ISFDB:Moderator noticeboard/Archive 30

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This archive includes discussions from July - December 2021.

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Get Lost, Lady

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?176767; this 1 was entered here in Spring 2006 per edit history and hasn't been touched since. Problem is it's not a novel, it's a nonfiction book about a female serial killer, and says "True Story" on the cover. So probably doesn't belong here. --Username 00:30, 1 July 2021 (EDT)

Zapped -- thanks! Ahasuerus 10:04, 1 July 2021 (EDT)

Dream

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pubs_not_in_series.cgi?2373; I remembered from back in the day that Love Object by Jere Cunningham was published by Scream/Press offshoot Dream/Press, and Fantlab photos verify that, but it says Scream/Press here. I'm going to fix that, but I noticed that books under Dream/Press on ISFDB don't have the / between the words Dream and Press. I checked online photos of spines and title pages, and all of those books have the /. --Username 22:12, 1 July 2021 (EDT)

Twilight

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1011331; http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?701405; The E. Stevenson is PV'd but the Edward P. is the correct one. It's part of a series. --Username 11:53, 3 July 2021 (EDT)

Creature by John Saul - 1989 Bantam Book

I came across this book at Goodreads (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2694974-creature). Also found a nice screen shot of the front and back of the book on eBay (https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/402900776136?hash=item5dcec1f4c8:g:eA0AAOSwTr9gHoHk). It has ISBN 0553176803 (ISBN13: 9780553176803) that is in the database, same page count and same €3.50 price, but it has a Terry Oakes cover (https://www.wow-art.com/product-page/terry-oakes-creature). Is this a different variant or does the entry in the data base have the wrong cover?? aardvark7 20:09, 3 July 2021 (EDT)

Christie

I added some info to http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?2570390, but stupid Wikipedia gave an ISBN for a much later reprint, and stupid me added it to my edit without checking first. Since this was a 1971 U.S. book I don't think it had an ISBN. So when you get around to approving that edit do not include the ISBN. Also, photo I mentioned in the notes confirms this has "...Andrew Carmichael" just like the original British edition of Hound of Death which I mentioned somewhere on the boards a while back. --Username 09:55, 4 July 2021 (EDT)

Nobody responded in time and edit was approved with wrong ISBN, so I just made another edit deleting it and explaining why. --Username 11:45, 6 July 2021 (EDT)

Moderator pages in the middle of being updated

I am in the middle of making changes to all moderator-only pages, which may take a day or two to finish. If you comes across anything unexpected, please post your findings here. I will update this post once the project has been completed. Ahasuerus 10:12, 4 July 2021 (EDT)

Done. Hopefully nothing got broken. Ahasuerus 18:27, 5 July 2021 (EDT)

Request to merge author listings

Dear Moderator,

A humble request to merge my author listings:

1. Robert B. Finegold, M.D. --[Author Record # 222716] -- http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?222716

  Used These Alternate Names: -- Robert B. Finegold [Author Record # 260237] -- http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?260237

and: 2. Bob Finegold -- [Author Record # 319487] -- http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?319487

My alternate historical fiction is appearing under "Bob Finegold" with one, possibly two additional tales forthcoming later this year and/or 2022.

Respectfully, Bob

Robert B. Finegold, M.D (aka Robert B. Finegold, aka Bob Finegold) www.robertbfinegold.com

One of the core principles of the ISFDB database is that we always enter author/editor names as they appear in the publication. We then determine which form of the author's name is best known within the genre and make it the "canonical name". As Help:Screen:MakeAlternateName explains:

An author who is widely known within the genre by an alternate name, e.g. Mark Twain or Cordwainer Smith, will have a canonical ISFDB name which is technically a pseudonym. This can create odd situations where a person's legal name is listed as an alternate name.

We then create "alternate names" for pseudonyms and for all other forms of the author's name. If and when an alternate name becomes better known within the genre than the current canonical name, e.g. Robin Hobb eclipsed Megan Lindholm some years ago, we flip the relationship.

In this case it looks like there are 3 different forms of the name with the following breakdown:

4 stories and 1 essay have appeared only as by "Robert B. Finegold, M.D."
1 anthology and 1 essay have appeared only as by "Robert B. Finegold"
1 story has appeared only as by "Bob Finegold"
1 story has appeared both as by "Robert B. Finegold" and as by "Robert B. Finegold, M.D."

At the moment it looks like "Robert B. Finegold, M.D." is the best known name within the genre, but it hasn't been used since 2016 and "Robert B. Finegold" is gaining on it. If and when it overcomes the other form of the name, we will flip the relationship.

Hopefully this clarifies things. And thanks for confirming that "Bob Finegold" is another form of your name! Ahasuerus 10:24, 6 July 2021 (EDT)

Nic Perumov

This name needs to be merged with Nick Perumov and his alternative Ник Перумов.aardvark7 12:46, 7 July 2021 (EDT)

Thanks for the tip! As mentioned above, we always enter author/editor names as they appear in the publication. We then determine which form of the author's name is best known within the genre and make it the "canonical name". In this case I have corrected the spelling of the Polish form of his name and linked it to the canonical Russian name. Ahasuerus 13:14, 7 July 2021 (EDT)

Two records for the same pub.

Wicked Women and Wicked Women: An Anthology of the New England Horror Writers created within a day of each other, are the same publication. They need to be merged or just move the primary verification to "Wicked Women, and delete the other title record, pub record and the one content title record. Looks like they were both sitting in the submission queue so neither editor knew of the other. John Scifibones 08:12, 8 July 2021 (EDT) P.S. There are two edits in the submission queue to correct one of the editor's name for the first publication, "Wicked Women"09:16, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Nope. Considering that one of them is PV'd, it actually will need to work the other way around - move the contents into the PV'd record and delete the non-PV'd one. :) Moving a PV requires the editor to be here, moving the contents can be done by anyone - when that happens, we usually try to work without needing the PV to do anything (who knows when they will be back online). And I will drop a note to the moderator that approved the second one to keep an eye for that kind of issues. Do you want to do the moving of the contents or do you want me to? Annie 10:01, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Or we can convert the duplicate into its ebook version :) Let me do that :) Annie 10:06, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

A few things:

When the introduction is named specifically and not just Introduction, we use the name as used in the book. I fixed that (both the paper and the ebook show it as "Introduction to Wicked Women").
Contents moved over and the second record is now the ebook
The subtitle is on the title page so it is editors' discretion if it is included (in this case I think it is important so I added it to the copy that did not have it).

