction-Stories 5 (which seems to be the spelling used throughout for these anthologies and collections, so I will change them also, when I come across them). I also added and will add some notes to them. Thanks, Stonecreek 13:49, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

'Ein Ullstein Buch' / Ullstein 2000

Hello, we are just now trying a new numeration series for Ullstein 2000. Rudam proposed 1 (2760), 2 (2773), 3 (2782) and so on. The reason is that on the copyright page it is stated that the four digit number belongs to the pub. series 'Ullstein Bücher', which makes Ullstein 2000 into a sub-series (See here for an example). Now, we wouldn't want to catalogue the whole 'Ullstein Bücher' series since most of them weren't speculative in content.

Also, I have started to establish a chronological order for the publications of the pub. series (and the corresponding titles) by using YYYY-00-00, YYYY-00-01, YYYY-00-02 etc., especially to have 'Science-Fiction-Stories' as edited by Walter Spiegl in a chronologically order. Thanks, Stonecreek 16:19, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

That is again a totally un-intuitive enumeration. Nothing in a book can gives me this series number. The series number of Ullstein is a fine and easy detectible number. Better an intuitive numbering which has gaps, that an counter-intuitive (what do you do, when by accident one book was overlooked? Renumber anything behind?). Simply document in the series description that it is a subset of the Ullstein numbers and state that there are gaps instead of introducing something which nobody will understand. --Stoecker 16:29, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Yes, this again is an example that intuition is misleading in some cases. Please take a look at the rules: A Publication series is a group of publications marked out by the Publisher in some way. In this case the publisher clearly assigns the number to the pub. series 'Ullstein Bücher'. As you may see when you take a close look at the entry it is clearly stated that the continuous numeration isn't stated in the book. And don't fret about leaving numbers out: there are various reference works that catalogue the whole series. Thanks, Stonecreek 17:39, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Essentially this is the main point I complain about and is also why I stopped entering any German books. The rules you apply can't be understood. They look like dictatorship and without common sense. --Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
I do concede that the sheer amount of text in the rules seems to be overwhelming in the beginning. I have had my difficulties at my start, I can assure you of that. And there is absolutely no dictatorship involved, they were discussed over and over again in the course of years. The standard they represent seems to be the only way to prevent anyone`s own preferences taking over (which usually differ from one editor to the next, and would inevitably lead to a somewhat chaotic database). The main purpose of ISFDB is to give biblioghraphical data (and not only for publications, but also for publication series and publishers) and somehow to represent the author's/editor's and publisher's intentions. So, intuition isn't really the best guide, instead we have to rely on the data stated inside a given publication and (in cases of unclearity) on reference works, as for example other bibliographies. Therefore, it is really helpful for editors who come upon a publication to have notes that represent what is stated in the publication.
Reading again the help text regarding pub. series, we decided to change the numeration of Ullstein 2000 to '1 (2760)' etc., this way hopefully representing the actual position in the series and in the series Ullstein Bücher. Thanks, Stonecreek 10:47, 22 September 2013 (UTC)


If your process does not create understandable and usable rules, then I have the freedom to not follow them simply by not entering data. My main task to have Russell complete is finished, seems I wont continue with Foster. --Stoecker 14:27, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Carnivores of Light and Darkness

Are the four extra pages in this publication separately paginated, or do they continue the pagination of the novel, or are they unnumbered? Mhhutchins 17:11, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

The "excerpt" part of the 3 books restarts numbering by 1. I changed the other 2 as well. --Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Into the Out Of

Is the publication date given in this record stated in the book? Mhhutchins 17:12, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

The title page states 1999 (and the copyright page states copyright for title cover 1999). The amazon data also stated 1999. If they didn't forget to update the title page, I'd assume it really is 1999. --Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

The Spoils of War

You didn't give a source for the data in this record, so I'm assuming you have a copy. If so, can you confirm the publication date? That ISBN range didn't start until the spring of 2000. Thanks for checking. Mhhutchins 17:18, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

I can't state ownership for ClonePub (which is actually really ugly, as it is complicated to find the right entry after it was accepted). It is stated "Reprinted by Orbit 1999". As "A Call To Arms" states two years 1997 and 2000 (for second printing I assume) I'm pretty sure this one was printed 1999. --Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

The False Mirror

Another publication record which has to be sourced or primary verified. Mhhutchins 18:11, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Two more: here and here. If you are creating these records with the books-in-hand add a note to the "Note to Moderator" field saying that. Cloning a record doesn't give you the option of auto-verifying the new record, so this is the only option that allows the moderator to know your source for the data. Thanks. Mhhutchins 18:16, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

