User talk:AlHazred

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Welcome!

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

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

I hope you enjoy editing here! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will insert your name and the date. If you need help, check out the community portal, or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! Ahasuerus 06:17, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

The Necronomicon

I have approved your changes to Price's The Necronomicon and have a couple of questions if you happen to be working off a physical copy of the book:

  • Could you please confirm that the title of Price's introduction is "The Figure in the Flying Carpet" and that it starts on page vii? (We support both roman and arabic numerals, by the way.)
  • Is "Demons of Cthulhu", which appears on page 62, credited to Robert Silverberg or to "Charles D. Hammer", his pseudonym?
  • Similarly, is "The Mantle of Graag" (p. 11) attributed to Frederik Pohl, Henry Dockweiller and Robert A. W. Lowndes or to "Paul Dennis Lavond", their collective pseudonym?
  • Are the page numbers listed by Locus for the currently unnumbered Lin Carter micro-stories correct?

Thanks! Ahasuerus 06:23, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

I do, in fact, own a physical copy of this book -- I started picking up the Call of Cthulhu Fiction line from Chaosium with #1 and have almost all of them. I am adding them to my Book Collector software, and plan to submit changes to ISFDB as time permits.
  • Price's introduction is, in fact, named "The Figure in the Flying Carpet." It is in the typical Price style of combination Introduction/Literary History/Homage. The headers of the pages it's on, however, do say "Introduction." Similarly, all of the stories are started with a short bibliographical intro.
  • "Demons of Cthulhu" is attributed to Silverberg. Price mentions the pseudonym in his intro.
  • "The Mantle of Graag" is attributed to Pohl, Dockweiller, and Lowndes. Price mentions the pseudonym in his intro.
  • The page numbers for the microstories appear to be correct.
Stories are listed as starting with the page containing Price's intro. --AlHazred 06:38, 25 November 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, that helps! I have removed the title record attributed to "Charles D. Hammer" and added the one for Silverberg. (It's a common issue with reprints.) I also added a note about the slight discrepancy in the way the introduction is listed.
Now, re: the proposed removal of the micro-stories, the question is whether we want to enter "The Dee Translation" as a single novella title or as multiple short story titles (or perhaps both). All of these micro-stories originally appeared in various magazines and we will eventually want to create publication entries for them and enter their contents. Once that is done, it will be useful to show that these stories were later reprinted in an anthology, something that we will not be able to do if we enter just the novella record. Would you agree? And again, thanks for your contributions!
P.S. I may have to drop off for the night since I am on the East Coast this week and it's 2am here. There may be other moderators popping up over the next few hours, but if no one else chimes in, I will pick it up in the morning. Ahasuerus 06:56, 25 November 2010 (UTC)
I think it's a good idea. However, the stories in these anthologies come from a bewildering variety of minor fan-made magazines spanning decades -- putting them all in the database is the chore of a lifetime. Verifying them will be difficult if not impossible -- I doubt some of the magazines still exist in more than a handful of physical copies.--AlHazred 07:06, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
Primary verification can be indeed problematic when more obscure fanzines are involved. However, we do accept secondary verifications from reliable source, although primary verifications are, of course, preferred.
In this case, some of the micro-stories have appeared in other reprint anthologies, e.g. "The Doom of Yakthoob" appeared in 4 publications that we list.
Also, you wanted to remove Steffan B. Aletti 's "The Castle in the Window" from this publication. Does Locus list it in error? Or is it, perhaps, attributed to another version of the author's name? Thanks! Ahasuerus 23:19, 27 November 2010 (UTC)
Hmmm... That was in error. Aletti's "The Castle in the Window" is in there. It starts on page 73 -- the first page is a short intro to the piece by Price, and then the story itself spans seven more pages. I blame a current bout of insomnia.
I should also mention I own two copies of the Necronomicon anthology -- one from 1996 and the later 2002 edition. I do not own the edition currently being sold on the Chaosium.com website. I will have to sit down with them later today and compare them to find the discrepancies. --AlHazred 18:32, 29 November 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for checking! Based on your explanation, I have rejected the Title removal submission and added a few missing page numbers. We are getting there :-) Ahasuerus 03:02, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Bad Ronald

