User talk:Davecat

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Contents

Welcome!

Hello, Davecat, 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! Mhhutchins 16:19, 17 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Updating Analog issues

Welcome to the ISFDB, Davecat. Thanks for your recent submissions updating Analog issues of the 1960s. Everything looks good so far. Some early magazine issues were first entered when the date field only allowed a year designation. Improvements in the database now allow designation of month and day (if applicable.) If it's not too much trouble, please consider when updating the issues to also update the date field at the same time. For example, if you're working on the December 1966 issue of Analog, change the date field from 1966-00-00 to 1966-12-00. This should also be done for each of the content entries as well. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask, either on my talk page or on the help page. Just click the plus sign (+) at the top of the talk page to create a new subject. Again, welcome and thanks. Mhhutchins 16:27, 17 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Help links

Just a quick note to the effect that all isfdb.tamu.edu links are currently broken. You can still access the Help pages (and other Wiki pages) if you replace "isfdb.tamu.edu" with "www.isfdb.org" in the URL. Thanks for editing! Ahasuerus 14:34, 18 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Your Questions

I've answered the inquiry you made about the erroneous title record in the June 1967 Analog on my talk page. Here's a helpful hint about keeping track of responses to inquiries here on the ISFDB Wiki. Set your preferences so that an automatic watch is placed on any Wiki page that you edit. Then occasionally check your watchlist. You can also check the Recent Changes page, but it tends to get somewhat crowded during certain times of the day. It appears that you've already figured out how to get around the "tamu.edu" problem, which I hope will be resolved soon. That's enough to make you an experienced editor! Mhhutchins 15:45, 18 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Another Welcome

Glad to have you aboard. You may notice that many of your submissions will be on hold until Mhhutchins can look at them and others can discuss them with him. What you see on his talk page may not be final decisions. There are two of us working extensively in magazines and we are looking forward to co-ordinating with you once you are comfortable with the system.--swfritter 12:26, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks, I'm still learning, as you can see.

I have no objections whatever to having things be held for discussion among the moderators - I'd sure rather get things done right rather than learning later that I've done them wrong. I'm trying to remember to check my pending edits to keep track of this. Thanks very much for any (serious) feedback you can give me. (And that's what I've gotten so far.)

-- Dave 12:50, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Dave, I've responded to your inquiries on my user talk page. All of your submissions have been accepted but one (the change in story length) for which I explain on my user talk page. I wanted to answer your questions on the same page on which they were asked instead of "ping-pong"-ing back and forth. Mhhutchins 16:35, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)
You don't have to worry about responding to my submission comments or even necessarily reading them. They are primarily meant as input for Mhhutchins to save him some time when viewing your submissions. With the skill level and interest you have shown it probably will not be much longer before other moderators will be communicating with you directly.--swfritter 16:56, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Creating variants

Now that you've learned how to create variants in titles (and exceedingly well, I might add), the next trick is to make an author a pseudonym. Go the page for Guy McCord and choose "Make This Author a Pseudonym" from the menu. On the next page you'll find two fields. You can enter Mack Reynolds' Record # (which happens to be 400) or just put his name in the Parent Name field. Be careful that you spell his name correctly, otherwise you might make "Guy McCord" a pseudonym of "Mac Reynolds" (if it existed in the database!) Mhhutchins 17:39, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks! I've done it. I vaguely think I noticed at least one other such pseudonym while wandering through the data, & now I think I know what to do if I remember it. --Dave 20:38, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Adding interior art credit and book reviews

I don't want to shove this down your throat, but when you feel more comfortable in updating the Analogs, you might consider adding credits for the interior art and book reviews. Here's an example of a complete and verified issue of Analog from the period in which you're working. Again, this is entirely up to you, of course. Please don't feel like I'm pushing you into the deep end, but you've really come a long way in such a short time. Mhhutchins 18:15, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks. I don't think you're "pushing me off the deep end", though I know there are still some things I don't know about. And you're definitely not shoving anything down my throat! But for the present, well, there are plenty of holes in the data that I care more about & which can be updated pretty quickly & easily - all those missing page numbers, in particular. Checking for illustrations, for example, is likely to slow me down a lot - it means flipping through every page, I'd say.
My plan is to run through the issues I've got (& there are quite a lot) for which page numbers are missing & do those, add editorials at the same time where those are missing, & when all that's done take a slower pass for other things. I'll probably dragoon family members in for that pass. But it will all take a while. I may start adding the Brass Tacks (letters), In Times to Come, etc., which can be seen from the TOC page. I see the value of having all the book reviews indexed, too, but as with illustrations that is likely to be a very big, slow job. (I'll have to manage a procedure that lets me check for titles in the database already, too, right?) So I'm pushing your request down in the pile, but not intending to drop it forever. (I'm afraid my editing pace will slow somewhat once I'm more sure that I know what I'm doing.)
I keep realizing that I need to learn more about just editing these talk pages - I see the "Editing help" link there, but that page seems to lack any content. I figured out the leading colons for indentation by observation; the buttons are fairly straightforward; the tildes for "signature"/timestamp was in your welcome message; & I've learned the hard way not to separate my "signature" for readability (it encourages people to put replies before the "sig"); but I'm sure there's more to learn. -- davecat 21:00, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)
It's good to prioritize, as we all have time constraints when it comes to the ISFDB. I tend to jump from one project to another just to keep from going nuts concentrating on the same thing. Right now I'm enjoying walking you through this learning process.
You're picking up the Wiki editing as fast as ISFDB editing. I learned how to edit talk pages by opening them in an edit window and seeing how they work. In other words, you learn by doing. You can't do much damage by experimenting, because you can always revert a page to its previous state. So have fun. Mhhutchins 22:29, 19 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Ok, Mhhutchins, I've tried entering illustrations, book reviews, etc. - completing one issue. You can see what I did - the issue is Analog, April 1969. Besides that it took a LONG time, even just this one issue hatched a lot of questions - even after much recourse to the help page. So I'm going to ask here, & either I or someone can (I hope) clean up any messes I made.
(1) I changed the page count for the magazine as a whole. It showed 178. The pages are numbered 3-178 (actually 4-178, starting on the reverse of the first leaf), which would make the front cover 1 & 2. If I understand the rules, the two sides of the back cover should also be included in that count, so I changed it to 180. Is that right?
(2) The editorial had a small illustration (no credit) - crude drawing of a TV set with the article title inside. (TV was relevant to topic.) I entered this as an uncredited illustration, & I think that is probably right; is it?
(3) The Science Fact article (essay) had a photograph, captioned "Cornell University Photograph", as its title pages. I entered it as interior art, put "Cornell University" as author, & intended to add a note that it's a photo after it's approved. Is that right?
(4) The same article had another illustration, a chart labeled "Simultaneous recordings of a pulse from CP0950, observed with two polarizations" (looks like tracks of pens on moving paper, in effect a graph with no numbers). I entered this as interior art but am much less sure this is correct; please advise.
(5) The same article had a table as well - "LATEST (Nov. 26, 1968) PULSAR DATA" with various data columns. I did the same for it, & am even less sure. Again, please advise.
(6)In the book reviews, one of the (book) authors' names had an accented "e" in it. The help page says "Other characters should be entered in Unicode if possible; this includes accented characters"; but I don't know how to enter Unicode. I found another author's name on the site containing the same character & used copy-&-paste to copy that in, but it looks like a smaller font. Um. Help??? Or is that OK?
(7)In entering the "Analytical Laboratory" feature, I thought it prudent to enter the full title of "The Analytical Laboratory/January 1969" (this is ratings based on user votes of the stories in that issue), even though no one else seems to have followed that practice - as well as including the "(Analog Science Fiction -> Science Fact, April 1969)" following some but not all past practice (search title "Analytical Laboratory" to see what I mean). Is that OK?
That's a lot of questions for you to have to answer, but the sooner I learn what I'm doing the less cleanup will be necessary at some future time. And I address it specifically to you because you suggested that I enter this much detail; of course anyone else may jump in to answer. Thank you very much. --Dave davecat 15:28, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)
A response to each of the numbered items:
  1. You're correct in counting the last page as pages 179 and 180. So the mag's total would be 180
  2. Technically correct, but personally, I don't bother with illustrations to non-fiction, especially if they only illustrate the heading and are uncredited.
  3. I don't think we credit photographs unless they're the manipulated work of artists like J. K. Potter, or if the photographs are original and intended to illustrate that particular piece (so such thing as technical photographs and film stills would not be credited.) Let me read further into the ISFDB Standards to give you a more definitive response.
  4. Same as #3
  5. I don't think we credit tables, but let me investigate further.
  6. Yes, try to get as close as possible with non-standard letters. Cutting and pasting is fine. I use the Character Map included in the Windows Accessories / Systems Tools folder.
  7. I think your method is better than the one that is more commonly used. A search revealed around 50 results using the other method, so it wouldn't take too much work to change those. Since you seemed to have taken on the mantle of cleaning up the Analogs, I will leave this decision to you. Or you can place a message on the Rules and Standards Discussions page and get comments until a consensus is arrived. Afterwards we can write it into the Rules and Standards.
Hope this was able to clean up most of the issues. Mhhutchins 16:06, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog SF->Fact, September 1968