Let me know if you have any questions and/or concerns. Annie 10:15, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

I used the title "Wicked Women" as that is how it is on the copyright page. I have no problem with adding it. Good idea to change it to the ebook. John Scifibones 10:26, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

The copyright page is irrelevant for the DB - we go by the title page. If the cover, copyright page and the title page disagree, we use the title page and we note the other two in the notes (if the editor wants to) :) Annie 10:36, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Removing cover art that isn't there

I tried to delete the cover art credit for Fangoria, June 1980 (http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?844409), but apparently it didn't take. Could someone delete the record? Thank you, Rosa --Rosab618 15:15, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Once the record is created, you need to remove it from the publication (the same way you will remove a story that was added by mistake for example) - you cannot just delete the values during an EditPub - you can change them if there was a typo or something (and it will update the record) but removing the record requires the record to be actually pulled out. Done now :) Annie 16:07, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Thanks, Annie. But how do you do that?--Rosab618 17:07, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Go to the book - for example. Look at the left menu and find "Remove Titles From This Pub". For our book, it opens this. Select what you want to remove (the coverart shows up if there is one on the book). Press Submit :) Once ejected, if noone else uses it, the cover will need to be deleted (we have a report to catch these overnight of they remain around). The help page is here. Let me know if you have any more questions :) Annie 17:11, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Thank you very much! I've been editing for about two years, I think, but I still feel like a newbie. There are a lot of things I don't know.--Rosab618 17:32, 8 July 2021 (EDT)

Same ISBN totally different publications

ISBN for this is 0-02-615170-7 which is exactly the smame ISBN as for this which should be 0-02-615160-X --Mavmaramis 14:14, 9 July 2021 (EDT)

Where is 0-02-615160-X coming from? At the moment the duplicate ISBN is based on OCLC. If we are fixing it, we need a source (as mentioned "Bad ISBN on the back cover: 0-02-615160-3"). Annie 15:09, 9 July 2021 (EDT)

Sorry should have mentioned the source. Dealer listing on ABE here and ISBN search --Mavmaramis 23:50, 9 July 2021 (EDT)

Wasting contributor's time (again!)

I've submitted on 2021-07-09 03:00:47 the following MakeVariant. On 2021-07-09 06:42:05, that is 3 hours LATER Dirk P. Broer submitted and approved this similar varianting operation. Then, he/she rejected my earlier submission with the now famous comment Already Done. This is frankly infuriating as it's not the first time that my work has been thrown down the drain by DPB just because he/she adores to "jump" on the cleanup reports BEFORE having a look at the queue and without noticing who is the submitter and connecting this with the fact that this contributor usually "finish" its chain of edits. All this is a waste of everybody's time (DPB and mine) and such lack of respect for the lowlife's contributions makes me want to quit immediately. Apart from the fact that I probably do suffer fools gladly, note that I'm not alone in voicing such complaints against DPB.
On a related subject, this update set the date for the Author/Work Herbert George Wells/La machine à explorer le temps couple to 1927 based on noosfere. A keener eye than DPB's should have noticed the term "Réédition" (reprint) near the 1927 book (a bit more research might have let DPB stumble on this) and the fact that the name on the cover is given as H. G. Wells. So the fact that the combination "Herbert George Wells/La machine à explorer le temps" first appears in 1927 is pure speculation by DPB (unless he has this precise edition), That's why, after some reflexion, I've initially left the date of the variant set to 2001 (the first documented occurence of this combination). Such bibliographic guesswork by a well-meaning moderator who knows zilch about french publishing does not have its place on a serious (or pretending-to-be-serious) site.AlainLeBris 04:08, 11 July 2021 (EDT)

Re: the change of the title date from 2001-09-10 to 1927, I see what you mean. I have asked Dirk to stop by and respond.

Re: the issue of valid submissions getting rejected because another editor/moderator has already made the same change, I am afraid this is frustratingly inevitable as long as our workflows require multi-step submissions. It's happened to all of us at one point or another, sometimes multiple times per day depending on what we are working on. Even moderators are not immune -- again, depending on what we are working on -- so it's not just something that happens to new contributors. It can be confusing and frustrating, but there isn't much that we can do about it short of rewriting the software to make all submissions single-step. And that would require a great deal of development work, so it's not likely to happen any time soon :-( Ahasuerus 15:25, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

P.S. While we are waiting for Dirk to comment on the first issue, here is a thought for moderators who work on both the submission queue and the cleanup reports. It may be more efficient as well as less collision-prone to work on newly added submissions first and on the cleanup reports second. Ahasuerus 16:18, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

Why does AlainLeBris never frequent my page to discuss things and always goes straight hollering to the moderator notice board? Here's my change submission.--Dirk P Broer 21:49, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

Publisher name change

This publisher's name should be changed to "Bifrost/Étoiles vives" with an accent and without spaces as it's not an imprint/publisher case but a kind of co-publishing case. AlainLeBris 09:28, 11 July 2021 (EDT)

Updated; notes added. Ahasuerus 12:46, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

Autor's name change

This author's name should be changed to "Étienne Le Roux" (accentuated capital). AlainLeBris 06:31, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

Updated, thanks! Ahasuerus 12:01, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

Gerber

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/se.cgi?arg=ie+gerber&type=Name; I fixed the title for Sharon Webb's The Half Life to The Halflife, and noticed the husband-and-wife Gerber team of artists did covers for both Tor HC and PB, but ISFDB editor spelled wife's name as Stefanie for the PB when it says Stephanie on copyright page. ISFDB has nearly 20 Stephanie credits but also nearly 10 Stefanie credits, so this wasn't a singular mistake. Which spelling is correct and whether her name is spelled Stefanie in any books is unknown. --Username 11:22, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

That's an interesting question. It looks like some of these credits come from Grady Hendrix's Paperbacks from Hell: The Twisted History of '70s and '80s Horror Fiction (2017). Checking Google Books, I see that sometimes they spell her first name "Stefanie" ("Hobgoblin", p. 240) and other times they spell it "Stephanie" ("Seed of Evil", p. 239). It's possible that the name was misspelled in the original paperbacks and copy-pasted by the researchers, but it's also possible that at least some of the misspellings were theirs. Either way, we should probably create an "alternate name" relationship, variant the art records and add a note to the affected unverified pubs about the uncertain nature of the attribution. For now, I have asked the only active verifier who has copies of pubs with the "Stefanie" version of the name to check the spelling. Ahasuerus 12:39, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?848994; Archive.org copy says "Stefanie" on copyright page, so apparently publishers spelled it differently sometimes for some reason. --Username 12:06, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

Thanks for checking! I have set up an alternate name and VTs. If and when we determine that some of our records misspell her first name, we can correct the spelling. Ahasuerus 13:58, 14 July 2021 (EDT)

Hodgson

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/publisheryear.cgi?6251+1921; I added info to the "abridged" record of The Night Land and then noticed there was another record for the same book; "Pwendt" has major research on his board so he obviously worked on Hodgson's books extensively a few years ago, while the other record has no edit history or notes; now that I've improved "abridged" record the other one probably isn't needed anymore. --Username 18:28, 12 July 2021 (EDT)

1996 E-Book?

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?13736; an e-book in 1996 seems unlikely, especially since it has a higher price than the original hardcover. --Username 10:17, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

Baen has some ebooks from back then, so it's not unheard of. I don't know how to check the price for back then, however. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 17:16, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