Was this published as by John Holbrook Vance or Jack Vance? You put it under the title record for John Holbrook Vance and the OCLC record gives Jack Vance credit as the author. Also what is the currency you placed in the price field? If US dollars you should place "$" before the figure. Thanks. Mhhutchins 00:27, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

Fixed. My apologies.--AlHazred 15:33, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Last Man on Earth

Have your submission to add Wayne Barlowe as the artist for [this] on hold. If the image is correct, there is a signature on the bottom right [that I can't quite make out] but it looks nothing like the one Barlowe was using in 1982. His "Celtic Rune" sig. was a box with three initials inside at the time. See [here]. Is there another cover or a secondary source? I see the 1985 printing credits Barlowe and AbeBooks has one of those that states Barlowe as the artist, but without an image. Thanks! --~ Bill, Bluesman 18:19, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

There is, in fact, another source. I never knew it was Barlowe until I saw that exact piece in one of his art book collections (will get the exact one, and page number, when I get home). It's credited to him elsewhere, as well; for instance, this anime wallpapers site.
Super! Now that site has a gorgeous pic and the signature is plainly visible. Thanks for checking, will approve the submission. --~ Bill, Bluesman 01:19, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street

I'm holding a submission that wants to change the note on this record to indicate that it's a teleplay, and not a story adaptation of the teleplay. I'm not sure (not having any of the books to check), but I believe this is the story and not the teleplay. We have a record of the teleplay which was published in Twilight Zone magazine. Do you have a copy of any of the books in which the first record was published? Mhhutchins 04:44, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm also now concerned that I accepted the changes you made in Walking Distance and The Fever. All three of these stories appeared in the book Stories from the Twilight Zone which has been verified. Someone has changed the note fields of the title records of every story in the book indicating they're teleplays. Somehow this doesn't seem right. Thanks. Mhhutchins 04:47, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
I made those changes to make the different entries for the Stories from the Twilight Zone publication match -- I saw that some of them had the teleplay data while others did not. The stories are all, in fact adaptations of teleplays; the teleplay data for most of them is in the notes to the stories (the ending of each is the concluding narration by Mr. Serling); one of the stories has the note that the teleplay was "scheduled" for airing on a particular date, but this differs from the notation in that story, and I guess the teleplay aired earlier than expected. I thought that the Notes showed the proper way to do that, but I guess there's supposed to be a different way to do it? --AlHazred 18:03, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
Yes. I would suggest "Story adaptation of a teleplay originally broadcast on [date]." This makes it clear that the record is for the story and not the teleplay, which may have been published later, and making it an entirely new work. Thanks. Mhhutchins
I've made the changes in the notes to the stories. Mhhutchins 19:41, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
Thanks! --AlHazred 01:32, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Title date changes

Afraid I've been asleep at the switch. You entered the contents for [this] and are now changing the dates for the individual stories. Please stop!! The vast majority of the stories have been previously published and changing the dates for the entries in the above publication doesn't really do anything as they still need to be merged with the existing record[s]. To do this in one step all you have to do is click on each author's name from the contents of the pub record and then from the bibliography page that comes up, click on "Check for Duplicate Titles". The story, if it has been published before, will show up with the new record adding all those contents will have created. Click on "Merge Selected Records". You will see the dates of the original record and the one you added [all of which will have 1987-00-00]. The earlier story will already have the button 'selected' so just click "Complete Merge". Then go back to the contents of the pub and select the next author and repeat. The ones you submitted already [and I approved without thinking about it properly] will still have to be merged. Doing as above eliminates one step. Some of the stories are original to this publication, but will still need to have the dates changed to 1984-04-00 as that's when the first edition was published. The contents should also be imported to the other two editions. My apologies, should have caught this earlier. --~ Bill, Bluesman 04:53, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I've started from the bottom of the contents and have done a few to lighten the load... 100 is a lot! --~ Bill, Bluesman 04:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
(Needless to say) I did not know that! That's an awesome feature, and I will start over from the top!--AlHazred 15:30, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Catalog numbers in the Catalog #/ISBN field

When adding a number (or a group of letters and numbers) in the Catalog #/ISBN field that is not an ISBN, you should place a number sign (#) before it. There are plans to remove catalog numbers from the field and place them into their own field. Adding the # allows a global change, and avoid having to do manual edits. Thanks. Mhhutchins 00:29, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Updating dates along with the notes

