User talk:Kraang/Archives/Archive09

From ISFDB
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Lords of Creation

The cover artist of this is Jeff Jones, see this talk page. Horzel 09:18, 9 July 2021 (EDT)

Welcome back!

Long time no see! Welcome back! Hope things are gong well in Kraang-land :-) Ahasuerus 12:57, 24 September 2021 (EDT)

Exploring the infinite universe was taking me long than I thought it would!Kraang 13:37, 24 September 2021 (EDT)
I know how that can go :-)
When you have a moment, could you please review Rules and standards changelog, which lists the changes to our data entry rules since the mid-2010s? TIA! Ahasuerus 08:28, 25 September 2021 (EDT)

Words Without Borders

Hello,

Under which rule are this and this eligible for addition? The current rules for web-only publication are:

      • Speculative fiction webzines, which are defined as online periodicals with distinct issues (note: online periodicals without distinct issues are not considered webzines)
      • Special speculative fiction issues of non-genre webzines
      • One time speculative fiction anthologies published on the Web
      • Online publications available exclusively as a Web page, but only if:
        • published by a market which makes the author eligible for SFWA membership (listed here), OR
        • shortlisted for a major award

This is a non-genre webzine and these are single stories inside of non-genre issues (if we bend the second rule to mean "a story" inside of otherwise non-genre issues or just a story out there, we are literally allowing ANY story published online...) I generally am in favor of allowing these types of stories from non-genre webzines BUT we need a rule change for that. Or do you see it as eligible under one of the available categories above? Thanks! Annie 14:50, 27 September 2021 (EDT)

I see that this is one of those Rules changes (Rules and standards changelog 2018-07-05) that were implemented while Kraang was on hiatus. I would recommend reviewing them carefully because some of the language was very carefully crafted to allow certain types of publications while disallownig certain other types. It can be confusing at first :-) Ahasuerus 15:25, 27 September 2021 (EDT)
Well in my defense I looked at past updates for this webzine and figured it was included[1].Kraang 18:35, 27 September 2021 (EDT)
That one was a "International Science Fiction" issue which is indeed included as a "Special speculative fiction issues of non-genre webzines".
Webzines were not allowed at all and this specific issue was one of the reasons we added that specific subclause. As I said, I am in favor of actually allowing these non-genre webzines in the same way we would allow them if they were ebooks or on paper. If I start a Rules discussion, would you support it the rule change? :) Annie 18:49, 27 September 2021 (EDT)
No. I'll delete the non genre editions. Mostly stayed away from mags and especially web mags in the past. Now I remember why.Kraang 19:02, 27 September 2021 (EDT)
They can be a pain... I still think of reopening the discussion - way too many story do not make it to anything but webzines lately... Oh, and welcome back :) Annie 19:04, 27 September 2021 (EDT)

For now I'll stick with what I know, plus mags and webzines that are all ready established here, the questionable submissions I'll leave in the queue.Kraang 19:13, 27 September 2021 (EDT)

And yet: it happened again (one of the authors pinged on a report). So shall we start a discussion in R&S that will allow these? :) Annie 12:49, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
Which author and what story is the problem? "pinged on a report"?Kraang 16:48, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
I fixed the author who pinged (it had a non a-zA-Z letter in the directory name - that last letter is not a straight i). The problem is that this magazine is still not eligible except for their speculative issues (and children literature issue is not that). :) Annie 17:02, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
Should I leave it as is or remove some or all. I've had lots of practice in the past, thousands of pubs and titles.(non genre and early reader books(you read they look at the big pictures)) :)Kraang 17:13, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
That's the question. :) If we want to reopen the discussion on non-genre webzines and see where it leads us, we may as well leave it for now and we can delete it if it is decided against. If not, it is technically not supposed to be here. I am all for opening the discussion - the current state of the policy was supposed to be just phase 1 of an expansion allowing us to catalog web-only material... So I think we should leave it for now (just let's keep any new ones on hold) and I will restart the discussion later this week. What do you think? And yeah, deleting is part of life - especially with some of the stuff added early on - that and the novel -> chapbook conversions... :) Annie 17:20, 6 October 2021 (EDT)

I changed it to a non genre webzine and added some warnings. If I had of seen the 2009 webzine labeled non genre I would have passed on the submission. /:Kraang 17:37, 6 October 2021 (EDT)

