Difference between revisions of "User talk:Dagon99"

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::::The same methodology can be used to process the [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?Ralph%20Stephen%20Harding  Ralph Stephen Harding titles].--[[User:Swfritter|swfritter]] 16:10, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
 
::::The same methodology can be used to process the [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?Ralph%20Stephen%20Harding  Ralph Stephen Harding titles].--[[User:Swfritter|swfritter]] 16:10, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
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== ''The Body Cartel'' ==
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Thanks for submitting ''The Body Cartel ''! The submission was fine, but I moved the book's editor, Tim Marquitz, to the Notes field since we currently have no other way to enter the editors of single author books. [[User:Ahasuerus|Ahasuerus]] 23:38, 7 December 2009 (UTC)
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== The Busker questions ==
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Hi.  I've placed your submission of ''The Busker'' on hold while I check a couple of small things with you.  I don't have access to the catalogue you cited as the source....
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* Is the publisher really "Bullfrog", or might it be "Bulldog" Books? [http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/s/guy-n-smith/busker.htm Fantastic Fiction], [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Busker-Guy-N-Smith/dp/0953270106 Amazon UK], [http://www.alibris.com/search/books/qwork/865896/used/The%20busker Alibris], [http://books.google.com/books?id=yVJaAgAACAAJ&cd=1&source=gbs_ViewAPI Google Books], and others all use "Bulldog".  I found a couple of "Blackhill" citations, too, but I think those are mixing up Smith's secondhand books operation with the publisher.
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* Do you know the size is standard paperback?  Various references cite it as trade paperback.
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* I found [http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/412G29B745L.jpg this image] while searching....
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Thanks. --[[User:MartyD|MartyD]] 02:37, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
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- I saw on Amazon that it was "Blackhill" but everywhere else, it said "Bullfrog". I assume that perhaps the American version or a reprinted version may have been by Blackhill. 
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- I didn't see the dementions anywhere. I put paperback just because I didn't want to assume that it was a trade paperback. If your sources say that it is, then it probably is.
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- Yes, that is the image that I've seen associated with it. [[User:Dagon99|Dagon99]] 13:14, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
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:Ok, thanks.  {{P|305803|Here you go}}.  I did change "Bull'''frog'''" to "Bull'''dog''' Books" (I found a reference on Smith's site also using "Bulldog" for it) and the size to tp.  And I added the above cover image link that I found.  Thanks for the submission!  --[[User:MartyD|MartyD]] 18:17, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
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== "Agoraphobia" and "The Box" merges ==
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Hi, I put two of your submissions on hold while I investigate the proposed date changes.
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For "Agoraphobia" I just have to confer with other moderators to see if we want to preserve the day in the date or not.
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For your "The Box" merge, you propose changing the original 2009-11-00 date to 2009-12-00.  What is the source of that December date?  The title is listed in {{P|HSFHRRRBST2009|House of Horror: Best of 2009}}, and that has a 2009-11-00 publication date, which if correct would put the first publication of "The Box" in November.  Thanks.  --[[User:MartyD|MartyD]] 13:42, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
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:- Sorry about the confusion. "The Box" was originally published in House of Horror: Best of 2009 in November. I inadvertently selected the wrong date when I merged the titles. As for "Agoraphobia", it was indeed first published in Toe Tags September 29th. The only reason I zeroed the exact date was to make all the dates more uniform. The 29th is accurate if you prefer to keep it that way. [[User:Dagon99|Dagon99]] 16:17, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
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::No problem.  I will accept both merges and fix "The Box" to be November.  And having conferred with others, the conclusion is that if we have a reliable DAY of publication, we keep that in the date.  I am very sympathetic to your desire for uniform dates, but since Lulu.com does tell us the DAY, we will keep the 29th in the date for "Agoraphobia", so I'll fix that date up, too.  Details, details! :-)  Thanks for the contributions.  --[[User:MartyD|MartyD]] 12:06, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
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== Doom Magnetic! ==
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I had to remove the link for the cover of [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?312743 this pub] as it's on a server which hasn't given us permission to deep-link.  You can upload a copy of the image to our server and link to it from there.  Use the "Upload Cover Scan" link on the pub record.  Thanks. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 20:39, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
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== ''A Pint of Bloody Fiction'' ==
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I accepted the submission to add [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?400192 this record] to the database, but had to make a couple of changes. Research shows that Nancy Ekle was the co-editor, so I added that credit. I also removed the link to the cover image on an unapproved website. You have the option to upload the image to the ISFDB server. Click on the link "Upload cover scan" and follow directions. After the file is uploaded, you will have to go back to the publication record, and link it to the uploaded image file. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 15:24, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
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== Graveyard Scavenger Hunt ==
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I'm holding a submission to add a record for this title, but there are several concerns and entry problems that will have to be corrected once it's in the database. I'm going to go over them below. Please keep this in mind when adding publications in future submissions. (These standards appear in the help pages which are linked in the Welcome section above.)
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# Catalog#/ISBN field: "B00A8414OY" is neither a catalog number nor an ISBN. It appears to be the Amazon ASIN. This is a unique product identifier used solely by Amazon. These numbers can be recorded in the Note field. Do you know if the publisher has assigned a number for this publication?
