User talk:Marc Kupper/Archive3

Figure out template conditions

(note to self) To allow for Template:Artist Category to support including the PAGENAME when the lastname parameter is included it looks like I need some conditional logic. Some MediaWiki systems use an {{if}} template if they don't have the parser functions. Marc Kupper (talk) 18:30, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Conditional logic in templates would indeed be a great help. I recall Wikipedia's template:if. it used a complex tangle of parameter substitutions and templates within templates to achieve its functions; the key feature taken advantage of was the ability of template logic to provide defaults, and to react to empty named parameters differently from missing parameters. However, it was something of a resource hog, and at least on a project the size of Wikipedia, it was to some extant deprecated, or at least argued against. once the parserfuntions extension became available, it was replaced en masse by automated action, and the template itself was deleted to prevent it being used in place of the parserfunctions extension. All of the other wikis that i have checked now use the parserfunctions if they use IF functionality. I will see if I can find a copy of the old code for template:if. -DES ^Talk 19:53, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Please see {{Qif}}. Other related templates exist, but I have not yet migrated them. -DES ^Talk 20:37, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Perfect and thank you. Marc Kupper (talk) 04:58, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I am alo importing the various related templates. See Category:If templates. -DES ^Talk 05:59, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks - the Qif templates were not as messy as I thought they would be. Marc Kupper (talk) 18:10, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Alien Years

Added $C price to ALIENYEARS1998 and a note "Stated first printing August 1998" to justify adding the month to the pub record.--Bluesman 23:59, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - I'm doing a (slow moving) second pass on many of the older verified pubs. to add data like the stated first printing info. Marc Kupper (talk) 04:59, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Ping

Please take a look at Rules and standards discussions#Third example changes. I think I have managed a better version of the Cover Image Data template. I would like some feedback on this version, if you have a moment. This version has a link to the publication on the "edition" parameter, but no link if no publication record number or tag has been provided. -DES ^Talk 15:01, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Done Marc Kupper (talk) 18:04, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Cover scans and backups

I am 95% sure that the "full" backup process captures all images in the "images" subdirectory of the Wiki directory tree, but it would be nice to be 100% sure :) Have you been able to restore the "full" backup file and confirm that all Wiki tables are readable and that the images are viewable, by any chance?

P.S. As our second line of defense, I capture all images with the "tar" command (and save them to a thumb drive) from time to time, but it would be nice to know that the automated stuff does it for us nightly. Ahasuerus 17:22, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

The full backup file only contains the database dump and not the images meaning you may want to add a chron job to copy the images to isfdb2. At present there's 945 images totaling 71mb. Marc Kupper (talk) 21:15, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Only 71mb? I must be slacking, there's 450mb of covers on this PC. Of course, a lot are on Amazon rather than here. I wonder what proportion of the 71mb are mine? BLongley 21:58, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I restored the full backup - it takes a while as it's a 2gb file. It seems to be complete but I'll need to browse through the tables to see if everything is there. Marc Kupper (talk) 21:15, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Hm, nothing under /var/www/html/wiki/images? That's unfortunate, but at least I have it saved locally. I am in the process of re-capturing the data and uploading it to isfdb2. Once that's done, I'll see if I can set up a cron job to do it nightly. Ahasuerus 21:37, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

On second thought, let me notify Al in case he wants to set it up on his end. There is much to be said for keeping all maintenance operations in one hands... Ahasuerus 22:13, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Nope - the gz file only contains a dbdump which is much like the partial file but only with all the tables. There is no tar. Marc Kupper (talk) 23:14, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's a good thing that we caught it before disaster struck then! :) Ahasuerus 00:31, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Interwiki map

See about adding ISFDB to MetaWikiPedia:Interwiki map

• Wikipedia:Template:Isfdb name is used by 1036 pages on Wikipedia.
• Wikipedia:Template:Isfdb title is used by 458 pages on Wikipedia.
• Wikipedia:Template:Isfdb series is used by 202 pages on Wikipedia. Marc Kupper (talk) 18:54, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Jurassic Park

One of the records you created from an Amazon Look-Inside with the "Day used for printing number" experiment looks particularly wrong. I think the base publication was December 1991 rather than December 1999? I've just added a 35th printing that specifically states March 1993 as publication date, so this isn't going to order right either way. BLongley 19:14, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Curious - There are multiple publications for 0-345-37077-5

• Dec 1991 $5.99 Unknown printing, assume 1st.
• Jan 1993 $5.99 15th printing.
• Mar 1993 $6.99 35th printing. (verified by BLongley)
• Jun 1993 $6.99 35th printing.
• Oct 1999 $7.99 18th printing.
• Dec 1999 $7.99 24th printing. (verified by Marc Kupper from Look Inside)
• Feb 2001 $7.99 21st printing.

It looks like I cloned the record for the 18th printing and forgot to change the year. That's fixed which only leaves the strangeness of the two 35th printing records both in 1993 and which are priced lower than the 18th to 24th printing.

I wonder if this is related to the international vs. USA domestics printings. Marc Kupper (talk) 20:35, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

It may be that there are two separate baselines, but only one reference to current printing? Mine says specifically:

First International Ballantine books Edition: September 1991
First Ballantine books Edition: December 1991
Thirty-Fifth printing: March 1993

I assumed mine was not an international edition as it was printed in the USA, and only has US and Canadian prices, no UK ones. But I suppose mine might be 35th International and the June 1993 is 35th domestic, or vice versa. Which of course doesn't explain lower numbered later printings unless there's another "edition" to baseline from. BLongley 20:48, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I've checked the current "Look-Inside" and apart from the Random House URL the main difference is the addition of the word "Domestic" for the Dec 1991 edition, and the OPM number-line replacing stated printing number. I'm confused. BLongley 20:54, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I checked the local library and oddly, while the system has about 30 copies the local branch, which is also the main branch, has zero. I'll add this to my list of things to look at when I'm in a book store. Marc Kupper (talk) 21:54, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Stranglers' Moon

My Jove edition of Stranglers' Moon has the same cover as your verified Berkley edition, but I don't see a signature on the cover or any other sign of Stanislaw Fernandes. Is he credited on the copyright page, perchance? Ahasuerus 00:16, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Aha! According to Stephen Goldin:

• Before the fifth book came out, Pyramid Books was bought by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, and the paperback line was renamed Jove Books. Apparently a new art director came along with the deal, because I received a cover proof for the fifth book that stunned me to my core. George Barr's elegant artwork had been replaced by glitz and flash. I'm told that the new artist, Stanislaw Fernandes, has won prestigious design awards in New York -- but that doesn't make me like the covers one iota more. To make matters worse, Jove reissued the first four books with new Fernandes covers, dropping the Barrs completely.

I'll add notes to my verified editions. Ahasuerus 03:54, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Berkley edition credits Stanislaw Fernandes on the copyright page. We'll need to figure out how to rework what Goldin wrote onto the Pyramid and Jove publisher pages. Plus, in looking at the Berkley edition record again I remember not being happy as the publication states

Printing History Jove edition / March 1979 Berkley edition / November 1982

which is a challenge to show "as is" in a pub note. Marc Kupper (talk) 19:22, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I have now verified all 10 books in the series and Fernandes seems to be credited in about 30% of the cases. Clearly, Jove was using a sub-standard crew of dope smoking penguins... Ahasuerus 19:45, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

It seems many of my recent publications have presented unusually time-consuming issues. For example, I just dealt with two in a row (unrelated to each other) where stories were given with two titles. The anthology Legends II has two title pages per story and the anthology The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century has a story that goes by Another Story or A Fisherman of the Inland Sea with the typesetters apparently given creative license for dealing with the or. Of course, right after that was an anthology that was a "giant book" that's a distillation of three already large anthologies and of course, it did not have its contents in ISFDB. I've been mulling over the user interface for how to allow the contents of a publication to be copied to another as in this case it would have been easier to copy in the three anthologies, to assign page numbers, and to delete the unused titles. I noticed the Blockbuster movie queue has a thing where you can drag/drop movies to change the order of things in the queue. I'll need to figure out how to do that. Marc Kupper (talk) 20:09, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

"Legends" is indeed a particular pain, which is why it's been on my "to do" pile for ages. It was split for UK paperback publication and although I only own one of them the title-page data seems insufficient to disambiguate the two with our current practices - in fact, there are TWO title-pages and even the cover is a double-cover. (It only has art on one of them though.) We should probably rework them all with essays included for a start - the ToC says they're there, and they really are. BLongley 22:27, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

The other title page at the front is called the half title. It's more common on hardcover works though sometimes shows up on tp and pb. At least we have already agreed to use the title page meaning even if the half title conflicted the debate should be minimal.

Do we have guidelines for distinguishing the two? In my half of Legends (1) one page has Title, Sub-Title and a list of the "Worlds" they're set in (Earthsea, Majipoor, etc), the next has Title but no sub-title, Authors and Publisher. One is not a subset of the other. BLongley 18:35, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

My understanding is that in the classc case, the half-title has the title alone, while the full-title has the title and authro, and any sub-titles. Legands doesn't seem to fit that classic pattern, does it. Wikipedia:Half title syas the same, and references the Chigaco Manual of Style. It also links to this everything2 page which says the same, addign that the half-title "usually precedes the full title page". I think i would take the 2nd page you mention as the full-title. -DES ^Talk 19:32, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

The online version of the Chigaco Manual of Style says in its section on "half-title":

The half title (on p. i, the first recto) normally consists only of the main title. The subtitle is omitted, and the author’s name does not appear. The verso of the half title (p. ii) is usually blank but may contain text or an illustration.

