Work page test : Combined page vs. Work page

I've made a test—a trial-balloon test—and want to get reactions. Basically, I've added a link to see the work page for a book you own as if you didn't own it—the work page without the book information.

The best way to see this is on a work that you have. Here's a picture.


Notice "Combined page" and "Work page." The "Combined page" is the work page as before, when looking at a specific book. The "Work page"—an option available ONLY when looking at a specific book—shows just the work information, removing "Book information," using only work-level other-author information, changing the cover, etc.

The positive I see here:

1. It's useful for people doing work on a work, especially the other authors, otherwise available far down the page in a different format.
2. It moves us toward a logical separation between books and works.

The negatives I see here.

1. More is not better, either in code or user interface.
2. It moves us toward a foolish consistency, namely the separation of books and works.

I'm frankly very wary of this change—I did it as much because Jeremy was pushing me on the book/work distinction, and this less than a full separation of the concepts. And I thought it might stimulate some thinking on all our parts.

You're not going to like me saying this, but I'm worried about users' reactions. My feeling is that users will like this in part because users do not always weigh cumulative negatives. That is, if it pleases someone, they're happy with a new link, a new feature, etc. Comfortable with the interface, they can't evaluate the drag that "more" puts on something. Users would add button after button to the iPhone, each one wanted and each one taking things away.

LibraryThing is no iPhone, and I think the work/book distinction can be vexed and confusing. But that's my initial feeling.

"Combined page" versus "Work page" versus "Work details" versus "Books details." This is a rather obscure set of distinctions and will likely be confusing to new and casual members.

At one point on the other thread I said I wanted more separation between work and book data. But after some consideration I decided my actual concern is the clutter on my default page (here's the comment). The addition of a work page view doesn't help with that problem.

#1 by @timspalding> I'm very pleased about this change, as it's crucial from a technical perspective. The people who keep LibraryThing the high quality of cataloging data that it is need such an option to do their work so they don't have to resort to switching to dummy accounts just so they can see the generic work page.

1. More is not better, either in code or user interface.

On the other hand, less is not better when it's a necessary function. "But... my pretty interface!" is a poor excuse.

2. It moves us toward a foolish consistency, namely the separation of books and works.

Where I think you ran into the "foolish consistency" is in your choice of implementation. Why did it need to be all up in people's face like this? Why not tucked away in the green "Advanced" box with recalculate cover/author? It seems like that would have alleviated pretty much all of your gripes.

Definitely agree that access to this work page is necessary.

The confusion is really just the terminology. "Combined page" isn't obvious in its meaning. Also, why not streamline things in the navigation menu?

Your book
- Book details
Work page
- Work details

or

Your book - details
Work - details

I do a lot of organizational work on LT and I've never logged out or set up a dummy account to see the plain work page. So although I have no problem with the technical addition of having an option to see the work-level page, I wouldn't call it necessary. Being able to see the work-level title and primary author somewhere is enough for me.

But I think it's important to note that when separating work and book level data has been discussed before the issues were rather broader than this minor change.

I've only skimmed and will write a more detailed response later, but in general, it's not at all the direction I was hoping this would take.

I think it's fine and good to have a "see this as others see it" work page, but I doubt I'll ever actually look at it.

When I go to the work page, all I want is to see information about the work, but in a way that makes it clear what work I'm actually looking at (i.e., with my title and cover appearing somewhere prominent). The work information is useless to me if I can't make the connection to the work I actually own, but that doesn't mean I want all sorts of edition-specific garbage cluttering up the page.

This whole thing has been largely an exercise in foolish consistency, as you say. Largely because you made the step from one justified inconsistency (showing our title/cover so that we can identify the book) to the idea that there's no point in consistency at all, so we should just merge all our book information onto the work page, so that we now need a separate work page. Blech.

When I go to the work page, all I want is to see information about the work

I suspect that other people care to see information about their book as well. That some users only want to see their book information in their catalog is a sign of diversity of interests, not of general will. I suspect that if I made the work page only about the work the vast majority of users would regard that as a bug. What me to try it?

I don't actually see the point you're making. LibraryThing always showed work pages subbing in information that related to your book.

If this is about the dates, I give up arguing it. It clearly rankles some people, so I've removed them as of now. I think it's obvious that seeing dates by works is useful. It helps you to know if some novel is recent or was published in 1972. But if others don't feel that way, fine.