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# Cover Artist field: You give the name of the person who created the series logo credit in this field. That should be done in the Note field. The Cover Artist field is solely to credit the cover artist.
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# Image URL field: You did not give the complete '''URL''' of the file, only the name of the file. This brings up another matter. You uploaded an image to the ISFDB wiki before the record for the publication was accepted into the database. Look at [http://www.isfdb.org/wiki/index.php/Image:Graveyard_Scavenger_Hunt.jpg the file's wiki record] and you'll see that there is no license tag attached to the image. Without a license tag in which the ISFDB claims fair use of the image, we are liable for any charges of copyright infringement that the artist/publisher may claim. It is better to wait until the record is in the database, and then use the "Upload Cover Scan" function which is linked to each record. Doing it this way will 1) create a unique file name (unlike the one you used to name the file), 2) add a license tag to the file that protects the ISFDB, and 3) links the image file back to the database record. (You can see the Wiki image file is not currently linked to the database record.)
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# And the most significant omission: you didn't source your data. If you are working from a copy of the publication, tell that to the moderator in the "Note to Moderator" field. If you don't have a copy and are working from secondary sources, give those sources in the "Note" field.
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I'm going to accept the submission to make the necessary changes that I've outlined above. Because the cover image is available on Amazon's server, I will link to it and delete the image that you uploaded to the ISFDB Wiki. Thanks. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 23:42, 16 November 2012 (UTC)
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Further questions: you give a page count of 96 pages. Ebooks in Kindle format usually aren't paginated. Are you certain of this figure? Also, are you certain that this is novel-length, containing more than 45,000 words? If it's less than that, it should have been entered as a CHAPTERBOOK with a SHORTFICTION content record of novella length. I'll hold off accepting the submission until you're able to answer these last questions. Thanks. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 23:45, 16 November 2012 (UTC)
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*Whew, that's a lot of boo-boos. I apologize profusely for all of them.
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**I found the ISBN is 9781301713110
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**Sorry about the cover image. I tried the URL and it gave me an error message, so I tried just the file name. Evidently I messed that part up too.
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**Sorry about the logo artist credit. I thought since he designed it and it was a part of the cover, he would get credit.
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**I have a copy ,that's my source and the reason I know it's 96 pages.
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**Sorry, it should be a chapterbook as a "novella"
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[[User:Dagon99|Dagon99]] 21:56, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
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::I'll accept the submission and make the changes based on your response. I still don't understand how a Kindle-formatted ebook has page numbers. Even though I don't have one, it's my understanding that it's one continuous file and the pages are set by the user according to how large they want the font. Whatever. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 19:59, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
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::Here's the [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?403558 record]. Please do a primary verification of it when you get a chance. Then remove the data sourcing note ("Info from...") from the Note field. I've linked to the Amazon image and deleted the image uploaded to the ISFDB server. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 20:03, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
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== Image for ''Bites - The Hunt and More Fright with a Bite'' ==
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The image you uploaded had to be deleted because it was improperly uploaded. Please go to [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?434405 the publication record] and use the link labeled "Upload cover scan" to upload the image again. You'll also need to update the pub record with the URL of the newly uploaded image. Thanks. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 16:32, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
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== Ralph Stephen Harding ==
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Hello, I have your submission on hold to add birth- & deathdate for this author. First of all, the canonical author is [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?21851 R. S. Harding] and we would add this dates only for the canonical name (to avoid double date entries on the start page). Also, I saw that a death year of 2007 was proposed, but the author seems still to write (or at least publish) novels, that is if Robin Bennett is in fact another alter ego. Do you have any source for the dates? [[User:Stonecreek|Stonecreek]] 15:42, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
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:Long time since you submitted: I finally decided to reject your submission, due to the unknown background of the author. [[User:Stonecreek|Stonecreek]] 09:00, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
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== ''Bones II'' ==
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Submission to add [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?437303 this record] was accepted but's there's a few inconsistencies. If you have a copy of the book, then there's no reason to source Amazon except for specific data which is unstated in the book. Also, are you sure this is a trade paperback selling for the incredibly low price of $2.99? I found it on Amazon as an ebook priced at that. Also, the Amazon "Look Inside" shows that the cover art is by Mike Jansen and the interior art is by Niall Parkinson. Thanks for checking. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 19:20, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
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== ''Grave Diggers'' ==
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I accepted the submission adding [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?448646 this record], but there are some discrepancies between your stated source (Amazon) and the record you created. They give the publication date as 2013-03-06 and the page count as 274. The page numbers for the contents differ from those given in the table of contents, according to the Amazon look-inside.  Also, I didn't see "Untitled (Under the gaze...)" poem by "Phoebe. O. M." in the table of contents. Are you working from an actual copy of the book? And the "Forward" should be "Foreword". Thanks. [[User:Mhhutchins|Mhhutchins]] 19:57, 15 May 2014 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 15:57, 15 May 2014