You should add that option in the webinterface! Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
I can't write software, and such a change would not effect me. I suggest that you make a request for it on one of the community pages. Mhhutchins 20:37, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
I already created another bug-report in the sourceforge bug-tracker. It gets ignored, so I handle this like all the other projects. No more reports, when they get ignored. It is too much work to create reports to have them ignored --Stoecker 08:42, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
How do you know it was ignored? There's only a couple of guys who work on the software and they go through the reports and prioritize them based on the urgency and their limited time. Just because it's not fixed overnight doesn't mean it's being ignored. Mhhutchins 15:58, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
When for multiple weeks no comment, change of meta data or anything else happens, it gets ignored. I manage several software development projects and contribute to numerous bug trackers, so I know what's the difference between being ignored and no time to implement it. Basically always at least one of the fields of a new bug is wrong and needs to be fixed (e.g. the assignment of the component). --Stoecker 19:39, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
Again, I ask "How do you know it was ignored?" Just because it hasn't been changed doesn't mean it's been ignored. (Perhaps we have differing definitions of the word?) BTW, this is not a "bug" per se. It's a feature request. There's a difference. Please bring any complaints to one of community pages. It doesn't do any good to whine on your own talk page, or in a submission's Note to the Moderator. Mhhutchins 20:08, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
For me an report is ignored, when for more than a month no reaction happens at all. I don't whine about it, I only say that I wont do any more reports based on the experience of many other projects I have. I give every projects at least one try - if it fails, then I wont continue. Everbody needs to decide where he spends his time, as there is only limit amount of available time. I make my decisions based on past experience with others. --Stoecker 08:51, 21 September 2013 (UTC)
The ability to mark pubs as "primary verified" in NewPub and AddPub was added a couple of months ago. The same change was made to ClonePub shortly thereafter, but it hasn't been deployed yet because it depends on other changes that are still being tested. Ahasuerus 20:49, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
My feature request is not about that topic, but about something else I really care about. --Stoecker 08:44, 21 September 2013 (UTC)
The underlying problem is, as Michael indicated above, that our development and testing resources are quite limited. In addition to development and testing, I handle server maintenance, moderation of submissions in Central and Eastern European languages, robots (which find thousands of raw ISBNs every month) and resulting robotic submissions -- there is a snapshot of where we were three days ago here. That's a lot of balls to juggle and the result is that feature requests often take many months to implement. Ahasuerus 20:49, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
I understand all that and know same situation from my projects. Still you should understand, that I wont make bug-reports, when it is wasted time. In the same time I can probably fix 1 or 2 bugs in my own software. I did dozens of reports for KDE only to have them closed after years with the comment "KDE3.5 is out of maintenance" - most the same bugs are still in KDE4. Same happened for some other projects. So the rule is - when reports are ignored I wont do any more of them. Should be simple to understand. If in some month my report is cared for in some way (either positive or negative, but at least noticed), then maybe I change my opinion. --Stoecker 08:44, 21 September 2013 (UTC)
With one exception which I clearly stated I own any books I enter. --Stoecker 19:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
Moderators should not be expected to remember which editors only enter their own books. As I suggest, you should let them know in the Note to Moderator field, or expect to be asked the question each time. Your choice. Mhhutchins 20:39, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
It is the first time someone asks. Previously the same approach was ok. So how should I know that such a note would be required? --Stoecker 08:42, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
It wasn't asked because you had indicated you were working from the primary source. Mhhutchins 15:58, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
No, for clone pub I never did that. I wasn't aware of the fact that would help. I always verified the pub later. --Stoecker 19:39, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
Verification isn't a moderated process. No one but you, and the users who come after you to see the record, know that you verified it. Mhhutchins 20:08, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Title changing

FYI! I've added hyphens to the following pubs: Science-Fiction-Stories 3 and Science-Fiction-Stories 6 Rudam 18:21, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Das Geheimnis der Matrix

I've changed this publication record from ANTHOLOGY to NONFICTION. The first type is for fiction. Thanks. Mhhutchins 18:51, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