In the slightly later section on "title page" the CMOS says:

The title page (p. iii or, if a two-page spread, pp. ii–iii) presents the full title of the book; the subtitle, if any (note that there should never be more than one subtitle); the name of the author, editor, or translator; and the name and location of the publisher. If the type size or style of the subtitle differs from that of the main title, no colon or other mark of punctuation is needed to separate them.

Take it for what it is worth. -DES ^Talk 19:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

FWIW - I'd never seen a title page as a two-page spread until this morning. It's not a specfict book meaning I did not add it to ISFDB but the title is splashed across both pages with the publisher, G. P. Putmans' Sons, in small print on the left page and the author in large print on the right.

Bill, half-title pages are usually easy to spot and re probably ignored as most of them only have the main story title and do not include the sub-title, author name, etc. Marc Kupper (talk) 00:57, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I took a whack at this and ended up organizing the various "Legends" using series and sub-series. See Robert Silverberg and Legends.

I also took another look at the essay/story thing and decided to break these out into separate title records for Legends II. The main question is - who wrote the essays? Whoever set up LGNDSHNBZQ2003 believed Robert Silverberg did (the pub was already this way). When I first set up LGNDSNWSHC2004 I assumed Robert Silverberg did too but I just read the essays and each has a fairly detailed description of a series implying the source is the author. However, The American Gods quotes the author Neil Gaiman with "Gaiman says '... Until Robert Silverberg called and asked about an American Gods novella.' ..."

I think what happened is that Silverberg asked the authors to write something (or he called and interviewed them) and as so much of the material was theirs he uses their names for the titles of the essays though probably edited them. The copyright page is silent on this matter in that it says "Compilation and introduction copyright (c) by Robert Silverberg" and then is followed by copyrights for the novellas for each of their respective authors. Marc Kupper (talk) 04:06, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

It's a good start, but note that the UK breakdown of Legends was different. As Andrew Wheeler wrote a few weeks ago, "The original _Legends_ anthologies were hardcovers, and very fat. They were also very expensive (for the publisher), and so got chopped up into several paperbacks, to better make back the immense sums of money lavished on them." Ahasuerus 13:32, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I think Locus is missing a printing as they report

• 0-00-648393-3, Apr 2000, £6.99 (Locus reports this as the second half)
• 0-00-648394-1, Nov ’99, £5.99

You'd think ISBN 0-00-648393-3 would be used first and there would be a printing from ~Nov ’99 and priced at £6.99. Bill seems to have this though with a 2000-00-00 date. Bill, does your introduction or any other material say anything about if it's the first or second half?

I'm also wondering about 0-00-648394-1 where Locus reports "Story Introduction" essays and does not use their names from the original Legends.

ISFDB had three Legends publications related to this which I've separated out and filed into a a new series, Legends I (2-part set), that's part of the Legends tree. FWIW, I compared the original Legends TOC against the two UK pb halves and while they include all of the stories their order got shuffled around. Marc Kupper (talk) 02:02, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Now I need extra strength Tylenol, some Lisinopril, and a can of WD-40 :( Ahasuerus 02:14, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and the Family D'Alembert stuff is a nightmare too. I think I've finally acquired all ten in UK editions, but there's big philosophical debates to be had over whether Smith should actually be credited for anything but part of the first. Same with the Tedrics... still, complications are why we talk about such things, aren't they? BLongley 22:40, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

It gives us something in common. Marc Kupper (talk) 04:06, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Template:P

Why did you change the (optional) name of the first parameter from "Id to "Tag"? "Id" matches the form used in the wikipedia isfdb templates. Moreover it is more accurate. "Tag" implies that only the publication tag can be used here, while in fact the record number works equally well, and is often handier. In fact I am trying, when possible, to gently encourage the use of the record number in placer of the tag because tags can be changed, although they rarely are. Id is also consistent with {{T}}. Those two templates are very similar, and i would very much like to keep them consistent in parameter usage. {{Series}} should also be consistent with these two, although it is less used. -DES ^Talk 03:15, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

ID was there from a copy/paste of {{pubr}} and as I was writing up the documentation I realized that tag is a better name as people refer to publication tags but never "publication IDs" though the actual db field name is pub_id. I agree that we should not be changing the established names of parameters but as id only existed for 11 minutes I assumed the odds were low that anyone had spotted that I added the field and had started using it.

About if pub_ids or tags are more stable - I regularly move tags around. As I collect anthologies and collections I'll often find that ISFDB has a pub record with contents and others without. It's easier to clone the pub record that has contents and to move the pub metadata, including the tags, to the new records than it is to add the contents. Thus I'm throwing away the old pub_ids.

Do you really? I use the import/export feature in such a case. I also reoutinely link by record number, both here and on wikipedia (althogh the wikipedia links are always to title, not pub, records). Do you think the realatively new import/export feture would decrease the incentive to move tags around? -DES ^Talk 05:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Export/import must have gotten added when I was swamped earlier this year as I did not know about it. Export explodes with a Python error on pub 274045 and another of my anthologies. It would be great if it worked. Marc Kupper (talk) 06:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Does it inded? I have mostly used import, sometimes export, I've never had either generate an error. This error should be reported, but with Al out of the loop at the moment, probably nothing will be done for a while anyway.

Reported -Marc Kupper|talk 04:50, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe it would be good to get rid of the tags (leaving a mapping table in place so we don't wipe out all the existing external references to pubs by tags). I understand why they get edited for magazines and at one point someone went through all the Tor Doubles and changed their tags to be something like TORDBL## with ## being the book # in the series.

You have a good argument though for using id - let me sleep on that one though at present my inclination at the moment is to wards using id and encouraging a shift away from using tags. The biggest thing in favor of tags is that for ISFDB editors something like LGNDSNWSHC2004 is immediately recognizable as a link to a publication where 274045 is not though we could change the template to display the id-only (no name) version as pub 274045. Marc Kupper (talk) 04:44, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

You are correct, my error, id had not been used on the previous stable version, so that argument fails. People don't generally speak of pub IDs when they mean tags, but they sometimes do when them mean record number, and I have mostly tried to use "id" when either is supported (except on the Image Data templates where i have used Pub=. That may be a mistake, but I thought in that case it would be clearer.) Your suggestion of pub 274045 I think is a good one, and a corresponding change could be made on {{T}} and {{Series}}. -DES ^Talk 05:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

A thought that came to mind as I was fixing up the {{p}} documentation to note the use of id was that the current id values are SQL identity columns. Essentially it means that SQL is generating the record numbers automatically and that the application has no control over it. Generally identity field values are internal to the database and should not be exported to external applications. The reason for this is if a database is copied to another machine that server may well assign a new set of values. In this view - a publication tag is more stable as it's a way to refer to a particular publication record regardless of the internal structure of the database. Marc Kupper (talk) 06:51, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Is that also true for the title ID values, and the sereis id values? Those are also being exported, and there is no courretly available alternative. Every use of the isfdb tempaltes on wikipedia for title and aeries uses the record number, I think -- surely every one i ahve inserted does. Can thse be converted from identity columns to unique keys under the control of the applicaiton? Should they be? We really need to have stable, accesible, unique identifiers for every record that might be linked to from the wiki or from outside. Franky truew outsiders, as oppsoed to the ISFDB wiki, are far more likely to link to title or series records than to pub records. -DES ^Talk 15:56, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they all are identity values. I suspect what'll happen if we ever move to a new database is there will be a big mapping table from the old style URLs into the new URLs as title, series, and perhaps publication and publisher ID values are being used outside of ISFDB. At least you can't view an author page by it's record ID meaning there would be few references to those though it's happened as I've directed people to use a particular author's dup-titles function for example. The ID values could be considered "stable" but technically they are not. I guess it's yet another feature request to add the ability to link to each of the record types using keys such as the author name plus story title. If that hits multiple records you'd see a disambiguation page. The big upside with link by id values is zero overhead to pick up the record. With anything else you are either doing an index look-up or at worse, a full table search, to translate the key into a id value. -Marc Kupper|talk 05:02, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I just remembered that ISFDB:About#What link types are persistent and safe to link to? states that the record numbers are permanent, with the exception that titles could get merged, etc. meaning we should be safe in using them. -Marc Kupper|talk 05:23, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I must say I also have a preference for leaving templates visible on their template pages, and not using includeonly. But that is a mere style preference. Changing template parameters can have negative effects. i am consulting you before changing this one back. -DES ^Talk 03:15, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe for 99% of the users a {{{1}}} floating at the top of the page has little meaning. Maybe it helps alert people that they are looking at a template page? Marc Kupper (talk) 04:44, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps so. When there is any significant text to the template, the amtter is different IMO. But ther isn't here. -DES ^Talk 05:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed - I looked at the other linking templates and may remote the includeonly as having the template visible is useful to those who can understand it and is likely ignored by those that don't. Marc Kupper (talk) 06:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

As to making the name= optional, I had realized this could be done, and had considered doing it. Frankly I suspected that it was the name= that was inducing Bill to use {{C}} rather than {{P}} on cover images, and so was reluctant to change this, although it will be more convenient. -DES ^Talk 03:15, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Why were you reluctant to make name optional? Marc Kupper (talk) 04:44, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Specifically because I suspected that Bill might return to using {{P}} on uploads of cover images, rather than {{C}}, if he could use P without typing "name=". Beyond that it was mere inertia. -DES ^Talk 05:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

That makes sense - we don't want this stuff to be too easy for Bill to use. We might be out of that high payin' job. :-) Marc Kupper (talk) 06:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Ye, :) But really i was bribing him to do it my way (use a cover image templetem not just P) by making C easier for him. But maybe by now he's hooked on {{C}}. :) -DES ^Talk 15:56, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Template:Marc Kupper