1989 Book About Computer Viruses?

https://archive.org/details/computervirusesw0000mcaf; this book is on ISFDB, but as a 1998 Griffin trade edition; original 1989 St. Martin's Press edition is on archive.org, but does a book about computer viruses belong on ISFDB? Probably only reason it's here is because of the review in a SF magazine linked in the record. --Username 10:31, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

I moved the review to the notes and deleted the entry. Thanks for catching that. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 17:14, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

Author name change

This author's name should be changed to "Stéphanie Hans" (she's french).AlainLeBris 10:41, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

Since we go by how she's credited, not necessarily the correct spelling, we'd have to check the credits she has. Her official website doesn't use the accent at all (as far as I can see). Neither does her Twitter account. Some of the works she has are verified, so you could contact those editors to have them check for the accented e. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 17:01, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

I imagine all of the French titles credit her with the accented e. The ones to check would be the English publications. The hardcover of Nomad (529407) has the accented e. I couldn't see a credit inside any of the others. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 17:28, 13 July 2021 (EDT)

Mondo

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?103322; I fixed titles and added covers, and I think all ISFDB editions are correct now, although there's a Spanish edition with the Titan cover and another cover online that says it's Titan but has a white cover with a woman on it, so there's more out there; but someone entered a variant title here that doesn't seem to exist on any cover, and I tried to break it twice but had no luck, so after my last 2 edits are approved someone should remove the variant title (unless they know of some earlier edition that actually had that subtitle). --Username 18:53, 15 July 2021 (EDT)

ISBN Question

I found 2 Thomas Tessier stories on his old blog, and 1 of them was in a charity horror anthology not on ISFDB. I entered an edit, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5036360, but ISBN is a problem. This is a 2008 book, so is right on the cusp of the switch to 13-digit ISBN, and it's possible it got its ISBN just before the change occurred. However, the 13-digit ISBN on Worldcat brings up only 2 pages on Google from a site called pingpdf.com, which is in some foreign language and looks like a fake site. So when my edit is approved, I don't know which ISBN should be used, or maybe none. --Username 15:19, 17 July 2021 (EDT)

Fake Blake

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?22146; I think the 2012 Blake is actually the guy on this page, https://youandwho.weebly.com/authors-a---e.html. --Username 19:27, 17 July 2021 (EDT)

Duric

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?277004; I added a lot of missing cover artists to old Prime Books stuff a few days ago, and the first one I did actually had the wrong cover artist entered, Garry Nurrish. There's 1 blurry, upside-down photo of the back flap on eBay which showed Nurrish was cover designer while Simon Duric was cover artist. I submitted an edit with a note explaining that, but after more than 2 days went by with exactly 1 of my edits being approved, this morning someone finally approved a few, but they entered Duric as an alternate name used by Nurrish, which is not right. He's a different guy, so if some other mod can fix that when they get a chance... --Username 10:12, 18 July 2021 (EDT)

Fixed. MagicUnk 11:54, 20 July 2021 (EDT)

1958?

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5036887; editor's note goofed and wrote 1958 twice, and I made an edit based on the fact that there's a reference to 1968 online, but to be sure someone who has Tuck's book can check before verifying. --Username 21:11, 18 July 2021 (EDT)

Tuck made a mistake in Volume 1 of his Encyclopedia. He then corrected it in Volume 3.

Approved and updated. Thanks! Ahasuerus 16:15, 19 July 2021 (EDT)

Database Error

I uploaded some cover art then the site went dead and now the two covers I uploaded before that happened don't show and I get "Database error. A database query syntax error has occurred. This may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was: (SQL query hidden) from within function "LocalFile::loadFromDB". MySQL returned error "1030: Got error 134 from storage engine (localhost)" Could someone investigate please. --Mavmaramis 16:56, 20 July 2021 (EDT)

Looking into it... Ahasuerus 17:13, 20 July 2021 (EDT)

I will be taking the Wiki and the main database down for maintenance at 5:45pm EDT. Hopefully it will resolve this and related issues caused by the database crash. Ahasuerus 17:37, 20 July 2021 (EDT)

Merging

I mentioned this a while back, but here, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5038438, is an example of merging problems. "Comet" is a 1997 story that was reprinted online in 2003, but as a poem on ISFDB. I checked archived online zine, verified it was a story, edit was approved, but merging didn't work. It drops the 1997 date and "short story" which is the opposite of what it's supposed to do. So I don't know what's up with this. Could be a cookie thing, could be ISFDB's problem, who knows. Anyway, mod can merge if it works for them. --Username 10:18, 22 July 2021 (EDT)

I approved this submission a few seconds ago and the result appears to be as intended. Could you please check to see if everything is OK? Ahasuerus 13:43, 22 July 2021 (EDT)

It's OK, so in the future if I merge I'll just wait until edit's approved and then see; maybe it just highlights the wrong boxes when edit is added but enters them correctly anyway (or maybe I'm just reading the display wrong). I did many merges when I first started but rarely do them anymore, but I have noticed this problem crop up several times before. --Username 09:42, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Jim Craig/James C. Pilon/John C. Pilon art

I am rather swamped right now, what with the database issues, the ongoing minor browse nodes download, Fixer prioritization, etc. Would anyone be in a position to take over something that the artist Jim Craig aka James C. Pilon (currently listed as John C. Pilon) has communicated to the SFE3 team re: his illustrations in the Rat Tales books? It's kind of convoluted and will require working with the primary verifier of 2 of the affected publications to sort out how different versions of the same art will need to be credited.

If anyone wants to volunteer, please let me know and I will post the details on your Talk page. TIA! Ahasuerus 13:40, 22 July 2021 (EDT)

Tag

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1068376; last tag is misspelled, and seems redundant. --Username 09:30, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Removed, thanks. Ahasuerus 10:16, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Accidental rejections

I accidently rejected this submission. Is it possible to restore or process it? Thanks, John Scifibones 12:25, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Moderators can "unreject" submissions. I have unrejected and approved it. Ahasuerus 13:22, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Blade...?

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?5726; Title seems obviously wrong, Bladerunner instead of Blade Runner, and I found this, [1], which seems to agree. Also, cover is the same for both but only 1 artist is entered, there's no month for the PB, and there are 3 PV's, 2 for 1 edition and an inactive PV for the other, none of whom seemed to notice the title error, so anyone else think this needs fixing? Maybe I'm wrong and title is just fine. --Username 14:34, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

We no longer include series names in publication titles. I will remove them. -- JLaTondre (talk) 15:44, 24 July 2021 (EDT)

Quick approval

Are any moderators available to approve this submission. John Scifibones 15:58, 26 July 2021 (EDT)

Done. Ahasuerus 16:26, 26 July 2021 (EDT)

Thanks, I wanted to submit the edits, transliteration and variants while I had the notes on my desk.John Scifibones 16:38, 26 July 2021 (EDT)

Numbers Only

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?897197; found a photo of Aldine edition's contents page, and page # match those of Midnight Tales; is there a way to only export page #? --Username 13:20, 27 July 2021 (EDT)

I am afraid not :( Ahasuerus 15:01, 27 July 2021 (EDT)

The way I do that is in two steps for things that have too many stories/entries to copy one by one: RemoveTitles first to pull all the titles I will want to add pages to and then Import Titles with number of pages attached. Annie 16:40, 27 July 2021 (EDT)

Email confirmation

I just created an account here. While it works, obviously, I have yet to receive an email confirmation. I would expect that within a minute, but it's been a few hours. Does this need manual approval? I use Yahoo.com -- and no, it's not in the spam folder. AlanHK 23:52, 29 July 2021 (EDT)

You won’t get one - even if it tells you that we do, we don’t have verification mails. Your account is all set and ready to go. Keep in mind that the site is actually two separate sites - the wiki and the DB - same credentials work on both but you need to login in both separately. Welcome to Isfdb. :) Annie 01:26, 30 July 2021 (EDT)

Tags set to "Private" in error?