Welcome!

Hello, Dagon99, 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:

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 11:00, 6 Dec 2007 (CST)

The Good Guy and Curse of the Claw

Thanks for submitting The Good Guy and Curse of the Claw! I have approved the submissions and made a few changes as per our Help pages:

  • Our software expects all dates to be in the YYYY-MM-DD format, otherwise it changes them to "unknown"
  • The abbreviations for different types of binding are "hc" for hardcover books, "pb" for mass market (i.e. small) paperbacks and "tp" for trade (i.e. large) paperbacks
  • The dates of publication that you entered apparently came from Amazon.com. Unfortunately, Amazon's dates are not very reliable and although there is no harm in including them, it's probably safer to use the YYYY-MM-00 format unless we have a solid source for the publication date
  • The page counts also apparently came from Amazon.com and they tend to be even less reliable than their publication dates. Basically, publishers send information about forthcoming books to Amazon.com well ahead of time, before they know how many pages the book will end up with, and Amazon employees almost never correct that number after they get the actual book. We use a variety of sources to double check Amazon's data -- see our Sources of Bibliographic Information page. In this case I used OCLC's FirstSearch engine to correct the page count for the Koontz.
  • I also entered the publisher's description of Koontz's novel from the OCLC record and changed the book's type from "NOVEL" to "NONGENRE" to reflect the fact that, as far as I can tell, the book has no speculative fiction content. We do catalog non-SF books by SF writers, but we need to mark them accordingly or else our users will not be able to tell what in the author's bibliography is SF. Imagine ordering a previously unknown Silverberg novel and then discovering that it's one of his pseudonymous soft core porn novels :) Unfortunately, due to current software limitations, this isn't something that can be specified at the time of the original submission and you have to go back and change the type after the submission has been approved.
  • I added Curse of the Claw to the appropriate series based on your note and then deleted the note. Again, due to current software limitations, this has to be done after the original submission.

Don't worry about the changes, they are all very common when new editors begin to contribute to the project. That's why we have the moderation process in place and this Wiki to communicate with the editors :) Thanks for editing! Ahasuerus 11:33, 6 Dec 2007 (CST)

Blackout by Guy N. Smith

I accepted your submission of this novel but had to correct the date. The ISFB recognizes dates as YEAR-MM-DD, so July 18, 2006 should be entered as 2006-07-18. Otherwise the system reverts to 0000-00-00 indicating "unknown" date. Thanks. Mhhutchins 11:14, 2 Jan 2008 (CST)