>2 eromsted: - Agreed on the potential confusion/terms/&c. Would something like what rsterling suggests in #4 help with that?

Generally, I agree with rsterling and brightcopy that having this view is both useful and necessary. It made me crazy that I couldn't see the work-level data for a book I have in my catalog, for a whole bunch of reasons. That said, where we put the link to it is not all that important (I wouldn't be opposed to either brightcopy's suggestion or rsterling's, frankly).

>5 eromsted: - Right, there's an argument to be made (maybe) in favor of a great distinction. Tim and I argued it yesterday for a while, in fact. It would involve some really big changes to the way the site works, and he persuaded me that it may not be the best idea. I think as we continue to add enhancements to the way we handle editions and other "versions" of works, we're going to need to think more about this issue.

Generally, I wanted something like what we've done here so that it's possible to easily view work-level data for books in your catalog. It wasn't doable before (without dummy accounts) and that bugged me.

_Zoe_ - give us a fer-instance here. I'm not quite sure I get what you're saying.

#8 by @jbd1> I'm not greatly opposed to rsterling's suggestion. But I just feel like this is an option that will be used about as frequently as the other stuff in the Advanced box. It doesn't need to be where any "regular" user would ever run across it. Right now, it's in a hugely prominent area of the screen. I just don't get why that should be.

To me, this feature is about as necessary as those other advanced features - in other words, not much in the grand scheme of things. It just helps every now and then for a very specific subset of people, generally the ones that try to help with bug reports.

>9 brightcopy: - Yeah - I don't mind your idea at all, either. As long as it's an option, I don't really care where it is :-)

I want to make it clear that LibraryThing will not be moving to a strict separation between book and work pages. We will continue to have a mixed view. I feel this hits the sweet spot of what most users want.

Within the confines of that decision, I'm willing to consider options. But that's the core principle.

To me, this feature is about as necessary as those other advanced features - in other words, not much in the grand scheme of things.

Let's move it to the advanced features box, with the cover recalculations, etc.

There are multiple links next to a book in my catalogue. One takes me to the general information about the work, one takes me to details about my specific copy, and one takes me to the editing page. Maybe what you should be doing is improving the personal pages that already exist, instead of making them take over the general information page.

Basically, when I want bibliographic data about my copy of a book, there's already a page for that.

I agree with you that it helps to know whether a novel is recent or was published in 1972. That can be conveyed cleanly and simply, too. I don't think it's top-of-page information whether my copy of Jane Eyre is from 1995 or 1998, especially when that requires introducing all sorts of extra explanatory words to distinguish between the multiple dates.

The basic question is, why is a given piece of information included on the general work page? What is the work page for?

If the answer is just "some people like it, so we put it there", you'll just end up with chaos. Although I bet use of the reading date field would increase if you stuck it on there somewhere.

>8 jbd1: Things that I don't think belong on the work page:

a) Edition publication dates (certainly not so prominently!)
b) The whole Book Information box, though I know this is a lost cause. Incidentally, this *already* contains the publication date of our book, so it's even less necessary to show it again at the top of the page.

Member-specific things that I do think belong on the work page:
a) our title and cover, so that we recognize the work if we happen to come to it from a different page
b) the "members" section showing people on our lists--because this is social information about other people, even though it's targeted to us

Mostly I'm just worried about where things are going to go from the addition of publication dates. If the date of our edition of the book is suddenly the most critical information about the work, what other random things are going to take over the page next?

#12 by @timspalding> Thanks for listening.

I'm glad it's been added to advanced features; thanks.

The general work page is the main landing point for a work. It's what you go to if you follow a recommendation, search LibraryThing. It's the place you go almost every time you click on the title of a work, whether you have the work or not. It's the place you go when you click on a title in your catalog too. Direct links to the other pages are only available from the catalog, where having lots of different links for a single book is acceptable.

When you click on a work, and you have that work, your having of it is significant—the most significant thing about that work in most circumstances. It makes logical sense for users to have to go to some other page to find that information, but it doesn't meet their expectations. Logically the work is superior to the book. But, in users mind, the work is subordinate to the book—the book they have is the important thing about what's going on, with the work its connected to metadata about their reality.