SF Perry Rhodan Magazin

Hello, I changed the editor of the first entered magazine of this series to 'uncredited'. You gave William Voltz as editor, which most certainly is not correct, since this would be the only issue of SF Perry Rhodan Magazin edited by him. Please take a look at the copyrights of the publication to determine who is stated as Chefredakteur. I also changed the title of the magazine by taking a look at that source of information printed in other issues of the magazine from that time period. And we enter the title of magazines in a way that was worth a discussion. In that argument there also is a link to the ISFDB standard from which aroused the need to change the page count (see here about the differences between entering magazines and other publications). I also put the essay by Urbanek into an essay series, again by taking a look at other issues of the magazine; probably this will be the case for other essays as well, but since I don't own the issue, this will have to wait a while. In any case you will be informed about the correct placement in a title series and other necessary changes. Thanks, Stonecreek 07:53, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Foster's Genom

To avoid a double entry and so that you may primary verify the publication if interested, I'd like to direct your attention towards this. Stonecreek 14:31, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

I fixed the entry. I wont do double entries, as for each book I first check existence (except when ISFDB search function fails, which nearly happened for Now & Beyond). --Stoecker 19:47, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
That's good to hear (or rather read): few editors are aware of this possible problem. That's how we catch the occasional double entry. Thanks for verifying this. As much as I'd like to, there's no chance to catch them all. Stonecreek 14:43, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Cover image of "Mid-Flinx"

I'm responding to your query by private e-mail where you wanted to know whether the cover image of this pub is correct. It is not, and you are right to notice that the title text "Mid-Flinx" on my 6th printing copy is entirely in red, not blue with a red border (for the record: I am talking about this cover scan). Thanks for spotting this. Feel free to update the pub record with a new cover scan. Patrick -- Herzbube Talk 17:19, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Cover art for Science-Fiction-Stories 3 identified...

... and it's by Paul Lehr, first used as cover for Asimov's The Martian Way and Other Stories, see here. I corrected the credit and added notes to your verified pub.. Stonecreek 14:28, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

And same procedure for Science-Fiction-Stories 5, original cover see here. Stonecreek 14:57, 19 September 2013 (UTC)
I also found the original art for Science-Fiction-Stories 19 and added the credit for the artist. Stonecreek 12:53, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Story length field not selected on excerpts

Per ISFDB practice, when entering an excerpt leave the story length field blank which defaults to "shortfiction". I've removed the shortstory length from this record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 20:10, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Mir gehört die Welt, SF Perry Rhodan Magazin 5/80 and Science-Fiction-Stories vs. Science Fiction Stories

Hello, as there's no mentioning of the sub-title 'Lebensgefährliche Erfindungen' on the title page (p. 1) of this publication, it has to be removed from the entry per standard for ISFDB. Would you like to correct it on your own or shall I do it for you?

This is also a reminder to correct (or state here) the 'Chefredakteur' of SF Perry Rhodan Magazin 5/80. He should be stated on the copyright page (probably page 3) of the issue in question.

Also, could you please correct the spelling of your verified 'Science Fiction Stories' as edited by Walter Spiegl. Again as a reminder, we report the title as stated on the title page of a given book. Thanks, Stonecreek 08:39, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

Well, not responding is also a kind of response, I think. I'll go ahead and make the necessary and responsible changes, adding some appropriate notes where they seem to be in place. Stonecreek 16:31, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Wenn trügerisch Besuch kommt

I've put your submission on hold as it seems to me that you're giving a translator for a text which is originally in german. Hauck 12:11, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Right, he did no translate his own story. I canceled that one. Got one too much in the heat of the battle... :-) --Stoecker 12:16, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Das Land der Blinden

I changed the date for this shortfiction by Wells to 1979-00-00. You wrote in the notes that this text/translation was from this year, so the title should reflect it, even when we don't have the corresponding publication (probably by Zsolnay) in the database. Thanks for adding the contents of Von Shelley bis Clarke! Stonecreek 13:49, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Great World Mysteries

Please disambiguate the title of the bibliography in this record. Also, the link to OCLC is malformed. It must have the complete URL to link from an ISFDB record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 20:26, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

A preview would be nice to find such errors before submit!--Stoecker 20:28, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
As I've requested several times before, please bring any concerns about the software to one of the community pages. There's nothing I can do about it. A response like this is a waste of time, both yours and mine. I will no longer respond to them. Mhhutchins 20:38, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
Whether I write "Yes, fixed it" or the above is the same work for me. :-) I didn't expect any answer. --Stoecker 20:48, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Clone of Great World Mysteries

Perhaps you meant to remove the US price when you cloned it for this UK edition? Mhhutchins 20:40, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Jup.--Stoecker 20:46, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Publication year