Richard Laymon's Island

Thanks for submitting Richard Laymon's Island! I have approved the submission and changed the publication date to 2002 to reflect the date when this edition was published. Also, the Amazon image didn't appear correctly, so I have deleted it for now. When you get a chance, please take a look at the result to make sure that everything looks fine. Also, please keep in mind that all submissions are reviewed by moderators and approved/rejected, so it may take some time for your submission to percolate to the top of the submission queue. Thanks! Ahasuerus 11:30, 17 Jan 2008 (CST)

The Fuel of Tender Years by Froehlich

I accepted your submission of this new pub, but had to make corrections to comply with ISFDB standards

  1. Dates should be in the form of YYYY-MM-DD, so August 1996 would be 1996-08-00. As it was entered "August 1996", the system reverts back to 0000-00-00 and shows the date as unknown.
  2. Binding: A paperback edition should be entered as "pb"
  3. Generically titled content entries, e.g. "Introduction" should be entered as "Introduction (The Fuel of Tender Years)" so that it can be distinguished from similar titles.

Thanks for submitting. Mhhutchins 15:21, 30 Jan 2008 (CST)

Midnight Screaming

According to the magazine's website, there have only three issues of Midnight Screaming, but none of the three match the contents of your submission. Is this a forthcoming issue? If so, the date should be a part of the title and the content records. Also the number you placed in the ISBN/Catalog # field is neither. It appears to be an ISSN. If so, it can be recorded in the notes field. The submission is being held awaiting your response. Thanks for contributing. MHHutchins 06:15, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

"Toe Tags: 21 Spine-Tingling Tales..." by Brian Barnett+William Pauley III

I have approved your submission for this publication. But I have a few questions and issues of formatting.

  • One author is listed as "T.J. McIntyre". We always show initials with spaces, so this should be "T. J. McIntyre".
  • One author is shown as "Oonah V Joslin". W always show initials with periods, unless the author has consistantly treated the letter as a complete name, so this should probably be "Oonah V. Joslin". Do you know if this author treats "V" as a one-letter name, rather than an initial?
  • The date is currently listed as "2009-09-29". Did this come from amazon, or direct from Lulu, or where? Amazon so often adds spurious day-of-th-moth figures to its dates, that I and many other editors here routinely change any amazon-derived date to YYYY-MM-00, deleting the day of the month figure. But with a Lulu published book there might be an accurately known, specific day of publication. Is there?

The listing for the pub is now here. Please double check, and verify if you are working from an actual copy of the book. Thank you for your contributions. -DES Talk 16:19, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Copied from User talk:DESiegel60
Yes, Oonah V Joslin is correct. There is no period after the "V".
I have no issue with changing T.J. to T. J.
The date is correct, unless you would rather change it to just the month and year. That was the exact day that it was open to be purchased to the public.
Thanks! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dagon99 (talkcontribs) 11:30, 1 October 2009 .
End content Copied from User talk:DESiegel60
  • I have changed "T.J. McIntyre" to "T. J. McIntyre".
  • A Google search confirms that Oonah V Joslin generally (but not always) omits a period after the V. I have therefore left this unchanged.
  • Since the exact date is accurate, i have not changed it. There is no objection to exact dates -- many magazines have them, for example, particularly ones more frequent than monthly. It is just that Amazon days-of-month are so routinely wrong they are apparently assigned basically at random, and Amazon is so big that many exact dates for book publications seem to be derived from their data. This has made people here suspicious of exact dates. But when they are know to be accurate, great. I have added a note so future editors will know this date is actual.
Again, thanks for your contributions, and I hope this exchange has been helpful. -DES Talk 15:01, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Communication among editors and moderators

This page is your talk page. It will be used by other editors and moderators for questions, comments and other messages. When a change is made to this page, the "My Messages" link will be highlighted when you log onto the ISFDB website. Clicking on the highlighted link will lead you to this page. For more information about using this Wiki go here. MHHutchins 03:16, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Midnight Screaming again

I accepted the second submission (the duplicate), because it answered some of the questions I left in the post above. I had to remove the cover image link to the publisher website, because we need explicit permission from the website owner to deeplink to another server. You can download a copy of the image file to your home computer and then upload it the ISFDB server, using the link "Upload cover scan" on the publication record page. I also removed the message in the note field about communication which I hope I answered in the post immediately preceding this one. And I made the publisher's website address that you placed in the note field into a hyperlink. If you have any more questions about this publication, you can ask them here. Just click the (edit) link for this posting. An edit window will open. Type in your message (preceded by a colon [:] to indent the message from mine. At the end of the message type four tildes (~~~~) which will automatically sign and date your post. I have placed a watch on this page, so I will be notified immediately when you've responded to the message. Thanks for your contributions. —The preceding unsigned comment added by Mhhutchins (talkcontribs) 22:25, 1 October 2009 Signature was present, but blocked by incorrect wiki formatting. (-DES)