I see that a number of apparently legitimate tags have been recently set to "Private", e.g.:

It would appear that at least one moderator doesn't fully understand what happens when you change a tag's status to "private". When it happens, it affects ALL titles associated with the tag. If you need to have an invalid tag removed from a particular title instead, please post a request on the Moderator Noticeboard as per the notice that appears on the "Tag Breakdown by User" page like this one:

Note that ISFDB bureaucrats can remove invalid tags. Requests should be posted on the Moderator Noticeboard.

TIA. Ahasuerus 17:22, 30 July 2021 (EDT)

Another request

Are any moderators available to approve [2],[3],[4] and [5] ? TIA John Scifibones 17:41, 30 July 2021 (EDT)

I have approved 3 of them and will post follow-up questions on your Talk page. Ahasuerus 18:10, 30 July 2021 (EDT)

Satty

[6]; [7]; 1st link has just the title, 2nd link has title and name, but name is below the rest and so is not really part of the title, but rather the illustrator's credit. This seemed like a pretty obvious fix to me when I made 6 edits to delete the "By Satty" part of the title wherever it appears on ISFDB, but all were rejected with a note to ask the PV. 1 edition's PV is no longer active; the other I left a message for months ago telling him I made an edit fixing/adding a few things to 1 of his edits, and he responded with extreme rudeness, so much so that I left him another message calling him out on it, so I don't really feel like talking to him again. So now that I've provided photos, whichever moderator wants to fix this can do so, or not. I'm not making another 6 edits. http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1091217 --Username 16:28, 31 July 2021 (EDT)

?-1984

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?354008; I was surprised to see no cover for this, since most of these modern fantasy novels are largely covered here, so I added it. However, there's still a problem; some editor left note about reference work saying July 1984, which is the month for the artwork here, but the date for the book is October here, while the title record has no month. I see 2 editors worked on this, 1 still active, so maybe they know why it's that way. --Username 15:20, 2 August 2021 (EDT)

I updated these to reflect October 1984 per the Locus source and date credit. I split the two coverart titles, since the artwork on the Avon Books edition is different; that one's dated 1986-12-00, matching the pub. --MartyD 14:52, 4 August 2021 (EDT)

Reject

A mod left me an unnecessary message on my board that said, "I approved you submission for Dangerous Red, but you need to clone the pub under that title and enter the 2003 edition in edition to the new edition." There are many, many records here with an earlier date in title record because editor didn't own a copy of that edition/didn't want to enter the info, but entering the date at least lets people know that the original is earlier than the edition(s) on ISFDB. In my case the book has at least 2 much earlier editions with different covers by the same publisher but no actual copies on archive.org, so I just added date in case anyone comes across a copy somewhere so they know it needs entering; small-press books like this one are often riddled with wrong info online so an actual copy is necessary. More importantly, 2 of my edits were rejected unnecessarily. http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5047058; as can be seen here, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/publisher.cgi?41200, there's a dozen books with that publisher name. Also, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/view_submission.cgi?5047072, where I obviously added cover artist with a note. I'm not entering either of these again, so 1 of you can un-reject them if you want to. --Username 15:54, 3 August 2021 (EDT)

Rejected edits without communication

My message to Biomassbob will explain why I'll stop correcting badly linked reviews. AlainLeBris 01:58, 4 August 2021 (EDT)

It can definitely be frustrating to have an edit rejected (I've certainly had many rejected in the past). However, rejected edits can be unrejected, so no information or work is lost. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 13:57, 4 August 2021 (EDT)

Yes I know this but what annoys me is the unfortunate trend manifested by some moderators (Dirk P. Broer, Biomassbob) that bows down to "Reject First - Talk Later" instead of a more civil "Talk First - Reject Later". AlainLeBris 12:40, 5 August 2021 (EDT)

It is far easier for moderators to have one page -their own talk page- where all their moderating issues are mentioned, than to have to scrape that info at each and every editor's talk pages, don't you agree?--Dirk P Broer 06:45, 7 August 2021 (EDT)

Action requested on rejected edits list

Will a moderator please process these four submissions from my rejected edits list? [8], [9], [10], [11]I stored them there so they would not cause a "forced" rejection of several other edits. Thank you John Scifibones 11:13, 5 August 2021 (EDT)

I went to do these, but looks like you already resubmitted them and the new versions have been processed. If there is any remaining, let me know. -- JLaTondre (talk) 11:37, 7 August 2021 (EDT)

Help! Way out of my knowledge base

Found a French variant of the Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos Editor: August Derleth. Title Record # 34377

Book Title: Légendes du mythe de Cthulhu 1 by August Derleth, H.P. Lovecraft Publisher: Pocker (France) Nov 2007 256 pages. €5.80 Translation Claude Gilbert with cover by Marc Simonetti All of this from https://www.noosfere.org/livres/niourf.asp?numlivre=2146570988 all of this is easy but at Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13453526-l-gendes-du-mythe-de-cthulhu-tome-1?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=xZkpKLzOfH&rank=1 It lists all of the stuff in the book and I have zero clue on how to do this. aardvark7 15:14, 5 August 2021 (EDT)

Same way you do it for English - you add the stories with their French titles, then after it is approved, you add a note with the translators and variant them to their parents. When the reference title is set to French, all other titles will automatically be set to French as well. :) Do you want to try? Or do you want someone to do it? Annie 16:12, 5 August 2021 (EDT)

It will probably quicker to clone this pub that looks quite similar.AlainLeBris 02:03, 6 August 2021 (EDT)

I'll give it a try. Where my problem comes from is adding all of the story titles. Goodreads gives that info but not page numbers, plus I've never done this before. I'll try to Clone but please forgive if I royally screw up aardvark7 11:30, 6 August 2021 (EDT)

Links to GCD

So I've been adding the text stories from "Heavy Metal" and referencing the Grand Comics Database for supporting information. I just read their "Data Distribution: How should I credit the GCD? What rights does the GCD retain? What rights do I have?" on giving credit, and I realized that I may not be doing this properly. Before I go any further, I thought I'd check to see what the policy is here. Should I be linking/using their data at all? Should we reach out to their board for permission? TAWeiss 11:28, 7 August 2021 (EDT)

Facts are not copyrightable (at least under US copyright law which governs the ISFDB, but I believe also international copyright). Analysis or presentation of those facts can be, but not the basic facts. So if you are talking about basic bibliographic information, there is no copyright issue. That page seems to be more about their database as whole. -- JLaTondre (talk) 09:10, 8 August 2021 (EDT)

That makes sense. Thanks TAWeiss 10:32, 8 August 2021 (EDT)

Need Help with Getting a Story Included

Hello: I am a retired astronomer and listed as an author on your database.