Right after hitting Approve on this I realized that the dates you updated were all Octobers, but this the September issue according to the title. Also, the Campbell essay you added mentions June 1968 in its title. Could you doublecheck this pub for correctness? --WimLewis 15:07, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)

<sigh sigh> Um. Ooops. Thank you. I've changed them again. I was hurriedly making changes to several issues. I see someone else has a probable error I made this morning, too.
Regarding the editorial I added ... I chose Essay, but, well, it's an editorial in the form of a 6-line poem; I guess I should change the type to poem, since that's a valid type. But the date is a matter of lead time from writing to publication (& the magazines came to my mailbox a couple of weeks or so before their cover date). June 5, 1968 was the day Robert F. Kennedy was shot. (At this late date I'd never have figured this out if seeing it for the first time - but I remember that rather bitter editorial poem quite vividly from 1968.) Possibly I should add a note somewhere, now that the title's been added. --Dave davecat 15:42, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)
You can add the info in the note field of the title record. Very few of us (including myself) would have known the significance of the title's date. Mhhutchins 15:51, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I guess I'd like to reopen this matter of the editorial that's a poem. I managed to mess up changing the author, & now a title search finds 3 different title records. I'll fix that. But in the meantime I noticed that, in setting the item's type to Poem instead of Essay, it no longer shows up on Campbell's bibliography with the series (Editorial (Analog)). What I'd propose to do, when I fix things up, is to make it an essay, but explain in the notes that it is in the form of a poem. In further defense of this, I'd point out that clearly Campbell didn't write it to be great poetry (and it's not); he wrote it as verse as an effective means of making a point. (I'm tempted to scan the thing in & post it; the illustration (full-page photograph, composed for the purpose, with the text typed on it as (maybe actually) by a typewriter) contributes greatly, too. But I'll avoid posting this copyright material.)
Anyway, I'll wait for comments before doing anything at all about this. Thanks. --Dave davecat 11:15, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I'm assuming that series only link titles that are all the ESSAY type or NOVEL/SHORTFICTION type. Since poems are separated on an author's summary page, they won't be linked in with an ESSAY series. Here's my suggestion: change the type back to ESSAY but place a note in the title record that it is written in the form of a poem. That would allow it to be grouped under the Analog Editorial series, probably the best place it should be. I think the various records that came up on the search is because of the variant created for the lack of a "Jr." in the author's name. I'll check it out. Mhhutchins 17:00, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Thanks. Unless someone else jumps in to contradict on this, I'll set it to be Essay with notes indicating the verse form. --Dave davecat 20:45, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog, November 1968

Please double-check this issue of Analog. Your submission added the Campbell piece, but is it shortfiction or essay? Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:11, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Again, thanks and <sigh>. Failed to notice & change the default on that one. It's an essay, of course. (Though some readers probably might have considered it fiction. (It's an attack on the then-current state of our two-party political system - most of what he says applies (or fails to apply) equally today, mutatis mutandis.)) --Dave davecat 16:02, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog, December 1969

Good job with the update on this issue of Analog, but I don't think you have to give each piece of artwork credit, only credit the artist with each piece of fiction. A problem will arise when someone wants to merge two records with the same title, only to discover that they're both in the same pub. I've not ran across this issue before. Maybe a moderator more experienced in interior art in magazines can chime in here. I'll ask around. Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:17, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Some editors, including Al, credit each illustration using the [1], [2], etc convention, e.g. Analog Science Fact -> Science Fiction, January 1965. As our Help pages say:
It is also acceptable (but not required) to enter all pages where multiple artwork appears in a story.
Ahasuerus 15:26, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Thanks, I'll hope to remember to look at that & either do it that way (in the case of the Freas illustrations for sure) or maybe delete in the case of the SciFact article's chart/graph things (see my questions a couple of sections back, which I was writing when this item was created). --Dave davecat 15:39, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)
ACK!!!! I went to fix the Freas illustrations for the serial, & forgot the need to delete/re-add (so presumably I've created variants). Unless they get rejected, I'll plan to fix this tomorrow. --Dave davecat 16:01, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)
No, it's fine. Remember: if you change a content record, you're changing all pubs which contain that record. In this case, there are no other records, so it was fine to change the titles themselves. In fact, this is an easier method than the "Drop Title"/"Add Title" method. But do this ONLY WHEN THERE ARE NO OTHER PUBS CONTAINING THIS TITLE. (I'm not hollering, just emphasizing an important point to keep in mind!) You're doing some fine work here. Mhhutchins 16:15, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Further response to your update on Analog, April 1969

Here's what I discovered from Swfritter and on that will help us both in the future concerning interior artwork. From the help pages this:

Rules for including artwork. If artwork illustrates a particular story, it should be included. If it does not, but is a significant piece of artwork, or is signed by or credited to a well known sf artist, then it should be included. Credited cartoons are always included. Uncredited full-page cartoons in digest magazines of at least 1/3 page cartoons in pulp and bedsheet size magazines are always included. The title should be "Cartoon: " followed by the caption, in the original case, between quotation marks. If there is no caption the words "no caption" should be used without quotation marks. See the February 1957 issue of Dream World for examples (http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?DRMWRLDFEB1957) If an article is illustrated with diagrams, or with photographs, these do not need to be included; they are not "artwork" in the sense that we are indexing.

You can index individual pieces, but as we both learned, give each piece its own desigation (adding a number, for instance). Or do as I do, and just give each story its own artist credit.
So following these standards and using the April 1969 issue of Analog as an example:

  • The editorial artwork on page 4 would not be credited, so it should be deleted.
  • The essay on page 53 should show only the canonical title of pub and month in its title: "In Times to Come (Analog, April 1969)"
  • The interiorart records on pages 72, 78 and 83 should be deleted (and don't forget to delete the orphan titles)
  • Give each of the two records on pages 108 and 128 an individual title.
  • Drop the title record "The Reference Library" on page 160 and add a content entry for "The Reference Library (Analog, April 1969)". [Don't change the content record because there are MANY title records with the same name, which may be affected. I'm not sure, but it's better not to take a chance.]
  • Change the title record "Brass Tacks (Analog Apr 1969)" to "Brass Tacks (Analog, April 1969)"
  • Each of these columns have a series entry, so update them to add them to the series: In Times to Come, The Reference Library, Brass Tacks, and The Analytical Laboratory.