Thanks again for the help with this. I learn something new every time. I uploaded the cover pic from my computer. I suppose that you or someone will need to approve it? Thanks again. —The preceding unsigned comment added by Dagon99 (talkcontribs) 07:50, 2 October 2009 Signature was present, but blocked by incorrect wiki formatting. (-DES)
Uploads of cover images do not need approval. But the change to the database record that links an image (via its URL) to a publication record and thus displays the image with the pub record does need to be approved, just like any other change to a publication record. Thanks for uploading. -DES Talk 15:14, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I edited the publication record to display the cover image. For future reference, after you upload a cover image, click on the image displayed on the wiki page, or on the link with the name of the image (or it may say "full resolution", depending on the image size) to get a page that shows just the image, no description. This will have a URL like http://www.isfdb.org/wiki/images/2/21/MDNGHTSCRM2009.jpg. Copy this URL to the clipboard. Click back on your browser. Click the green link in the description page just before the word "edition". This will take you to the publication record for the book or magazine. (Or navigate to the publication page by any other method you want. You may still have it open in another window or tab if you just uploaded from the "Upload cover image" link.) Click "Edit this Pub". Past the image URL you copied into the "Image URL" field. (Note that this must be the URL to the page with just the image, not to the wiki image description page.) Click "Submit Data". A moderator will review and (normally) approve the edit. -DES Talk 15:58, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Wiki stuff

Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will insert your user name (Dagon99) (or a custom signature if you set one in your preferences) and the date. See Wiki Conventions for more on how things are generally done on the wiki. -DES Talk 15:08, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Midnight Screaming yet again

  • Since this is a magazine, and other issues exist that should be entered, I have changed the title to "Midnight Screaming, October 2009". See Help:Screen:EditPub#Title (The section on magazines) for more details on our customary practices for magazine titles. -DES Talk 15:28, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
  • Do you know how much of the contents of issues 1-3 was speculative fiction, that is: science fiction, fantasy, or horror, in a broad sense? There is enough data on the magazine web site to create entries for these issues, but i don't want to do that if there was little or no SF included. The magazine's web site says that SF is welcome, but so is work in other genres, and doesn't indicate how much of the actual content might be SF in any given issue. -DES Talk 15:49, 2 October 2009 (UTC)


  • Yes, they have speculative fiction stories. I think the majority of their stories are, anyway. Dagon99 14:15, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Maneater by Guy N. Smith

I approved your addition of Maneater, and added an amazon cover image URL and an OCLC record number. However, this amazon page suggest that the book is thriller/horror, but with no supernatural elements. Note that ISFDB:Policy#Definitions specifically includes "Supernatural horror". Is the amazon review a good description of the content of this book? (Amazon is often wrong.) If so, I would like to change this to a NONGENRE book -- it seems to me that Guy N. Smith has written enough speculative fiction for his non-genre books to merit inclusion here. Wouls you object to this? -DES Talk 21:22, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Price sources and notes

In your submisison of Wolfcurse you left a note "I cannot find an original cover price." When you leave notes with an "I" in them, it is a good idea to sign them with your ISFDB user name, or your name or initals, or some other handle, so that a reader has some idea who the "I" is. I was going to add a signiture to this note, but first I checked the British Library Integrated Catalogue. For books published in the UK (and sometimes elsewhere) since 1970 or so, this often gives prices. See our page on Sources of Bibliographic Information for this and other places worth checking. In this case I found a price and added it to the pub record. -DES Talk 21:38, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

To be clear, you are never required to check additional sources -- it is fine to enter what information you have. I mention the BLIC and other sources only in case you want to look further. -DES Talk 20:55, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Eleven O’Clock Fright by Joshua Scribner and data sources

I recently approved your submission of Eleven O’Clock Fright. I note that the record you submitted appears to match the Amazon.com record very closely. In particular, Amazon says that this book has 220 pages, as does your submission. OCLC record #1932606114 says that this book has only 210 pages. Usually, but not always, OCLC is more accurate than Amazon.