I note that you use a template for your sig. This is usually a bad idea, but I can understand why you choose to do it. But if you are going to, may I suggest that you consider "subst"ing it going forward? This would mean that template calls would not been needed for each of your sigs each time a talk page is rendered. It would also mean that if you change your sig style, your old sigs will stay as they were, not be retroactively revised. Also, the template would be less of a spam target. I would also suggest that you protect the template anyway, as sig templates are natural targets for wiki-aware spammers and vandals. -DES ^Talk 16:17, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Good timing as I'd been thinking of getting rid of the template anyway. With older versions of MediaWiki the raw version was used "as is" but this version is cooking the string in that it forces a SUBST: into templates and if you use [[name|]] style links it forces [[name|name]]. Thus I'd been signing recently using {{Marc Kupper}} ~~~~~ which is a pain. -Marc Kupper|talk 02:32, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

You can mark your sig as "raw" in your prefs, then these adjustments are not automatically made, as I understand it. But forcing or using a subst is IMO a very good idea. -DES ^Talk 04:19, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

That's what I was trying to explain. In previous versions of MediaWiki a raw signature was just that and the sig-string was used literally. With this version of MediaWiki they are cooking the string a little bit even when "raw" is set with the cooking being that they turn {{name}} into {{SUBST:name}} and that [[namespace:pagename|]] is cooked into [[namespace:pagename|pagename]] though with the latter the cooking is done as the signature is applied while with the first it's done when you save the signature. Thus there's cooking when you save the signature and more when you use it even though you asked for raw.

I'd used {{Marc Kupper}} without subst deliberately as the purpose of it was to prevent talk pages, when viewed in edit mode, from getting cluttered with <span style="border: 1px solid #f0f; border-bottom: none; padding: 0 2px">[[User:Marc Kupper|Marc Kupper]] ([[User talk:Marc Kupper|talk]])</span> each time I signed something. I agree that if I changed the signature via the template that it would change everywhere. I don't think that's a problem as long as the change was not to deceive or mislead people. I've protected the template. -Marc Kupper|talk 04:44, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I see. Sig tempaltes have long been strongly discouraged on Wikipedia (wher the server load issue matters more, adn the vandalism risk is higher), perhaps it is now policy that if used they must be substed, and the software follows suit. -DES ^Talk 05:36, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Second Stage Lensmen

I am verifying my Doc Smiths at the moment and I wonder if you would agree that the fictional "Foreword (Second Stage Lensmen)" in your verified Second Stage Lensmen would be better classified as a story as opposed to an essay? The "Acknowledgment" at the end of the book is trickier since the first half is fictional while the second one is (more or less) not. Ahasuerus 01:45, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, my copy is in a rather hard to get at location at the moment. If you want to reclassify it as a shortfiction then that's fine with me and when I regain access to the shelf this book is on I'll take a look. -Marc Kupper|talk 09:20, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

No hurry! Actually, now that I have thought about it some more, the "Foreword" appears to be just a part of the novel, so we may not need a separate title for it, but I'll wait for your logistical situation to improve :) Ahasuerus 15:03, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

A bit of fall cleaning gets me to Second Stage Lensmen. I've converted the Foreword to a shortfiction but that bugs me a little. The problem is while the text is clearly fiction set in the Lensmen universe there are asterisks every so often with the footnotes referring to earlier Pyramid publications of the Lensman series. Thus in a sense the Foreword is an essay that's a summary of what occurred in earlier in the presumably fictional Lensman chronology.

I'd say the Foreword is not part of the Second Stage Lensmen story itself and it should be a separate title record.

Unfortunately, I don't have the Fantasy Press edition of this book, so I can't check, but Smith added a bunch of introductory and linking material when he rewrote the original Astounding serials for book publication in the late 1940s and early 1950s. My guess is that the "Foreword" first appeared in the Fantasy Press edition since I am not aware of Smith rewriting anything for Pyramid publication, but I can't be 100% sure. Oh well, no harm done either way! Ahasuerus 02:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I'll leave the Acknowledgment as an essay though added a note explaining it's mix of fiction and reality.

I see that this publication is a clone of mine. It's a bit odd as someone did the cloning, changed the date, but left my notes in about that this is a second printing. I assume someone got distracted.

The other night I left Dragoondelight's a message about having both "Assumed 1st printing" and "Second printing July 1984. This." In his response he wrote "I rarely mess with previous notes as I have been warned not to", which makes me wonder if this may be a similar situation. Ahasuerus 02:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I was thinking it would be interesting to list the publications for sale on the order form but once I dug into it I realized either the order form or ISFDB has errors or incomplete data.

• R-1015 Ten Years to Doomsday (May 1964) by Chester Anderson and Michael Kurland
• R-1028 The Falling Torch (May 1964) by Algis Budrys (The order form uses "R-1028" but this seems to be F-1028 which is 40 cents. I also checked AbeBooks and there are 16 copies of F-1028 available and zero R-1028)

Tuck says "F-1028" as well. Pyramid likely goofed up and the person who did the original data entry for ISFDB either didn't notice or was affected by the fact that "F" and "R" are next to each other on the keyboard :) Ahasuerus 02:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• R-1029 Weird Tales (May 1964) by Leo Margulies (editor)
• R-1042 The Ghosts of Manacle (Jul 1964) by Charles G. Finney
• R-1043 Time Tunnel (Dec 1966) by Murray Leinster (This is dated after the date of Second Stage Lensmen and presumably is a later printing of R-1043)
• R-1055 Tongues of the Moon (Aug 1964) by Philip José Farmer
• R-1056 Five-Odd (Aug 1964) by Groff Conklin
• R-1068 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (Apr 1967) by Theodore Sturgeon (this is for a 4th printing, ISFDB does not seem to have a record for an earlier R-1068 printing)

According to Tuck, R-1068 first appeared in 1964, so I have added a stub for it. Ahasuerus 02:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• R-1069 Mutiny in Space (Sep 1964) by Avram Davidson
• R-1084 The Planet Buyer (Oct 1964) by Cordwainer Smith

One thing I see is that although the order form says "Latest Releases / Science Fiction" that the list of publications are all at least one year old with nothing at all from 1965 despite that Second Stage Lensmen was published by Pyramid in November 1965. I guess the honesty in advertising people that would have used "Clearing out stock from a year ago" were on vacation at the time the order form was laid out or that they inserted a year old order form by accident. -Marc Kupper|talk 01:43, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I guess they would have argued that the term "latest" is somewhat subjective :) Ahasuerus 02:53, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Checking my Gnome Press rebinding of the Fantasy Press first edition of Gray Lensman, I see that its version of "Foreword" is the same as in my Pyramid reprint except that the Pyramid edition replaced all references to "Fantasy Press" in footnotes with "Pyramid". Very clever of them, I bet you nobody ever noticed the switcheroo :) Anyway, I think we can safely date these "forewords" to the Fantasy Press appearances of the Lensman books. Ahasuerus 05:48, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

The Masks of Time (new Introduction)

I was verifying my Silverberg paperbacks the last few days -- and feeling all warm and fuzzy inside since so many pubs had already been verified -- when I noticed that you added "(new Introduction)" to this pub's title. Was that a one off or would you suggest that we start adding these kinds of notes to Pub titles as a general rule? Ahasuerus 04:23, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't remember adding the "(new Introduction)". It looking things over I don't think "(new Introduction)" is adding that much value and so I've removed it. I've sometimes wondered if I should variant title things like this. The story did not change and yet there is new material within the package called The Masks of Time. I have other publications, usually 10th or similar anniversary issues, where the author wrote a new introduction. -Marc Kupper|talk 09:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Collections/anthologies with slightly different contents are generally a pain and are likely to remain a pain until we have a way to link "related" Titles. However, I don't think that Essay changes (introductions, afterwords, etc) in publications merit new Titles or else Orwell's 1984 will have a few dozen of them :) The only permutation that I can think of when a new Title would be indicated is a collection of Essays which later gets revised or expanded. Ahasuerus 15:20, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I personally find them interesting to read. -Marc Kupper|talk 09:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Oh yes, they can be quite informative! Ahasuerus 15:20, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Martian Chronicles link from the SFBC initial offerings table

I'm not sure why you placed a link to this edition of The Martian Chronicles on the SFBC page. It doesn't appear to be a SFBC edition because it has an ISBN and a printed price. Seems to be a trade edition. MHHutchins 01:38, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry - The SFBC pages seem to mention trade editions from time to time. I should have been clearer in that it's a trade reprint and fixed that. Are there any Doubleday SFBC publications that were SFBC only or did they always do trade editions? In other words, if 99% of the time they also produced a trade edition then we probably don't need to mention them on the SFBC pages at all and it's the exception (something that was only available via SFBC and never trade) that could be highlighted. -Marc Kupper|talk 01:54, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

There are only a couple of reasons why trade editions are mentioned on the SFBC listing: 1) when they were offered as selections to club members, and 2) when a contemporaneous Doubleday edition had a different gutter code than the SFBC edition. All SFBC editions are reprints of trade editions unless the notes indicate "First edition" or "First hardcover edition" (being a reprint of a paperback original). These notes "highlight" the fact that these editions are exceptions. I don't believe that the Doubleday imprint was ever used for original SFBC editions. In those cases, they used the Nelson Doubleday imprint. Please point out any instance where a trade edition is linked to the db, other than the first exception that I stated above. I don't believe any non-SFBC edition should be linked to any of the titles on the SFBC listing, unless they were actually offered as a selection by the club. MHHutchins 03:58, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - that makes sense. I need to think a bit about if the pages need to be clearer. For example Publisher:SFBC_1980-1984#1980 says for Giants "Alternate selection (same as the trade edition)". In light of this discussion I see what you are trying to say but it may not make sense to a first time viewer. A question about this one. Was the trade edition offered as the alternate or did they offer Giants as an alternate and shipped the trade edition to SFBC customers? -Marc Kupper|talk 18:10, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

By "Alternate selection" I mean that it was not a "Featured selection", which is a book that is automatically sent to members unless they choose to decline it. Alternate selections had to be specifically ordered. Most of them are book club printings... except, in this case, the edition of Giants offered to club members (at a discount) was the same edition available in stores, even though it may be a later printing (as Bluesman pointed out about a couple of the selections that he owns.) There was no separate book club printing of this title. I've tried to make it clear, but am open to suggestions. Sometimes when you're close to something it's harder to see how others may perceive it. MHHutchins 20:54, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - I agree that it's difficult to maintain "beginner's mind" when someone gets immersed in a subject. Sometimes what I do is to stop working on something for a few weeks or months, visit it, and see if it make sense to me.