There is something wrong with the publication year of this book Flinx' Abenteuer Rudam 17:09, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Fixed. Good luck it does not affect all the contents. --Stoecker 17:11, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
A new typo: The fourth printing is 1822 Die neuen Abenteuer des Luke Skywalker
Hmpf, I already changed that line 3 times before submit. --Stoecker 17:36, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
Typos happen! Rudam 17:44, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Publisher

I've accepted your submission of Starfight, but changed the publisher into the standardized Droemer Knaur. Rudam 08:17, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Ellipsis

Just an FYI that I have changed a few of your submissions to follow what Help:Screen:EditTitle says:

  • An ellipsis should be entered as the sequence "space", "period", "space", "period", "space", "period". If the ellipsis is in the middle of the title, it should be entered with a space after it as well, prior to the start of the following word.

Don't blame us, it's what various style manuals say! :-) Ahasuerus 21:08, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

It's seems the logical choice if you don't use the special UTF-8 symbol for it, which would be … and usually looks ugly :-) BTW If you see that I mismatched Uppercase/Lowercase for English titles, please correct them. I'm no native speaker and not always sure which words should be lowercase and which not. --Stoecker 21:33, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
Unfortunately, there is no universally accepted standard in English, but the current ISFDB rule states that:
  • Titles should have case regularized unless there is some specific evidence that the author intended certain letters to be in a specific case. For example, if the title is "EXTRO" in all caps, the title should be entered as "Extro". This applies to the titles of short stories as well as books. Typesetting style is not important; for example, Fantastic Universe typically printed story titles in lower case, but these titles are regularized for the ISFDB. Regularized case means that the first word is capitalized, and all later words are also capitalized except for "and", "or", "the", "a", "an", "for", "of", "in", "on", "by", "at", "from", "with", and "to". Hyphenated words have the first letter after the hyphen capitalized.
That's all there is to it! :) Ahasuerus 22:52, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Alan Dean Fosters Homanx-Universum: Die Commonwealth-Konkordanz

Would you happen to know whether Michael C. Goodwin's "Alan Dean Fosters Homanx-Universum: Die Commonwealth-Konkordanz" is a translation of Michael Goodwin and Robert Teague's A Guide to the Commonwealth: The Official Guide to Alan Dean Foster's Humanx Commonwealth Universe? Ahasuerus 23:00, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

The entry I made is according to the text and stating "A Guide to Alan Dean Foster's Commonwealth" copyright 1983. Your text has additional authors, is 2 years later and has another name. Maybe it is a reworked version? They are clearly related, but probably not the same. Thought I find no reference in the net - maybe the 1983 version was never published officially? --Stoecker 09:25, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Good points, thanks. I will see what I can find tomorrow... Ahasuerus 06:56, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I have been unable to find the 1983 version either :( Oh well, at least I found another book by Goodwin and set up a couple of series while searching. I also turned "Michael C. Goodwin" into a pseudonym of Michael Goodwin and set up various VTs, so things are looking up. Thanks for digging! Ahasuerus 20:53, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

L*z*r*s L*ng

According to Gary Westfahl's "Science Fiction Quotations: From the Inner Mind to the Outer Limits", p. 65., "Notes from Magdalen More", which was published in Analog as by "L*z*r*s L*ng", was actually written by Susanna Jacobson, so I have changed our record and rejected your "Make Pseudonym" submission. You learn new things all the time :) Ahasuerus 23:09, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, I came from validation of non-language Heinlein pages and simply mixed the target here (also probably because Lazarus Long is tied to Heinlein in my mind). --Stoecker 09:25, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Non-Latin characters in authors' names

I am afraid our software still has some problems with non-Latin characters in authors' names :-( , so we are forced to use transliterations. I hope to resolve these problems within the next 6 months (give or take), but for now I am afraid I will have to reject your submissions which would have changed the spelling of Sergei Lukyanenko's name. Ahasuerus 23:14, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Can we create a "Sergei Lukyanenko (rus)" and use this for the original entries, so that I don't need to rework everything later on, but only need to change one author entry? --Stoecker 09:25, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Well, you would also need to link all kinds of "Lukyanenko" and "Лукьяненко" titles using variants. And then there is a good chance that some well-meaning editor looks at it and tries to "normalize" the affected records, undoing all of your work. Overall, I think it would be much safer to wait until the next round of language changes goes live. I can't promise anything specific since I have a lot of different balls in the air at the moment, but I hope to have them in place in early 2014. Ahasuerus 06:55, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Also I think it would be a good idea to add direct fields for transliterations to names and titles (and also translators please) and display them in links, so that "English guys" are at least able to read it. :-) --Stoecker 09:25, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
There is a Feature Request (we call them FRs) to "Add a field for romanized/transliterated form of each title" and I expect that we will need to add a similar field to author records before we allow non-Latin author names. Translators are much harder to implement, but I have been thinking of a band-aid that we could use for now. Stay tuned! :-) Ahasuerus 06:55, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Bill Drussaï

