- This topic has 27 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated June 24, 2013 at 9:33 pm by
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jschara wrote:I’ll add the language field.
I’m open to suggestions on the name fields. I added one for second author (for co-authors or the main author of an anthology (assuming it isn’t the FM member) — realizing that isn’t a complete solution either.
This sort of question always trips me up when I try to design a database. How to allow for the “outliers” without creating a huge, clunky beast with a zillion fields which will almost never be used? If there’s an answer to that question, I’ve never found it.
jschara wrote:I doubt it. I took the initial listing from our Genre Boards, and that’s where I left it. For the “sub-genre”s there, I think I’ll remove the hyphens and make those their own genre for the purposes of this exercise.Speaking for myself, I think I’d find that much less confusing.
If we go the language route, many are fortunate enough to be published in multiple languages, so I suppose a pick box would be best for that.
Help me compile a list of languages, please, everyone.
jschara wrote:And I’ve had a MAJOR glitch with the backend forms database that renders all my work useless until I figure out what’s wrong. I’m hoping it’s an “operator error” or “newby user” type thing that will be easy to resolve (like most of the other challenges have been with creating the form), but until I figure it out, this won’t see the light of day on the live site.Because of that, I’m definitely able to continue taking your thoughtful suggestions for the foreseeable future.
:ohmy: Ouch! You have my sympathy. Databases always seem prone to developing glitches.
At least for me, it is usually the index portion which blows up in my face, or linking to reference tables. Thanks for going through so much work for this. I’m not sure anyone who has never tried creating a database can really appreciate the sacrifice.jschara wrote:Help me compile a list of languages, please, everyone.Just major languages, or minor as well? (Two of the first that leaped into my head were Welsh and Gaelic…)
In the meantime, I’ll at least try to come up with as many major ones as I can think of.
Note: A few of these I’m listing are very similar – but since there are various cultural sensitivities, it may be best to list all possible choices. For a few of the more obscure languages, I’m listing the country in parentheses, just so you have some idea what they are.
If I inadvertently step on anyone’s toes, I’m sorry. These are all at least (relatively) major languages, with very few exceptions, having over 7 million native speakers. Of course, you could also add to this list on request.English
Welsh
Gaelic
Spanish
Portuguese
French
German
Barvarian (sometimes considered distinct!)
Dutch
Norwegian
Swedish
Danish
Finnish
Italian
Romanian
Hungarian
Czech
Russian
Bulgarian
Esperanto
Turkish
Hebrew
Greek
[strike]Chinese[/strike] Mandarin (Yes, I was a dunce… :blush: )
Japanese
Thai
Vietnamese
Hindi
Arabic
Bengali / Bangla (India – both names are used)
Javanese
Farsi (Iran)
Punjabi (India)
Wu (China)
Malay
Indonesian
Korean
Telugu (India)
Marathi (India)
Tamil (India, Sri Lanka, etc.)
Urdu (India, Pakistan)
Persian
Cantonese / Yue
Gujarati (India)
Jin (China)
Min Nan (China)
Polish
Pashto (Afghanistan, Pakistan)
Kannada (India)
Xiang (China)
Malayalam (India)
Sundanese (Indonesia)
Hausa (Nigeria)
Oriya (India)
Burmese
Hakka (China)
Ukrainian
Bhojpuri (India)
Tagalog (Philippines)
Yoruba (Nigeria, Benin, Togo)
Maithili (India)
Uzbek
Sindhi (Pakistan)
Amharic (Ethiopia)
Fula / Fulani (West & Central Africa)
Oromo (Ethiopia, Kenya)
Igbo (Nigeria)
Azerbaijani
Awadhi (India)
Gan Chinese
Cebuano (Philippines)
Kurdish
Serbo-Croatian
Malagasy (Madagascar)
Saraiki (Pakistan)
Nepali
Sinhalese (Sri Lanka)
Chittagonian (Bangladesh)
Zhuang (China)
Khmer (Cambodia)
Assamese (India)
Madurese (Indonesia)
Somali
Marwari (India, Pakistan)
Magahi (India)
Chhattisgarhi (India)
Chewa (parts of Africa)
Deccan (India)
Akan / Twi / Fanti (Ghana, Ivory Coast)
Kazakh
Min Bei (China)
Sylheti (Bangladesh)
Zulu
Kinyarwanda (Rwanda)
Dhundhari (India)
Haitian Creole
Min Dong (China)
Ilokano (Philippines)
Quechua (Peru, Bolivia)
Kirundi (Burundi, Uganda)
Hmong (Laos)
Shona (Zimbabwe)
Uyghur (China)
Hiligaynon (Philippines0
Mossi (Burkina Faso)
Xhosa (South Africa)
Belarusian
Balochi
Konkani (India)
Rajasthani (India)
Lao-Isan (Thailand)
Berber (Northern Africa)
Rangpuri (Bangladesh, India)
Sotho–Tswana (Africa)
Haryanvi (India)
Kannauji (India)
Makuwa (Africa)
Tatar-Bashkir (Russia)
Bagheli (India)I doubt it. I took the initial listing from our Genre Boards, and that’s where I left it. For the “sub-genre”s there, I think I’ll remove the hyphens and make those their own genre for the purposes of this exercise.