If you see "Editors of" as the author, it is most likely non-genre. We recently changed the rules so we do not enforce the "Editors of" anymore for all non-genre ones but all the older ones will have it if they were not changed and virtually no genre one will. I suspect you may already know that but it had been awhile so... sharing my shortcut :) Annie 17:53, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
Although, ironically enough, the 2009 issue is actually a genre one - so included here and in full... Always fun with those. Annie 17:55, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
Ok 2009 is genre but 2020 is not, how does one determines what content is in since the 2020 content looked like it was genre to me? I'd like to understand where I've gone wrong so I can make decisions about what webzines to approve and what to leave for others. Is there are page or discussion that I can read to get up to speed?Kraang 18:10, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
The stories that were added ARE genre, the problem is that non-genre webzines can only have issues added when the issues fall under "Special speculative fiction issues of non-genre webzines". So the 2009 one being a a Speculative Fiction special issue falls under that rule. The 2020 one is a Children Literature one - it has some genre fiction but as it is not a special genre issue (most of the fiction is not genre), it is out. See the top of this thread for the part of the policy I copied that applies to webzines (web-only - once they have an ebook or a paper version, those are back to the normal rule where we can add any issue but the non-genre ones get only genre contents). I will track down the old discussion where the rule was decided and post a link here - although I remember it being the usual meandering mess. Annie 18:26, 6 October 2021 (EDT)
This was the outcome that actually made this 2009 issue eligible (before that, even it was out). The actual discussion linked there is now here. Have fun! :) Annie 18:30, 6 October 2021 (EDT)

Ok. This helps explain things better. I'll read the thread and be much more careful in the future. Thanks!Kraang 19:13, 6 October 2021 (EDT)

Anytime. You will also see that we called it Phase/Part 1 of the changes. We never revisited because... reasons. I am still considering actually reopening the discussion to at least equalize fiction webzines with e-zines and paper-zines (aka open for non-genre fiction ones at least) - we want these stories, we were just being careful as this was the first time webzines (outside of awards winners and SFWA markets) became eligible and as you can imagine, there are thousands of them. At one point I was tracking 100 crime/mystery webzines (not for here) - allowing non-genre webzines looked like opening the gates too fast; same with the non-issues based blogs/webzines... thus the decision to restrict that way. Let me know if I can assist in any way. And thanks for working the queue on the last weeks! :) Annie 19:25, 6 October 2021 (EDT)

Submission problem?

Is there a problem with this submission? I noticed you skipped it yesterday and today. Thanks, John Scifibones 12:52, 2 October 2021 (EDT)

I've been doing the low hanging fruit subs and probably just went by it by accident and haven't done a run through of the skip ones. Will do them now. THanks!Kraang 13:58, 2 October 2021 (EDT)

Reviews of non-eligible works

Hello,

We had changed the policy/practice on that a bit - we convert the review to an essay instead of leaving it as a review and with an empty title. We even have a report to clean the non-fiction non-genre that had been added under the old practice... :) So I deleted "The Birthday Ball" after fixing the review here. Annie 15:08, 7 October 2021 (EDT)

Yes much tidier. Thanks!Kraang 19:01, 7 October 2021 (EDT)

New Editors and policies

Hello,

Just a gentle reminder to keep an eye on common mistakes from new editors (and not so new - but new are critical before they learn bad practices = easier to teach them now than correct for the next 10 years). Things like Introduction/Afterword essays without the book name attached on them), Cover designers added as cover artists, pb vs tp (very common problem with new people), not using Notes templates (especially Tr, Narrator, A and Publisher), ISBN10 as ASIN, wrong formatted or outright wrong external IDs, links where we have an external ID, lack of notes on sources, not ordering contents when the order is clear (the piped pages numbers) - stuff like that. I know that some of these are new to you as well - thus me dropping a note. :) Annie 17:47, 11 October 2021 (EDT)