After updating this pub, you'll get a good idea about what a complete entry for an Analog issue should look like. I might be throwing a lot at you at once, but feel free to go back to updating and verifying only the fiction contents. In either case, thanks for doing whatever you're able to do. Mhhutchins 17:21, 21 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks very much for the detailed, helpful info! --Dave davecat 08:49, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Oh. Yes, this helps me (a lot!) toward knowing what all should go into an issue's listings. My plan at this point is to mostly go ahead with the issues that don't have page numbers yet, adding those; but I'll also plan to add the editorials & departments (where missing) that can be seen from the title page itself. For variety, I'll also sometimes work on some general cleanup - for example, getting all those editorials with titles starting "Editorial: " changed, with the series reference added to the title records.
Now, that brings up one more question. You gave as the form to use "Brass Tacks (Analog, April 1969)", but I see a lot of the titles with other formats, mostly things like "Brass Tacks (Analog Science Fiction -> Science Fact, April 1965)" (& similarly for other departments). Should I modify those? The form you had me change, which was different yet, had been copied from the verified issue you'd suggested as a model. That's not a complaint; my point is simply that these things have a lot of inconsistencies, & is cleaning them up appropriate? (And I hope I'm not tying up too much time in discussions among the moderators, but I'd like to do things right.) Again, thanks. --Dave davecat 09:43, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
And one more (afterthought) question: Is the issue of Analog "Science Fact" articles with titles beginning "Science Fact:" parallel to that of editorials with titles beginning "Editorial:", since there's a series for those as well?
--Dave davecat 10:01, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
There are Analog series records that have the complete pub title, but that was before a standard could be established. Take a look at this page for Analog. Besides the series standards, you'll find links to every issue which could save you some searches. You'll also see that "Science Fact" should not be in the title and neither should "Editorial" (unless it's part of the title) Mhhutchins 16:48, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog, July 1969

In the update for this issue of Analog, you began changing the dates to 1969-07-00, but half-way through you stopped. I assumed you hit the submit button before you were completely updating the pub. Mhhutchins 16:52, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Right. Making too many changes, lost some, I'd say. I've changed the rest (all, I hope) & resubmitted. Thank you very much. --Dave davecat 17:01, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Editorial in parentheses?

Does the editorial in the July 1966 issue of Analog have parentheses around the title? Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:22, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Parentheses, no - but I suspect you meant quotation marks, which it does. (Unsafe At Any Speed was the title of a book by Ralph Nader, published in 1965, & for a while his chief claim to fame; the phrase was much quoted for many purposes.) --Dave davecat 20:39, 22 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Sorry 'bout that. Of course I meant (quotation marks). Thanks for verifying it. Mhhutchins

10/23/2007 submissions on hold

I have put your submissions on hold for Mhhutchins. Please ignore the comments I made about them until he gets a chance to look at them - I used a certain amount of shorthand. One thing I did screw up on which caused some confusion is the way I documented the 'In Times to Come' essay series. It should actually be 'In Times to Come (Analog)' since there is the possibility that other magazines might use this somewhat generic title. I would rather have fresh egg on my face now then a ton of rotten ones later on. Good job. You have some good ideas.--swfritter 13:36, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Your latest set of submissions and series titles.

I've approved most of them, but have a couple on hold. I'm not sure why you'd want to drop the Campbell editorial ("Men in Space") in this issue, or the editorial ("Technological Status") in this issue. Were the variants in authorship created incorrectly? There was a duplicate submission that I rejected (it should be in your "My Rejected Edits" list.)
Swfritter has reconsidered the title of the "In Times to Come" column, so please place any future submissions into the "In Times to Come (Analog)" series. He also suggests (and I agree) that a better format for titles in the Analytical Laboratory series be: "The Analytical Laboratory: [date of issue polled] (Analog, [date of issue in which the poll in published]" (Using the colon instead of the slash.) Since we led you astray with these series issues, I'll go back and correct those records to conform with the newly established standard. Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:44, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

The problem with the two editorials is that I first entered them with the name John W. Campbell, Jr. (following many examples I'd seen); on discovering that they should be entered as shown in the editorial itself (John W. Campbell), & then set up as pseudonyms, I attempted to correct them. This created a new title, as a variant of the old, incorrect one. I can't see any other way to get rid of the incorrect entries except to delete the variants from the pub, delete the variant title, delete the original title, & reenter it correctly. (Please tell me if there is a better way!) (Can't just delete the incorrect one because it has a variant.)
Regarding the AnLab title format: I used a slash initially because the examples I was looking at (in the physical magazines) had it that way. On looking more widely, I see that Campbell was not all that consistent (sometimes date on separate line, especially when he put two or more batches in one issue; sometimes something like "April Issue"; at least once no indication at all of what issue was being polled). Given this, a colon seems much more reasonable than the slash. (I'm betting he initially went with the slash sometime when he was squeezed for column length or something like that.) I'm all for trying come up with a standard format while still trying to represent the actual title/subtitle pattern shown in the magazine. Thank you (& swfritter!) very much. -- Dave davecat 16:52, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Orphaned titles

  1. Here's a title that has been orphaned by one of your submissions. Was the editorial in the November 1966 Analog credited to Campbell or Campbell, Jr.?
  2. Here's another orphaned title, but I can't find the issue in which this editorial appeared. Perhaps the wrong title record was deleted?
  3. This title also has no pub record. But I did find the same title (as by Campbell, Jr.) in this issue.
  4. Here's two records with the same title but neither has pubs: this one as by Campbell, Jr. and this one as a variant by Campbell.
Thanks for checking these out. Mhhutchins 16:01, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Placing the Analog editorials into a series, the variant bug

I believe I've figured out the problem here. Because you're creating two records, one under the published author (Campbell) and another for the canonical author (Campbell, Jr.), you can't place both records into a series without both showing up in the series list. I think you've been looking at the series list and deleting duplicate which is not a very good idea. You should only delete records from the pub or title listings.

Because Campbell, Jr. is the canonical author, I suggest that you place only the title record under his name into the series, and leave the title records with the Campbell only credit un-seriesed (Is that a word?) This is a known bug of how the db deals with series. It just can't handle variants. Sorry that I didn't bring this up sooner and it just didn't occur to me. I'm going to go ahead and try to clean up the series, and let you do as I suggested for any future submissions. Mhhutchins 16:17, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

No, I didn't mean to have two titles at all. According to the standards, these should just say Campbell, & then get that linked to Campbell, Jr. as a pseudonym. Having messed that up, I was trying to clean it up. It took me an unreasonable amount of time to learn that changing the author of a title didn't actually change it but added a variant. Sorry. (See above in the previous talk note for more detail.) --Dave davecat 16:58, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I'm not sure what you mean by "changing the author of a title didn't actually change it but added a variant." A variant is only created when you use the "Make This Title A Variant" function on a title's title record page. If you use the "Edit Title Data" function on this page, you can add or change anything in any of the fields without creating a variant. This would not be a variant record but an edited version of the same record. Perhaps the confusion is semantic? Mhhutchins 17:29, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
That isn't the way it's seemed to work. Admittedly, at least some of the times I haven't gone into the title editor as such, but changed it in the pub. But when I changed the author's name there (& maybe also when I tried it in the title record), I found that I then had the original title record still in existence, plus one with the new version of the author's name, which said it was a variant of the other (& the first, incorrect one said that it had a variant & so could not be deleted). This wasn't obvious until I searched by title or looked under the author, so I did quite a number. It's also not what the help files seemed to say would happen. I am reasonably sure that I did not create any variants at all through the "Make This Title A Variant" function; I used that only to mark it as a pseudonymous work, using the bottom half of the screen.
I may have gotten myself confused here, but that's sure what it has looked like to me. --Dave davecat 18:42, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT) (I keep thinking I should enter a test case, but (1) I can't find just now where in the help stuff it said how to identify such a thing for everyone's benefit, & (2) the lag in getting submissions approved means it probably would take 2 or 3 days. -- davecat 18:58, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT). Aha! found it - it's [[1] this link] -- davecat 19:03, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT) I'll try it in the October 1966 issue. davecat 19:05, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT))
You must create a variant for a pseudonymous work, in order for it to appear on the canonical (parent) author's summary page. The database treats a variation in authorship the same way it treats a variation in the piece's title. Let's say that a story was published as "A Story" by "John Smith" but actually written by "Jim Brown". When you enter this from the pub (either magazine or anthology or collection) you enter it exactly as it's printed in the pub. You know "John Smith" is really "Jim Brown" so you go to the title record of the piece you just entered and use the "Make This Title a Variant Title or Pseudonymous Work" function to create a variant under the author's real name. So now when you go to "Jim Brown"'s summary page you see a listing for "A Story" (as by "John Smith"). What if Jim Brown then decides to reprint the story under another title and under his true name? We enter the new title record exactly as it is published: "A Tale" by "Jim Brown". We know that this is the exact same story, so we go to the new title's title record page and use the "Make This Title a Variant..." function. Because we know that there is already a record for this story, we must have first determined what the record number is for that original entry. You can go that its title record page and remember or record its number from your browser (it'll be the number after www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi? ). On the variant page there are two options. In the first option you can create a variant if you know the record number of the parent title ("A Story"). Since we've remembered or recorded the title record number of "A Story" (the parent title) we place that number in the first field and press the "Submit Data" button (the upper submit button, not the one at the bottom of the page.)
Take a look at this story, written by Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore. It was first published in 1946 as "Chessboard Planet" by "Lewis Padgett", then as "The Fairy Chessmen" by "Lewis Padgett", then as "Chessboard Planet" under both of their true names. Each time this same story is published under a different title or different author a variant must be created, and then merged with the parent title for it to show up on one title page showing all the publications.
I'm sure you're already familiar with most of this in the short time you've been submitting. Hopefully, this may help clear up any questions you may have about variants. If not, just let me know. Thanks. Mhhutchins 19:51, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Your testing