I don't know how to add a story to my listing and am hoping someone can help me.

I have had a science fiction story published in Flash Fiction (which is a web magazine not limited to science fiction). How can I get this listed under my author page: "Andrew Fraknoi"?

The story is called "I Swallowed a Martian" and appeared on July 23, 2021: https://flashfictionmagazine.com/blog/2021/07/23/i-swallowed-a-martian/

Thanks so much for any help you could give me.

Andrew Fraknoi

We do not have a record for Flash Fiction Magazine in the DB and we have somewhat restrictive rules about when an online-only publication is eligible:

Speculative fiction webzines, which are defined as online periodicals with distinct issues (note: online periodicals without distinct issues are not considered webzines)
Special speculative fiction issues of non-genre webzines
One time speculative fiction anthologies published on the Web
Online publications available exclusively as a Web page, but only if:

published by a market which makes the author eligible for SFWA membership (listed here), OR
shortlisted for a major award

The only way we may be able to fit this publication would be under the second rule, with the date defining issues - which will be a bit of working around the spirit of the rules as written. If we cannot fit it there, it will not be eligible for addition under the current rules - at least at the moment. The reason for the restrictions is pure time and effort related - we do open up for additional categories occasionally (a few years ago, web-only publications could only be included under the last bullet). Thia kinds of webzines had been in my mind lately - thinking on a way to change the rules so we can add them cleanly. Let me do some more digging on this one. Annie 12:56, 9 August 2021 (EDT)

Emile Denis => Émile Denis

The name of this artist should be changed to "Émile Denis" as he's credited.AlainLeBris 05:26, 8 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 11:27, 9 August 2021 (EDT)

Secrets of Our Spaceship Moon

Hello mods. In regards to this publication. I can see no evidence in the publication that it is a variant title of Our Mysterious Spaceship Moon/ In fact the cover ahas the text "The Astounding sequel to / Our Mysterious Spaceship Moon" although the copyright page does say "published by arrangement with Dell" so where's the evidence that this is a variant title as opposed to a "sequel" as stated on the cover ? --Mavmaramis 16:20, 8 August 2021 (EDT)

Well, let's ask the editor who made the variant back in 2015. :) If that was a mistake (and it happens) and you now think it is not a variant, go ahead and fix it. :) Annie 12:24, 9 August 2021 (EDT)

Hauck is no longer active. I'm am not entirely confident I can unmerge the two titles. --Mavmaramis 03:20, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Hi! There's no need to unmerge the titles, they have to be unvarianted (but that's what you propably meant). Just use the usual 'Make variant' button and enter '0' (zero) as parent: that'll do the job. Christian Stonecreek 12:44, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Phil(l)ippe

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?169482; I added a cover to 1 edition of his co-written books, and added another today, and now they're all covered. Then I noticed that all covers show his first name with 1 L. Is that a mistake here? --Username 22:11, 8 August 2021 (EDT)

Wrong Cover

I thought Parlour Papers' cover couldn't be found online, so I got it from a multi-page spread of small press magazine covers on Vault of Evil, only to learn it was on philsp.com along with other issues of the same magazine; the cover I uploaded turned out to be from an earlier issue not on ISFDB, so I uploaded the right one. I need a mod to delete the earlier cover. --Username 07:13, 9 August 2021 (EDT)

Control Panel moved

The link to the "Control Panel" page has been moved from the Moderator section of the navigation bar to the Bureaucrat menu. It's not used during day to day operations and at least one of the fields is meaningless unless you are a developer. Ahasuerus 17:29, 9 August 2021 (EDT)

Double Gorman

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?179259; I tried twice to delete that extra Gorman in the Carroll edition, but had no luck. Not sure why, so maybe it's a mod-only thing. --Username 02:16, 10 August 2021 (EDT)

Took care of it. To fix it, have to change one of the duplicate names to something else, have that approved, and then remove the changed one. -- JLaTondre (talk) 18:45, 10 August 2021 (EDT)

Pending submissions

Sorry to be insistent, but the bottleneck at submission level is starting to be quite serious (presently more than 1000 edits are in the queue). As I'm entering a certain number of new publications that are in the process of 1st approval (waiting for me to "finish" the record) or 2nd (or 3rd) approval (which will allow me to definitively shelve the book after verification), this leads to accute storge problems for me. All the free surfaces in my study are cluttered by books waiting to be fully entered and so shelved. I don't have any miracle cure but it seems to me that the pool of active moderators is sufficient but that the burden of approving simple contributors' submissions fall only on too few shoulders.AlainLeBris 04:31, 11 August 2021 (EDT)

Summers can be complicated that way - people are away for various reasons and when we have a few very active editors, it can get a bit complicated. Let me see what I can do today - I had been mostly working on a project and away from the queue for the last weeks. Annie 10:46, 11 August 2021 (EDT)

I just went through a bunch, so that should help. I'll try to do more later. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 12:14, 11 August 2021 (EDT)

Tag system enhancements

The tag system has been enhanced based on my 2021-07-30 post. When viewing tag pages like this one, moderators can now see a "Log of Tag Status Changes" for the displayed tag.

In addition, two new reports have been added to the "Moderator Links" section of the navigation bar: "Tag Status Changes" and "Private Tags". The first one lets you view all recent tag status changes. The second one lets you view a list of all tags that are currently set to "Private".

As the "Private Tags" report says, if you notice a misspelled or otherwise malformed tag, please post on the Moderator Noticeboard and a bureaucrat will remove it. Ahasuerus 10:19, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

Next up: merging tags and preventing some tags from being marked private. (^_^) ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 11:59, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

From a purely technical perspective, it wouldn't be hard to do. However, we'd need to consider the functional implications. Some editors may be upset when their carefully crafted tags are merged with other -- similar but subtly different -- tags. Ahasuerus 14:56, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

Merging can be tricky - subtle differences in usage are important for some people. Unless we can have separate views (one for the combined tag and then for each of the components). Annie 17:16, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

I can understand people wanting to not have too many changes made, but merging "action adventure" (1), "action/adventure" (1), and "action-adventure" (115) could only be beneficial, especially for the two that have only one. There are currently 12,426 tags, and I suspect a significant number of the tags needing merging are like these three examples. Then there are probable misspelling like "zombes" (1), which could be likely merged with "zombie" (1) and "zombies" (2343), again benefiting the two with only one. Any that are super specific (like "ofearna-1998" (361)) can be made private (if they aren't already). ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 19:06, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

