We have some larger problems, too, with unmerging. There was an accidental merge of Dean Koontz with one of his pseudonyms Edward Gorman. It happens. Now the author search results show (correctly) that he has 300+ works
https://openlibrary.org/search/authors?q=Dean+Koontz But his author page shows zero works. https://openlibrary.org/authors/OL7119293A/Dean_Koontz even though the accidental merge was supposedly undone. https://openlibrary.org/authors/OL7119293A/Dean_Koontz?m=history I think we need better tools to be able to repair this sort of thing when we see them, and getting the search results to accurately match the database is a vewry good first step. ________ Jessamyn librarian.net ::: jessamyn.com ::: jessamyn.info ::: box 345, randolph vt 05060 On Mon, Nov 18, 2013 at 3:00 PM, <ol-discuss-requ...@archive.org> wrote: > Send Ol-discuss mailing list submissions to > ol-discuss@archive.org > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > http://mail.archive.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ol-discuss > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > ol-discuss-requ...@archive.org > > You can reach the person managing the list at > ol-discuss-ow...@archive.org > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of Ol-discuss digest..." > > > Today's Topics: > > 1. Author merges incomplete? (Sarah Breau) > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Message: 1 > Date: Mon, 18 Nov 2013 10:30:18 -0600 > From: Sarah Breau <smbr...@hotmail.com> > Subject: [ol-discuss] Author merges incomplete? > To: "ol-discuss@archive.org" <ol-discuss@archive.org> > Message-ID: <col129-w11e78cce47a31e4d29d4e6b0...@phx.gbl> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > > I am finding that the search results for an author isn't changed even after > an author merge. I have several examples of this from recent work. One is > Janet Louise Moody. There were two records for her, so a search on her name > returned two results, OL5410443A and OL5410444A. After moving both works to > one author record, I merged the author records. However, if you do an author > search for her you still get both author records above in your result. If you > try to merge them again, you will find that there is only one author record > now, OL5410444A. OL5410443A has been merged into OL5410444A, but it still > shows up in the author search. > > Even worse, if you have an author whose name is misspelled and you merge that > author record with author records in which the name is spelled correctly, you > are preventing the works listed under the misspelled author's name from EVER > showing up in an author search result, because searching with the correct > spelling will NEVER return all the results. So, for example, if you merge a > "Willam Shakespeare" author record with a "William Shakespeare" one, the > works under the misspelling will never appear in a search for "william > shakespeare". Which is freaky, because if you open the page for one of those > works, the author will show as "William Shakespeare." I think this problem > has the potential to introduce a great deal of confusion into the database. > > The workaround for this problem is to move all the works from the misspelled > author record to the correct author record (by editing each one and changing > the author name) before merging the author records. Unfortunately, this is > nearly impossible to do if you are working with an author with more than a > few author records, however, since it is hard to know if you are choosing the > correct author name -- you can't chose the author record by number, you have > to type in his or her name and hope you are picking the record you chose to > be the master record. I had a workaround for this problem that involved > putting different numbers of spaces between the first name and last name on > each record so I could keep them straight. Honestly, it is more than a bit > tricky. > > I'm pretty sure I brought this problem up about a year ago, but I don't > recall what the outcome was then. Since I have encountered it again recently, > I thought I'd ask about it again. > > Also, hey, when will we be able to merge editions into works? > > Sarah > > -------------- next part -------------- > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > URL: > http://mail.archive.org/cgi-bin/mailman/private/ol-discuss/attachments/20131118/f9eb2b3f/attachment.htm > > ------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > Ol-discuss mailing list > Ol-discuss@archive.org > http://mail.archive.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ol-discuss > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send email to > ol-discuss-unsubscr...@archive.org > > End of Ol-discuss Digest, Vol 75, Issue 5 > ***************************************** _______________________________________________ Ol-discuss mailing list - Ol-discuss@archive.org http://mail.archive.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ol-discuss Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/ol-discuss@archive.org/ To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send email to ol-discuss-unsubscr...@archive.org