I am afraid there is no way to delete an author manually -- author records are deleted automatically when the last Title/Pub/Review record is deleted. There are still some bugs in that part of the software, so on occasion an Author record lingers on. When that happens the only way to fix the problem is to create a pub for the author and then delete. I will go ahead and do it now. Ahasuerus 21:29, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

It turns out that there were three bogus entries for this author in "canonical_author". Once I deleted them manually, I was able to get rid of the author record using the trick described above. Presumably the sequence of events that you used to create/edit some of the test data for "Bill Drussaï" left dangling records in canonical_author after you deleted them. My guess is that it may have had something to do with "ï" being a non-ASCII character. Ahasuerus 21:46, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
Hey. This is not my test. I never test in a live database. I only know this bogus author due to my constant check about Garen Drussaï/Drussai. --Stoecker 09:08, 1 November 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, I should have realized that the title IDs were too low for it to be a recent test. Let me see... Ah, yes, it was something that Bill Longley played with on 2007-09-12. Ahasuerus 17:20, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

Flammenritt

There are two versions of this title in our database. Could you please take a look into your verified publication to determine if both of them match? Stating the translator should do the job. Thanks, Stonecreek 05:47, 2 November 2013 (UTC)

Added. --Stoecker 12:55, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
Thank you very much, now it's possible to merge the two. Stonecreek 18:06, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Science Fiction Stories 4 and Herbert Papala

Hello, could you please take a look as how the credit for cover artist is stated in Science Fiction Stories 4? If it is just for 'Umschlagentwurf' the credit for Papala should better be removed, because this is a credit for cover design, not the illustration. I found artwork by Paul Lehr reproduced on the cover of Science Fiction Stories 2, where you had previously Papala credited.

It's "Umschlagentwurf" --Stoecker 12:55, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for taking a look. I'll remove the credit (hopefully we'll find the original art sometime). Stonecreek 18:08, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Also, please correct the spelling of the title if it is spelled with hyphens on the title page and check again for the ISBN: there shouldn't be one stated in 1970. Thank you, Stonecreek 05:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Box of Oxen

A couple of questions about this pub:

  • Is the language of the novella really German? Amazon's Look-Inside suggests that it's English.
  • Is the price that you see at Amazon.com really $3.44 rather than $2.99? I know that Amazon used to charge some customers an extra $2 for Whispernet (I think) delivery of e-books in their countries, but a $0.45 difference is new to me. Edit: Upon reflection, a 15% difference sounds like a VAT surcharge.

Thanks. Ahasuerus 23:28, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

No. it's English. Fixed it. Price, I have no idea. For me it display $3.44 when going to amazon.com. --Stoecker 10:58, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for checking. I have changed the Note field and the language of the novella. Ahasuerus 14:29, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Maybe they charge something like a 'continental' (European) price? Just an idea. Stonecreek 13:48, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Looks like it may be due to the changing VAT rules. This article discusses the issue. Ahasuerus 14:29, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Thank you very much for clearing things up! This has to be the reason, I think. Stonecreek 14:46, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Planet des Ungehorsams

Hello, I will verify the Guhl edition of Russell's book (and add some notes). Would it be okay if I add the cover image of my copy, which looks a bit better (because, I have to admit, I haven't read this edition yet)? Stonecreek 13:53, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Sure, if you have a better picture. --Stoecker 09:08, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
Thank you, done. Stonecreek 20:06, 7 November 2013 (UTC)