That's why I said tricky, not impossible. Some are clear cut. Some are not. Who is going to decide when we cross between the two? We need some type of voting system (or we will open the door for a lot of editing war). And there are some tags I would not touch with a ten-foot pole even if they look the same to me - race-based ones for example - different culture look at these differently so what sounds the same to an American eye is different from a French one or a Bulgarian one. And any moderator can make a tag private if they want to already. :) Annie 19:11, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

We could always have a discussion for any non-obvious ones. And any that could be potentially a problem (like those you mentioned), they could be marked private. I assume it's just as easy to change it back to public if we decide it's fine. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 19:30, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

(unindent) OK, I think have cleaned up the most obvious offenders. Some were obvious typos and have been deleted with the correctly spelled version of the tag name added to the affected title(s). Others were apparently misunderstood by the moderator who made them private, e.g. "worn out" was a reference to the plot of the story and not to the condition of the book. Finally, it's important to remember that making a tag private makes it private for ALL titles, both current and future, that may be tagged with it. Ahasuerus 15:00, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

Canonical name change

Perhaps "Trisha J. Wooldridge should be the canonical name instead of Trisha Wooldridge. John Scifibones 18:24, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

Looks like you're correct. Feel free to switch things around. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 19:32, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

I don't see a "Remove" button next to the current alternate names on the canonical record. Is this a moderator only function? John Scifibones 07:15, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Nope - anyone can do it. It is on the alternative name, not on the canonical :) You attach the alternative to the canonical so when you are breaking it, you unattach from there as well. Same way as with the variants - you start from the child (bringing that up as once the canonical is changed, the variants will also needs to be fixed) Annie 11:13, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Thanks. I understand now. Here is an excerpt from the relevant help page.

Removing existing alternate names

If the currently displayed author name is already set up as an alternate name of one or more authors, these alternate name associations will be listed at the top of the page with a "Remove" button next to each alternate name. If one of the alternate name associations is in error, click on the Remove button next to the erroneous alternate name. The resulting "Remove Alternate Name" submission will need to be approved by a moderator before the incorrect alternate name is deleted.

A touch misleading? John Scifibones 11:20, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

A bit, yes... it makes sense once you know how it works but I can see why it got you confused. Let me think on the wording. Annie 11:44, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

You're right, it's clear after you do it. I think I have everything submitted correctly. The only thing I couldn't submit was the reversal of any parent child relationship. Won't let me submit till the break is processed. Let me know how I did. John Scifibones 12:18, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Fenn

I don't know what's wrong but after changing several story dates in Hugh Lamb's 1977 anthology Victorian Nightmares that were wrongly dated as original (I guess editor didn't notice the word Victorian in the title) I can't get Fenn's "Haunted by Spirits" to be as by "Manville Fenn". I tried breaking the variant "Mandeville Fenn" but now it has Manville with the story but no books and Mandeville with all 3 editions of Lamb's book. He didn't write as Mandeville, it was somebody's error, so could somebody get rid of that variant name and put that story under Manville? --Username 21:53, 12 August 2021 (EDT)

I will fix it. FYI, you'd need to edit the title and change the credit on it. When the bogus name has no titles associated with it, it will get deleted. Judging by this no variant should be needed -- it's credited to the full George Manville Fenn we have as canonical. --MartyD 09:58, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed and merged. --MartyD 10:26, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

How to separate

In creating new books, how do I classify an ebook vs a Kindle? Many times the book is available as a hardcopy, ebook and Kindle . Hardcopies are hc, tp to pb. Ebooks are ebook but what is a Kindle? Kindles' seem to have ASIN but hardcopies and ebooks look to have ISBN aardvark7 13:10, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

It is more complicated than that. :) What you think of ebooks are often also Kindle books and a lot of Kindle books have ISBNs as well (even if Amazon hides them these days - publishers often publish a single book in multiple formats (epub and mobi for example - mobi is Kindle, epub is for other readers such as Kobo for example - and look Inside in Amazon or the publisher site will have an ISBN for the book even if Amazon pretends that it does not exist anymore) and that book will have both ASIN and ISBN). The change happened sometime in 2020, before that Kindle books which had ISBNs showed it on the page; then Amazon dropped that information both from the API and the UI. But the ISBNs still exist. :)

Unless you are sure that the two versions are different, we keep the Kindle and non-kindle ebooks as a single entry, with the ISBN and the ASIN added to it (and the BN number if it has one and you want to find it). For the publishers who publish separate versions, add them both as ebooks (one will have ASIN, one won't; they may have different ISBNs or the Kindle one may have none) and add notes to differentiate them. Annie 13:29, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Where's The

Don't know if anyone will care about this, but I entered an edit and Modified Regular Titles said, "Title date after the publication date" while New Cover Art said, "Title date after publication date". One has "the", the other doesn't. Minor, but I thought I'd mention it so mods that fix that sort of thing know about it. --Username 19:16, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed - thanks for reporting the problem! Ahasuerus 20:02, 13 August 2021 (EDT)

Michael Gilbert?

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?1886; fixed several "short fiction" entries that are clearly art credits. I don't think the artist is the same as the guy who wrote "Stay of Execution", that story probably being by mystery writer Michael Gilbert, since it's in 1 of Joan Kahn's mystery anthologies. Which one wrote the chapbook, "The General's Bane", or the poem, I don't know. --Username 01:57, 14 August 2021 (EDT)

Bound to the Dark Prince

"Bound to the Dark Prince" by Aria Lovely is a new book that I recently added to the data base. Title Record # 2898585 This is her first book in her "The Fae Wars" series. Unfortunately it has been tied to another Fae Wars series, "The Fae Wars: Onslaught" by J. F. Holmes and Lucas Marcum. Title Record # 2851786 "Bound to the Dark Prince" by Aria Lovely is book 1 of her The Fae Wars through Kindle (Goodreads 57399557) "The Fae Wars: Onslaught" by J. F. Holmes and Lucas Marcum is also a Vol One (Goodreads 57399557)(Kindle) Date base shows Cannon Publishing. Amazon shows this as a Kindle & Paperback and is the first of 2 books with the 2nd as "The Fae Wars: The Fall". These are 2 different series by 2 different authors with the same name and should be separated. aardvark7 17:10, 14 August 2021 (EDT)

Both series call themselves "The Fae Wars". The software links titles to series by name, so in a situation where we have multiple series with the same name, we have to add disambiguation to the those names. Where the titles in a series are all credited to the same author(s), we use their names. I've done that. Now we have The Fae Wars (Lovely) and The Fae Wars (Holmes, Marcum). If you visit either of those, you'll notice the software also automatically includes a prominent pointer to the other series with a similar name. I hope that makes sense. Please ask if that's not clear or if you have any questions. --MartyD 08:36, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

p.s. I also added The Fall. --MartyD 08:36, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

I get where you are coming from. I knew they were two different series but also knew it was way beyond my knowledge on how to fix it. So I tried to get enough information so that someone with that knowledge could get it corrected. aardvark7 13:08, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

Editing secondary Verification Sources

"ISFDB Bibliographic Reference Table Editor", which used to be linked in the Moderator Tools toolbar, has been removed. It used to let moderators edit the labels, names and URLs of secondary Verification Sources. However, the functionality was poorly implemented and could mess up the database, so editing was disabled many years ago.