(the piped pages numbers)? that's new to me and Notes templates also new, the rest I watch out for as best as possible. You'll note I leave in the queue anything that's really messed up.Kraang 18:00, 11 October 2021 (EDT)
Yeah - I try to process the hairy ones when I see them...
The piped numbers are useful because they will keep the contents in the correct order - we did an aborted attempt to change the default order to alphabetical and it was a disaster... So whenever we know the order, we set it in stone with the piped numbers. See how I did it here. That way the order in the book resembles what the PV/editor meant it to show no matter what the default sorting is or what happens to any title (now it is essentially by internal IDs).
For the notes templates, here is the list. Publisher is usually used on PublisherEdit submissions (to link to one's parent or something like that; people often forget that one). In regular notes - Tr on titles and Narrator on audio are probably the most common. And Incomplete - that needs to be added to any book which has partial contents only and which needs more contents (we can find the empty ones but if you have 4 stories, how do you know it is just a small collection or we are missing titles? Thus the template was born. :) It is not to be used for non-genre works where we won't be added the rest of the stories (and to empty collections where we have a special report for them already).
Don't take that in a negative way - I am just trying to help - the site had changed a lot on the last few years. And new editors learning bad practices is never a good thing. :) Annie 18:10, 11 October 2021 (EDT)
Used some of those Templates in the past and I saw how the stories were keep in order without displaying a number, didn't know it had a name.Kraang 18:27, 11 October 2021 (EDT)
The help page. It's the symbol/character name of | - so piped numbers/pipe method/pipes - you will see it every which way. Sorry for not being clearer initially. :) Annie 18:37, 11 October 2021 (EDT)

The Amazon images warnings

Ah, you missed that fun as well :)

The warning is because it is a /S/ and not an /I/ image. /I/ images are stable - they get linked from various places but once you have an /images/I/ link from Amazon, that one stays stable.

For books: /P/ images are bad (they are ISBN based - when the cover changes for the ISBN on Amazon, the image changes. Not good for us for covers. Behind the scenes, Amazon shifts their /P/ pointer to a new /I/ images.
For authors: The /S/ images behaviour is an unknown one at this point - it is unclear if they stay stable or if when Amazon changes the image of the author they will create a new /P/ image or change this one (linking it to a new /I/ image behind the scenes - the way /P/ images work). But as it will be the image of our author anyway, you can ignore that specific warning for author images - it is just hard to code it to differentiate. Hope that explains the situation with the weird warnings.

And I really need to write that up for the help page. On my list it goes. Annie 19:04, 11 October 2021 (EDT)

Tocchan

Hello,

When moderating Tocchan's submissions, they always require a heavy edit after they are approved:

  • For ebooks, we need ASIN, ISBN when available, price, source notes (they never add notes) and often page numbers need to be moved to the notes.
  • For paper books, we need format change (very often), price, page numbers and source notes.

They also never record exact dates and that means someone later usually spends the time to fix them (they are a good information to have). Every moderator had tried to work with them multiple times, we are just ignored and the quality does not approve. So if you approve their submissions, you are on the hook to fix them after that - see the edits I did here and here for example. :) Thanks! Annie 20:21, 12 October 2021 (EDT)

OK. Figured something was better than nothing and since not verified, then no issues when updated. A quick scan of their Talk page indicated no replies. Will try to fix the print books but may ignore the ebooks for now until I become more familiar with them. If I can't hold it I don't own it.Kraang 20:55, 12 October 2021 (EDT)
Part of the problem is that they are adding future books - which are not properly identified (the lack of ASINs for example makes it impossible for Fixer to know that we already have the book so I get a duplicate and need to deal with it). Plus future books tend to shift and change a lot. So some books end up with 10+ edits in the following months. Thus the attempt to make sure we at least have minimal information when adding.
And even if nothing else is fixed, we should never allow a non-verified book without at least one source listed in the notes (that's why we have that weird Yellow " - No Note data" at the bottom of the approval screen like here - if nothing else, that needs to be fixed upon approval by adding whatever place the moderator checked that the book does exist and the data is correct (and the editors need to be advised - unless it is one of the known ones who never listen). And if you are fixing that anyway, adding the price and a few other pieces usually does not take much longer. A lot easier to track problems when we know the sources. Thanks for the understanding. :) Annie 21:06, 12 October 2021 (EDT)
Figured out how to add the ASIN, but while working on publishers I find a lot of them don't link to anything especially the older ones(ebooks). I was wondering about the "No Note data" now it makes sense. If I don't break something I will never learn how to fix it.Kraang 21:29, 12 October 2021 (EDT)
Re: older ASINs. Amazon started removing old unavailable records a few years ago due to marketing reasons (before that they kept everything). However - other sites (Goodreads for example) and other bibliographies and author sites use them as de-facto identifiers so we keep them on record. If an inactive one is found, a note can be added in the publication saying "The ASIN does not work on Amazon.com/UK/whatever anymore as of date" or something like that. Also - sometimes they work on other Amazons (that's why we have 16 on that line). Please note that for most paper books, the ASIN is ISBN10 so we do not record it separately; we want an ISBN only for ebooks, audiobooks, non-ISBN records and for ISBNs starting with 979 (because these do not have ISBN10 - and without the ASIN for these, we do not have direct link to the record anymore - as the Amazon link on the left uses ISBN10 based links - so now it sends us into the "search for ISBN" instead of the source record). And as of a year or so ago, Amazon stopped reporting ISBNs for ebooks - so without the ASINs in play, dots cannot be connected (and Fixer suffers - although this is less important). Amazon can be fun sometimes. :)
The warning is only yellow because if we force the editors to add notes programmatically, they will start clicking "from the publisher site" (which adds automatic text) which defeats the purpose... So yellow warning and education it is :)
If something does look weird, feel free to ping me :) Annie 21:47, 12 October 2021 (EDT)

