Search improvements are the next area that would really aid in submission.
Searching for complex titles is generally easy, but books with short titles are much harder.
Issue #1 - Relevancy is not considered, so the search term “Hope” matches lots of less relevant results before the close match is displayed.
Issue #2 - Searches cap at 50 result and the best match may be on the next page (currently inaccessible).
Being able to refine the search for either a Title or a credit Name, would be a great start.
Indexing common identifiers, e.g. SBN, ISBN, ISBN10, ISBN13 and Barcode would also be helpful.
Being able to page through results would provide a “quick fix”. In my current scenario I want to make sure that a book titled “Voyage” doesn’t already exist, but I can’t be sure as there’s no match in the first 50 items returned.
eg, a search for “Elizabeth Caldwell”, “Elizabeth C Caldwell” or “Liz Caldwell” produces no results. Only “Elizabeth C. Caldwell” returns the correct profile.
I have used both “Elizabeth Caldwell” and “Liz Caldwell” as alternate :title attribute values to the main-profile “Elizabeth C. Caldwell”.
This applies to both the main search and the edit form search. If I search for “Liz Caldwell” in order to add a credit, we really need the lookup to find the proper profile, or we’ll get duplicates. I wouldn’t expect the search to be able to tell that Liz is a short form of Elizabeth, just to know that it’s been used in a :title value linked to the profile id.
Also, I’m trying to figure out how to add a credit for the imprint Tor. It does not appear in the search/credit dropdown, probably because the combination “tor” appears in a lot of names.
Ok, I’ve made some updates to the search. “Tor” now ranks first on that search. And the Elizabeth Caldwell searches seem to work correctly. Please let me know if there are any problems with these changes. thanks!
Seems good so far. This is one of those things that will prove itself over time.
Would it be possible to be able to open a credit/profile link from the drop-down picker list on an edit form?
When you pick a profile in discogs for assigning a credit to a role you can click an “open in new tab” link next to the name in the drop-down, and it keeps the drop-down open and your scroll position in it. In ctlgs right now you need to choose the profile for the property’s value and then open its link just to see if you’ve got the right profile.
Unfortunately, this leaves "Open " appended to the field, as if part of the credit name! It ends up like that in the submitted Book and Edition entry and you have to Raw Edit them away. Doesn’t happen for new credits (obviously).