A new option, "Edit Verification Sources", has been added to the Bureaucrat menu. It means that changing secondary Verification Sources no longer requires developer intervention. Ahasuerus 15:06, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

A new option, "Add New Verification Source", has been added to the Bureaucrat menu. Developer involvement is no longer required when adding secondary Verification Sources.

Table maintenance activities which still require developer intervention:

Editing language codes
Adding/editing image credits
Adding/editing Notes templates
Adding/editing External ID types

We'll get there... Ahasuerus 16:49, 18 August 2021 (EDT)

Daniken

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?156732; fixed record for 1970 Chariots of the Gods, added 1969 original, fixed some stuff for sequels. Under 1968 German is a 1981 English, but there's also a separate 1970 English. That doesn't seem right. Also, when I entered the original I made one of my rare mistakes and said the SBN was on front flap when it's actually on copyright page. By the time someone gets around to approving I'll be on to 100 other things and may forget to fix note, so if mod who approves it could fix that and save me the trouble that would be cool. --Username 21:57, 15 August 2021 (EDT)

Well, nobody answered and edit was just approved, so I fixed it myself. Also, nobody answered my question of why 1 edition of Chariots was under the original German edition's record while the other was separate, but I see it was fixed by someone anyway. You the man, Username. No, you the man. --Username 10:10, 17 August 2021 (EDT)

The Case of the Two Paul Alexanders

Just to let people know. Illustrator Paul Alexander IS NOT the same person as writer Paul Alexander Zink. They have been combined together as Paul Alexander and will have to be separated in the near future. MLB 04:25, 16 August 2021 (EDT)

The records have been disambiguated and SFE3 has been notified. Thanks! :) Ahasuerus 10:46, 16 August 2021 (EDT)

Electronic media

Help! I need some guidelines on how to classify electronic media. Many times a book, along with a hardback and/or paperback will have a Kindle version. Sometimes a Kindle version and an ebook. And other times a Kindle and Audiobook. Kindle and Audiobook are not options listed under Format. And Audiobooks have always been listed as Audiobook, not Audio CD or Audio Mp3 CD. Should Kindle and Audiobook be listed as "ebook" or "Other"? aardvark7 21:34, 16 August 2021 (EDT)

Kindle is ebook - all eBooks formats are classified as ebook. Audible and other downloadable audio-formats are “digital audio download”. :) Annie 23:48, 16 August 2021 (EDT)

THANK YOU Annie!! aardvark7 08:36, 17 August 2021 (EDT)

Alternates

Was there a recent improvement where the annoying process of having to link alternate cover artist's name to the parent name was made easier by including the parent name when you start the edit? I don't remember seeing that before. I added a new edition of The Hunting Variety, there was no artist credit but a Marchetti signature on cover, and edit said it was an alternate name of Lou Marchetti. --Username 10:17, 17 August 2021 (EDT)

Well, edit was approved and now it says Lou Marchetti twice; http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?88877. I'm tired of trying to figure out this variant stuff, so mod can fix it, or not, if they wish. --Username 17:36, 17 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed. As far as I can tell, a circular reference was created somehow having both Lou Marchetti and Marchetti as alternate names of each other (I think). No idea how that could have happened... MagicUnk 15:40, 18 August 2021 (EDT)

It happened again; http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?124889. Either I'm doing it wrong or something's wrong behind the scenes; in the future if I enter an artist that has a parent name I'm just going to leave it alone. --Username 18:17, 18 August 2021 (EDT)

Aha, I didn't think it possible, but you submitted a 'Make Alternate Name' edit while it already existed. So there are now two links between both author names. Have a look here: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/author_history.cgi?124889. MagicUnk 04:54, 19 August 2021 (EDT)

That looks like something that the submission review software should be able to catch and block. Let me do more research on the development server... Ahasuerus 12:22, 19 August 2021 (EDT)

Checking the code, I see that the submission review software currently displays a "This name is currently labeled as an alternate name for the following authors" list, which is helpful, but it should also make submissions which would result in duplicate alternate names unapprovable. Bug 782 has been created. Thanks for reporting the problem! Ahasuerus 12:50, 19 August 2021 (EDT)

(unindent) OK, I think I got it. Please let me know if you come across any issues. Ahasuerus 15:03, 19 August 2021 (EDT)

Incorrect/Dup Artist

Reborn Title Record # 2895882 shows the cover artist to be Jackson Tjotan. The correct spelling is Jackson Tjota. The Reborn title is correctly shown under Jackson Tjota for Title Record # 2895724. IMHO Reborn Title Record # 2895882 should be removed. I could delete it but don't want to step on toes. aardvark7 17:00, 17 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed. MagicUnk 15:32, 18 August 2021 (EDT)

Carl Brandon Society Awards

Beginning this year, The Carl Brandon Society will be selecting a long work and a short work winner in each category. Please make the appropriate modification in anticipation of the release announcement. Thanks, John Scifibones 16:25, 19 August 2021 (EDT)

Once we know what the exact names of the new award categories will be (have they been announced?), we can create new records for them. Ahasuerus 16:13, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

They haven't announced the winners yet, only that they will award a long and a short in each category as opposed to only one per category as in past years. Just trying to be prepared. John Scifibones 16:51, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

Sounds good, thanks! Ahasuerus 18:41, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

More stuff I don't know how to do

Recently I added a number of books to the data base. Most of these had various combos of paperback, ebook, Kindle and Audiobook. In the past when I have done this they all appeared merged under a parent title. Didn't happen this time. Tried variant and was told nope, they need to be merged. Fine but I have not been able to find this command. Titles that are bad are Song of Shadow (3 versions) and Hymn of Ascension (2 versions) All found under "Ballad of Emerald and Iron" Series Record # 64030. Canticle of Magic is also under there but the paperback has been attached to the above Series Record #64030 and the ebook version under "Ballad of Emerald and Iron Book" Series Record # 64035. Notice that extra word "Book" Is there a page showing how to merge stuff? I find "Unmerge Titles" but no "Merge Titles" aardvark7 16:13, 20 August 2021 (EDT)

On both title records and publication records, there is a "Check for Duplicate Titles" option. Click that and it will give you matches where the title, author, and type match. You can the select duplicates and submit a merge. Hope that helps. Let us know if not clear. -- JLaTondre (talk) 17:19, 20 August 2021 (EDT)

OK I found that. So for Galaxy Under Siege it shows the 2020 and 2019 versions. I assume that I want to click the top two to merge the books but not the bottom two since the covers are different. Also even if the covers are the same, since each one has its own link, would I even then want to merge covers? aardvark7 09:50, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

Since you are referring to top two and bottom two, I'm assuming you are talking about the "Check for Duplicate Titles" from the publication record. In other words, this page. You would submit merges for both - do the novels and then go back and do the covers. For covers, we merge them if the artwork is the same and they have the same title and artist credit. -- JLaTondre (talk) 14:51, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