The Duchess of Kneedeep

Cover art for this has been identified as Richard Bober. Original canvas with citation here. --Mavmaramis 10:44, 13 October 2021 (EDT)

Please add art and mention source. ThanksKraang 11:30, 13 October 2021 (EDT)
Done. --Mavmaramis 06:03, 17 October 2021 (EDT)

small request

Will you process [2] while you are still online? Thanks John Scifibones 21:35, 15 October 2021 (EDT)

Done.Kraang 21:39, 15 October 2021 (EDT)

Borrowed Hearts

Hello,

Please see this - a few things to keep in mind when approving deletion of books - the pub that got deleted. :) Thanks! Annie 19:47, 19 October 2021 (EDT)

Use to leave them in the past like this[3], a title only and no publication attached. Do we turn the review into an essay and note why it was switched??Kraang 21:51, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
Yup, the rules were changed some years ago. The new rules are as described in the Help section that Annie linked below. Ahasuerus 22:13, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
I'll hunt down the collection and add it back in with that one story and leave a note.Kraang 22:00, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
(after conflict) Because it is not eligible for addition (having a review does not make it eligible) so we follow our own ROA and we do not add books and titles just because a genre publication happens to review it. We had been cleaning the non fiction that was added that way as we have a ton of them - there is a report for that. See also: the help page for NewPub - the reviews section of the what to include where we spell it out that reviews of non eligible books are to be added as essays. The list of what is not eligible is just for an illustration of what types of books are ineligible - it really applies to any ineligible book.
Although in this case, the pub should not have been deleted at all to start with as it is eligible as a non-genre book with genre content (so partial contents only to be added). Use the OCLC link I linked in the post I left to get you started with tracking it down. :) Annie 22:06, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
Already added the ebook will add original HC 1999 next.Kraang 22:22, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
The last sentence was based on your note that you will hunt it down (which sent me in edit conflict) - was just trying to help as I did some digging and no reason to redo all the work from scratch - oclc have ISBNs, then finding a book is easier. And thanks! :) Annie 22:27, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
Earliest book I found was Sept 2000 and a book review from"The New York times book review. (June 27, 1999)" I wonder if this is where the 1999 date is from?Kraang 22:40, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
OCLC mentions copyright 1999 on at least a few of the 2000 copies (and has them as 1999) so probably at least some of the confusion came from that. Biblio says 1999 as well and this isbn pings as 1999 on a lot of selling sites (among later dates). Kirkus claims a pub date in 1999 as well. Goodreads also claims 1999 publication but they do not have an entry for it. So it feels like there is a 1999 book. I will do some more digging tomorrow morning. :)Annie 22:54, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
We can also pull the deleted record from the latest site archive and see what was inside and if it gives us anything about the 1999 edition. On a separate note - do you mind if I rewrite your note a bit? We don’t know if the review reviewed just the one story; we include the one as the only known speculative contents basically - not because it got reviewed (which is how your note sounds). Thanks. Annie 23:04, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
Change the note to something better and add back the missing bits. Found the 1999 and it appears that it was reprinted in 2003, no idea on the 1999 price.Kraang 23:09, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
Changing the notes to "Only the short fiction that is known to be speculative is included; the rest of the collection is believed to be non-genre.". You may want to add some notes about the source of that first edition though. BTW - you do not need to close a li tag :) Annie 23:30, 19 October 2021 (EDT)
All of them need a source actually: unless a pub is verified, we should always have a source listed from where the book was added/checked, with a date attached preferably if the source is online. I fixed the ebook source (As it was obviously Amazon so that was an easy one). I also moved the page number in the notes - for ebooks we never use the Pages field as per the help page: "For ebooks, do not enter in this field the number of pages. The estimated number given by the publisher or some sites may be specified in the "Notes" field.". Thanks! Annie 23:35, 19 October 2021 (EDT)

