For a translation of an "book", would that be in an edition group or just linked to the work?
2025-12-18 35215, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Asking bc Harry Potter has 4 series, each in a different language.
2025-12-18 35231, 2025
jwillikers[m] joined the channel
2025-12-18 35231, 2025
jwillikers[m]
A translation will be a separate work linked to the original. It will also end up with its own edition group separate from the one for the original work, as far as I'm aware
2025-12-18 35248, 2025
Binyamin[m]
But there should be a single series, right? It's the same conceptual collection of works, just translated.
2025-12-18 35214, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Also, I though edition groups were for editions in different formats. The style guidelines read less like docs and more like notes from a discord conversation.
2025-12-18 35227, 2025
PaulBryan[m] joined the channel
2025-12-18 35228, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I believe each language should have its own series. It appears there are 3 separate Harry Potter Series in the database: English, German and Greek.
2025-12-18 35253, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Not sure what the 4th may be...
2025-12-18 35207, 2025
Binyamin[m]
No, that was a mistake on my part. Still, if I write a series of book in German, and you write a completely different series in English that would be two different series. I think the core issue here is that a "series" is just as real as a "book". There's not really a "book", just different editions with the same title and author.
2025-12-18 35200, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Yes, a series is abstract like a book, and in such a case should group a set of works.
2025-12-18 35218, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Also, I think end-users would find it much easier to location a single Harry Potter series, and then navigate by what translations each individual book contains.
2025-12-18 35246, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Hmm...
2025-12-18 35206, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
The database isn't (currently) designed that way.
2025-12-18 35228, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I suppose it might be worth making the case as a feature request.
2025-12-18 35229, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Also, if I'm a messy contributor, I might add a completely separate series for a dedicated audiobook run.
2025-12-18 35203, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I think if someone discovers a duplicate series, they would edit to merge to avoid duplication.
2025-12-18 35230, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
As audiobooks are just different editions of the same work.
2025-12-18 35236, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
s/work/works/
2025-12-18 35240, 2025
Binyamin[m]
full disclosure: I'm coming from the world of openlibrary, where many of the entities I saw created by bots. Sorry, did I say created? I meant mutilated.
2025-12-18 35240, 2025
Binyamin[m]
One of the reasons I love musicbrainz is that it's so incredibly structured, and you can downvote edits to hold people accountable. It's like Open Source Software, but for structured data.
2025-12-18 35224, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
We like structured here. 🙂
2025-12-18 35205, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Either way, I think the style guidelines should be clear on this issue. Where do I go from here?
2025-12-18 35209, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Well, if there is a Harry Potter series for the language you're dealing with, then nothing else to do there. Works in different languages call for different (deriviate) works. Those then call for their own editions and edition groups.
2025-12-18 35243, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
As for the guidelines, feel free to suggest changes to improve them. They're community-managed too, through proposal, discussion, etc. on Discourse.
2025-12-18 35214, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
The guidelines can definitely use a lot more work.
2025-12-18 35228, 2025
Binyamin[m]
discourse meaning the forums? So what do I do: post a topic, wait for someone to okay my change, and the PR on github?
2025-12-18 35245, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Yes, the forums. Generally you'd propose new/modified text. They'd be discussed, modified, and then when community consensus is reached, a PR on GitHub.
2025-12-18 35214, 2025
Binyamin[m]
At the risk of being a stick in the mud, why forums? GitHub allows people to propose changes to text, comment on diffs or the PR itself, even request a review from the people who need to approve the PR. Why do all that on a single threaded list of comments?
2025-12-18 35231, 2025
julian45[m] joined the channel
2025-12-18 35232, 2025
julian45[m]
that still happens if/when you get to the point of proposing a change, but the norm is to just... discuss the idea first with other people on the discourse instance
2025-12-18 35204, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Yeah, I guess historical? Many want to have a say on policy that are not GitHub users.
2025-12-18 35225, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Paul Bryan: That's fair. I just found it very confusing when I went to the forum. I'm not going to read through 2 years of comments, just to figure out what the currently proposed version is. Also, what's the status of the proposal: eg. was it implemented, or is it just stale?
2025-12-18 35228, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Yeah, that's cognitive overhead for sure. If weeks/months go by, it's probably stale. Not a great answer, I know.
2025-12-18 35215, 2025
Binyamin[m]
I just feel like the system is overcomplicated. Sure, you shouldn't put all your eggs in one basket. But here we need a metabrainz account for the forum, a GitHub account for PRs, a Jira account for the issue tracker.... Why? I feel like it's reinventing the wheel. Except that GitHub wasn't the first. But still ;)
2025-12-18 35222, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I have a somewhat different perspective, as I've soured recently toward GitHub due to Microsoft's machinations. So, there's something to be said about not having all eggs in one basket.
2025-12-18 35256, 2025
Binyamin[m]
No, 100% agree. It's just confusing.
2025-12-18 35211, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Also: All of this should be in a page on the website titled "Contributing"!!!
2025-12-18 35242, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I think the major disconnect though is developers vs. non-developers. Git[Hub/Lab/etc] is pretty unintuitive to non-developer contributors.