Ночной Дозор

Go to the title Ночной Дозор. Then use the Unmerge tool on the left tool bar and select the appropriate publication(s). You then only have to merge the new title with the existing one. Hope that helps. This publication stems from older times, when different languages weren't supported. Stonecreek 21:24, 7 November 2013 (UTC)

system to properly import/export XML

I was talking to Dave Langford this weekend about some mutual cross-linking between ISFDB and SFE3. He's willing to provide an XML dump of Author data - although he's not the most experienced developer apparently he's the best SFE3 have. I think we can start small and populate our author links with references to their SFE3 author pages, where we haven't already done so manually. The first problem is minor - we have authors listed by full name, SFE3 have a 'last name, forenames' format. That's mostly easily fixable but with our current interface we would have several thousand names that need to be approved one-by-one. I would prefer a mass update instead, so I was wondering how far along your idea is? Obviously we'd need Ahasuerus to approve such a big update, but if the two of us pester him enough we can probably get it approved. BLongley 21:34, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

The next problem is alphabetical - I'm pretty much mono-lingual so I would need a lot of help in transliterated names. Is this a project you'd be interested in collaborating on? BLongley 21:34, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

I don't know and investigated the infrastructure for bigger imports yet. I have seen some possibilities, but did not explore them. Actually this is nothing which really interests me much, but when the task is only to get one XML, reformat the authors, match them to the ISFDB authors and output results (either as text, XML or probably SQL insert statements), then it is easy. I can write a small script doing that in a couple of hours (make the XML available and I see what I can do). Non-automatic conversion remains handwork thought. Or did I misunderstand your intent? --Stoecker 17:13, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
I could do a script myself, although not as quickly as you. I'm hoping we can cut down the work on APPROVING each change, which would take almost as long as manual entry. We have apparently imported other databases before but I don't think Ahasuerus was involved in such, and Al is notably absent from the project now. Our API is still very rudimentary and I can't think of a quick way to ensure we only apply NEEDED updates - but at worst we should at least be capable of submitting the changes "en masse". I could do a fair bit of work on an XML basis but would need Ahasuerus to allow mass SQL updates. If you can suggest the best way to process the records I'll see how well Dave Langford can provide the data. BLongley 02:40, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
Are you sure we need Dave Langford's data? SFE3 has a few "category" pages which list all of their authors, artists, critics, editors, house names and "media people". All we need to do is parse these 6 pages to extract the URLs. We can even re-parse them once every few months and check for added authors.
That said, matching what they have against our data may not be trivial, e.g. how do you tell that our A. E. is the same as their AE? We also have hundreds of author names disambiguated with parenthetical suffixes like "Andrew Smith (I)" through "Andrew Smith (VI)". And then there are mismatches between our "canonical" names and theirs, e.g. we use "Leo Frankowski" as the canonical name and they use Leo A. Frankowski while our "Leo A. Frankowski" is a pseudonym. So one way or another human oversight will be required, although if you prepare a fully reconciled cross-reference list of our author IDs and SFE's URLS, SQL insertion shouldn't be a problem. Ahasuerus 03:42, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
I know it's not trivial, I have thought about the exceptions. 90% of the work is easy, but the other 10% will probably take another 90% of the time. I'm trying to 'strike while the iron is still hot' - it was good to meet him again and have a brief chat about our respective projects, much mutual appreciation was involved. I think I promised to get back in touch within a week or so, and email correspondence should be easier than me having to raise my voice to cope with his hearing problems. It's a good thing that these projects are pretty open, as talking to Dave usually means talking to everyone else in the same room! BLongley 09:57, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
There are a few other things that we might want to work with - e.g. his Josh Kirby data should be cross-checked with our own data - but that would be another 90% work. BLongley 09:57, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
This does not sound like automatic task to me, so I'd could do what told above: Do some automatic matching were possible (i.e. names matching and no other conflicts possible). But the "10%" will be handwork and I don't see automatics for these. For OSM we have multiple projects like these, which output the remaining data as wiki page and encourage the users to do the matching (i.e. setting links). With each new run of the matching algorithm, the contents of the wiki page gets shorter and shorter... --Stoecker 10:39, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
There is a Bibliographic Projects in Progress page which uses a similar approach to cleanup tasks, but most of the logic has been migrated to moderator-only "cleanup scripts" which identify suspect records in real time. Ahasuerus 19:25, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
Ahasuerus raises some very good points - we could indeed just use the SFE3 web-pages without Dave's help - I was thinking about mutual cross-linking where we could get links FROM SFE3 rather than just provide links TO their site. Leave it with me for a day or two and I should have a better idea about what mutual benefits we can achieve. They get paid for their work whereas none of us at ISFDB do - and in fact Ahasuerus is not just a bureaucrat and joint founder but our only person that pays for hosting costs. Feel free to examine the problems in the meantime - it may be possible to extract more data than just an author link. Thanks for considering the task at all, I'd love to be part of a mutual collaborative effort, I don't think we've ever had more than 2 people involved in a change. BLongley 12:50, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
Once we have added SFE3 URLs on our side -- and BTW, we already have 4,272 SFE3 links as of last Saturday -- it should be easy to create a crosswalk between our author IDs/names and the corresponding SFE3 URLs. We could then send that file to Dave and hope that he adds links to ISFDB on his side. Welcome to the wonderful world of The Semantic Web! :-) Ahasuerus 19:33, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, but I finally decided not to continue trying to improve ISFDB - It's simply too much frustration for me and I don't see any light. I'll continue to care for data I already entered, but not more. All the ISFDB structures are so strict and fixed, that it simply makes no fun. Regarding hosting - I operate so many servers, that ISFDB would not even count when installed on one of them. For our OpenSource projects we have sponsored servers (JOSM server e.g. is sponsored by the hosting company, we only added a small note as a thank-you to the wiki). --Stoecker 18:34, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
At one point ISFDB was hosted by a major university in Texas. Unfortunately, their support was sporadic at best and at one point the server was down for a over a week while the students who maintained it were on break. That was the last drop which prompted us to move to a commercial server. Which is by no means problem-free, but still much better than the last solution. Perhaps something like the Amazon cloud might be an even better option in 2014. Ahasuerus 20:06, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Import Title(s) change