Serialized essays

Hello,

We cannot have serialized essays due to how we define serials:

  • SERIAL. Use for a title that would otherwise be either SHORTFICTION or NOVEL, but which is being serialized in a magazine, a fanzine or a series of chapbooks.

If you would like to propose that we allow essays or other formats (poems?) to be serialized, we need a rules change discussion. :) But as it is now, they need to be treated as separate essays when published in parts. Annie 01:22, 23 October 2021 (EDT)

Seemed a logical solution, never was one to read the owners manual, just pushed all the buttons and learned the hard way. Serials mostly only found in magazines and this was never a strong area for me so learning as I go.Kraang 11:48, 23 October 2021 (EDT)
While I understand that, I've found that when I am supposed to explain the rules to someone else, it is a good idea to actually check the rules and not assume what they might be. Easier to teach a new editor how to do things than to unteach them in a few weeks/months when someone notices that they are doing something weird because they had been taught so. :)
Magazines can be... challenging. I wish the site had not drifted into two separate patterns and rules books - one for magazines and one for books but we are where we are. :) Annie 00:00, 24 October 2021 (EDT)

HTMLs

Hello,

Li tags do not require their closing /li but you need a ul around them - otherwise it messes up how the site shows the contents. I fixed a few you edited today where you forgot the opening and the closing ul. Thanks! :) Annie 02:21, 23 October 2021 (EDT)

Only notice one warning, would have fixed it but forgot(cleanup report helps me find them). lots of messy submissions to clean up. Would help if some of these new? submitters would respond.Kraang 11:36, 23 October 2021 (EDT)
A couple looked like your own edits - that’s why I stopped by to mention it just in case you have a bad template somewhere or something. It would, wouldn’t it? :) Annie 17:37, 23 October 2021 (EDT)

Publisher change

While approving my submission of the tp The Killing Pledge, you changed my publisher attribution. I entered just the publisher. You decided to change it to imprint / publisher. The standards state that my entry was perfectly acceptable. You might have at least asked my opinion. Yes, the publication is not verified, you were under no obligation to notify me, but, a little consideration. What do you think? John Scifibones 22:21, 23 October 2021 (EDT) P.S. I have no problem with using imprint / publisher, only not being pinged.

Amazon look inside provided a better publisher name so I added it. Since there was no Primary, Transient or Secondary Verifications a minor improvement was justified. If I notify every submitter for minor changes on this type of submission much few approvals would get done.Kraang 23:49, 23 October 2021 (EDT)
On the other hand when we have a newish editor who is eager to learn and is actually paying attention, not notifying them in such cases so they learn how to do things better does not help them grow on the site and moderators will keep needing to change things for them in perpetuity. Just a thought. Annie 23:57, 23 October 2021 (EDT)
Coincidentally, I am trying to start a discussion on publisher attribution in Rules and standards, interested in contributing? John Scifibones 08:51, 24 October 2021 (EDT)

A Curse So Dark and Lonely: The Complete Cursebreaker Collection(Box Set)

Hello,

Can you point me to the rule based in which you added (Box Set) to this title? We will have that in the title if it is printed on the title page (or cover if there is no unified title page for paper box sets) but I do not see it anywhere on this one and it is not a practice to add such things to our titles thus making the ebook title different by necessity and requiring us to to additional variants - as they have actual title pages. PS: And if we add it, it will need a space before that (".