The general pattern of the comments on the SFBC pages is starting to make sense but there's still some confusing elements. Looking at 1980 around where Giants is I see

• The Flight of Dragons says "Alternate selection (may have been the trade edition)" - This is confusing to me as it sounds sounds like the advertising is not available for this month and thus someone is guessing that the trade edition was offered? What's the basis for this guess?
• Mockingbird says "Alternate Selection. Trade edition has code "U48"" - Here I'm assuming it's been confirmed that the BCE edition was offered and someone has noted the gutter code for the trade edition. I'm guessing this additional note either does not belong on the SFBC page or that you document non-SFBC (trade) gutter codes on the SFBC pages. Presumably that's so if someone gets a U48 without a cover (or with the wrong cover) that they will know it was a trade?
• Giants says "Alternate selection (same as the trade edition)" - It sounds like from what you just wrote that the BMOC stated in their advertising that you would be getting the retail/trade edition meaning the note could say "The trade/retail edition was offered as an alternate selection." Usually when something's in parentheses it's indication information from another source, that it's not directly related to the subject at hand, or perhaps there some uncertainty/guesswork. It's not clear what applies here.
• The Art of Star Wars says "Alternate selection. May have been the trade edition". This is similar to The Flight of Dragons but does not have the "may have been the trade edition" in parentheses. This is confusing to me as it sounds sounds like the advertising is not available for this month and thus someone's guessing that the trade edition was offered? What's the basis for this guess? -Marc Kupper|talk 00:49, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

[unindent] There are occasions when I hedged my bet. The SFBC catalog never actually states "This is the same edition that's available in the store." It will state the retail price, even for those books that it is reprinting, and then the club price. In the case of the Star Wars book and The Flight of the Dragon the price for those selections were so close to the retail price that I believe that the club is offering the real thing, just discounting it for customers. Remember this was back in the mid 70s to early 80s and bookstores rarely offered discounts like they do today (maybe 5-10% off when the books were first published or for pre-orders.) When I'm not sure (that is, if I don't have the book myself), I'll say "may be the trade edition" until someone comes along and proves it. Like in the case of Bluesman when he had a couple of these higher price items (usually artbooks) and noted that they were the trade editions. I also do searches on abebooks and contact dealers to see if the books indicate "Book Club Edition" or something that firmly establishes them to be one or the other. (Some of them have stopped responding to my inquiries, realizing I'm a bibliographer, not a purchaser!) The reason I note the gutter code for the trade edition of Mockingbird is because I only have the trade printing, not the book club printing. Remember Doubleday placed gutter codes on everything, even their trade printings. In the case of Mockingbird the trade's gutter code is more than five months earlier than when it was offered as a club selection. Until someone comes along with a book club printing, the gutter code will firmly establish the time difference between the printing of the two editions. Look at the gutter code for A Scanner Darkly (April 1977). I give the gutter code for the first two trade printings. You see that the book club printing was actually the second printing by Doubleday for its book clubs, and that the second trade printing was actually the third printing. PKD collectors can see how the book club edition would take precedence over that later printing. I'm not sure how that would relate to collectability, since the books are all otherwise identical, i.e. Doubleday's usual slipshod bare-bones quality. Nevertheless, they're all fetching the big bucks nowadays, especially the PKD Doubleday first editions from the 60s. MHHutchins 01:59, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

One Against Herculum

Found that sneaky EMSH's signature on NGSNTLSTRC1959 on the right tip of the 'saucer'. Added to the pub record.--Bluesman 03:30, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Halcyon Drift

Added a note to THHLCNDRFT1972 that the Canadian edition (identical in every way) states "First printing, November, 1972" on the copyright page. Currey also has the publication as 1972-11. Sure your copy doesn't state the month?--Bluesman 02:44, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

That's correct - DAW Books started publishing in April 1972 and for the first few months did not state a first printing date at all. Starting in September they used "First Printing, 1972" and continued that practice up to December where they have "First Printing, December 1972" but don't have a number line. In January 1973 they added a number line but it was unusual in that it's the words "First Printing (over) Second Printing (over) Third Printing (over) ... Tenth Printing." In April 1973 the number line was changed to the 1 2 3 4 ... format and DAW has not changed how they show the printing stuff since April 1973.

Thank you for the heads up on this. A couple of questions.

• Does it state "First printing, November, 1972" or "First printing, November 1972"?

First one, with the two commas.--Bluesman 06:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

• Is there a number line?

No number line.--Bluesman 06:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

If it had been me I would have cloned the publication to create one for the Canadian printing. For example, your price would be C$0.95. This also allows you to mark it as verified and if someone has a question about the USA vs. Canadian edition they'll know who to ask. -Marc Kupper|talk 08:25, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Just found another Canadian DAW (Sutton's MINDBLOCKED MAN) that has "First printing, May, 1972". This one is not in Currey, though I just have the original book, not his updated one, so maybe Sutton is in that. Nearly all my DAWS are Canadian, and I don't recall seeing the 'words' style of printings you mentioned above, but I went through most of them before I knew what differences to look for and will no doubt catch a lot more things on the second go-round.I also rarely buy second printings though I see lots. Since you are the resident authority on DAW are there things you would want to know even if the verifications weren't yours? If there are questions to be answered I can know what to look for..... --Bluesman 06:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - I learned a couple of new things; that the Canadian editions started including the month much earlier than the USA editions, and that they formatted the first printing string a bit different. It's possible they never used the words style number line.

On things I'm looking for that are in addition to the standard publication record they are:

• DAW Book No. I also check the # stated on the front cover, inside of front cover, and copyright page to make sure they match. For many years later printings did not have a DAW Book Number and so I'll note "None" for those.
• The Order # which starts with the letter U as in UE2678.
• The USA and Canadian price for the dual priced books.
• Country of printing. (USA or Canada) If it's Canada then that means the stated price is Canadian dollars for the single-priced books.
• The printing number line. Rather than "1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9" I usually just note "1 to 9"

I'm collecting a bunch of other things but don't think I'll ever document them in publication records.

• The spine style. See the Spines section of Publisher:DAW#DAW_List Columns.
• The series or sequel. For example "Sequel to Pride of Chanure", "Darkover", "Dumarest of Terra #25", etc. I convert One, Two, Three, etc. into #1, #2, #3, ... The intent is to capture the series name as stated as too often the series found in bibliographies is constructed by others using names that seem convenient to them.
• Genre - Most of the DAW books will say Science Fiction or Fantasy but if it's not stated I look over the synopsis.
• The copyright date and or dates.

Most recently I have added

• Orientation, horizontal, vertical, or (none), of the data line on the front cover. I don't know if it means anything yet though they started with a horizontal line in ~1989 switched to vertical.
• The full contents of the data line on the front cover. I'm doing this as I realized I can date books with this and also trying to pin down the transition from the 1-line to 2-line format.
• If the back has a barcode. I believe they got introduced in 1982 but want to pin this down and now realize the Canadians would have their own history.
• The address from the title page. I've discovered DAW was homeless in late 1979 for example and am documenting the addresses to better pin down when they moved, were acquired by Penguin Putnam, etc.
• The distributed by line from the copyright page. Again the effort is to document changes. They started with no line and somewhere around 1998/1999 they started using "DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Putnam Inc." and by 2003 it changed to "DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Group (USA) Inc." but even these days they are inconsistent and use
  • DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Group (USA).
  • DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
  • DAW Books is distributed by Penguin Group (USA).
  • DAW Books, Inc. is distributed by Penguin Group (USA).
  • After documenting a bunch of these I've decided the Penguins are wildly inconsistent and there's nothing to be mined from knowing the exact wording other than pinning down the date for when Penguin Putnam was added and the change to Penguin Group.