I am working on your submitted Import Titles change and I am trying to determine what the intent of the addition of the variable "ptype" in clonecontent.py was. It looks like it was a replacement for publication[PUB_CTYPE], but its value is set to 0 on line 161 of the submitted code and it's never changed afterwards.

This changes the behavior of the import logic so that importing data from a container pub will now include the container title, e.g. see this submission. Was this change in behavior intentional? Thanks. Ahasuerus 00:17, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

No. Search for "pytpe" and change it to "ptype". Should fix these issues. The variable was introduced, as the value is set only in one of the code pathes, but needed in both (thus initialization with 0). Is cleaner and easier that multiple checks. --Stoecker 17:04, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Ah, I see, thanks. Ahasuerus 01:08, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
Python really could use a "use strict;" like Perl has. A simple typo in a seldom used path of the code and you will hardly find it ever. --Stoecker 17:52, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
P.S. And while we are on the subject, there are a couple of syntax errors in edit/submitnewpub.py:
if new.form.has_key('title_wikipedia' && new.form['title_wikipedia'].value): submission.NewSubmissionElement(u'Wikipedia', new.form['title_wikipedia'].value)
if new.form.has_key('title_synopsis' && new.form['title_synopsis'].value): submission.NewSubmissionElement(u'Synopsis', new.form['title_synopsis'].value)
Ahasuerus 04:01, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Hmm, they are not in older tested version. Probably an error due to updates to recent CVS. I believe you added some checks here. CVS conflict resolution is awful and I did not really check the updates that much as the initial changes. I'd recommend SVN instead (would not have solved that issue, but some others). "&&" instead of "and" is a common python bug of me, as nearly all other languages support "&&", but not python. --Stoecker 17:04, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Dark Star and Perry Rhodan Magazin 5/80

Hi, this book by 1984 should be part of this pub. series. Would you be so kind to check it (should be at least stated on back)?

After four days, I'll go ahead and enter the series. I also found Dunkle Mission by Alan Dean Foster, to which I'll also add the publication series (and the month of publication). I'll add some more months to your verified books without further notice in the future (unless you state here that you'd like to be informed).

And for the magazine: Interestingly, this has no 'Chefredakteur' stated (the previous issue had one, the following also, but a different one). But I found a vice editor ('Stellvertretender Chefredakteur'). So this Wolfgang J. Fuchs should be entered. I'll do it Tuesday if you don't have any objections or do it first. Stonecreek 19:35, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

I added the editor and made some minor and some major changes. A minor change was replacing 'Weltall' with 'Weltraum' for Hellmann's essay. I also changed the title of von Däniken's essay (to put it into the title series Direkt von Däniken) and the credit for interior art on p. 26, which doesn't seem to be by Lehr, judging from the signature. Major additions were the poster and the 'sci-fi-media' department which may be missing in your copy (I have several issues without these items, which were originally distributed with the magazine). Thanks, Stonecreek 19:57, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Kabu-Kabu