Did you work for a physical copy of the book? (If so, Amazon is right and OCLC wrong for once.) Or did you work from the Amazon record, or from some other source? When data comes from a source other than the book itself, it is a good idea to include a note indicating where the data came from. Other editors then have an idea where else to check, and some indication of reliability, as some sources are more reliable than others, or are more reliable on particular issues. -DES Talk 22:05, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Luna by Gina Farago

I approved your submission for this book. I then found the OCLC listing for it, which says that it has 399 pages rather than 372. Were you working from the actual book or from a secondary source such as an Amazon.com listing? It is perfectly fine to work from a secondary source, but in such cases it is very helpful to include a note indicating what the source is. -DES Talk 20:53, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I also added a cover image. Is it correct for your copy? -DES Talk 20:53, 7 October 2009 (UTC)


Sorry about that. I forgot all about it. I'll cite my sources from now on. It was from Amazon. Dagon99 12:09, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Thank you. -DES Talk 13:51, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

As the World Dies: The First Days

You entered As the World Dies: The First Days as a mass-market paperback (code pb). But amazon says that it is 8.9 inches high, and OCLC that it is 23 cm high. This indicates that it is a trade paperback (code tp). As you will see in Help:Screen:EditPub#PubFormat, the standard height for a pb is 7 inches, (18 cm) possibly up to 7.25 in (19 cm). anthing over that is generally a tp if it isn't an hc. The price is also a clue: a current book selling for 14.95 is probably not a pb, although this isn't certain, and prices must always take the year they are stated for into account.

I have changed this to a tp, and have altered the page count based on the OCLC record. -DES Talk 13:59, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Similar remarks apply to As the World Dies: Siege. Amazon often lists as "(Paperback)" both mass-market and trade paperbacks. -DES Talk 14:05, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

I also changed Among the Living to a tp for similar reasons. -DES Talk 14:14, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Semi-automated cover image uploads

I notice that you have been using the semi-automated cover image upload feature. I hope this makes uploading cover images easier.

However, you still need to edit the publication record after you upload the image, and enter the image URL, just as we used to before the semi-automated upload feature was made available. otherwise the uploaded image is not actually displayed on the pub record.

There seem to be 15 images you uploaded that need this step. To fix them:

  1. Open the image wiki page (from the list below)
  2. Click on the link just below the image, or the image itself, to go to the image file page (displays only the image, not the description)
  3. Copy the URL (address) to the clipboard
  4. Click the back button
  5. Click on the link to the pub record in the Description line (first line of the "Fair Use Image Data")
  6. Click on "Edit this Pub"
  7. Paste into the "Image URL:" field.
  8. Click the "Submit Data" button.
  9. Repeat these steps for each image.

The images that need attention seem to be:

In future, when uploading a cover image via the "Upload cover scan" link from a publication, after the upload is complete, you must follow steps 2-8 above, except that if you have kept the publication record open in another tab or window, you can skip steps 4 and 5, simply switching to the proper browser window or tab.

I hope this is helpful. Please indicate if this outline is clear. -DES Talk 22:39, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Author merges for Harding

Could these possibly be pseudonymous entries? Our standard is to enter the title and author data as credited in publications. A variation in the author's name is considered to be a pseudonymous relationship. See this Help section. Perhaps this is the more appropriate approach?--swfritter 15:36, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I'd say that changing the names to pseudonyms would be best. I tried to follow the directions, but I think I must have missed a step or two along the way. Dagon99 16:54, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
The first thing we need to decide is the name of the Canonical Author. It seems that you think R. S. Harding is appropriate. If that is the case then this is the way you would do the one title for Ralph S. Harding. You will want to bring up the title. Under Editing Tools click Make This Title a Variant Title or Pseudonymous Work. You will see Ralph S. Harding in the Author1: field. Replace the Author1: data with R. S. Harding. Click Create a New Parent Title and your submission will in the queue.--swfritter 20:09, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
Alright, we got that part. The next step is to document Ralph S. Harding as a pseudonym of R. S. Harding at the Author level. Go to the Ralph S. Harding page. Under Editing Tools click Make/Remove a Pseudonym. Enter R. S. Harding as the Parent Name. Click Submit Data. And then once again you have to wait for a moderator.
The same methodology can be used to process the Ralph Stephen Harding titles.--swfritter 16:10, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

The Body Cartel

Thanks for submitting The Body Cartel ! The submission was fine, but I moved the book's editor, Tim Marquitz, to the Notes field since we currently have no other way to enter the editors of single author books. Ahasuerus 23:38, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

The Busker questions

Hi. I've placed your submission of The Busker on hold while I check a couple of small things with you. I don't have access to the catalogue you cited as the source....