I see you've submitted an edit to a record by changing the title and author from a pub's content entry. I'll approve it and let you see the results. Mhhutchins 19:54, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Well, clearly I was misunderstanding what I was seeing. This worked the way you said. (What this means is that I got off track on which things I'd done what to.) Ouch. Sorry to grab so much of everyone's time with this. Thanks for the quick approvals, allowing me to finish this off tonight. I've deleted the test entry from the pub & will delete the author & title either in a couple of minutes or tomorrow. Thank you -- Dave davecat 20:05, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Here's another test. Do a search for the edited story title ("Test essay initial entry") and see what dropping the record from the pub does. Now do a search for the edited author ("Test Davecat name 2") Mhhutchins 20:09, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I already saw that (after you approved the title/author changes) a search on "Test Davecat" only found the edited version, & same for a search on "Test essay". I've dropped the record from the pub (& you approved that); that left me with the essay & the author, second version of each. I've submitted the deletion for the essay, & it's pending. I'm guessing that I couldn't delete the author while there's an essay out there anyway; but looking ahead at the author record, I don't see any way to delete an author, either under the tools or on the edit screen (unless somehow "Dup Candidates" relates to that). Need to log out now so I'll check this tomorrow; but how do I delete the author record? Or does it automatically vanish when the last work for that author is deleted? As always, thank you for taking the time to help me with this - it turned out to be a big tangle of my own making. -- Dave davecat 20:32, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Just like you can't delete a title record if there's a pub record of that title, you can't delete an author record if there are title records under his name. When all the title records have been deleted, the system automatically deletes the author record. I think your testing has given you greater insight into how the db works. Mhhutchins 21:16, 23 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Yes. In two ways this is not the way I'd have designed things, I think. (I'd have had keys for nominal author & canonical author both in the pub, I think. And I'd be strongly inclined to allow orphan authors so that author info doesn't get lost so easily. But (in the former case) that would complicate searches & (probably) take more space, & (in the latter case) you could wind up with a lot of bad info in orphan author records.) Thanks for all your help. I'll work on cleaning up the messes I left in trying to clean up messes I thought I'd made. This may take a while. -- Dave davecat 09:28, 24 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Clearing out the John W. Campbell page

I was going to clear up the summary page for John W. Campbell, but thought that you might want to take a whack at it. It'll make you'll more familiar with creating variants that will appear on the canonical author's summary page, in this case John W. Campbell, Jr..

The first thing to take into account is that there should be no records listed on the pseudonym summary page. Each of the titles on this page should have a variant made of it. For instance, if you make a variant of this essay it will disappear from this page, and appear on Jr.'s page with the title "Sensational Discovery [as by John W. Campbell]". The entry for this essay in the publication in which it appears will change from "5 • Sensational Discovery • essay by John W. Campbell" to "5 • Sensational Discovery • essay by John W. Campbell, Jr. [as by John W. Campbell]". If you get a chance, try making variants of a couple of these.

Something else to keep in mind: once Sensational Discovery has been moved over to Jr.'s page, you will want to place it into the Editorial (Analog) series. And remember to change the record under Jr.'s credit to the series, not the non-Jr. one. Hope that's clear. Have fun! Mhhutchins 19:08, 24 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I keep running up against things I should have noticed but didn't, or noticed & forgot to ask among everything else. The Brass Tacks department comprises reader and/or author letters, usually with brief (or not so brief) replies by Campbell; but these replies are formally uncredited, though the letters are mostly addressed to Campbell & it's pretty clear from the replies that he composed them. (This is during the Campbell period, obviously. I'll get around to Bova & Schmidt eventually, I hope!) Options I see:
  • I guess my own impulse would be to just make them all say JWCJr up front. Since nothing says JWC (unlike the editorials), I'd avoid that.
  • I could use The Editor; unlike AnLab & In Times To Come, that's not explicitly given but seems very defensible to me.
  • I presume that "uncredited" would be a bad choice, but I toss it in for completeness.
I'll avoid changing Brass Tacks until I hear an answer. (Otherwise, I've started the process.) Thanks --Dave davecat 11:40, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
From Help - "Letter columns with embedded editorial responses should be credited to whoever writes the responses, or to "uncredited" if this is not obvious." Once again we cannot be sure that Campbell wrote all the responses. He most certainly wrote the long responses but some of the one-liners may not have been by him. In case you are thinking about it, we generally do not currently enter the names of the letter writers although that may be a future consideration. That was one of my first impulses but once I realized how much other work needed to be done it seemed a lot less important.--swfritter 12:41, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Changing the author credit to The Editor

You asked this on my talk page:

In the September 1969 issue of Analog, there's a Science Fact article credited to The Editor (credit at end, p. 75). This was previously credited to JWCJr. I noticed it in adding page #s & missing departments in that issue. I was going to change it (would need to remove/add, as it apparently was anthologized), but then I thought I'd check what The Editor says. Look at it here: [[2] this link]. Among other things, it says "Used As Alternate Name By: Larry T. Shaw". How should I handle this, please? (Really, I'm not trying to cause trouble!) Thank you! -- Dave davecat 14:07, 24 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I first went to the summary page for The Editor, clicked on the "Make This Author A Pseudonym". On the next page, I put "John W. Campbell, Jr." in the Parent Name field and submitted. After the submission was accepted, you now see that Campbell is listed as one of the authors who used the pseudonym "The Editor". Checking at the top of John W. Campbell, Jr.'s summary page you will now see that "The Editor" is one of the pseudonyms that Campbell used.

You're right to realize that since there are two publications of Political Science - Mark II, you can't just edit the title record to show the author as "The Editor", or you would be changing the authorship of both records. I don't have a copy of the anthology in which the article was reprinted, and let's assume that you don't either. Thus we have to assume that the person who entered that publication correctly gave credit to John W. Campbell, Jr.

Here's the steps to get this title in shape.

  1. Go to Analog, September 1969.
  2. Choose "Edit This Pub" from the editing tools menu.
  3. Go down under the Content listings and click "Add Title", and enter the essay exactly as it appears in the publication. Submit.
  4. After the submission is accepted, go back to the pub record and choose "Remove Titles From This Pub" from the editing tools menu.
  5. Check the box for the incorrectly credited title (in this case, the one credited to Campbell; the one that you added for "The Editor" should be listed as well.) Submit.
  6. After the submission is accepted, go to back to the pub record for Analog, September 1969 (for the third time!) and click on the link from the essay to get to its title record page.
  7. On the essay's title record page (there should only be one pub listed here) choose "Make This Title a Variant Title or Pseudonymous Work" from the editing tools.
  8. This will lead you to the Make Variant Title entry page. Go down to the bottom section. Remove "The Editor" from the Author1 field and replace it with "John W. Campbell, Jr.". Click the BOTTOM "Submit Data" button.
  9. After the submission has been accepted, go to the summary page for John W. Campbell, Jr. You will find that there are two entries for this title: the original one that lists the George Hay anthology as a pub, and the one that you just created that lists only the September 1969 issue of Analog. In order for these to appear on the same title record page, they must be merged. Click on "Dup Candidates" in the editing tools menu.
  10. On the Duplication Finder page, you find pairs of identical titles. Go down until you find "Political Science - Mark II". Make sure that the Type matches (they both should state ESSAY.) Check the two boxes and and click "Merge Selected Record".
  11. On the Title Merge Results page, there may be conflicts between the two records that must be resolved before the titles can be merged. If the conflict is in the date, choose the earliest date of publication. Click "Complete Merge".

