The New Catalog is Official! (Feature Requests & Bugs)

Comments about LibriVox? Suggestions to improve things? News?
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Peter Why
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Post by Peter Why »

Can't we search the catalog for Reader any more? ... and if not, there's a link on the catalog page that points to a Help section which still mentions it.

**** Apologies: I found this: Advanced search options

Peter
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Chrisczech
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Post by Chrisczech »

May I ask a couple of questions and possibly make a suggestion or two?

I feel that some of the "advanced search options" are actually quite basic: fiction, non-fiction etc and maybe ought to be included on the first search page? The browse to fiction reveals a small selection (OK 40 with works-in-progress, but would a visitor be interested in those initially?) and no method of sorting the results by initial of surname (e.g.). A choice of completed works or w-i-p would aid visitors to find what they are looking for more quickly. (Why would a non-volunteer user be interested in works-in-progress at all? I think they are more likely to want to see what is on offer.)

Why is there a link to the old catalogue, when this is admittedly now out-of-date, and the pages appear to be broken when the link is followed?

My third point is about usability. A friend who is fairly computer-literate was invited to look at the catalogue to see the "bill-of-fare" on offer at Librivox, but he found it quite confusing in that he felt he was expected to know what he was looking for before he began, rather than being able to browse the titles easily. He very soon asked for help in using the catalogue. Had he been alone he would have given up.
The problem may be in that the links are small in size and not sufficiently clear to aid usability.


Don't get me wrong, I think the new searchable catalogue is a vast improvement on the old static one, and has great potential. It shows that a great deal of work has been done behind the scenes, and I think that is fantastic. It will certainly prove to be a tremendous asset when the bugs are ironed out and refinements made.
[url=http://librivox.org/idle_thoughts_of_an_idle_fellow_by_jerome_k_jerome/]Idle Thoughts Of An Idle Fellow[/url] / [url=http://librivox.org/the-triumphs-of-eugene-valmont-by-robert-barr]The Triumphs Of Eugene Valmont[/url]
hugh
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Post by hugh »

hi chris,

thanks for that. good points all ... right now the catalog is in-progress... that is, it works mostly as it is supposed to work, but the UI issues need some working thru.

So please please keep the comments coming. actually, if you could ask your UI friend to jot down more notes that would be great.

Point-form is easiest, and no need to be apologetic!
GDB500
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Post by GDB500 »

I have noticed that when searching for a Genre, in my case 'Science Fiction' or 'Sci Fi', that not all books in the catalogue are located.

One case in point is Piper, H. Beam
When searching using genre these 3 are located
Piper, H. Beam. "Cosmic Computer , The"
Piper, H. Beam. "Five Sci-Fi Short Stories by H. Beam Piper"
Piper, H. Beam. "Omnilingual"

If I search for Author Piper I get another book
Oomphel in the Sky

Would this be just that the genre field isn't quite right.

I have noticed, others, should I post info about them here when I come accross them?
Or is this already covered somewhere else?

This is a great library, glad I was pointed at it. In fact it was one of those Ebay sellers reference to Libravox that got me here.


Rod
kayray
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Post by kayray »

Thanks GBD, that one had no genres filled in at all! I've given it "science fiction" and "teen/young adult".

We really appreciate it when people bring catalog glitches to our attention. Feel free to start a new thread in this section any time you find something that needs to be fixed, so someone will be sure to notice :)
Kara
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kri
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Post by kri »

However, I would request to everyone not to report not finding certain books in a particular genre that they know are in the catalog and should be in that genre. This is only because the vast majority of works in the catalog aren't genre-ized. When we did the initial data entry to get all of the catalog into the database, we didn't worry about Genre. Annie (librarylady) and Betsie (thistlechick) have said they would like some day soon to go through and add all the genres (at least I think that's what they said). So, unfortunately for now we've got to deal with an imperfect system :)
ChristianPecaut
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Post by ChristianPecaut »

How about having one BIG list of ALL the completed/non-completed works.

At least as an option, if not the default first appearance of the catalog -- it's much easier to find and browse -- less high-tech, but works soooo quick.
kayray
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Post by kayray »

ChristianPecaut wrote:How about having one BIG list of ALL the completed/non-completed works.

At least as an option, if not the default first appearance of the catalog -- it's much easier to find and browse -- less high-tech, but works soooo quick.
If you leave all the fields blank and hit the "Search" button, you get all 861 "completed" and "in progress" works. Is that what you're looking for? Or did I misunderstand your suggestion?
Kara
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"Mary wished to say something very sensible into her Zoom H2 Handy Recorder, but knew not how." -- Jane Austen (& Kara)
ChristianPecaut
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Post by ChristianPecaut »

If you leave all the fields blank and hit the "Search" button, you get all 861 "completed" and "in progress" works. Is that what you're looking for? Or did I misunderstand your suggestion?
Unless I am not pressing the right Search button -- leaving the fields empty returns a list of 861 books, but split up into 22 different lists, each on a separate link.

I am looking for the vanilla ASCII version of ALL the books on in one html file -- like Gutenberg, but with links thrown in. So that I can use the search in my browser to find any author/title.
hugh
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Post by hugh »

yeah... i like this idea, will check w tis about implementation.
kayray
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Post by kayray »

And a giant ascii page of everything will look MOST impressive :)
Kara
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"Mary wished to say something very sensible into her Zoom H2 Handy Recorder, but knew not how." -- Jane Austen (& Kara)
Cori
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Post by Cori »

It might just be me ... but from my Catalogue Reader page, the listen to LibriVox - Our catalog link goes to the old catalogue, not the new one.
There's honestly no such thing as a stupid question -- but I'm afraid I can't rule out giving a stupid answer : : To Posterity and Beyond!
kri
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Post by kri »

Cori wrote:It might just be me ... but from my Catalogue Reader page, the listen to LibriVox - Our catalog link goes to the old catalogue, not the new one.
What page are you getting this link from?
Cori
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Post by Cori »

http://librivox.org/newcatalog/people_public.php?peopleid=92

I was really surprised, because it *looks* like the same menu as everywhere else (and the links on other types pf pages works fine), but I refreshed the page a few times, and it's as up-to-date as it can be.
There's honestly no such thing as a stupid question -- but I'm afraid I can't rule out giving a stupid answer : : To Posterity and Beyond!
kri
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Post by kri »

Cori wrote:http://librivox.org/newcatalog/people_public.php?peopleid=92

I was really surprised, because it *looks* like the same menu as everywhere else (and the links on other types pf pages works fine), but I refreshed the page a few times, and it's as up-to-date as it can be.
Thanks Cori. It's incorrect as it's a separate file that creates that sidebar than the one on the main page. I was unable, unfortunately, to tap into wordpress to pull out the template file so I didn't have to duplicate. Will fix now.
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