Can you confirm that the title of this collection as recorded on its title page includes a hyphen? According to the Amazon Look Inside (of the ebook) and the OCLC record (of the print book), the title is Kabu Kabu, which is the title of one of the stories included in the collection. Thanks for checking. Mhhutchins 00:04, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Weird Tales, December 2004

I added navigation links and letters by folks already included in the database to the December 2004 issue of Weird Tales. Thanks. --Ron ~ RtraceTalk 22:19, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Up- and redates

I'll update your entries for Terra #491 and Terra #493. They'll also predated to the end of 1966. How did you reach the conclusion that they were published in 1967? In every case that's a good example why there's a need to source the data you enter. (Also, there may be some more updating in line, depending if you had more publications of the series entered than these two.) Stonecreek 10:40, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Also, considering the length of the text, Im Banne der Farben had to be attributed as NOVELLA and its first publication as CHAPTERBOOK. Thanks, Stonecreek 11:11, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
Some additions, a specifying of the date of publication and a change of title (since there was no colon to be found anywhere in the publication and the found one disrupted a meaningful phrase into two parts) for Terra #489. Stonecreek 10:25, 15 March 2014 (UTC)
I updated this anthology. Also, the title for the SHORTFICTION by Damon Knight was corrected. Thanks, Stonecreek 06:18, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Predators I Have Known

FYI, the name of the publisher "Open Road Media" has been changed to "Open Road Integrated Media" as per Amazon's Look Inside. The change affected one of your verified publications, Alan Dean Foster's Predators I Have Known. When you get a chance, could you please confirm that the new name reflects what's in the book? TIA! Ahasuerus 19:12, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Die denkenden Wälder

I corrected the notes for this publication: you stated 1979 as the year of first printing, whereas this is a new edition (new ISBN, new Heyne catalogue number, additional material, new cover art). You may be interested in the first german publication of the Goodwin essay in Heyne Science Fiction Magazin #12. Stonecreek 09:49, 15 June 2014 (UTC)

cover artist

Hello, can you confirm that the artist of your verified pub is not Chris Foss, the cover looks a lot like this lot. Hauck 19:37, 9 July 2014 (UTC)

Expanded Universe

I made some changes to this pub that you verified. You may want to review those changes:

  • Pub notes extended
  • Changed 5 content items so that they appear with the title from the title page instead of from the table of contents. For instance, "How to Be a Survivor: The Art of Staying Alive in the Atomic Age" instead of only "How to Be a Survivor"

Cheers, Patrick -- Herzbube Talk 10:30, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

New cover image for Alan Dean Foster's A Triumph of Souls

Replaced the Amazon image of Alan Dean Foster's A Triumph of Souls with one I scanned. You are listed as Primary reference. Doug 01:11, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

New image for Alan Dean Foster's Into the Thinking Kingdoms

Replaced the Amazon image of Alan Dean Foster'sInto the Thinking Kingdoms with one I scanned back in 2008. You are listed as Primary reference. The only difference I noticed between the images looks like some text in the middle of the cover at the top and bottom edges. The original image is here and the new image here Hope it wasn't part of your matching the pub to verify. Doug 13:14, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

New cover image for Alan Dean Foster's Parallelities

Replaced the Amazon image of Alan Dean Foster's Parallelities with one I scanned. You are listed as Primary reference. Doug 13:58, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

The Omnibus of Science Fiction

The cover art for this is the same as for Het Kosmisch Biljart (and apparently also the same as for The Omnibus of Science Fiction Bonanza/Crown 1980, but ISFDB has no picture of that one), and is thus by Eddie Jones. Horzel 08:31, 2 October 2014 (UTC)


Terra Sonderband

Hi, I am cross-referencing and completing the Terra & Terra Sonderband editions. I am adding the publication date and references for Die Wespe. Cheers, John. JLochhas 14:54, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, but this editor hasn't been active for more than a year, so just go ahead and add notes & the correct dates. Stonecreek 15:22, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Alan Dean Foster's Terminator Salvation

Replaced the Amazon image of Alan Dean Foster's Terminator Salvation with one I scanned. You are listed as Primary reference. Doug 16:32, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Ullstein 2000 titles

I have updated this publication with its month of publication (and an accompanying note), and will do so with other ones in the seríes as I happen to stumble over them. Stonecreek 13:51, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Alan Dean Foster's Transformers Revenge of the Fallen

Replaced the Amazon image of Alan Dean Foster's Transformers Revenge of the Fallen with one I scanned. You are listed as Primary reference. Doug 19:37, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

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