  • Is the publisher really "Bullfrog", or might it be "Bulldog" Books? Fantastic Fiction, Amazon UK, Alibris, Google Books, and others all use "Bulldog". I found a couple of "Blackhill" citations, too, but I think those are mixing up Smith's secondhand books operation with the publisher.
  • Do you know the size is standard paperback? Various references cite it as trade paperback.
  • I found this image while searching....

Thanks. --MartyD 02:37, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

- I saw on Amazon that it was "Blackhill" but everywhere else, it said "Bullfrog". I assume that perhaps the American version or a reprinted version may have been by Blackhill. - I didn't see the dementions anywhere. I put paperback just because I didn't want to assume that it was a trade paperback. If your sources say that it is, then it probably is. - Yes, that is the image that I've seen associated with it. Dagon99 13:14, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. Here you go. I did change "Bullfrog" to "Bulldog Books" (I found a reference on Smith's site also using "Bulldog" for it) and the size to tp. And I added the above cover image link that I found. Thanks for the submission! --MartyD 18:17, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

"Agoraphobia" and "The Box" merges

Hi, I put two of your submissions on hold while I investigate the proposed date changes.

For "Agoraphobia" I just have to confer with other moderators to see if we want to preserve the day in the date or not.

For your "The Box" merge, you propose changing the original 2009-11-00 date to 2009-12-00. What is the source of that December date? The title is listed in House of Horror: Best of 2009, and that has a 2009-11-00 publication date, which if correct would put the first publication of "The Box" in November. Thanks. --MartyD 13:42, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

- Sorry about the confusion. "The Box" was originally published in House of Horror: Best of 2009 in November. I inadvertently selected the wrong date when I merged the titles. As for "Agoraphobia", it was indeed first published in Toe Tags September 29th. The only reason I zeroed the exact date was to make all the dates more uniform. The 29th is accurate if you prefer to keep it that way. Dagon99 16:17, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
No problem. I will accept both merges and fix "The Box" to be November. And having conferred with others, the conclusion is that if we have a reliable DAY of publication, we keep that in the date. I am very sympathetic to your desire for uniform dates, but since Lulu.com does tell us the DAY, we will keep the 29th in the date for "Agoraphobia", so I'll fix that date up, too. Details, details! :-) Thanks for the contributions. --MartyD 12:06, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Doom Magnetic!

I had to remove the link for the cover of this pub as it's on a server which hasn't given us permission to deep-link. You can upload a copy of the image to our server and link to it from there. Use the "Upload Cover Scan" link on the pub record. Thanks. Mhhutchins 20:39, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

A Pint of Bloody Fiction

I accepted the submission to add this record to the database, but had to make a couple of changes. Research shows that Nancy Ekle was the co-editor, so I added that credit. I also removed the link to the cover image on an unapproved website. You have the option to upload the image to the ISFDB server. Click on the link "Upload cover scan" and follow directions. After the file is uploaded, you will have to go back to the publication record, and link it to the uploaded image file. Mhhutchins 15:24, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Graveyard Scavenger Hunt

I'm holding a submission to add a record for this title, but there are several concerns and entry problems that will have to be corrected once it's in the database. I'm going to go over them below. Please keep this in mind when adding publications in future submissions. (These standards appear in the help pages which are linked in the Welcome section above.)