I don't think it's top-of-page information whether my copy of Jane Eyre is from 1995 or 1998, especially when that requires introducing all sorts of extra explanatory words to distinguish between the multiple dates.

"Animal Farm (1945)" makes a lot of sense to people. It's how much of the world operates. Bibliographies. Almost every time a movie is mentioned online. Etc. The problem comes in that, when we make the top title YOUR title, people object to the 1945 date there, because that's not the date of their edition. So we add both, specifying work and edition dates. That seems to me a fair compromise between showing no information and showing only one or the other data. But YMMV. I think the feature is a net win. But not having the feature is also fine.

Well, I didn't reply before because I didn't want to tangent the thread even more. But I guess it's well and firmly tangented already. :D

I also have to disagree with Zoe's view that the "work" page should contain less information about your copy. As this new work page feature has demonstrated, you don't REALLY go to a "work" page when you click on a book. You go to a "if I don't have the work, then general work information - if I have the work, then book information".

And I agree with Tim that this is as it should be. Zoe's comment that the book information box shouldn't go there is really baffling to me. It seems that all this would do is add an extra click every time I clicked on my book (whether from home page, catalog, touchstone, etc) and wanted to set the collection, tags or rating. In fact, it'd add an extra click for me to even SEE that information (because if not there, where would they go but on another sub-page?)

It makes about as much sense as if you flipped it around and said that clicking on a work you don't own should take you to a blank page with a link saying "You don't have this book in your collection. Click here to go to the work page." Each one is just clunky and unnecessary.

Well, it appears you went ahead and scrapped the publication dates. While I appreciate you listening to users, sometimes I think it's a bit frustrating when you listen more to ONE user, as long as she badgers you often enough in every thread she kind find. ;)

(No offense to you, Zoe, I still like you. But it's kind of odd that your view seems to have won without much of a consensus behind it.)

Personally, I'm going to miss those publication dates at the top. A LOT. (shouting intentional)

I've moved the new page to the advanced box.

Well, it appears you went ahead and scrapped the publication dates. While I appreciate you listening to users, sometimes I think it's a bit frustrating when you listen more to ONE user, as long as she badgers you often enough in every thread she kind find. ;)

This particular change caused all sorts of irritation, from both sides. I think it stirred up the work/book discussion in pointless ways. I'm tired of getting needled about it and hearing from Jeremy that members are still bothered about it. I might reintroduce it in some other way. But I'm tired of the argument.

Just to be clear about my perspective on this: some members were still bothered by having dates at the top (some didn't like dates at all, some only wanted their edition date, some only wanted the OPD). I agree that the argument was frustrating and that there wasn't a good solution to it. I hope we can find some better way to display it. I think many, though, liked having the easy way to see OPD, and I agree that it's useful to have. Maybe it could return on the new "work-work" page, in parens after the title as it was?

#20 by @timspalding> Yeah, I know. Damned if you do...

#21 by @jbd1> Maybe it could return on the new "work-work" page, in parens after the title as it was?

By "work-work" page, do you also mean the one you land on if you don't have the work in your catalog?

>22 brightcopy: - Hrm, right. Dunno. Good point. Sigh.

#23 by @jbd1> Well, I'm fine with that. I just wanted to point it out.

But it's kind of odd that your view seems to have won without much of a consensus behind it.

What actually happened doesn't reflect my view. Nor does it reflect what Tim wants, or how the world works.

All of that would be "Animal Farm (1945)".

#25 by @_Zoe_> Fair point. But I didn't get that from your paragraph above. But I've sure you've explained in detail in other threads.

I've always thought a link to the work-only page should go here:

#27 by @saltmanz> Good call.

ETA: Though, on further cogitation, I wonder if that whole "Work details" section needs to be there at all now that we have the link in the advanced box that will let us see ALL the work info. I'm not sure how often you want to see just the work title and author that isn't worth clicking and getting the entire work page.

ETAA: And on even more thought, it's probably bad to put it there. Because now that Tim moved it to the advanced box and took out his whole "Combined page", etc. UI changes, going to the work page puts you in a bit of a funny state. None of the links on the left are bolded any more. And if you click "main page", you wind up back on the combined book/work page. So you're kind of in limbo.

All of this is to say that it might be best to avoid a "mainstream" link to a place that puts you in limbo.