That should do it. And it only took 11 steps! There should now be a title on Campbell's summary page for "Political Science - Mark II [as by The Editor]" and the publication should have a content entry for "Political Science - Mark II - essay by John W. Campbell, Jr. [as by The Editor]". Mhhutchins 20:00, 24 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Verifed Pubs

Some of the issues you have been Verified by Alibrarian. Normally it is a courtesy to inform the verifier that you have made a change to their verified pub but this particular verifier no longer seems to be actively reading their Talk page. I have not been notifying Alibrarian. If it is a very significant change you may want to notify the verifier before you make the change. If you are doing the series thing to the essays you do not need to notify.--swfritter 12:51, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Ack!! Several times now I've made a (mental) note to check whether the pub is verified before changing; I wasn't sure what I should do if it was, but I keep forgetting anyway. Thank you for the reminder. I hope it's the last time. And thanks for the additions on Alibrarian & on pulling things into series. --Dave davecat 13:44, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Observatory series

New series? There is already an Observatory (Amazing) series so perhaps we should make Observatory (Analog). I think you see now why it's a good idea to qualify the series with the canonical title of the magazine. It's always a good idea to use the series search option to see if there are any similar series.--swfritter 12:56, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Oops! I just approved a submission for The Observatory (Analog, October 1963) placed into a series simply titled The Observatory. Because Swfritter is more familiar with the series created for columns in various magazines, I'll go along with his observation that this Observatory be more specific. I'll more more observant in the future. Thanks. Mhhutchins 13:58, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I was going to approve it and change the name of the series. I just wanted to make sure that Dave did not add a bunch more.--swfritter 14:03, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
That one title was already in a series of that name("The Observatory"). I just verified that it was attributed to The Editor, changed the author to that, & eventually made that a pseudonym for JWCJr. The series already existed. But I agree that putting magazine name into mag-related series is the way to go. Does one create a series just by putting the new name into the title's Series field? (Swfritter slipped in while I was editing this resp.) -- Dave davecat 15:27, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Yes the series is created automatically if it does not exist. I kind of wondered why there were no titles in the series list.--swfritter 16:06, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
FYI, the intended behavior of the software is for the Series record to disappear once it loses its last Title record. Unfortunately, it turned out to be difficult to implement because of nested Series -- we allow unlimited nesting, BTW. Consequently, series auto-deletion, although improved in the last few months, is still flaky and you may see weird artifacts left in its wake, especially when there are nested series involved. Ahasuerus 13:17, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

The Editor problem

I did not realize how many of these there were. This is more of a project than a quick fix. I'm just glad we caught your submissions before things got out of hand. I am usually working on multiple projects at the same time. It is much less tedious to do a few from each project at a time. I would rather see you entering new data than burning yourself out fixing mistakes made by others.--swfritter 13:08, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I'm glad this got brought up to me fairly early, too. I was generally trying to follow previous models, & I'd rather do it to current standards.

Up to a point, I'm enjoying doing this cleanup. I will continue to add page numbers & editorials (& probably AnLabs & Brass Tackses & In Times To Comeses) as well, especially now that I (hopefully) have got the authorship issues down.

The thing that really makes it kind of a pain is waiting for submissions to be approved, simply because (say) I can't make JWC a pseudonym for JWCJr until the title with JWC in it exists. (And, as mhhutchins has seen & maybe you too, once in a while I think I haven't made a change & try to do it again. Often can't tell from the pending list what's actually pending.) That's not a complaint - the approval process is unquestionably a Good Thing. Thanks! -- Dave davecat 13:59, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I remember having a little notepad around and writing furiously in pencil all the things I had to keep in mind. One thing you might want to to is create a bookmark folder and bookmark the pubs your are working on under that folder.--swfritter 14:12, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Would it be reasonable to do something similar to what we do with authors with the same names. So have The Editor (Analog), The Editor (F&SF). Dana Carson 03:54, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Great idea! A fair amount of fix-up work to do and needs some documentation but better now than later. We should wait a couple of days for any further comments but it sounds like an obvious impmlentation.--swfritter 13:49, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Oh yes, let's tackle that before "The Editor" has a page longer than Asimov's! The only thing that worries me is that when you look-up "The Editor" there are a few Strays with no titles, which makes me think someone has tried this before and been over-ruled? BLongley 13:53, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Another issue is whether or not we want to standardize such entries as "ed.", etc. as "The Editor".--swfritter 14:22, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Who Goes There? by JWCjr

I see that you've cleared out the JWC summary page. Good work. When you made a variant of Who Goes There?, the record was moved to the JWCjr summary page. There's one more step you need to do to clean up this record. It must be merged with a previous record of the same title. Use the "Dup Candidates" editing tool, and you'll see a list which includes the two records for "Who Goes There?" Be careful that you merge only the records that have matching types (there's a collection with the same name, and merging the three titles would be, let's say, less than disastrous, but very difficult to correct!) Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:03, 25 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I couldn't do that until the record existed. In the near future, the JWC summary bibliography will have new stuff, transiently, as I enter more editorials. Ditto for The Editor, which I don't think I've cleared out yet. -- davecat 06:15, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Hmm. There seems to be a problem with merging. It shows "title_storylen Conflict:", with two radio buttons; the first says "nv" [novella], the second is blank. I'm going to choose nv & go ahead & do it. Someone can let me know if this is wrong. (I did investigate enough to see that nv & <empty> are in the two title records as they stand now, before the merge.) -- Dave davecat 06:28, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
A "conflict" simply means that the records being merged have different values in that field. If one of the records doesn't have a value in that field, then it's usually safe to choose the other record's value unless it's clearly wrong. If both records have a value in that field and the values are different, then it gets trickier -- see Help:How to merge titles.
Most of the non-trivial conflicts have to do with the "story length" field, e.g. "novella" vs. "novelette" or "novelette" vs. "short story", and the date field, e.g. 1939-00-00 vs. 1940-00-00 or 1939-00-00 vs. 1939-04-00. We follow the standard Hugo/Nebula rules for story length:
  1. sf - Shortfiction - This is the default story length for shortfiction and means the length is not defined.
  2. ss - Shortstory - A work whose length is less than or equal to 7,500 words. (Roughly, 20 or fewer pages in a book.)
  3. nt - Novelette - A work whose length is greater than 7,500 words and less than or equal to 17,500 words. (Roughly 20 to 50 pages in a book.)
  4. nv - Novella - A work whose length is greater than 17,500 words and less than or equal to 40,000 words. (Roughly 50 to 100 pages in a book.)
which can make life difficult if the story in question is right on the border between two categories, especially if it was published in a magazine with lots of partially filled pages.
As far as dates go, if one date has the month specified and the other one doesn't, then we want to use the one with the month. Otherwise we generally use the earliest date of publication -- note the word "publication" as opposed to "completion by the author(s)", which can be months or years earlier than the date of first appearance in print. Another scenario that can potentially lead to confusion is an article/story that was first published in a fanzine or semiprozine and later reprinted in a professional publication, H. P. Lovecraft being our primary offender. The reason why this can be confusing is that some bibliographic sources list the first date of professional publication, while others do not discriminate between different types of publications for "first publication" purposes. Which reminds me that we need to add a note about our stand on the issue to the Help pages.
Finally, Serials are a separate can of worms. To quote our Help pages:
Magazines: Serial installments of a work are always given the date of the magazine in which they appear even if the work has been published previously in book or serial form. Novel length works (40,000+ words) printed as a single installment in a magazine are treated as serials and given the date of the issue in which they appear; the Title Type is "Serial" and the text "(Complete Novel)", preceded by a space, is appended to the title. See "Beyond This Horizon (http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?2373)" for an example of a novel which was published as a multi-part serial, a book, and then as a single installment serial.
Happy editing! :) Ahasuerus 11:01, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Um. A "single installment serial"? (Somehow I didn't think that looking at records in the database will clear that one up for me, & I was right. How is it a serial?)
Oh, I know, it's quite awkward and counterintuitive :( The underlying problem is that magazine appearances and book publications of novel length fiction have been historically treated differently by collectors (especially first edition collectors) and bibliographers. If you look up any pre-WWII SF writer in, say, Clute/Nicholls's Encyclopedia, you will notice that for novels they give the date of the first magazine appearance and the date of first book publication separately. The latter are bolded and the former are not to make sure they are not confused by the readers. We try to replicate this behavior, thus the differentiation between "(Complete Novel)" Serial records and subsequent Novel records. The two are automagically linked on each author's Summary Bibliography page when it is generated, e.g. see Jack Williamson's bibliography. Unfortunately, the linkage is purely lexical at the moment, so it doesn't support Variant Titles well, but Al was going to fix it once he comes back. Ahasuerus 17:43, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
But your mentioning serials reminds me of a related issue I've been meaning to ask about. Sometimes a novel appears as (say) a novella or two, then a serial. Campbell did this frequently; ones that come readily to mind include McCaffrey's "Weyr Search", a novella (which won the Hugo in its own right) & Dragonrider, a serial, which together make up most of the content of the novel; Piper's "Gunpowder God" & "Down Styphon" (looks like maybe neither of those was a serial, but together they're Lord Kalvan, & several of Schmitz's (Telzey stories come to mind). I don't see anything indicating this except where the serial portion has the same title & is listed as a variant. (I haven't looked widely, I admit.) But is there some way to note that "Novice" and "Undercurrents" are (each) parts of The Universe Against Her?