Or did I miss a source showing that as part of the title? Annie 19:45, 24 October 2021 (EDT)

Not ebooks, three pb/tp in a box according to the image and submitters notes.Kraang 19:53, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Did not say it is - I am explaining what will happen if we are changing the paper box sets titles like that - you are forcing a separate variant for the ebook just so we have something in the title that is not printed anywhere. But a paper box containing other books means no title page so we cannot use the usual method to determine a title. Which means we title based on the cover - the only title we have for these sets. We do not make up a name for these out of whole cloth. The "Box Set" part goes into the notes unless it is actually printed on that cover. Unless I missed a rule saying otherwise - so I am asking based on what rule that was added. Thanks! Annie 19:59, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Back to the original Amazon cover. Found this title[4] and added more info from the one I own. The original title I found was "The Expanse Box Set" not my words but no where on the box are the words "Box Set" and the data base is full of these.Kraang 20:14, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Plus this[5]Kraang 20:22, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Having older titles or titles added under older rules in the DB is not a good reason to keep making the same type of entries. We did not even allow ebooks until relatively late in the project's life or non-Latin characters in title or author names (not to mention web-only publications) so a lot of things made sense back then. Things keep changing and the DB sometimes get a bit... not uptodate. Is the DB full of weird cases that needs fixing? Yes - just look at the Cleanup reports page and that's the tip of the iceberg. But for newer stuff, the closer we keep to reality and what is printed, the better. Except for the few cases we do regularize (publisher names/pub series names, author names with initials and suffixes and capitalization of titles) :) Just saying. Annie 20:27, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
PS: IF anything, that Adams should be called "L!fe, the Un!verse and Everyth!ng" if we want to be exact or just "Life, the Universe and Everything" (considering the ! to be inverted i's so falling under the same rules under which we do not record html in titles) because it is the only visible title... What we have now is a description of the book, not a title of it... Although this may be the wrong cover for that ISBN considering the Amazon record's state. Annie 20:35, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Not my work. If the words "Box Set" are not on the box having (box set) in title in brackets indicates to me its not printed but if someone is searching titles you can still find all the box sets. Good luck finding them without it. Based on what I see at the book stores there are a lot more to come.Kraang 20:45, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
And "Pub Notes contain "Box Set" is as easy to search for as is (box set) in a title. We can even add a template that puts that in a way that is even easier to search. Will people use it? Same answer as with will they add (box set) to a title - we can keep an eye for them. The difference being that one is actually "title as used" (so if it says "Boxset", "Box Set", "Boxed Set" you do not need to look for all 3 or repeat the "prefered one" in brackets), the other requires us to have a separate record for the box set from its corresponding ebook title record (which can be box set or ebundle or anything like that - and which have proper title pages usually so we have a real title). Annie 20:51, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
This is the same[6] as the the one I was messing around with.Kraang 22:52, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
And it has a note on where the title is coming from: "Title based on Amazon's listing; no cover page or box set cover available.". When it was added, I was not sure this is the cover of the boxset - only Amazon showed that one (pre-release) - they tend to shift when the publisher does not have them. I review these usually when the rest of the formats show up (or when I do the monthly reviews for newly added books). Yours not only did not have a note explaining where the title came from but effectively kinda contradicted the note the editor left explaining why they had the longer title. Let me see if the cover of this box set finally stabilized now that it is out. Annie 22:57, 24 October 2021 (EDT)
Yep, Bloosmbury added the same cover finally so title and note updated. Annie 23:06, 24 October 2021 (EDT)

Bad ISBNs

You were right to not approve it here - that's a somewhat ongoing issue with the French books. We use the correct value in the ISBN field if we can find it and add a note showing the actually printed one and explaining the change (with a source if possible). If the Catalog ID is empty otherwise, we can add it there (helps visualization) - that also maps to the old practice to add # in front of it (which got abolished when we split the ISBN field into ISBN and Catalog ID fields so now ISBN must be numerically correct). Hope that helps. Annie 13:31, 25 October 2021 (EDT)

Remembered adding the # sign. I'll fix and leave message(into the fire).Kraang 13:39, 25 October 2021 (EDT)
Figured you might - that's why I mentioned it and what happened to it. :) Annie 13:45, 25 October 2021 (EDT)
Corrected and left note in pub and on original submitters page, all should be well. :/Kraang 13:53, 25 October 2021 (EDT)

Birthplaces

When birthplaces are entered, they must include the country. See Template:AuthorFields:BirthPlace for specifics. We have a cleanup report that catches invalid ones. I just cleaned up a bunch that were approved by you so thought I'd drop you a note. Seems like they all came from one particular user who is known not to follow our standards and so their edits need fixing when approved. Thanks. -- JLaTondre (talk) 10:08, 31 October 2021 (EDT)