Putting the "Work-only work page" in the advanced box is a fine solution.

More broadly, there were two data display issues that inspired the discussion of work versus book information. One was dates and the other was authors.

There's still no progress on the author side. My Encyclopedia of the American Left problem remains.

Regarding dates, I would prefer separate line with the original publication date clearly marked as such and no indication of edition publication date at the top of the work page.

I also continue to feel that the book information box is useful but overly redundant.

#29 by @eromsted> I'd definitely be for removing some of the redundancy.

I wouldn't mind if this:


became:


* When more than a certain amount of authors show up top, collapse rest into a "(show all)" link.
* Remove title and authors from your book info (completely redundant, since both are IDENTICAL to the top)
* Put "Info" header on publication line (matches what you get on someone else's book page and makes the info line look a little less out of place now that the authors are gone)
* Remove "Work details" for reasons outlined in message 28 (it was more important before we got the Advanced work page link)

>26 brightcopy: Yeah, I thought it had been pretty thoroughly discussed before. I can't actually manage to find the original thread, but here I cite polls of 26:3:1 saying it should be OPD rather than edition date, though only 5:15:8 wanted anything at all. I said there, too, that I thought the latter fight would have been winnable--showing just the simple OPD could have turned out okay--but it somehow got all tangled up in edition date. I don't even know where the idea came from that edition date is our personalized OPD.

I *still* think showing the OPD alone could potentially work out, if all the side arguments disappeared and the feature were actually finished (i.e., showed OPD even for books where it's entered in YYYY-MM-DD form--pretty much all popular, recently-published works). If Tim just said, as he did here, "It's how much of the world operates. Bibliographies. Almost every time a movie is mentioned online. Etc.," I don't really see what the rebuttal would be.

On a side note, I'm starting to lean toward the idea of work pages showing a more standardized title at the top, at least in most cases. It could still be a customized title, but not necessarily our *edition* title. Maybe canonical title in the language of our edition? Except there can be issues with canonical title even within one language (e.g., The Book of Negroes would suddenly become unrecognizable even though I own it. Also, "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone is an abomination). Still, it could be a solvable problem: how to show a standardized title while ensuring that the book is recognizable?

Anyway, I'm not sure what I think of the work-work page having information that's not available in any form on the main work page. I can understand sometimes wanting to show a different form of the information on the main work page (titles), and not wanting to add clutter by showing all forms, so it makes sense to be able to see what the default version of the page is. But I don't wouldn't want to have to go to a whole other page just for basic information about the work.

Likewise, the before and after for eromsted's example problem book:

 

Incidentally, the top authors is smaller--the font goes from 14 to 12--when it's longer. That won't help the American Left, though.

#31 by @_Zoe_> On a side note, I'm starting to lean toward the idea of work pages showing a more standardized title at the top, at least in most cases.

I could not disagree more. The fraction of times I want to see the work title versus my book title when I go to this page is incredibly close to zero.

And it would be utterly baffling to new users and old users alike. If Tim ever planned on making this change, I'd like some advance notice to start production on the effigies.

#33 by @timspalding> That is pretty incidental. ;)

Why, oh, why is the author information repeated twice in full? That's very non-incidental. It made more sense before you added other authors. Now, it just brings down the look of your pages.

In many ways, this thread just seems to be going back over all the same debates from the previous thread about dates and titles at the top.

I feel this hits the sweet spot of what most users want.
I'm not sure there's a consensus about what most users want.

I do think dates are useful information; I also think they looked bad at the top of the page. So I'm not sorry they're gone.

Ideally, and here I agree with _Zoe_, I'd prefer to have work-level info at the top of the page even if I have a copy, and my book's info listed elsewhere, secondarily. If we're never going to get that as a default (and it seems we're not), then I'd like to have an easy way to see work-level info prominently:
- The pink box should definitely contain work-level title, work-level primary & main authors at least, and OPD. (I'd also rename that section "work information" rather than "work details," since the latter is also the name of a much more detailed page.) But if that info is only in the pink box, it gets lost and swamped by all the other text.
- So I definitely want to have access to a generic work-level page, so I can see what the *work* looks like: how its title displays, how its authors display. (I'd like to know, also, exactly what URL I need to use to get to a work-level page. (The ideal way would be just to delete the book/XXXX bit of the URL to get to the generic page, but right now I think that will still give me my own copy. Instead I need to write /work/ at the end of www librarything com / work / NNNNNN -- correct?)
- Also, since it seems that work pages where I have a copy will still always default to my copy's info first, it'd be nice to have some indication when my info differs with the work-level info, so I know to switch over.