Yes, that makes much more sense to me.
Happy writing,
Deb Salisbury
The Mantua-Maker, Quality Historical Sewing Patterns and Books
www.mantua-maker.comThe Art of the Hoop: 1860 - 1869, Dress, Sewing, and Clothing Care Advice
https://www.mantua-maker.com/a---1860s-fashion.htmlDead Wizard's Loot: Wizard Whitewing #1
http://www.djsalisburybooks.com/Dead-Wizard-s-Loot.htmlLet’s go with the major ones that site members typically publish in. I’ve captured a few, but just remembered Tagalog, so there’s another one.
jschara wrote:Let’s go with the major ones that site members typically publish in. I’ve captured a few, but just remembered Tagalog, so there’s another one.To be clear, I’m not suggesting you necessarily add all those languages to the list. It was just an effort to give you all the possible choices to select from. (With the exception of Welsh, Gaelic, and Esperanto, all of those languages have over 7 million native speakers – and I do know that those three languages have a dedicated following: those who know Welsh, Gaelic, or Esperanto are perhaps more likely to publish their work in those languages even though they are obscure. I have personally known people who would go out of their way to do so specifically to promote the language in all three of those cases. Works are published in Gaelic and Welsh to a limited but very real extent; I’m not sure how much publishing in Esperanto is done purely to promote the language.)
The point is that, although I know of a few languages members of FM publish in (former or current; I’m not always sure of that) I am not sure I know all of them. They’re not always obvious: I do know we had at least one member whose native language was Finnish, which is not a language that would ordinarily leap into my mind. And once I started, I didn’t feel right about omitting some others just because they are – to me – obscure. I think we’ve had at least a few members from India – and I couldn’t even guess which languages they might publish in. On the other hand, as I pointed out, you can always add choices to the list later. I just thought it best to list all the major ones, and the three minor ones I happen to know of that have a passionate following, then let you or someone else make the decision.
One idea might be, first, to determine what the common languages are which agents look at when selling translation rights. Probably, all of those would belong on the list. Then, ask new members their native language(s) (and ask existing members to weigh in on this) so you can add those languages when we get members who are likely to be writing in them. Then again, I wonder if that is even likely to produce a skewed result. As an American, I’m sure agents would have a list of markets they might consider offering translation rights of my work to. But, if I were Indian, and wrote in any of those languages, or in English, I suspect the list of potential markets would prove very different. Likewise for Chinese, African languages, and so on. That’s why I wasn’t comfortable trying to edit that list myself.
I suppose you could try finding out what languages various major writers have been published in, and limit the list to those, unless a member requested an addition. Agatha Christie is said to have been published in many languages; perhaps she’d make a good start. Then add Salman Rushdie and a few others (I’m afraid I’m not as familiar with non-English writers) just to balance that out. If you like, I can try to put together such a list for you; just let me know the parameters (with the caveat that it will need to be a writer whose publication info is at least somewhat readily available in English if I’m going to do it.)
I plan to use your list. Thank you! I’ll alphabetize it and have English tagged by default, since I suspect that will be 90% of our entries.
The database problem appears to be resolved. Thankfully, it was something simple — an incorrectly checked check box. I’m going to work on solving a few cosmetic concerns. I think this is closer to being able to go live. Thank you for your suggestions.
Thank you for doing all this work. It’s a big job and I certainly could not do it.
I may be getting ahead of it all here, but I’m designing my publisher website right now, so this is on my mind. When all this is finished, will there be code to put up on my website to allow visitors to get at this database? Or would I just add a link to the database here on FM?
Whatever the answer is, it’s great. But, I eventually will need to know what to put on my own site to promote this.
–June
Great question! Unbelievably, I hadn’t thought that far ahead yet. I believe there will be a couple of options. I’m building a form view link on a tab, which will display the contents of the database in a fairly raw form. It will be searchable and sortable and exportable to Excel. I haven’t been able to figure out how to make it as pretty as would be nice. Additionally, Zette is getting a copy of each form submitted in csv format, so she can import it into a spreadsheet, and she has plans to develop some pages that have manipulated the data — all this is very nebulous right now, so I don’t know what will materialize.
At the very least, you’ll be able to link to the display. (If you’ve been peeking, the form for data entry is up now, but I haven’t advertised it yet — if anyone reading this wants to dip their toes in the water, feel free to enter your book information. I haven’t made the display live yet, because we want to make sure all goes well with the data entry.)
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