Vintage (UK)

Still work in progress or time to clean this note? :) Annie 15:18, 1 November 2021 (EDT)

Fixed a few "Vintage Books" to "Vintage (UK)". Most "Vintage Books" in C$ are probably "Vintage (UK)" but without look inside hard to be 100% certain. Most "Vintage Books" in Pound Sterling are Vintage Books / London the other 99% are New York. I think splitting them out might be useful.Kraang 16:55, 1 November 2021 (EDT)
I pinged you mainly because of the note. :) Yeah - one of the things I do occasionally is to look at our "same named across borders" publishers and shift books to where they belong - despite all the warnings and explanations, people enter them where they feel like - some are easier to clear, some can give you a headache tracing. The whole publishers system is a mess in places (thus this and we will see where that leads. Annie 17:01, 1 November 2021 (EDT)

Autumn Nights: 10 Sinister Stories to Skitter Up Your Spine

Hello Kraang,

A few things about a book you moderated:

  • A few of our frequent flyers use "pb" for all paperbacks. Most books these days are "tp". So always check the size when pb is used.
  • If the book is not verified source notes are MANDATORY. If the submitter did you add them, add the source you checked the book in. Adding a date of when the data was checked when the source is online also allows us tracing changes if needed.
  • "979-" ISBNs need ASINs - the ISBN based link leads to this which is all editions and not the direct edition; adding ASIN gives us a direct link. For 978 ISBNs the ASIN is ISBN10 so the direct link works.
  • Capitalization rules: "To" has to be "to".
  • This is not the complete contents of the book so the incomplete template is needed so we do not lose track of it.
  • The paperback has page numbers in Look Inside (but at least order should have been added when the titles/authors were checked if they were not there)
  • You changed the date on the book but not on all the titles inside of it.
  • Fay Lane's credit is for Cover Design. Which means that she does not get coverart but just a note.
  • Frank L. Tybush V should be Frank L. Tybush, V

All sorted now. I also fixed the ebook. Let me know if something above needs clarification. Annie 17:07, 2 November 2021 (EDT)

Let me just chime in to add a few things. First, this submission was created by Tocchan, who doesn't communicate via the Wiki, perhaps due to language issues. His submissions tend to have a lot problems and require finding his (usually unstated) sources and then a careful review of the data.
The second thing to note is that the ISFDB software and our data entry standards have evolved since you were last active. We have a lot more "yellow warnings" like the one about "No Note data" which you can see on Tocchan's original submission. We have also spent a great deal of time cleaning up the database -- fixing bad data, adding missing contents, implementing and adding External IDs, implementing and adding transliterated names, adding new templates, adding Edit History, adding more robust support for 979 ISBNs and ASINs, and so on and so forth.
All of the above means that the moderation process has changed. In some ways it's easier due to things like Edit History and better yellow warnings, but in other ways it's more involved and more time-consuming since we check more things. If most of the issues that Annie fixed above are new to you, you may want to consider staying away from working on other editors' submissions until you internalize the new processes. If you want to concentrate on adding data on your own for a few days and then ask other moderators to review the results, I am sure we'll be happy to provide feedback and help identify any areas that you are not familiar with. What do you think? Ahasuerus 17:33, 2 November 2021 (EDT)
US/THEM also needed some help (see the moderator note on my first edit for what I changed but as this editor is usually somewhat responsive, I posted on their page the details as well (combining your and my edit changes in the description) so the link is to it. The images thing is important - we can get in trouble for deep-linking where we are not allowed to or not following the required formats (as was the case here) so if you see the yellow warning for an image for a cover, it (almost) always needs solving even if that means leaving the book with no cover - the exception are some non /I/ amazon images but for non-Amazon images, it always means problems. Plus having these described on the editor's pages makes it easy for the next moderator who works with the editor to see the common problems with their submissions - and to watch out for them :)Annie 20:39, 2 November 2021 (EDT)

I've started to do a check list of things to keep in mind plus a template for notes, was not aware of the ISBN 979 thing. If something is outside the norm I'll ping someone to look it over. Decided not to deal with any magazine submissions by editors like the above mentioned only ones that provide detailed data. Thanks!Kraang 14:30, 3 November 2021 (EDT)