Why I think a separate work-level page is necessary: today I used this new view to discover that someone had changed the canonical title on a work I had, despite a disambiguation notice explaining that it wasn't what the person had changed it to. I noticed the problem right away when the work-level title was at the top (on the work-specific page), but I didn't notice it when the info was buried in the last line of the pink box, among a lot of other text.

>32 brightcopy:
That's certainly much better. I tend to use a lot of tags, so to save even more space I'd like to have the tags in the book information box be cut off at a certain point with the option to expand.

I'm of two minds about removing the "Work details" line from the box. On the one hand, I don't use it much and the info can be found by clicking on the new "Work-only work" link. On the other hand, it is sometimes useful for combiners purposes to see immediately if the work and book title/author don't match.

>33 timspalding:
A slightly smaller font doesn't help much for any book with more than 3-6 contributors.

37 - I definitely don't think the "work details" line should be removed. I do think, as I mentioned earlier, that it should be renamed "work information" to avoid confusion with the "work details" page.

I do agree with brightcopy, though, that there's no need to duplicate all the other author info at the top and in the pink box. What I'd prefer, though, is to keep the title and 1-3 authors, and put the rest in an *et al*.

Tim, on the work-level page, it would be nice if the left-hand navigation could have a link for "your book" if you have a copy. "Main page" for me doesn't make it clear enough that there's another version of the page for me.

I'm fine with the link to the work-level page being in advanced features. I still think, though, that *work page* and *your book* both being on the left would be good.

On a side note, I'm starting to lean toward the idea of work pages showing a more standardized title at the top, at least in most cases.

I could not disagree more. The fraction of times I want to see the work title versus my book title when I go to this page is incredibly close to zero.

In terms of actual usage, it doesn't really make much difference to me. 95% of the time the two titles will be the same, or at least the differences will be trivial. Agreement between my title and the canonical title would be even higher if it looked at the canonical title in the language of the edition.

It's more the later consequences that I'm worried about. The idea that the OPD somehow doesn't apply to the work when it's listed under our title still baffles me completely (Tim said: I think this is quite absurd--making a hash of book data by mixing work-level and book-level data). If the inclusion of our personal title means that it no longer makes sense to show work-level data there, then it might be worth it to sacrifice the title.

My own preference is still to include book-level data when there's a specific reason for it, but not if that means we can't have work-level data there too. Basically, I still see the work aspect as primary.

37/38> I can see that argument for keeping the "Work details" section. Even if infrequently used in the general population, I could see that being vital for people who do a lot of combining/separating.

But I think it's a good thing that the work details in the pink box gets swamped. What that means is that it doesn't leap to your eye if you're not actually looking for it. Which, considering how I think that section is used, is exactly what should happen. I just don't think many people care to have the work title jump out at them. It's just not in the top 10 most important pieces of info.

I don't understand much of what you are talking about here, but I have noticed that the OPD sometimes shows up and sometimes doesn't (in the work section), even when it is in Common Knowledge. I don't know if this is a bug. However, I do prefer to have the edition date and the OPD in the work section for my books, so thank you.

k4

> 30

When more than a certain amount of authors show up top, collapse rest into a "(show all)" link.

Yes, please!!!!

#41 by @krazy4katz> It's complicated, unfortunately. Sometimes unnecessarily. Of course, now it's all gone so I guess it's rather simple.

But one of the things that caused it not to show up is if an OPD was entered as anything other than YYYY. So YYYY-MM or YYYY-MM-DD would cause it to not even put the year at the top. Yeah...

43: But one of the things that caused it not to show up is if an OPD was entered as anything other than YYYY. So YYYY-MM or YYYY-MM-DD would cause it to not even put the year at the top. Yeah...

Thanks, brightcopy, that explains the phenomenon, I think.

k4k

I for one, will miss those dates at the top.

I for two, but I guess I'll live.

To me the concept work would much clearer if it was the original work in the original language. Translations are manifestations of the work. It is a little confusing that translations are works in LT.