I made some progress this weekend on getting a version of the DAW list on a web site. I'd give you the spreadsheet but I'm finding that it's a great deal of effort to merge spreadsheets people return to me back into the main sheet and so am looking at doing it on line. -Marc Kupper|talk 08:08, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

WOW! Old Donald A. would be proud! I will try and notice as much as I can. I will be home for a couple of months, soon, recuperating from an operation and might just pull out all my DAWs at once and give 'em the microscope treatment! --Bluesman 15:25, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Three Suns Of Amara

Found that pesky EMSH again. The man on the cover of TMTDGTSA1962, on the Three Suns cover, has four 'circles' on his collar and EMSH is visible between and below the left two. Added to the pub record by slightly massaging your note. Please check if it meets with your approval. (You will need a magnifying glass... that's how I find them...)--Bluesman 00:23, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

An interesting sidebar: I have both editions of Three Suns (Second being Ace double #76380) and in the second one it states that the first Ace printing for this title was April 1963. The copyright is 1962... wonder if this is a typo? Didn't change the pub record for the first Ace double F-129.--Bluesman 00:36, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

I will need to learn a new style of gymnastics to get to the book. It's right over there, I think I can see it, but there's wall of books in front... --Marc Kupper|talk 00:57, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't know the answer in this case, but it is not at all unusual for a copyright to be recorded in the 2nd half one one year, when the book was not actually published until the first half of the next, so a typo need not be assumed. In fact, even back in the days when the law required a correct and complete copyright notice for protection (as it did in 1962-3), it was of no legal effect if the date was too early or too late by one year (there was an explict provision to this effect), which suggests that dates being recorded +/- 1 year were normal. -DES ^Talk 01:08, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

DES is quite right re: copyright dates and their unreliability. According to [Double Your Pleasure: The Ace SF Double, F-129 appeared in February 1962. The April 1963 double was F-195 and it contained a Silverberg novel and Battle of Venus by ... Temple, which probably explains the confusion in the second printing. Definitely worth clarifying in Notes! :) Ahasuerus 01:26, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Automated Goliath / Three Suns of Amara

Bluesman wants to add cover art credit to your pub. I've placed the submission on hold for your approval. Thanks. MHHutchins 06:01, 12 November 2008 (UTC) Oops! I saw above that he's already notified you. Please take over the submission. Thanks. MHHutchins 06:08, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Michael - I approved it. I don't mind people making changes to my verified pubs though it's a good idea to drop a note so that the verifier can re-check if needed to see if maybe we are dealing with two different publications that for the most part are the same except for some detail. --Marc Kupper|talk 21:00, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

So should I have dropped the note first?? And then been responsible for you climbing over a wall of books and being buried for months....??? ;) I'm still relatively new, and all the 'protocols' are not second nature, yet.--Bluesman 04:58, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

No - fixing it first is better. The odds are better than 99% whatever anyone does is fine with me though I appreciate the talk-page note. For the harder to access books I leave the note on the talk page as a reminder to myself. The wall is (hopefully) temporary. I picked up 200 specfict books at once, mostly hardcover, and need to get them verified and then to figure out shelving. A second issue is that one of our cats suddenly took up a fascination with all of the stuff toy animals we have decorated our shelves with. He moved all of of them into the living room plus a couple of cozy closets, and keeps putting them in his water dish. Thus I've needed to lock the toys that are getting left in the water dish in a closet that normally has a bookshelf and at the moment those books are walled off by stuffed animals. --Marc Kupper|talk 07:52, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

R&S sub page

U see that you created Rules and standards discussions/Doubles and shortfiction I suggest that simply taking the entire section unchanged and putting on a new page is not quite the optimal way to do this.

• First of all, the "How should an uncredited anthology editor be recorded" threads aren't really part of the continuing "Doubles and shortfiction" debate, and i am inclined to move them back to the main R&S page.
• Secondly, although related, the "Doubles" issue is not quite the same as the "Shortfiction" issue, and perhaps these ought to have separate subpages.
• Thirdly, the sub-section structure, while Handy for keeping things together but split on the main R&S page, is IMO not needed on a separate page, and it keeps the whole debate in terms of the Binary star example, which is perhaps not the best frame for it.
• Fourthly, the combination of the move and the archiving breaks links upward to previous versions of this discussion, which need to be restored, IMO.
• Fifthly, a link Fromm the Main R&S page to this (and any other) sub pages is IMO essential, otherwise the sub-pages are effectively hidden from anyone not using recent changes as the way to find things.

I intend try to fix some of these. -DES ^Talk 01:39, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Fix away - I thought there was talk about moving things to sub-pages and so I did so with the high traffic thread - I won't be back on ISFDB for a few days - maybe Sunday depending on how well a couple of projects go. --Marc Kupper|talk 07:36, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Earth Factor X

Added a couple of notes to RTHFCTRX351976 , crediting Jack Gaughan with the front interior art and also the DAW Books No. 206. Cheers! --Bluesman 23:51, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - that one's behind another wall. You'd think I live in a castle with all of these walls, moats, and a cat wrestling with an anaconda at the moment. I'd say there's bats in the belfry too but they got evicted. --Marc Kupper|talk 08:06, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Earth Factor X was directly underneath Marune: Alastor 933. I would credit JG as that's how it is in the book and then variant title that to Jack Gaughan. I also renamed the title from Earth Factor X (Interior Art) to Earth Factor X (frontispiece). The cat decided she is a bat and is flying. --Marc Kupper|talk 05:27, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Marune: Alastor 933

Was going to add the frontispiece of MRNLSTRE01981 as interior art but can't figure out the artist. There are initials DM•MR on the piece. Any ideas?--Bluesman 03:30, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Don't tell me... this one's in the dungeon on the other side of the moat???--Bluesman 03:31, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

My notes said it was at the top of the tower and after huffing my way I look around... Come back, and see I'd brought it down a while back and it was sitting right next to my desk... DM would be David Mattingly. MR is familiar but the name escapes me at the moment. --Marc Kupper|talk 05:12, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Hunters of Gor

Don has submitted 4 changes to various Hunters of Gor pubs with the intent to change your "DAW Books (9th printing)/1974-03-09" experiments to "DAW/0000-00-00". I have put them on hold for your reviewing pleasure. Ahasuerus 03:20, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks - I approved the updates though edited one as he had a typo of "1st printing" when it was an eight printing. I'm not that attached to the printing number experiment. --Marc Kupper|talk 06:37, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Ace reprint of Norton's Victory on Janus

Locus #200 (March 1977) corroborates your assumption that this edition was published in 1977. It lists it as a March 1977 publication. MHHutchins 06:02, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Maiden, Matron, Crone

You've verified this anthology but there's no contents? BLongley 23:01, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

I started to verify it, got distracted, started to read it, set it down somewhere in the house, and now can't find it even though I'm sure I see the thing every few days... If you have a copy then take over the verification otherwise I'm sure my copy will float up soon. --Marc Kupper|talk 02:15, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

No, I've just been finding missing-content Anthologies and Collections and filling them in from Locus where possible, I don't have a copy. Another you verified is here: New Skies. Another mislaid book? BLongley 19:16, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing that. But there's another here - how many books have you got on the loose? BLongley 22:39, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

The annoyance was that Maiden, Matron, Crone had been one I was looking for and was happy to spot it at a book store's dump/discard sale along with quite a few other books on my list. I just sorted the list by date-received and see that all of the DAW books I picked up that day are missing. That's good as it means I must have set them aside and they are hidden in plain sight. Maiden, Matron, Crone may be harder to find as I carried it around for a few days to read.

Thanks for the heads up on New Skies - It was on the desk and has been entered, merged, and double-checked.

The best Japanese SF book is in hand but I need to run run and will try to enter that tonight. --Marc Kupper|talk 22:59, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Found another one: The Dimension Next Door . 17:03, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - I have it handy but unverified the record for now as I have a number of projects stacked in the queue. --Marc Kupper|talk 12:06, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

The Paths of The Dead-parsing other short fiction

This. [1] . You did much better than I could of done to parse the two starting short stories to another author. So, I must ask why did you not do so with the one (or two?) on page 393. Is it because it is split between two viewpoints? Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 23:45, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Harry - it always helps to have more eyes on these things plus I spotted a mistake in that I credited Concerning the Fall of the Empire... to Emma Bull when this is a preface that was likely written by Steven Brust. I think what happened is I saw the publisher's note with it's fictional author, hunted for who the real author was, saw that there were two essays, saw the preface by another fictional author, and assumed I had found what I was looking for. In this case I overwrote the title record for the preface with the Teresa Nielsen Hayden essay. I added more notes plus the Canadian price. Does this look good? --Marc Kupper|talk 06:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Now that looks super. You got the tone that "outsiders" have been brought into the Brust demense very well. I wonder if it will spawn like MZB did in Darkover. As a long time Brust fan, I thank you greatly. I know I 'rag' peoples nerves with commentary, but I am not trying for 'gotchas'. To me it is very apparent we each 'see' things differently and almost everything will be expanded upon with time. I love what you did with this. I temped it so there will be more choices in case of a question. Thanks Greatly, Harry. --Dragoondelight 12:56, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

James Blish's The Star Trek Reader

Locus #196 (November 30, 1976) gives the price for your verified edition of this title as $8.95. Does you copy have a printed price? It also gives October 1976 as the month of publication. MHHutchins 03:38, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I was juggling BCE and trade editions which is why I missed the price. I've fixed this plus added the October date. I figured it was late in the year as my copy was received in January 1977. --Marc Kupper|talk 12:03, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Spell of the Witch World

Marc, I have put this submission on hold since it looks like Don accidentally used "Edit pub" instead of "Clone pub" and Unapersson, the verifier, is not around. I was going to leave Don a message, but then it occurred to me that this is a DAW book -- and a very early DAW book at that -- so perhaps you may want to take a look at it from your perspective. Ahasuerus 04:19, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the heads up Ahasuerus - I left a note on Don's page. --Marc Kupper|talk 11:40, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Itchy mouse trigger

I was running through a series of my own submissions when I accidentally accepted your edit of this. Just wanted to let you know that it didn't disappear into the vapors! MHHutchins 01:36, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Michael - That must have confused me so much I did not know I was confused. :-) --Marc Kupper|talk 01:48, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Blackcollar

Added the Daw catalog # to your verified THBLCKCLLR451983. Cheers! ~Bill, --Bluesman 21:16, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - I've been doing a multi-pass verification thing recently where on the first pass I just check the base metadata and then polish up the details later. --Marc Kupper|talk 22:26, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

DAW submissions

Marc I've put four of Don's submissions on hold, they refer to a numbered box set and I thought this would be of interest to you. :-)Kraang 03:36, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Sean. I've approved the updates though am wondering if box sets are "in" for ISFDB. It would be an omnibus titled The Witch World (box set) containing 268896, 268907, 268917, and 277304. --Marc Kupper|talk 15:48, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Daw 30th

Added to your verified pub D3NNSFN2002 the roman numeral section to the page count, a note about first printing and number line, and the usual $C price. Liked the notes! Cheers! ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:10, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Bill - I have a large stack of anthologies that I'm slowly getting through. Once those are done I'm planning on a pass through the novels to add the Canadian price and to generally get the notes up to the format/content I'm using now. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:47, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Just going through my anthologies now and they sure do involve way more than novels. Glad I left them until now; if I had started with them the Mods would have ripped my hair out! ;-) Though I don't have any left... ~Bill, --Bluesman 18:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Lucky you that you are done. I have nearly 250 collections and anthologies. It'll take a while to get them entered/verified. At least I don't have that many magazines. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

22nd Annual....