When you're adding information in the notes that contradicts the date of the record, you should also update the date field as well. For example, when you note that "The Mind of Fu Manchu" was first published in This Week on February 1, 1959, the date of the record should be changed to from the original 1958-00-00 to 1959-02-01. I've corrected the ones you updated. Thanks for contributing. Mhhutchins 00:37, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Importing contents

You are adding contents to Shadows Over Baker Street. There is a much easier way. The [hardcover] already has the contents listed. On the left side of the page under "Editing Tools" there is a line "Import Content". Before hitting this, go to the hardcover record above and copy/note the Tag number [it's the last part of the URL, in this case SHDWSVRBKM2003]. Now go to the trade paperback record and hit "Import Content". The page that opens will give you the option of copying the page numbers as well. If they are different then uncheck that box and click on Import after pasting the Tag in the box provided. What you will get is a screen that [other than the page numbers] can't be edited! You can add more contents, if there's a new introduction for instance or add/change page numbers but you can't change any of the contents. What this feature does is make all those merges unnecessary! They're done!. No typing, either! Try it on this submission [I've put the other one on hold]. --~ Bill, Bluesman 19:47, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Pretty easy! --~ Bill, Bluesman 20:14, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
There are a lot more, and more specialized, features on ISFDB than on Wikipedia. Takes some getting used to. --AlHazred 20:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
It's worth a stroll through the Help pages listed at the top of this page. And more things keep getting added, supposedly to make life easier!! ;-) --~ Bill, Bluesman 20:27, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Solution T-25

I'm holding the submission to change the author credit for this pub. The cover gives the author as "DuBois". Do you have a copy of the book and can verify that the name given on the title page is "Du Bois"? Thanks. Mhhutchins 18:53, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I no longer have this item in my hands; I made the change while in a library with the book, and therefore can't confirm it now. I guess we'll leave this one alone, although it's suggestive that there's only one title for "DuBois" and a title of the same name and date for "Du Bois".--AlHazred 19:55, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
The existence of another pub under a different name isn't strong enough evidence to change a different pub. Once we've confirmed the title page credit for this particular pub, we can determine whether or not to create a variant. As it is, someone has made a primary verification so I'd rather not change it without proof. Thanks. Mhhutchins 20:02, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
No problem, and thanks for your attentiveness!--AlHazred 20:06, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

The Magic of Christmas

The submission adding this record was accepted, but I made some corrections:

  • The editor's name was changed from "Joel Silbersack" to John Silbersack
  • The ISBN was changed from "978-0-451-45190-3" to 0-451-45190-2 which I assume is the actual stated ISBN. The system auto-generates the ISBN-13, so editors should enter the ISBN as stated.
  • The title of the Judith Tarr story was changed from "I Sing for a Maiden" to "I Sing of a Maiden".

If the changes I've made are not correct, please respond here on your user talk page. Mhhutchins 02:42, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks!--AlHazred 04:34, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Linking to unauthorized sites

I had to remove the link to the cover image you gave in this record. It's on a server for which we don't have permission to "deep-link". You can upload the image to the ISFDB server using the "Upload cover scan" link on the pub record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 16:13, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Once again, I'm in too much of a hurry to do it right. Thanks for catching that!--AlHazred 16:21, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

The Dumas Club

This publication was entered under the wrong title record. If there is no title record for the book in the database (as titled on its title page), you should not use the "Clone" or "Add Publication to This Title" functions. You should use the appropriate link under the "Add New Data" menu (in this case "Add New Novel"). I will unmerge it from its current title record (The Club Dumas) and create a new title record which I'll variant to the canonical title. Also a question: if this book was published in 2003, it shouldn't have an ISBN-13 (which wasn't created until 2005). Please check the book again and update the record to indicate its stated ISBN (from the copyright page if present, if not, from its cover.) You may have a later printing which should be indicated on the copyright page. In that case, the date field should be changed to 0000-00-00 to indicate an undated printing. One last thing, I changed the publisher to "Vintage (UK)" which is the ISFDB designation for the London-based division of this publisher. Thanks. Mhhutchins 01:37, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Okay, this is a translation of "The Club Dumas" put out by Vintage UK in 2003 per the top of the credits page; my copy is from the 5th printing. Further down the page it says "ISBN 9780099448594 (from Jan 2007)". I guess I put that as 2007-01-00? AlHazred 13:36, 14 February 2014 (UTC)
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