>46 Nicole_VanK: I'll miss the OPD.

I am (as I said I would be) VERY UPSET that the OP date is gone.

I also want to second the sentiment (if not the exact wording) in brightcopy's message #18. I understand Tim's problems with ideas about design from users, but there are some people on LT who are or were system designers themselves, who try very hard to make suggestions that are function-based and will increase the utility of the system as a whole. There are other suggestions which come from less trained sources, which doesn't necessarily make them bad, but does make them fuzzier. It frustrates me no end that the carefully thought out suggestions are continuously drowned out in the noise of the fuzzier demands.

>49 aulsmith: I'd like to repeat my point in #25, that this was not a matter of actually listening to my feedback. Tim has a general policy of eliminating a feature whenever it generates too much negative feedback, without necessarily listening to the specifics of the feedback to see whether the feature can be saved.

Look at the example of the CR checkmarks: people didn't like the automatic connection of reading dates to CR, so instead of making that connection optional, he scrapped the whole thing and we didn't have functional CR marking for two more years. (Also note that I was perfectly satisfied with the original feature in that case.)

Similarly, look at the discussion of showing names on review thumbs (a feature that never even saw the light of day). People were generally supportive of the idea, but strongly disagreed with his *reasons* for implementing it, so the thread generated a lot of heat. Again, this meant that the idea was scrapped entirely, even though the disagreement was barely relevant for the result.

This is the "easy" route, but not one that I have a lot of respect for.

I also don't think that your point about who is or is not a system designer applies at all in this case. The matter of whether or not OPD and/or edition dates should appear at the top isn't a matter of some people giving suggestions that are too "fuzzy".

I feel like I want to say something about this but I don't know what I want to say. In general I think that the design of the site minimizes the distinction between books and works to the point where new users don't realize that there is a distinction leading to confusion. But I don't have any specific suggestions.

How important is it for new users to know the difference between books and works?

Well, in CK they sometimes put the year of original publication for their edition of a work instead of original publication date for the work as such. Things like that.

I'm still not sure I understand why all this is so problematic. To use a programming analogy, books are an instance of a work. There ought to be a work page, and there ought to be a book page for every book in that work.

When we click on a link from a specific library we ought to go to the book page for that specific book, and see the title/author/date details of that book. When we click on a link that is not from a specific library, we ought to go to the work page and see the consolidated details.

For convenience, the work page ought to note if you own a book that is part of that work, and allow you to click through to its book page. Likewise the book page ought to allow you to go 'up' a level as see the work page.

The problem with all this is whether work-level information such as CK and reviews should be shown on the book page. I see no problem with this at all, so long as it is clearly identified as such.

I too am unhappy that OPD is gone from the top.

It doesn't help that the EPD is shown more prominently than the OPD in the book detail box.

I made some polls, more out of curiosity than with any expectation that it would change things.

17> When you click on a work, and you have that work, your having of it is significant—the most significant thing about that work in most circumstances.

I think this is true of some people, but not all. Some people, and I include myself among them, don't really care what edition of a work they have in their library. We aren't primarily collectors, we're primarily readers and the most important thing to us is the words, not the paper.

So yes, for some us, I believe a lot of us, whether we have the book in our libraries is an important bit of information, but data from our books is not necessarily more important than data from the work.

Yup, I'd argue that whether I've read the book is more important than whether I own it.

> 57: I get what you say, and mostly that goes for me too. But, as a collector, sometimes I also care very much about edition I have (or want).

> 58: That's one way of seeing things. I get it. But in cataloging I try to get things exactly right - there are several "works" of which I have more than one version - on purpose.

>60 Nicole_VanK: I can certainly understand that too :)

#57 by @jjwilson61> I think this is true of some people, but not all.
#58 by @_Zoe_> Yup, I'd argue that whether I've read the book is more important than whether I own it.

But I think it's pretty obvious Tim was speaking in generalities, not absolutes. And unless he does some more scientific polling (sorry, but the Talk polling is just too limited to answer a question like this), everyone has their own "gut feeling" about what the majority of the LT userbase wants/needs/thinks, heavily informed by their own use of the site.

So when Tim has to pick between lots of people saying different things are what the majority of users want, he often just has to go with what he thinks they want. And, really, it's kind of a self-reinforcing decision. The people who like LT most are the ones who like the design decisions he's made, or they'll either leave or never sign up.