And it gets worse, I suppose. I vaguely remember some Van Vogt novels (The War Against the Rull comes to mind) for which independent short stories were rewritten to link them together; I think maybe some stories went into more than one novel.
This is something I'd be inclined to clean up as I come across them, not systematically, if I knew what to do. Thanks -- Dave davecat 16:31, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Ah, the dreaded monster known as the fixup raises its ugly head, and the ISFDB trembles in fear and loathing. Is there anyone who can save us, or are we doomed to forever cower in the shadows of this evil more powerful than any creature that slithered out of the imagination of H. P. Lovecraft? Has Davecat arrived on his snow white steed to battle that monstrosity? And shall he fall by the wayside, among the carcasses of past editors strewn like the offal of butchered animals on the path of Good Intentions and Well Meanings? Mhhutchins 17:14, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Yes, War against the Rull has indeed reduced me to the gibbering wreck you see before you. See the variations in the verified van Vogts viewable? Braver men than me have fled in terror... BLongley 06:18, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

(unindent and collision with Michael's post)What you are describing is known as a "fixup" -- the term was invented by its founding father, van Vogt, BTW -- the bane of genre bibliographers' existence. At this time we enter all involved Titles separately and then document these relationships in the Notes field. Eventually we will want a "related to" field and an associated "nature of relationship" field with a drop down menu of choices like "part of a fixup", "abridged", "revised", "expanded", "restored", etc. One of these days...

P.S. Don't worry, everybody asks these questions at first. They are the same questions that Al and I struggled with in 1995 when ISFDB was being dreamed up and then again in 2006 when the current ISFDB-2 version was implemented :) Ahasuerus 17:43, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I think I'll tiptoe quietly away from the true fixups; if nothing else, at this point I doubt that I'll recognize any. As far as the novel-broken-into-pieces-for-magazine-publication issue: it would seem to me to be reasonable to drop something into the notes field of the title, maybe along the lines of "This story was incorporated into the book version of The Lion Game"; is that OK? There are probably a large handful that I can spot easily. Thanks. -- Dave davecat 20:13, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Sure, that should work! Ahasuerus 21:21, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Brass Tacks credits

Because Analog doesn't show an author credit for these columns, didn't we decide to leave them as "uncredited"? And if we do, I don't think we should create a variant giving JWC,Jr. as the "uncredited". Mhhutchins 22:20, 26 Oct 2007 (CDT)

OK, I misunderstood about the variant. -- davecat 10:06, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I just read Dana Carsons response above (The Editor Problem). My concern is indeed that "The Editor" or "uncredited" just mixes these up with entries that are clearly by different people, with no notice, & Dana's is probably the way I'd do it myself at this point, for "uncredited" as well as "The Editor". I see the responses in the letters column, most but maybe not all by Campbell, as rather different from something that is just plain unidentified. But I'll do it however you folks decide. -- Dave davecat 10:45, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I personally feel that as long as the item shows up in the pub contents (and in a series listing, if applicable), it really doesn't matter if it shows up on an author's summary page. If there are a thousand entries for the author "uncredited", it's no big problem as far as I'm concerned. If the piece is credited to "The Editor", there should be a variant created only if we are positive who wrote it, in which case it will appear on the author's summary page and not on the generic "The Editor" summary page. If we're unable to determine who the real author is, I don't see the problem of their being mixed with other items on "The Editor" or the "uncredited" summary pages, because that's exactly what they are: items whose authorship has not been determined. Otherwise they would be on another summary page. Mhhutchins 13:03, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
OK, I'll do it that way unless a different consensus arrives. Thanks. davecat 13:10, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Publisher credit for the Analog issues you're updating

Dave, I meant to bring this up when I noticed it last week, but it slipped my mind. Since you're updating issues of Analog, it would only take a few more seconds to add the publisher (Condé Nast Publications, Inc.). I see that you've also started designating the binding as "digest". Thanks. Mhhutchins 13:30, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

A few seconds except for that !@#$% "é". As with the Digest, I will do it when I notice & remember.

That reminds me: I noticed that some of the issues already have sizes; in particular, in the period when Analog had larger issues, IIRC a couple of different sizes were in use for magazines of same size/format/binding. I'm reasonably sure Digest is correct for the smaller ones, but not sure about the larger ones. Right now I'm in the middle of the digests, though. --Dave davecat 14:21, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
The standard magazine terminology is "digest", "pulp" (8 by 11) and "bedsheet". Some collectors also distinguish the "trimmed pulp" format since trimmed pulps are a little smaller than regular pulps (not to mention much easier to read because they don't leave flakes on your body/furniture). Campbell was the first one to switch to the digest format ca. 1944 and the rest of the field followed in the early-to-mid-1950s. Campbell also tried the bedsheet format ca. 1964, but it didn't pan out and he switched back to the digest format within 18 months or so. I suppose we would need a special term for "slick magazines" if more than a few SF writers (Heinlein in SEP, etc) had sold to them. Ahasuerus 14:33, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
The bedsheets were March 1963-March 1965. Browsing through the ISFDB records, I see most of them are marked "bedsheet". December 1963 through February 1964 are marked "large", as are September & November-December 1964 & January-March 1965. Campbell definitely referred to it as "bedsheet" in something I was checking a couple of days ago. I'll just go change the "large" to "bedsheet" in that handful, I think. If I need to change them back, someone will let me know (or reject them). Some of those may be verified. This is not a terminology I was familiar with. --Dave davecat 14:55, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Series entries

I just want to make sure you have seen the discussions about the validity of some of the series data going on in Rules and Standards. It may well be that those for which the titles do not provide any kind of unique information ('Brass Tacks' for instance) might be unnecessary. Since these series were already in place it was logical to add to them but it might be that we are replicating unnecessary tasks.--swfritter 14:43, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks - had not seen it, will have to read it more carefully later. Especially if more discussion ensues & evolves toward consensus I can recognize. davecat 15:04, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
DO remember that this isn't a place where you just sit and watch the Moderators decide policies, your input is just as welcome and your opinion is just as valid as anyone else's. Sometimes a new editor can point out "The Emperor's got no clothes on!" and stop us dinosaurs doing pointless things. I've got no particular beef with this issue, I'm not working on magazines (although I've given examples of what would happen if I DID, which seems to have stimulated some thought) but sometimes someone has to ask "Why?" in an annoying voice to get people to stop and reconsider. I piped-up on this as it looked like the magazine-editors were descending into a masochistic orgy of self-imposed rules and conventions - it's no skin off my nose if they want it that way, but we're trying to ATTRACT more editors, not put them off. BLongley 16:46, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I think if you look out there in Rules and Standards again you will recognize the value of the series data so your entries are not in vain and are in fact quite valuable. Your User Page seems to indicate that you have a relatively moderate set of data you are interested in entering but there are a number of ways you can stay active once you have entered data from your own collection. I hope you stay for a long while.--swfritter 09:02, 28 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Placing the right variant into the series