Added a couple of things to your verified THRSBSTSCC2005. Notes about first edition/full number line and the usual $C price. In checking the stories prior to doing a transient, I noticed two stories that I think are mis-designated as novella: Shiva in Shadow (38pp) and The Garden: A Haw....... (29pp). Were these designated as such in original publication? Cheers! ~Bill, --Bluesman 01:34, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Bill. Most of my anthologies and collections do not designate the story lengths meaning I estimate it based on the page count. For some reason I missed those two but have fixed both to novelette as their lengths are 38 and 31 pages respectively. While looking at some award winners I realized the only time the story length is displayed is in the contents of publications and when editing a title record. It's not displayed on author or title bibliographies. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:42, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Had a very productive chat about this with Ahueserus and it's LOCUS that lists them and he seems pretty sure that they are accurate. I had changed them in a few of Dozois' Annuals and he/we decided to just leave them as is. In the grand scheme it's probably not of great concern and I think we all (editors) get anal about some things. Cheers! ~Bill, --Bluesman 06:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Agreed - I never question editor changes or setting of the story length. If LOCUS is reporting the length then a useful project would be to scan their DB and for each story to add a note to the ISFDB title record something like "Reported by LOCUS as a Novella" along with the link. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

At some point we will need to reconcile all of their data with ours, but that's easier said than done... Ahasuerus 00:59, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I never question a change from plain "sf" for shortfiction to a designated length, but if someone wants to change a definite length I'm going to leave it to someone else to approve. The length only matters in terms of awards, and most of our titles weren't up for awards. And even if they were, sometimes they've been nominated in different length categories anyway. The only time I get annoyed is when somebody has incompetently turned a short "Novel" into a "Chapterbook" and broken the links between Publication and Title, and made it impossible to add INTERIORART and Introduction or afterword ESSAYs and suchlike. BLongley 00:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

The Complete Stories, Volume 2 - Asimov

You verified this pub in September. I just got through moderating and massaging what appears to be another edition. If they are indeed the same perhaps you will have time to double-check the titles in the second. If the page numbers are the same I can export the titles to your verified pub.--swfritter 01:07, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks - I thought I'd unverified all of the publications where I did not have a chance to do the contents. I missed this one and so went ahead with adding the contents and verifying them. The contents are the same as the one you moderated except:

• Mine has an introduction essay. Who did the updates to the other edition? We should ask if his or her copy has the Introduction.

Editor was MA Lloyd who has not been responding on his wiki. He cloned his entry from your stub - I was hoping life would be very easy if the editions were identical. Thanks for entering yours - it seems like this the perfect choice for an export even though some page numbers would need to be changed.--swfritter 00:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)\

I've sent a ping via e-mail. --Marc Kupper|talk 01:15, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

• The pagination is different. As it is, neither import nor export preserves pagination but it helps that the stories were arranged in chronological order by the copyright year and within a year in alphabetical order meaning there's were groups of stories in the same order as on the ISFDB edit page.
• One story is titled Old-fashioned in the publication and as Old-Fashioned in ISFDB. Rather than adding a variant title I added notes.

After merging the titles I had about five titles to deal with - including the one you mention - I just merged it with the correctly capped (according to us anyway) title.--swfritter 00:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

• A number of stories are on the bubble between shortfiction and novelette or novelette and novella meaning my verification spreadsheet reported discrepancies. I decided to not change the lengths that are already in ISFDB.

Since I don't have a copy of the book I just used the lengths from the stories that I merged the entries with. Don't know if the editor knows the quick method for reprints - the copyright dates were entered but the lengths were all shortfiction - even after I gave them a couple of days to do the merge work.--swfritter 00:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

--Marc Kupper|talk 21:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Re: "Old-Fashioned", keep in mind that as per Help:Screen:NewPub, "Hyphenated words have the first letter after the hyphen capitalized". We are slowly accumulating a small army of rules... Ahasuerus 21:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

It's a good thing I only did a note. :-) Considering that army of rules; I was reading a good essay recently that discussed the trend toward ever more complicated sets of rules and laws to presumably address shortcomings in previously issued, but broader rules. Generally, everyone got along under the old rules. Someone would push a rule in a direction that most considered "unreasonable" and so a new rule would get added to address that situation. One side affect of this was that the old timers continued to quietly operate under the older, more general rules, and new people, or untrusted people, were held in check by the new rules. If a person gained a certain level of "trust" in a group or society then it was not an issue for them to do things that may be in violation of a new rule but within the overall spirit of the older rules. --Marc Kupper|talk 21:46, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

It's always a balance between having a few generic rules/guidelines which result in diverging de facto standards and having a lot of detailed rules which are hard to memorize/follow. OCLC has hundreds of very detailed rules which should -- in theory -- cover every conceivable permutation, but in reality their implementation is inconsistent at best.

One thing to consider is that we have a few bots which can identify discrepancies and change them to comply with the current standards. I have already trained Fixer to find and merge duplicate Titles and I suspect that we will be doing more of that as we wrap up basic data entry in the next few years and concentrate on data quality. Even if the rules are occasionally bent now, we will likely find and correct any deviations in the future :) Ahasuerus 22:10, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Book of Brian Aldiss

My copy of BKFBRNLDS19XX is Canadian, and does include the month on the copyright page: "First printing, November, 1972". The difference is too small to justify a separate pub entry, so I just added that fact to the notes. I know you are the DAW man, so do you want notes each time I find/add little snippets like this? We had a previous conversation about this and I'm pretty sure you do. Just wanted to check. Cheers! ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:48, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Excellent and thank you Bill for the heads up. I'm in the midst of pushing a round of DAW list updates out to ISFDB but will include this in the next round. I personally would do a separate pub entry as 1) That copy is in C$ (Canadian dollars) and 2) It allows someone mark it as verified and a distinct publication than the USA version.

One question about the note you added "The Canadian edition, published simultaneously, states "First printing, November, 1972"." Does your copy say "published simultaneously"? I know that often we see books from other publishers that'll say something about published simultaneously in the USA and Canada but I did not think DAW ever stated this. I have wondered at times what "simultaneously" means to publishers. Do they synchronize stop-watches and account for propagation delays while talking on the phone with fingers poised over the "publish" button? What is meant by "publish" given that it must take a few days to manufacture a book, and that the on-sale by date is often a week or two before the date stated in a book meaning they were delivered to book stores a week before that? --Marc Kupper|talk 21:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Quite correct, it does not state 'simultaneously', just that the cover is printed in the US and the book in Canada. With the two prices being identical, is another entry really necessary? Except for the 'November" the two are identical??? ~Bill, --Bluesman 23:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't have time to dig through all the rules and so don't know if you "have" to create a new record. Presumably the other differences are the title page will have something about North American Library at the bottom (often mis-aligned a little meaning it got added on top of the USA plate) and that it says "Printed in Canada" on the title verso. I handle the Canadian editions as separate printings in the DAW list and FWIW, they start at 1 and count up just like the USA printings though I have no idea if second or later printings were ever "simultaneous" between the USA and Canada. Later, once the CUS-FTA got underway (1988), there was no need to publish copies in Canada for sale in the Canadian market meaning we now see dual priced books with some printed in Canada and sold in both countries and most printed in the USA and also sold in both countries. As we now have NAFTA we should also see books printed in Mexico but they seem to be rare. Maybe because they don't have as many dead trees.