  1. Catalog#/ISBN field: "B00A8414OY" is neither a catalog number nor an ISBN. It appears to be the Amazon ASIN. This is a unique product identifier used solely by Amazon. These numbers can be recorded in the Note field. Do you know if the publisher has assigned a number for this publication?
  2. Cover Artist field: You give the name of the person who created the series logo credit in this field. That should be done in the Note field. The Cover Artist field is solely to credit the cover artist.
  3. Image URL field: You did not give the complete URL of the file, only the name of the file. This brings up another matter. You uploaded an image to the ISFDB wiki before the record for the publication was accepted into the database. Look at the file's wiki record and you'll see that there is no license tag attached to the image. Without a license tag in which the ISFDB claims fair use of the image, we are liable for any charges of copyright infringement that the artist/publisher may claim. It is better to wait until the record is in the database, and then use the "Upload Cover Scan" function which is linked to each record. Doing it this way will 1) create a unique file name (unlike the one you used to name the file), 2) add a license tag to the file that protects the ISFDB, and 3) links the image file back to the database record. (You can see the Wiki image file is not currently linked to the database record.)
  4. And the most significant omission: you didn't source your data. If you are working from a copy of the publication, tell that to the moderator in the "Note to Moderator" field. If you don't have a copy and are working from secondary sources, give those sources in the "Note" field.

I'm going to accept the submission to make the necessary changes that I've outlined above. Because the cover image is available on Amazon's server, I will link to it and delete the image that you uploaded to the ISFDB Wiki. Thanks. Mhhutchins 23:42, 16 November 2012 (UTC)


Further questions: you give a page count of 96 pages. Ebooks in Kindle format usually aren't paginated. Are you certain of this figure? Also, are you certain that this is novel-length, containing more than 45,000 words? If it's less than that, it should have been entered as a CHAPTERBOOK with a SHORTFICTION content record of novella length. I'll hold off accepting the submission until you're able to answer these last questions. Thanks. Mhhutchins 23:45, 16 November 2012 (UTC)


  • Whew, that's a lot of boo-boos. I apologize profusely for all of them.
    • I found the ISBN is 9781301713110
    • Sorry about the cover image. I tried the URL and it gave me an error message, so I tried just the file name. Evidently I messed that part up too.
    • Sorry about the logo artist credit. I thought since he designed it and it was a part of the cover, he would get credit.
    • I have a copy ,that's my source and the reason I know it's 96 pages.
    • Sorry, it should be a chapterbook as a "novella"

Dagon99 21:56, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

I'll accept the submission and make the changes based on your response. I still don't understand how a Kindle-formatted ebook has page numbers. Even though I don't have one, it's my understanding that it's one continuous file and the pages are set by the user according to how large they want the font. Whatever. Mhhutchins 19:59, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
Here's the record. Please do a primary verification of it when you get a chance. Then remove the data sourcing note ("Info from...") from the Note field. I've linked to the Amazon image and deleted the image uploaded to the ISFDB server. Mhhutchins 20:03, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Image for Bites - The Hunt and More Fright with a Bite

The image you uploaded had to be deleted because it was improperly uploaded. Please go to the publication record and use the link labeled "Upload cover scan" to upload the image again. You'll also need to update the pub record with the URL of the newly uploaded image. Thanks. Mhhutchins 16:32, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Ralph Stephen Harding

Hello, I have your submission on hold to add birth- & deathdate for this author. First of all, the canonical author is R. S. Harding and we would add this dates only for the canonical name (to avoid double date entries on the start page). Also, I saw that a death year of 2007 was proposed, but the author seems still to write (or at least publish) novels, that is if Robin Bennett is in fact another alter ego. Do you have any source for the dates? Stonecreek 15:42, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Long time since you submitted: I finally decided to reject your submission, due to the unknown background of the author. Stonecreek 09:00, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Bones II

Submission to add this record was accepted but's there's a few inconsistencies. If you have a copy of the book, then there's no reason to source Amazon except for specific data which is unstated in the book. Also, are you sure this is a trade paperback selling for the incredibly low price of $2.99? I found it on Amazon as an ebook priced at that. Also, the Amazon "Look Inside" shows that the cover art is by Mike Jansen and the interior art is by Niall Parkinson. Thanks for checking. Mhhutchins 19:20, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Grave Diggers

I accepted the submission adding this record, but there are some discrepancies between your stated source (Amazon) and the record you created. They give the publication date as 2013-03-06 and the page count as 274. The page numbers for the contents differ from those given in the table of contents, according to the Amazon look-inside. Also, I didn't see "Untitled (Under the gaze...)" poem by "Phoebe. O. M." in the table of contents. Are you working from an actual copy of the book? And the "Forward" should be "Foreword". Thanks. Mhhutchins 19:57, 15 May 2014 (UTC)