How and under what circumstances is a "group" assigned to an audiobook?

[TheBanjo]

I've just noticed (have I been blind all this time???) that the catalog entry for at least some audiobooks in our catalog has a "group" property.

I noticed this when looking here: https://librivox.org/history-of-egypt-chaldea-syria-babylonia-and-assyria-vol-4-by-gaston-maspero/

I think it's a very nice feature. It could clearly be applied, for example, to recordings I have made of Thomas Carlyle's three volume History of the French Revolution, of which this is volume 1: https://librivox.org/the-french-revolution-vol1-ver2-thomas-carlyle/

I don't believe there's anywhere in the New Project template where someone proposing a new project can suggest a group.

Can anyone shed light on what triggers the use of this feature, and on how, for example, it has come to be applied to one sequence of related history texts and not to another?

As it happens, I have just now completed recording the fourth and final book in Ford Madox Ford's "Parade's End" tetralogy. Would it be logical and in accordance with the intended use of this field to include all four volumes in a group called "Parade's End"?

None of this is in any sense a complaint — just a request for enlightenment!

[TriciaG]

It's very much an "if the MC or another admin notice and think to do it" function.

One down side of it is that it isn't friendly to the LV search functionality. For example, if I search for myself as reader and do only solos, it lists the projects - but the ones in a group are only listed in the group, and my solos in those groups cannot be separated out: LINK

I think there might be other searches that it doesn't play nice with, either.

However, that's not to say we can't group your series together.

Another option is to link the catalog pages together with simple links in the description. I can't find an example, although I know I've done it before. This one just has one other book linked, but I know I've done a list of 3 or 4 before: https://librivox.org/campaigns-of-curiosity-journalistic-adventures-of-an-american-girl-in-london-by-elizabeth-l-banks/

[TriciaG]

This one has 3 in the series linked together: https://librivox.org/the-unpleasantness-at-the-bellona-club-by-dorothy-l-sayers/

[TheBanjo]

It's very much an "if the MC or another admin notice and think to do it" function.

One down side of it is that it isn't friendly to the LV search functionality. For example, if I search for myself as reader and do only solos, it lists the projects - but the ones in a group are only listed in the group, and my solos in those groups cannot be separated out: LINK

I think there might be other searches that it doesn't play nice with, either.

However, that's not to say we can't group your series together.

Another option is to link the catalog pages together with simple links in the description. I can't find an example, although I know I've done it before. This one just has one other book linked, but I know I've done a list of 3 or 4 before: https://librivox.org/campaigns-of-curiosity-journalistic-adventures-of-an-american-girl-in-london-by-elizabeth-l-banks/

That's very enlightening. Thank you! I'm reluctant to do anything that might mess with commonly used search functions, so I think I'll stay away from 'group' in my own scenario. The hyperlink-inside-description approach does look good, I must say — though honestly, if I've mentioned a predecessor book in a quartet by title in my description of a later book in the same quartet, I'd really expect any half smart reader/listener to be able to find it without a hyperlink.

I think I'll stick with simple and basic for now — but thanks, as always, for satisfying my curiosity.