I've approved a couple of series placement submissions, but want to remind you that in order for the record to show up on the canonical author's summary page within the series listing, you must choose to place the variant under the canonical author's name and not the actual author's name. For an example, Mr. Edison's Lamp shows up in the Editorial (Analog) series as by JCW, but not in the listing on JCWjr's summary page. On this page the record is in the Essay listing and not in Essay Series listing under Editorial (Analog), where I think you want to place it. Remember there are two records for this title, here for JWC, and here for JWCjr. If you check out both you'll find that only the JWC record is in the series, and not the JWCjr (which is the one you want to have in the series). Thanks. Mhhutchins 17:24, 27 Oct 2007 (CDT)

The ISFDB database

Getting MySQL up and running with the database is relatively painless but in order to get it to run with other platforms (in my case Delphi 7) I had to resort to using ODBC as the db interface. I think there are some driver issues involved with accessing the native database. I was also able to import the data into Access 2000 via ODBC but after doing the joins I could not get the data to sort correctly. Perhaps a bit too much data to be handled adequately?--swfritter 09:33, 28 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I don't know what Access' limitations are these days, but the first thing that comes to mind is "Unicode". Our database stores all data in Unicode, which many older/cheaper databases apparently do not support. Ahasuerus 10:29, 28 Oct 2007 (CDT)
I don't have access to Access. When & if I get around to trying this, the database I have available is Open Office Base. I have my doubts that it will open a MySQL database, but I haven't investigated; my scepticism derives entirely from trying to import a comma- or tab-delimited file, normally the lowest common denominator for transfers between databases. (You can indeed import one, but it's a real pain: open the thing (named .csv, not .txt) & get a spreadsheet (& you must have or now add column headings for the fields); then by shift- or control- or shift-control-click, select all the records you want to copy; then without releasing the mouse button drag it into the database & go through creating the table. Can't import records into an existing table.) -- Dave davecat 13:33, 29 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Open Office Base does not have that capability, at least not a few months ago. The best way to use the data, without spending some bucks, is with the MySQL query browser. We should really document step-by-step the process of installing and accessing the database. If I remember correctly Crystal Reports might work but I haven't tried the trial edition and I think it is fairly expensive product.--swfritter 14:07, 29 Oct 2007 (CDT)
It is indeed fairly easy to get MOST of the data into a local MySQL database, if you can install MySQL (which you should be able to do on most home PCs, not necessarily a work one). There do seem to be some issues with truncation of data and maybe Unicode issues, which I may look into next reinstall - the backup provided destroys the previous database and creates a new one, it isn't just data, it's a whole "destroy and recreate all the database tables and insert the data" format. It's possible to query such a local database via various tools (I haven't tried it with Delphi 7, I gave up on Delphi around version 4 or 5) but I've had some success with TOAD and HeidiSQL and a few other front-end tools. If you have a preferred database (rather than front-end) then maybe it would help if we converted the latest backups into a more-useful format? I keep meaning to convert the current backup into Oracle format so I can use PL/SQL rather than learn Python or suchlike, but I can still do useful stuff in MySQL anyway for now so keep putting it off: but am willing to help get more people looking at the data in whatever format they prefer. BLongley 16:03, 29 Oct 2007 (CDT)

The Editor entries

Hopefully this idea will receive a quick and positive reception. Don't worry about fixing any current entries. I will get them.--swfritter 17:25, 28 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Please see this discussion when you get a chance. In the meantime, please don't create variants for the Analog items credited to the Editor. Enter credits exactly as they appear in the publication. When a consensus is arrived at later concerning the "Editor (Analog)" situation, those pieces can be changed. Sorry about the conflicting information. Mhhutchins 18:25, 29 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Have seen it (& added my own $2.00 to the discussion), will do. I'll start putting the series info in The Editor things as I do them or notice them, too. Thank you! davecat 09:36, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog December 1970

'Apron Chains' was changed to page 4 from page 110 when the second value was correct. The essays appear to have already been in the database - they are doubled up. I can take them out if you want me to.--swfritter 19:12, 29 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I'm sure I'm responsible for all of this. I thought I'd entered things for that issue, but they weren't there & didn't seem to be in my pending list. (Possibly the pub page was still cached. I try to remember to refresh under these circumstances but might have forgotten.) Thank you for changing the bad page number. I've submitted removals for the duplicates; when those are approved, assuming they are, I'll delete the titles. Thank you for catching this. -- Dave davecat 08:46, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

It looks like someone, presumably you, did go ahead with this. I saw that the duplicates had disappeared from the pub, assumed that it was due to my removals, & went to delete them; but the first one disappeared between my opening the title & my clicking on delete, as the record wasn't there to delete. I see that my removals are still pending; I just hope they're the same records you removed or that someone rejects them. davecat 14:03, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)
It wasn't me but Everything looks AOK.--swfritter 14:20, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

D. Pattee?

I encountered an interior illustration which was uncredited but signed legibly "D. Pattee". This is in Analog, March 1970. Following what's said in the pub editor's help, I used this name & put a note in the title record.
I see that there is, in the database, one entry for a David Pattee: the cover for Astounding, November 1950. Should I be making D. Pattee a pseudonym for David Pattee? I don't really have any evidence (either way). Thanks. -- Dave davecat 17:38, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Talk pages

I realize that anyone can edit anyone's talk page pretty freely any time, & that the changes are visible to everyone; is there a convention on how much it's reasonable to remove old postings from one's own talk page? I'm inclined to keep sections where there was discussion of issues, or anything else that I think might help some newby who (heaven help him) is browsing through this page in hope of enlightenment; after all, that's me even now to some degree, certainly a week or so ago. But does a section where, say, Mhhutchins says "Please double-check this issue (http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?ANLGNOV68) of Analog. Your submission added the Campbell piece, but is it shortfiction or essay? Thanks. Mhhutchins 15:11, 20 Oct 2007 (CDT)" need to hang around indefinitely? Or anything else that's mostly just communication, not enlightening to anyone else? Thanks. davecat 17:54, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

For right now it's probably better to leave it all there. There is a fairly simple method of archiving but your page probably is still manageable. And by the way, if a long discussion gets started on your page and starts getting off target for your purposes please feel free to politely suggest that the subject might be more appropriately continued on another forum. We do have a tendency to get carried away at times and no one will be offended.--swfritter 20:17, 30 Oct 2007 (CDT)

The Reference Library (Analog book review column)

As I'm entering these, I see a possible issue here. There's a common heading for the department (drawing of a book framing the words "the reference library P. Schuyler Miller"). But at least commonly Miller did not jump into reviews of specific books; first, there's a brief (usually) essay with its own little title. In the issue I'm looking at right now, April 1970, it's called "The Anderson Universe" & it's not brief - 3 pages! It gives general comments on series with a common background (including future histories as such), then discussion of Poul Anderson's series. Books are cited in passing (Satan's World & The Rebel Worlds).
Now, I've been ignoring these; the previous ones I've looked at enough to consider weren't reviews as such in any sense I'd recognize. But I'd already been wondering whether the pub contents should include the little essay's title instead of "The Reference Library (Analog, month year)", grouped with all the others by series name. This one maybe ought to be included as a review or reviews; but how does one handle brief discussions of two books (cited with publisher, # pages, & price) buried in a 3-page essay?
For the present I will again ignore this & get to the reviews, proper, but I surely would appreciate some guidance. Thank you! --Dave davecat 10:04, 31 Oct 2007 (CDT)
Ack! That particular issue's Reference Library continues with a section headlined "Charters to the "Helicon"" before actually getting to reviews. I'd kind of forgotten how much of these columns each year was information about upcoming cons. Don't know whether that will affect responses to my initial mess of questions. davecat 10:11, 31 Oct 2007 (CDT)