I am around most days so feel free to ping me if you see that I am handling stuff in Recent Edits. Always happy to help. And yes - the 979 is one of those newish things that had become a norm - the main seller for self-signed ISBNs in USA ran out of 978 ones last year so we have a LOT more 979 ones (and Amazon is being annoying with them because their design was around ISBN10 which does not exist for them). So we adjust :) Annie 14:37, 3 November 2021 (EDT)

Cassandra Kresnov series publisher change

Would you be ok with me changing [7] and [8] publisher from Pyr to Pyr / Prometheus Books? See discussion at [9]. Thanks. --GlennMcG 14:33, 8 November 2021 (EST)

It probably will make no difference since this imprint will be merged into just "Pyr". But yes feel free to change it. Thanks.Kraang 20:48, 8 November 2021 (EST)

One of yours

Just heads up that I reversed one of your rejections based on this request. It sounds borderline indeed but with the other copy in - we can as easily delete one as two and it gets marked as genre so... it can as well stay for awhile or until someone reads it and we know for sure. The title has a note explaining that it may be too borderline already so we are all good. Thanks! Annie 20:32, 9 November 2021 (EST)

Nonfiction and essays

Just a gentle reminder to keep an eye for nonfiction inside of fiction books and magazines when approving - a lot of editors forget that these need to be added as essays. I fixed 4 of these here. :) Annie 21:01, 21 November 2021 (EST)

Never occurred to me to look for that, just assumed they where stories. Used the look inside and I see the break down, but with out that I would have to accept what is submitted. Thanks for the heads up.Kraang 22:17, 21 November 2021 (EST)
They were NONFICTION and not "SHORT FICTION" in the submitted record though - I would not have noticed a problem if an essay was added as a short story unless the title was very very likely to be an essay (Introduction for example) :) It's one of the things that trip people that only add books occasionally (that and the pb vs tp - so I always look for both). Sorry for not making it clearer that I meant the "NONFICTION" as ISFDB type and not just the non-fiction pieces themselves. Annie 22:29, 21 November 2021 (EST)

Future

Hello, Kraang. Thanks for clearing off my pending edits so quickly! Do you think you could approve the issue of Future I submitted? It's been more than a week. Do you know if there's some problem with it? Thanks again.--Rosab618 00:09, 4 December 2021 (EST)

It's been done now. Had a look at it just now and it looked fine, probably just missed it.Kraang 09:52, 4 December 2021 (EST)

The Four Lords of the Diamond

I was getting ready to PV The Four Lords of the Diamond when I noticed that there is a map on the unnumbered page between the table of contents page and the half-title page. Can you check your copy and see if it's there? I think that will change the page count to [2]+755 with the map on [2]. Thanks! Phil 12:06, 12 December 2021 (EST)

The map is there. Thanks.Kraang 18:46, 12 December 2021 (EST)

What Distant Deeps

While preparing to PV What Distant Deeps, I noticed the page count was missing the unnumbered pages and the "Author's Note" on pg. ix isn't included in the regular titles. Any problem with me adding the regular title and changing the page count to x+370? Phil 10:25, 14 December 2021 (EST)

Please add it. Thanks.Kraang 21:22, 14 December 2021 (EST)

Kraang: thank you for your welcome note. I have used the ISFDb in "read only" mode for some time and found it extremely useful so now intend to contribute. At first, my submissions may be infrequent and sporadic as I am finding the process quite complex. I appreciate that it needs to be complex because the ISFDb is an extensive and comprehensive system but I hope that I will speed up once I become familiar with it. In particular, I find the Wiki to be quite a minefield so thanks for all those links to pages appropriate to a novice. I had come across quite a few of those pages, but not all. Regards. Teallach 17:46, 19 December 2021 (EST)

2 Rejects

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5180803; editors can't change publishers, only mods can; I wrote the note specifically so that whichever mod saw it would change the name. also, I left a message on the mod board about your other rejected edit of mine, the Heaven cover, which is actually the same, so you might want to look at that. --Username 23:19, 24 December 2021 (EST)

Publisher name was changed per note and cover variant was not obvious even after I looked at it several times, a explanation would have helped.Kraang 09:42, 25 December 2021 (EST)
Retrieved from "https://isfdb.org/wiki/index.php?title=User_talk:Kraang/Archives/Archive09&oldid=665764"