BTW, does your copy have a printing number line? iirc, the Canadian editions do while the USA ones don't. --Marc Kupper|talk 00:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

No number line and no mention of NEL. At the bottom of the copyright page it says "Printed in Canada; Cover Printed in the U.S.A." This is the only Canadian identification, other than the adding of the month. I can't recall any Canadian DAWs having the "cover printed in USA" on the back cover as so many other publishers have done. But I am going through my collection for the second time and will let you know what I come across. ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:25, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Bill. My own sample size is small but the "Printed in Canada" DAW editions I've seen have said something about North American Library on the title page. I'll need to re-check my books to see if all of them have this or if it got introduced later. --Marc Kupper|talk 18:11, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

My oops, looked at the copyright page only, not the title page where it does say at the bottom "Published by the New American Library of Canada Limited", and it is a little 'cocked'. ~Bill, --Bluesman 23:44, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

The Ascent of Wonder: The Evolution of Hard SF--clone/title & author changes

This. [2]. I have an SFBC publication of your verified edition. I cloned and submitted 4 title changes and 1 author change. All these changes are from the story title pages, but are also matched on the table of contents page. I have no idea if this actually affects your verification, but decided to cue you in. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 14:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Which edition do you have? I wanted to do a diff-pub to see what's different. --Marc Kupper|talk 22:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

My ISBN is the same as your verified edition, the only differences seems to be the usual lack of data that SFBC have. My page numbers are exact matches. I used the common ISBN for my cover image search. I am afraid I do not understand diff-pub, but my clone is aubmitted. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 22:25, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Perry Rhodan #6: The Secret of the Time Vault--same copy different view

This. [3]. I have the smae copy/printing/cover image as yours, but I do not think it is a series of short stories. Would you reconsider? I also have the Gray Morrow cover 75 cent, 65998, version, later formatting and image. Even though there are fewer pages, I am wondering if the 1-5 versions had a similar cover formatting as this. My 7,8.9(2copies)(with another having Second printing stripe and 95 cent price), 10, (my 11 is a second printing stripe 95 cent),12,13 also share this cover formatting. My 14 has the 60 cent pricing, but the later cover formatting. Will confuse Hall 3730 with this. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 15:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

I suspect the best place for a discussion about this would be on Series:Perry Rhodan or its talk page. I have Ace issue #6 and #29. In glancing over these a case could be made that they are separate stories and a case could be made that there's one main story with named chapters plus some essays and shorts. I don't have strong opinions either way. --Marc Kupper|talk 22:58, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to come back to this, but this is a #6 problem. Could we take the Perry Rhodan #6 out of the novel content title so the novel titles match? I realize that the novel title is not used on the start page for the novel, but the PR #6 removal would match how the others are presented? Up to you. Noticed this as I am doing a sweep of the early PR titles to make sure they are grouped together. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 13:28, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

That's fine. The only reason I did not do that in the first place is I did not feel like tackling all of the PR to get them consistent. --Marc Kupper|talk 03:19, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Tom Swift

I see that you have created a number of submissions like this one and I am wondering what you have in mind. We already have the Tom Swift series set up, so wouldn't we want to simply merge the new "Victor Appleton" titles with the pre-existing variant titles? 03:26, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Yep - that turned into a waste of time. When happened is that fixer submitted a bunch of Tom Swift books, I approved them, and when I saw that whatever the author's name was did not have the series I added it. As I was finished that up I realized the reason I did not see the series was because it was variant-titled off to the real authors and so I merged out all of the new title records I'd added... About the only benefit that came out of it is that some of the original titles had minor typos. There is one minor puzzle in that under http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?3848 there's "Tom Swift [2]" and also "Tom Swift 1980s" which looks like the same series. I'm out of time for that project but see that things like "The Rescue Mission" vs. "Rescue Mission" and "Planet of Wightmany" vs. "Planet of Nightmares" need to be researched. --Marc Kupper|talk 08:33, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Ah, I see! Yes, the world of "Victor Appleton" can be rather murky since some pseudonyms remained undisclosed for decades and some are still hard to find. Also, many catalogs do not distinguish between "Victor Appleton" and "Victor Appleton, II", which leads to bogus variant titles and other headaches. On the plus side, this area has been fairly thoroughly researched over the last few decades, so at least one typically can cut through multiple layers of pseudonyms and misattributions if one is willing to spend enough time on it. Ahasuerus 19:16, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

While it's likely I read most, and perhaps all, of the Tom Swifts while in school I don't own any. I wonder if today's kids know about the series as I never see them in thrift stores. Similarly, I usually see Nancy Drew books in the thrift stores but Hardy Boys are rare. --Marc Kupper|talk 20:18, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I did the Tom Swift Fixer fixes the day before Marc, and I must admit all I got out of it was discovering that we'd got two "amoung" titles that needed fixing. Fortunately we had all the variants set up already so no extra research needed. I only own one (never read it - but second-hand children's books are so cheap I tend to pick up any juvenile SF I see just for entering here) and agree Tom Swift is uncommon. But a lot of older children's books are less common than they were - I don't even see Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys anymore, and for SF it's usually just "Goosebumps", Narnia, Buffy/Angel or Doctor Who titles. I suspect a lot of classics are just gone now - I'd love to complete my "Danny Dunn" or "Scott Saunders" or Hugh Walters books, but it's going to cost me it seems. BLongley 21:39, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Nancy Springer's The Black Beast

I believe the ISBN for this pub has an extra "7". Removing one of them creates a valid ISBN. Thanks. MHHutchins 04:31, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks - there was an extra 7 in there plus I added a cover image. I suspect the ISBN parser could use a little tweaking. --Marc Kupper|talk 08:57, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

The Tragedy of the Moon

Think i have the name of the artist for THTRGDFTHM1978. The signature seems to be Plumadore, but this name means nothing to me. Is it one you know? I haven't added it yet. My copy is pretty clean and does have the whole signature. ~Bill, --Bluesman 06:03, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I added ISFDB:Verification requests#Plamadore? - Let's see what people say. --Marc Kupper|talk

The Day of the Klesh

Added cover art for Day of the Klesh Dana Carson 08:46, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks - I don't remember that cover. I've read all of M.A. Foster's works and so you'd think I'd remember what was on the covers. My copy is in a hard to get at place at the moment but hopefully I can extract it tomorrow. --Marc Kupper|talk 10:42, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

DAW reprint of Klein's The Overlords of War

Locus #203 (August 1977) gives July 1977 as the publication for this pub. It's catalog # would place it just after these two original pubs ([4] and [5]) with the same month of publication. MHHutchins 22:43, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you - it's nice to be able to come up with dates for some of the later printings. --Marc Kupper|talk 07:24, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Back issues of Locus have been a godsend for updating current records, especially publication dates when the pubs themselves aren't dated. I wonder if they knew back then what a great resource they would be for future generations. Kinda humbles you to think that we may doing the same for generations to come. MHHutchins 08:37, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Defender

Added the $C price to DFNDR2002. ~Bill, --Bluesman 02:56, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Scott Latham verified pubs

I see you have been noting my changes to Scott's pubs. Guess I had better start doing them again. Had stopped as he has been off for so long... still the right thing to do, even if it will take him a week just to read them all!! And I create enough extra work for the Mods as it is... ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:43, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm no longer doing notes to Scott unless the change is spectacular as you are right, he'll have a lot of catch-up to do. --Marc Kupper|talk 00:01, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

The Morphodite

Added the map in the front of MRPHD1981 as interior artwork. Might have to re-read this one to 'evaluate' your description of the sex scene! ;-) ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:24, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. FWIW, something I tend to do is if an artwork is signed that I will enter it as signed and then variant title. For example, in this case it's signed either MAF or M. A. F. depending on how you want to do it. The thinking is if someone ever runs across the signature MAF they can enter it in ISFDB and find that it may be M. A. Foster.

I have all his books and this one is the only one with any interior art, so don't think the MAF will go far! Unless he's taken up the brush/pencil instead of the pen? Hope he writes more. ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:57, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

BTW, have you seen wikipedia:M. A. Foster plus talk page? It's rare that an author or book gets genuine critical review. Maybe the books were part of a college course somewhere? http://www.blackgate.com/the-book-of-the-ler-by-m-a-foster/ is also a much deeper look at the books than the average review.

A while back, either in the intro for one of the omnibus reprints, or on his Acme "blog", Foster mentioned that if DAW reprinted the stories that he would write more. I haven't seen any new works. Ah, I just found http://www.acmecomics.com/node/70 - hmm, three letters? I'll see if I can pen up a fourth and maybe he'll start believing he's alive. --Marc Kupper|talk 01:53, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

The Rebel of Rhada

Added Gaughan's frontispiece to the contents of THRBLFRHDQ1968 and a matching note. ~Bill, --Bluesman 16:05, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Houston, Houston.......

Added C$ price to TORDOB11 .--Bluesman 22:53, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

The Mind Spider and Other Stories

My copy of TBTTMS1961 is very clean and under some magnification the signature is definitely EMSH. Added that to the record and massaged the notes. The image link is broken. ~Bill, --Bluesman 05:08, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Excellent and thank you. I've deleted the cover link for now and will scan a copy for ISFDB. These days when I link to an Amazon image where it's not for the ISBN of a book I'll know the Amazon ISBN or ASIN I got the image from so that someone can figure out the new URL quickly should Amazon break it. I've never seen Amazon delete a ASIN/ISBN. Technically a user could delete all or some of their uploaded images. Now that uploading to ISFDB is so easy I almost always use that route. --Marc Kupper|talk 06:41, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

The Book of Fritz Leiber

Got a good one for you. THBKFFRTZL0000 has info for a third printing. I have a first (Canadian) printing, full number line 123456789, with the cover and price from this 3rd printing (same DAW #1269 but without the DAW Books No.). Appears that the text from the first US edition was retained (even kept Gaughan as the cover artist on the copyright page when the cover is clearly signed G. Barr) but the cover from the 2nd or 3rd US printing was used. Thought you would like to know. ~Bill, --Bluesman 05:28, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you - that is an interesting one but I'm confused on THBKFFRTZL1974 and THBKFFRTZB1974. The pubs seem identical other than the latter has a JG frontispiece record.

Just forgot the C$ price, which is now added.--Bluesman 03:25, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Overall, it seems like it happened as you noted in that a DAW Canadian 1st was packaged inside a DAW USA 2nd or 3rd cover. It's an excellent example of why it's useful to look at both the cover and insides. Even if it has been a USA book on the inside there would still be a conflict as at the time DAW had the DAW Book No. on the covers of first printings and they replace it with the order number for later printings if the price has increased. As your cover does not have the Book No. it's in the style of a later printing.

