I added the Brooklyn Public Library system last week, including the central branch. More recently, the same branch got entered again, this time simply as "Brooklyn Public Library." I'm not sure how the merge process starts, but lampbane did propose the merger. So, how do I continue it?

Open the one you want to get rid of.
Hit edit this venue
Right side there is a combine option
It will ask for the venue number you want to combine into.

I haven't done it yet. My duplicates were my own mistakes and no one had favorited them so I just deleted the one I wanted to go away.

No idea. It seems to go into a queue that queue shows up on the Helpers/Stats page of LT Local - I don't know what comes next. Maybe we're supposed to cross-check that they have identical information, paste some over to the first venue to make it more complete, and then delete the second venue?

Re: #2 - alibrarian

Yes, but I think AnnaClaire is asking what happens next. That is, what do we do once the venue combination has been suggested?

Message edited by its author, Mar 9, 2008, 9:10pm.

> 3

I think you're right. It was somewhere in one of the threads. I can't find it right now. I think LT staff are going to do the combining (maybe to stop people who would combine all the branches of BPL into one entry !!!)

Ah- found it #57 in Library Thing Local-Part Dos (New Features) from Tim

If you edit the venue, you'll see a link to combine the venue into another venue. This adds it to the proposed list on the helpers page (low on the left). Venue combinations have to approved by LT staff because they're destructive of the old data--all the events and favorites move over, and won't remember where they were originally.

Message edited by its author, Mar 9, 2008, 9:19pm.

Yes, according to this thread, the venues get combined by LT staff on approval.

Personally I think that places too much of a burden on them and slows down the process - a lot; it would be much faster if the community could be trusted to do it themselves. But as you said above - shit can happen.

Message edited by its author, Mar 9, 2008, 9:18pm.

Hey, you post and edit faster than we communicate. :)

So, I'd be happy to distribute this task to some trusted characters, but it can't be open to all. Venues are full-blooded entities in the database. There isn't a layer in between venue and what you see, like there is for works, allowing things to be combined and uncombined pell-mell. Nor does the database keep changes on data like who's favorited who. If someone combined wrongly, things could get unrecoverably screwed up.

Anyway, I haven't combined any yet, mostly because all I needed at first was the redirection message. I haven't written the code that actually shifts the data around.

I'd be happy to distribute this task to some trusted characters

What? Isn't this completely contrary to one of the main principles of LT? How much longer would it be before we had Talk moderators?

Maybe it is, but because combining venues can't be undone (short of deleting the combined venue and rebuilding the original pre-combination venues), unlike other open-to-everybody tasks, I can understand the desire to restrict that ability.

Unfortunately, great power doesn't automatically bestow great responsibility!

Message edited by its author, Mar 10, 2008, 8:26am.

Oh, I definitely don't think it should be open to everyone. I think it should be restricted to LT staff.

I'm not necessarily against distributing some of this work. Letting anyone do it can lead to problems with handling the data. But the LT staff can't be stretched infinitely. They have to sleep sometimes.

Or do they? : )

Tim == Gumby? ^^;;

>8

It's a very low-volume thing and, as I explained, not amenable to crowd control.

How about if you ask for volunteers and select a limited number of helpers? If someone wants to drop out, that person can be replaced by someone else of your choosing?

I can see where it should not be an administrative task, where it should be a task given to someone trusted, but also should be a task that one does not feel he or she must do forever.

In order to be fair to everyone (so no one feels "left out"), I'm sure you'll develop other areas in the future in which you might need some more trusted volunteers. I think there's really a trusted place for most LT members somewhere here either now or in the future.

I have no problem with "trusted volunteers" handling some of the workload, however, I do think that this tends to create a sort of cabal that leaves newer users out. There's got to be a way for people to chip in without being one of the good ol' boys; maybe some sort of neutral criteria that allows anyone to apply.

Also, maybe the volunteers could be limited to a certain amount of months so we rotate regularly and more people get a chance to help out.

Personally I'd prefer it if LT Staff were working on features and bugs rather than looking into minor administrative stuff. I don't know what to do about the 'cabal'; I agree with lampbane's objection but not entirely with the proposal... then again no proposal would be entirely satisfactory.

So were any venue combinations ever actually done? I proposed one months ago and nothing has happened:

http://www.librarything.com/venue/29704/...

Some time ago there were some combinations. But the list hasn't been cleared out for a long while.

Message edited by its author, Aug 14, 2008, 7:42pm.

Combined. I've added it to my weekly list.

Perhaps venue combinations will actually happen by February? There are plenty of them pending.

I added a bunch last month and have wondered if there is something I can do myself, but I'm must be daffy, I can't figure it out. If you need help, I'm happy to assist with this.

There were a few that were just duplicates, and I just deleted them. I think it would help to clean these up though, before someone populates data into them.

I also noticed a few oddities with one or two yesterday, when I tried to add events and it wouldn't pull in the event location, even though they did exist. This was very odd...

If you add a venue and discover that it is a duplicate, there is another way to make a correction. Just make your duplicate into a new and correct venue.

Checking for a possible duplicate before entering it is easy, too. Just search by name or partial name on the Local home page. "Barely" will let you know if Barely Books is there, and where it is.