I generally do not enter reviews unless the books are reviewed as unique entities. The general guideline in help is that there at least be some indication whether the reviewer had a positive or negative opinion of the book. Some of the early F&SF issues which could have 20 or more mini-reviews which fulfilled the minimum requirements. And then at the end of each year the books are mentioned each in a Best Of column.--swfritter 14:25, 31 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Analog may-aug 1970

The example in Help has a space between the title and the sequence number for multiple pieces of artwork. I fixed up these issues to be consistent. Multiple artwork entries are justifiable content that Al the programmer wanted. As a retired programmer I appreciated those times when I could put on my 'Feed the programmer' face. Well now I find myself on the opposite side of the fence. Also, if you think about it, you can wipe out the prices that are in the notes. I believe they are from a time when there was no price field.--swfritter 18:14, 31 Oct 2007 (CDT)

Thanks. I'll start putting in those blanks. I think there are some earlier issues where I did it wrong; I'll hope to eventually catch & fix them.
As far as adding the multiple illustrations, I keep imagining myself as someone researching (say) Kelly Freas & wanting to find every last drawing.
I'd wondered about the prices in the notes, but hesitated to just nuke them without knowing why they were there; & there was always something more urgent to ask. I'll try to remember. Again, thanks. --Dave davecat 09:07, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)

adding existing title to existing pub?

OK, I'm stumped. Somehow, a while back, I apparently brought into existence two title records for the same title. One of them I made a variant (the author's name as given was a pseudonym). But, somehow, the title that wound up in the pub was the other one (that wasn't a variant). I've been trying to fix this ever since discovering it.
I removed the title (that wasn't a variant) from the pub, & deleted it. So now only the one that is a variant remained. I added the title to the pub, using (AFAICS) the same title, author, type, etc. as in the existing record. This apparently created a new title record. So I'm back where I started.
I guess that if I'd thought a bit faster, I'd have at this point made the new record a variant for the existing one with the author's canonical name, then deleted the variant that I've been trying to get into the pub. I was a little slow, & submitted a removal for that one; unless it gets refused, I'll have two records, neither in the pub. What should I have done in the first place?
Thank you very much. -- Dave davecat 14:32, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)

It would help if you mentioned the Title you're concerned about? BLongley 18:17, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)
Oh. "Sensational Discovery" is the title. (Does this mean it's not supposed to work the way it did?) The record which I wanted to add (to Analog February 1969) is 785673; the one which was created instead is 801033. -- davecat 05:40, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
This ties in with your merging question below. You've no doubt been warned not to change entries in a publication (as it changes them EVERYWHERE they're used), but to remove the wrong one and add the right one instead. However, ISFDB isn't sure whether you're creating a new entry to this pub that's already used elsewhere, or a totally new entry. There's actually THREE "Sensational Discovery" titles now: 
1969 	ESSAY 	785673 	Sensational Discovery 	John W. Campbell
1969 	ESSAY 	786057 	Sensational Discovery 	John W. Campbell, Jr.
1969 	ESSAY 	801033 	Sensational Discovery 	John W. Campbell
There's no problem with that, I presume you created 801033 when you tried to add the No-"Jr" version to the publication. This is NOT an error on your part, it's because ISFDB can't know whether you're adding a new title or an old one, so it creates a new one and leaves it to you to merge them later if needed. You could add 785673 or 801033 to Analog February 1969 and either would be correct: except that only 785673 would make it show as "John W. Campbell, Jr" writing as by the No-"Jr" version. You can't add by record number though, only type all the details in again - which will create ANOTHER title record. Still not a problem: you can merge 785673 and 801033 and whatever the new one is all in one step. It will warn you that there is a title_parent Conflict: one of the No-"Jr" records points to 786057, and that's the detail we want to keep. The others - they're just duplicate data. We don't want people thinking he wrote it four times, three under one name and one the other, so we merge the spare records (usually keeping the lowest record number, in case anyone is linking to it). BLongley 15:13, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
That's probably not very clear. :-/ I'll go see if I can track down the help on merging that you read and can't find now. BLongley 15:13, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)

Capitalization issue: In Times [Tt]o Come

I should have asked this a while back, but it kept getting shoved down in the stack. Sorry. In entering these, I've been following what's given here as a correctly formatted example. In it, the "To" is capitalized. But in the pub editor's help (see here under "Title", some distance down) it says:

  • Case. Titles should have case regularized unless there is some specific evidence that the author intended certain letters to be in a specific case. For example, if the title is "EXTRO" in all caps, the title should be entered as "Extro". This applies to the titles of short stories as well as books. Typesetting style is not important; for example, Fantastic Universe typically printed story titles in lower case, but these titles are regularized for the ISFDB. Regularized case means that the first word is capitalized, and all later words are also capitalized except for "and", "the", "a", "an", "for", "of", "in", "on", "by", "at", "from", and "to". Hyphenated words have the first letter after the hyphen capitalized.


I suspect that I'm supposed to follow the standard given there, & assume that the correctly-formatted example is wrong. I'd appreciate either confirmation or disconfirmation, though. Thank you! -- Dave davecat 15:03, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)

Ouch! One wrong item gets in there and it keeps getting replicated. I will fix.--swfritter 15:35, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)
Done. Well at least the correctly formatted example was formatted correctly - at least for the time being. I keep reminding myself to print out that tiny little section and tape it some place. Thanks!--swfritter 16:21, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)
Capitalisation was one of my first queries and there's been several discussions since. EXTRO/Extro is a particularly bad example - "MUgwump 4 or Mugwump 4" SHOULD have been better but petered out when we couldn't find an example of an editor that DID retain the author's intention... as always, I'd invite you to question the standard rather than ask what the standard IS, when we're inconsistent. The sooner we point out the discrepancies the better - but the Help is not always inarguable. A lot is still just created/adjusted on the basis of what we DO rather than what help says we SHOULD do. BLongley 18:16, 1 Nov 2007 (CDT)
I'd think by now you'd have seen that I won't hesitate to question a standard if I think it doesn't make sense (or if I think there are reasons for doing it some other way which may have been overlooked).
(Sorry. I didn't mean to be as snippy as that sounds; merely, I've already jumped with both feet into discussions where I hadn't seen all the background discussion that had already taken place. Several times in a week or so.) davecat 16:26, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
No worries - you develop a thick skin around here after a while. You probably never WILL read all the background info (I didn't - there'd be no time to edit, let alone moderate or advise if I did). Current discussions should make people drag up the relevant info, if it's actually still relevant. BLongley 17:22, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
I admit to thinking consistency is important in a context like this; but I might argue against regularization in the cases you cite if I were familiar with the works in question.
In this case I thought the standard is fine, though. (Although when I mentioned to my wife (who worked for many years as a descriptive cataloguer in a major university library) the list of little words to not capitalize, she said, "If they're not going to capitalize prepositions they shouldn't capitalize any of them.", or words to that effect.)
I've been bitten several times now by following examples I see in the data (canonical forms of magazine column/department titles, especially, but also use of author's canonical name rather than name as printed); that's one reason I'm eager to get in & work on cleaning them up. -- Dave davecat 05:56, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
Someone else might have more information but a lot of the initial data was entered from secondary sources and it may be that the conventions were inherited. I know that I constantly have to look up the list because my intuition tells me that the list should be longer but I certainly don't want to be the one who has to correct massive inconsistencies. For curiosity's sake, you might ask your wife about how to enter an ellipsis. I think we've got it right. And thanks for questioning both the data as entered and the standards. Not even close to being snippy. The various forums have gotten so bloated that it can be difficult to track down discussions. Added to that is a tendency to not move discussions the Community Portal and Standards pages from user talk when that might be more appropriate.--swfritter 17:17, 2 Nov 2007 (CDT)
We do actu