I have wondered what a publisher does if they want to reprint and they still have unbound stock from a previous printing. Maybe your book answers that question or it was just a plain mistake on someone's part. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:26, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

The second book of Fritz Leiber

Added the interior art by Gaughan to THSCZLBR151975 ~Bill, --Bluesman 16:44, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Engine City

Corrected the spelling of the artist (it was "Stephan" instead of Stephen") for NGNCTY2004 and added notes about first printing/edition and where the artist credit is. ~Bill, --Bluesman 04:34, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

The Broken Lands

The initials on the title page art for THBRKNLNDS1968 are Jack Gaughan's (stylish JG). Amended the note (assumed the notes are yours?) ~Bill, --Bluesman 19:26, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, those look like my notes. In 2007 we were not recording as much detail as far as printing #, etc. went meaning it's likely there were no notes at all. --Marc Kupper|talk 18:39, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Valor's Choice---Artist different.

This. [6]. I have the same cover, but Jody Lee is listed on copyright page as cover artist, with an art sales pitch. You have Luis Royo. Any thoughts? Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 01:02, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that looks odd. Let me look around to see why I have Luis Royo but no notes explaining the conflict with the credited artist. --Marc Kupper|talk 07:47, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

By The Light of the Green Star--Clone source?

This. [7] . If I understood the entry I just submitted for verification, you cloned from this verification. If you did so, please review to see that my entry matched your presumed cloning needs. I left the original entries, but entered my data above. Also, I was confused because there is a fifth printing entry also. If I parsed it correctly my fifth printing fills both spots. If this is not correct, just reject and I will use the other. My data is easy to replicate. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 15:32, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

It looks like another of the moderators already approved your cloning and so we have

• BTHLGHTFTH1974 UQ1120 at $0.95 1st verified
• BTHLGHTFTH0000 0-87997-268-8 at $1.25 3rd
• LGTGRNST1974 0-87997-268-8 at $1.25 4th verified (this is the pub I did)
• BTHLGHTFTD0000 0-87997-268-8 at $1.25 4th (duplicate of the record I did - I deleted this)
• BTHLGHTFTB0000 0-87997-742-6 at $2.25 5th - this look like your pub.
• BTHLGHTFTC0000 0-87997-742-6 at $2.25 5th (duplicate of the record you did - I deleted this)
• BTHLGHTFTH1982 0-87997-742-6 at $2.25 Printing # not stated - I decided to delete it as it was both redundant and based on a secondary source (they added a middle initial to the artist and had the date from Amazon.com).

I added a note to your pub "Amazon.com reports the printing date as June 1, 1982. It's quite likely this is the printing date for this 5th printing."

Overall, what you did looks fine. The alternative was to edit BTHLGHTFTC0000, add the interiorart and your notes, and then once approved to merge the interiorart record. --Marc Kupper|talk 09:59, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I was making sure my pub was your intended target entry. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 13:08, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "your intended target entry" and was also confused by the earlier statement "my entry matched your presumed cloning needs". I have no needs or targets for you or others. If someone wants to copy my notes, clone a publication, or ignore what I do entirely, it's all fine with me and the main times I comment on something is if an entry seems confusing or is possibly wrong. --Marc Kupper|talk 00:05, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Again Sorry. The entry I made had notes which stated it was cloned from your verification. I chose that entry, but was not totally sure that I was meeting that cloned entries notes. I assumed you did the cloned entry as you verified it's source. I am sorry if this confused you and myself. In no sense was I complaining, I was just trying to make sure my entry met the needs desired by the original notes. Thanks, Harry. --Dragoondelight 00:31, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm still confused. :-) The subject includes "Clone source?" and part of the first sentence is "you cloned from this verification." What makes you think I cloned anything? The record publication record I verified happens to be from ISFDB1 and was part of the initial set of records for ISFDB2. Later you wrote "I assumed you did the cloned entry..." Which publication are you referring to when you say "cloned entry?" You then wrote "I was just trying to make sure my entry met the needs desired by the original notes." What do you mean by the "original notes?" None of the publications have notes about things to look out for. There are no "needs" as far as I can see. --Marc Kupper|talk 08:58, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Earth's Last Fortress/Lost in Space

Added a cover image to RTHSLSTS1960 as the link for the previous one was broken. Honest! And I didn't break it! Honest! ;-) ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:44, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I spotted a broken image link on another of of my verified pups recently and so know it's happening. For a few months I've been adding a note to publications where I hunted around for an image that looks like this:

Jan-2009 - The cover image is from Amazon ASIN <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/xxx">xxx</a>.

with the "xxx" filled in. If I find the image on an ISBN record then I use "Amazon ISBN" instead. The goal is if the image link breaks that someone should be able to easily find the image again by clicking on the note. The only time an Amazon record should loose an image is if the original uploader decides to delete it but apparently Amazon changes the URLs to their images from time to time. --Marc Kupper|talk 10:11, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Earth Factor X [2]

Added a cover image to RTHFCTRX351976 to replace a broken link. ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:51, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Marune: Alastor 933 [2]

Added the frontispiece to the contents of MRNLSTRE01981 and a note about the initials, leaving it as uncredited in the contents ~Bill, --Bluesman 21:19, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Darwinia

Added the correct month of publication and price for DRWNHPLPXH1998 both from LOCUS. They are excellent for info on SFBC editions. For the first time, after leaving many notes here, noticed your "Thigns" to do list... your misspelling, not mine! A fine example to set for aspiring mods/editors!! ;-) ~Bill, --Bluesman 18:18, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Skull-Face and Others

I did indeed enter this from secondary sources, primarily The Arkham House Companion by Sheldon Jaffery, Starmount House, 1989. I have other sources (Sixty Years of Arkham House, by S.T. Joshi, Arkham House Books, A Collector's Guide, by Leon Nielsen, and the Tuck Encyclopedia) which agree with the contents. I entered dates where I could find them for the individual stories from the online Contento index which unfortunately has no entry for this collection. Should I be citing the source in the Note field? How many sources are appropriate to cite? --Rtrace 00:19, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Earthman's Burden

Added the cover image to RTHMNSBRDN1979 as the old one was broken. ~Bill, --Bluesman 00:44, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Erin Hunter

I've almost finished clearing up Erin_Hunter but there's two last shortfiction pieces that look awkward. From the notes, they may be the same piece in fact, and may not really be shortfiction, and they may not actually be credited. They're both in books verified by you though, so can I ask you to take a look please? BLongley 20:04, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

After looking at this again I decided to delete those. They are a list of cats grouped by clan and then by position within the clan. Each has a brief description of the cat's fur and sometimes other distinguishing characteristics. The list varies from book to book which is why I had named them Alliances (Rising Storm), Alliances (Forest of Secrets), etc. --Marc Kupper|talk 23:08, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Finally, a nice clear page with all the redirects and nothing else! Thanks! BLongley 23:18, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Darwinia

Changes to Darwinia put on hold pending your review. Ahasuerus 01:34, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

FYI, both Locus and the rec.arts.sf.written newsgroup listing give the date of the SFBC edition as October 1998. MHHutchins 03:55, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you to both of you. I approved the update but then edited the notes as I like to note that such and such is not stated and that the value we are using comes from "this" source. I believe that lowers confusion on if there is or is not a stated price though that could also be inferred. --Marc Kupper|talk 22:39, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Destroyer

Added the $C price to DSTRYR2005 ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:32, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Cradle

Added a cover image and notes to CRADLE1988 ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:50, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Teranesia

Added the month of publication to TERANESIUS1999 from two sources: LOCUS and on the bottom of the inside front jacket flap there is a code 1299. Adjusted the note accordingly. ~Bill, --Bluesman 03:38, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

The Florians

Identified the 'glyph' on the frontispiece of THFLRNS3A1976 as one of Michael Whelan's. Amended the note and added the piece to the contents. ~Bill, --Bluesman 16:41, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Chasm City

Added a couple of notes and replaced the "ZZZZZZ" cover image of CHASMCITY2002 ~Bill, --Bluesman 16:24, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Alien Years [2]

Added a cover image and notes to ALIENYEARS1998 ~Bill, --Bluesman 01:06, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

DAW 30th [2]

Added the DAW Books Collectors # to D3NNSFN2002 and replaced the "ZZZZZZ" image. ~Bill, --Bluesman 00:24, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Hugo Winners

Did a very small alteration to the notes for THHGNDTW9E1972. The last note had "Hugo Awards 1962-1970" in the ToC and "Hugo Awards 1962-1970" in the book. I simply eliminated the date from the first part. ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:11, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Chanur's Homecoming

Added a note to BKTG23088 using [8] to confirm the date of publication and price. ~Bill, --Bluesman 17:40, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Kif Strike Back

Added notes, month and price (from LOCUS) to THKFSTRKBC1986. the original number this record was cloned from #0475 is still on LOCUS but I'm sure it was just a flyer number and not the SFBC# as there were no more 4-digit ones by '86. I also put in the gutter code Q10 from page 252 which also translates to a printing date of March '86. What is the code on your copy? There is another pub record purporting a QA10 which is absurd. Think someone's finger slipped entering the Q and got an A as well. ~Bill, --Bluesman 22:59, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

It looks like I donated that back to the library sale. I've unverified it and so you can take over primary verification. --Marc Kupper|talk 09:55, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Masterharper of Pern

Added a cover image to MSTRHRPR1998 ~Bill, --Bluesman 04:34, 17 February 2009 (UTC)