Yes, that's the page. In this case for Galaxy Under Siege the covers are different so I will only merge titles. I merged Galaxy Under Seige (Title only as covers are different). I also did The Song of Shadow where I merged all 3 book versions (Top half) but only the 2019 covers (paperback and ebook) as they are the same but different from the 2020 audiobook. I did the top have book versions first, then went back and did the bottle covers part. I have others but I want to make sure I did these correctly first aardvark7 17:30, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

I approved your merges and you can see the results: Galaxy Under Siege and Song of Shadow. I also merged the cover art. The two Galaxy Under Siege are the same artwork (we don't care that the text is slightly different, only the artwork) and the three Song of Shadow covers are the same artwork (we treat cropped versions the same as the larger versions). -- JLaTondre (talk) 20:53, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

Varianting a Robert E. Howard story

I could do the mechanics, but would rather someone used to juggling titles took a go at it instead. My copy of Marchers of Valhalla contains a story (novelette) called The Valley of the Lost. The acknowledgements state "copyright of 1967, under the title Secret of Lost Valley, by Heath Knowledge, Inc. for Startling Mystery Stories, Spring 1967". The story title has a note saying not to merge or variant with Valley of the Lost first published in a horror magazine in 1966. However, this title is not a variant of The Secret of Lost Valley which includes the Startling Mystery Stories issue as the first publication. Sounds like a simple variant request, but the base title already haa a variant of Valley of the Lost - the title not to be merged/varianted to, although it isn't in the horror magazine. I've run out of tabs, time and brain stacking space. Any takers? ../Doug H 19:47, 21 August 2021 (EDT)

Could you make clear of what 'The Valley of the Lost' should be made a variant of? Judging from the Statement made in 'Marchers of Valhalla' it should be text-identical with Secret of Lost Valley. It seems there are two different texts titled (nearly identical) 'Valley of the Lost' and 'The Valley of the Lost'. Christian Stonecreek 07:13, 22 August 2021 (EDT)

I believe it should be a variant of a story called Secret of Lost Valley that is contained in the publication for the Spring 1967 issue of Startling Mystery Stories. However, that doesn't exist - the title referenced by the issue is called The Secret of Lost Valley. Either the reference in my book is wrong, or the magazine entry is wrong (one PVer last seen in 2013). The existing title has a variant title of The Valley of the Lost, which has multiple entries. I don't know on what basis they were varianted to The Secret of the Lost Valley rather than Secret of Lost Valley. {ref. on history of the story - see #13)}. I'm thinking the key is to find the magazine and check. There are copies listed in the OCLC, may be able to get a librarian somewhere to check. ../Doug H 15:14, 22 August 2021 (EDT)

Startling Mystery Stories is available at the Internet Archive. That issue is here. The title page uses "The" as per our entry. Please compare the text to see if it is the same story as in your publication. Thanks. -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:37, 22 August 2021 (EDT)

Same text (first few paragraphs). I'll variant to the existing title and add notes to this stories pub and title records. ../Doug H 16:44, 22 August 2021 (EDT)

Space

Last moderator on the list, Tpi, has no space between since and the date, unlike the other missing mods. --Username 08:18, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Fixed! Thanks for catching that. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 12:12, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Utah Speculative Fiction Award

This award was given out from 2002-2005, and it may be starting up again based on some information from some conversations I've had with a few people. The first two years, it was only a single award with a list of finalists. The second two years, they added a short fiction category. I have the winners and finalists for 2002-2003, but I'm still trying to find those for 2004-2005. I will fill in the information I have once the award is created. Thanks! ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 12:21, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Here's the info needed to create it:

Short Name: Utah SF
Full Name: Utah Speculative Fiction Award
Awarded For: Recognize and honor the best novel-length book (and later, short fiction) for the year written by a Utah author or about Utah.
Poll: No
Covers more than just SF: No
Webpages: none at the moment
Note: Awarded from 2002-2005. From 2002-2003, awarded for a speculative fiction novel. From 2004-2005, awarded for the novel and for short fiction.

···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 12:26, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Checking the Wayback Machine, I see the following line:

Anybody who has a membership to a current year sfcon sponsored convention is eligible to be a Judge. If you are interested, please read the Judge Voting Process and contact the Utah SF Award Contest Coordinator.

It looks like the "Awarded By" field should contain a statement like "Anonymous volunteer judges selected among members of the sfcon". A somewhat unusual process, but I don't think it should prevent us from adding this award. Ahasuerus 14:47, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Probably "Anonymous volunteer judges selected among members of CONduit", since SFCON was the parent organization that put on CONduit and CONduit was the only con they ever ran. If the awards start up again (which I think they will), we'll have to change that since the judging process might be different. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 16:18, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Sounds good. If there are no objections, I will create the new Award Type in a couple of days. Ahasuerus 17:26, 23 August 2021 (EDT)

Done! Ahasuerus 09:58, 25 August 2021 (EDT)

Thanks! All the information I have has been entered. There are apparently awards for 2004 and 2005, but I haven't been able to find anything on them. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 11:51, 8 September 2021 (EDT)

Author Merge Request

Fanni Suto and Fanni Sütő appear to be the same person. Follow Fanni Suto's instagram link and you will see she spells her name Fanni Sütő. John Scifibones 20:38, 24 August 2021 (EDT)

My mistake. Never mind.John Scifibones 07:27, 25 August 2021 (EDT)

iUniverse

http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/publisher.cgi?1801; 51 books under this imprint, but shouldn't publisher's name be Writers Club Press / iUniverse for all? --Username 08:29, 25 August 2021 (EDT)

merging publisher

Could someone please meege Laissez Faire Produktion AB into Laissez faire. Cheers /Lokal _Profil 14:15, 26 August 2021 (EDT)

Done! Rudolf Rudam 07:28, 30 August 2021 (EDT)

Variants?

I don't know if this is normal, but I've noticed when I correct wrong names or titles some editors make the right ones variants of the wrong ones. For example, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1247011; I checked the Archive.org copy and it's Gold, so Golden was just copied from some online site without editor checking titles from actual book to make sure they were correct. My edit was approved, but instead of just using the correct title it was made a variant of the old incorrect title. Golden was never really the title, so why is it still there? Also, http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?783456, where Gauitier was corrected to Gautier but it's still a variant of the wrong name. The point of correcting these countless errors is to get rid of the wrong info, and leaving them in the record gives the false impression that those wrong names and titles were actually used somewhere in the publications when in fact they're just mistakes copied from somewhere to ISFDB without verifying anything. --Username 18:49, 27 August 2021 (EDT)

In both these cases, the titles were already variants before you edited them. When you edit a variant, you only change the variant. If there needs to be a change in the parent also, that needs to be submitted separately. I made these two changes. As you make changes, you will need to pay attention as to whether you are editing a variant and, if so, whether the parent also needs a change. Thanks. -- JLaTondre (talk) 08:17, 29 August 2021 (EDT)