>62 brightcopy: Sure, but the more different perspectives can be accommodated, the more room LT has for growth (though I know many people don't see this as a desirable thing).

Anyway, I think I've figured out what my main problem with the work/book issue is. It's not that I don't want any book information on the work page (though I do wish we could customize the book information boxes), but that I don't want the presence of book information to end up pushing out the work information. That's largely what happened in the case of OPD: it was declared that we couldn't just put work information next to book information, and so plain OPD couldn't go next to book titles. The work data ultimately ended up being excluded because of the presence of book data, and I think that's a bad trend. I wouldn't want to see series go next.

A slightly smaller font doesn't help much for any book with more than 3-6 contributors.

When more than a certain amount of authors show up top, collapse rest into a "(show all)" link.

First, I want to emphasize that we can't make major site decisions based on things like this. Many of you feel very strongly about this issue, but I need to look to the site overall and overall only 0.1% of books and 0.05% of works HAVE more than six authors!

That said, I think the solution suggested is an excellent one—a display change, not a major UI revolution. The change is click-through limiting on authors, both in the heading and in "Your book informaiton." Basically, it now show only five authors, with the rest available if you click a "more" link.

Headline:



Book information:



I'm now reading my way through messages after that one.

Example: http://www.librarything.com/work/12639227

It is a little confusing that translations are works in LT.

No, translations aren't works. Works embrace all manifestations--to use the FRBR term you used--including the original text. The title of the work is indeed the title of the most popular edition, not the original edition. But I would also note that whether I look at the "uniform title" or descriptions of FRBRizing the Iliad, it's always The Iliad not Ἰλιάς.

This is the "easy" route, but not one that I have a lot of respect for.

I respect your lack of respect.

So when Tim has to pick between lots of people saying different things are what the majority of users want, he often just has to go with what he thinks they want. And, really, it's kind of a self-reinforcing decision. The people who like LT most are the ones who like the design decisions he's made, or they'll either leave or never sign up.

All very true. I try to adjust my understanding of user sentiment based on this--to realize that the people who talk tend to be the power users. But it's hard, I agree.

Finished reading.

Thanks for removing the dates after the title.

Thanks for making that author-collapsing change, Tim. (That sounds funny).

And while it's something that happens in a tiny percentage of cases, that also describes a lot of bugs. But when it does happen - oh boy. And it basically encourages people to munge their data (or just not bother entering it) to prevent the annoying display. Always a bad situation.

And while you might quote how it affects a tiny percentage of overall books, that's when you try to average it out over the whole population. I have about 30 short story anthologies. They have dozens of authors in each. So that's around 4% of my entire catalog of 762 books. And that's not even counting the comics, some of which are also anthologies and most of which have multiple people for writing, illustrating, coloring, inking, editing, etc.

Speaking of which, I REALLY wish there was an easy power edit utility for me to copy the work Other Authors into my books in a batch fashion. Those 30 anthologies with dozens of authors each are rather daunting. But the data is already all there in the work OA!

Example: http://athena.librarything.com/work/12639227

You mean

http://www.librarything.com/work/12639227

Thanks.

You're right about that tool. It would be useful.

#69 by @timspalding> Cool, glad I threw it in there. :D

Glad it's on your radar, even if not urgent or anything. It'd just be good to think I could do it easily eventually. It'll be more crucial when you get a chance to add more support to our catalog for searching/listing other authors.

As long as I'm letting the ponies out of the stable:

Another "advanced box" feature along these lines would be "Public view of book" (could go under "Work-only work page"). What that would do is take me to my book page, but like OTHER people see it. That's another one I find useful sometimes when I'm answering questions in BC.

Probably even more minor than needing to see the work-only work page, but just thought I'd throw it out there.

>64 timspalding: - I like it.

Thanks for collapsing the author list.

>64 timspalding:
Thanks. That's a big improvement. Although I still would like to have the distinction between primary and secondary authors for books in my catalog.

OPD is now showing under "Work details" in the "Your book information" section of "Main page".
It is NOT displayed in the "Work details" section of the "Work details" page.

Could it please be displayed on both pages?

Thank you.

>75 geitebukkeskjegg:

For me is OPD one of the most important information.
So I second geitebukkeskjegg.