2025-12-18 35219, 2025
julian45[m]
Binyamin[m]: if i may offer a small clarification: although the jira UI doesn't make this the most prominent option, by and large most people log into the metabrainz jira with either their metabrainz account or their github account
2025-12-18 35253, 2025
Binyamin[m]
julian45[m]: ty. I assumed, and I was wrong :)
2025-12-18 35258, 2025
julian45[m]
it'd be nice if the single sign-on options were more prominent or the user/pass auth could be relegated to another page/a dropdown or something (can't get rid of it entirely because native accounts are still needed for admin "break-glass purposes"), but alas
2025-12-18 35226, 2025
julian45[m]
* it'd be nice if the single sign-on options were more prominent or the user/pass auth could be relegated to another page/a dropdown or something (can't get rid of it entirely because native accounts are still needed for admin "break-glass" purposes if sso is unavailable), but alas
2025-12-18 35229, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Okay, so if discussion happens on the forums, what's jira for?
2025-12-18 35253, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Issue tracking. More history.
2025-12-18 35255, 2025
Binyamin[m]
I just want to contribute ðŸ˜
2025-12-18 35201, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Most of the infrastructure predates GitHub.
2025-12-18 35208, 2025
julian45[m]
Binyamin[m]: agreed - i will chalk this up (but not inherently justify it) to bookbrainz being "in development" vs, say, musicbrainz, which has been around for *years*
2025-12-18 35235, 2025
julian45[m]
* agreed - i will chalk this up (but not inherently justify it) to bookbrainz being "in development" and publicly marked as such on the homepage vs, say, musicbrainz, which has been around for years
2025-12-18 35201, 2025
julian45[m]
e.g. bookbrainz doesn't necessarily have a stable api yet
2025-12-18 35204, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
Oh boy, over two decades!
2025-12-18 35216, 2025
julian45[m]
generally only one or two devs work on bookbrainz, and most of their dev time goes towards listenbrainz iirc
2025-12-18 35223, 2025
Binyamin[m]
julian45[m]: Okay, but there are forum topics from 2016. How many apps have started, grown, gone viral, and died in that time?
2025-12-18 35259, 2025
Binyamin[m]
julian45[m]: Yes, and I'd like to help. But I can't make heads or tails of the system.
2025-12-18 35204, 2025
julian45[m]
that said, i do think i understand your frustrations and i wish i could offer a magic-wand solution, but alas
2025-12-18 35220, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
I think we're all on the same page.
2025-12-18 35234, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
BB has very limited resources, unfortunately.
2025-12-18 35221, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
The hope is, one day, we'll reach a critical mass of data, that attracts usage to warrant more resource allocation.
2025-12-18 35240, 2025
PaulBryan[m]
(That's my opinion; not sure if that's shared.)
2025-12-18 35200, 2025
julian45[m]
i would say a *rough* outline of proposing a BB style change would be something like: -> post proposal on forums and ask for feedback -> if feedback is positive, start working up a PR and open an issue in jira so that it gets tracked there -> open PR -> work through it with BB devs to the extent needed -> assuming all goes well, PR is merged :)
2025-12-18 35239, 2025
julian45[m]
* i would say a _rough_ outline of proposing a BB style change would be something like: -> post proposal on forums and ask for feedback -> if feedback is positive, start working up a PR and open an issue in jira so that it gets tracked there -> open PR -> work through it with BB devs to the extent needed (e.g. assuming content of the change has already been hashed out, they might have minor nitpicks on code formatting) -> assuming
2025-12-18 35239, 2025
julian45[m]
all goes well, PR is merged :)
2025-12-18 35203, 2025
julian45[m]
* i would say a _rough_ outline of proposing a BB style change would be something like: -> post proposal on forums and ask for feedback -> if feedback is positive, start working up a PR and open an issue in jira so that it gets tracked there -> open PR -> work through it with BB devs to the extent needed (e.g. assuming content of the change has already been hashed out, they might have minor nitpicks on code formatting) -> assuming
2025-12-18 35203, 2025
julian45[m]
all goes well, PR is merged and jira ticket is closed :)
2025-12-18 35202, 2025
jwillikers[m]
[@binyam.in:matrix.org](https://matrix.to/#/@binyam.in:matrix.org) If I understand correctly, you are confuses on edition groups and series, especially around translations. Is that right? I contribute metadata to BB, MB, OL, WD, and Hardcover, so I think I get where you are coming from. BB is structured more like MB and less like the standard model used by GR, OL, and the like.
2025-12-18 35215, 2025
jwillikers[m]
s/confuses/confused/
2025-12-18 35256, 2025
Binyamin[m]
Yes. The way I think of it is, if the author created a website listing every single book they had ever written, how would they organize it? It's their books, they define the rules because they defined the books.
2025-12-18 35238, 2025
jwillikers[m]
So, most of the books sites out there are based on the FRBR model, which is from library science. This is what you'd be familiar with on OL, although most sites aren't a true FRBR model and are somewhat simplified versions of it. BB deviates from this model in that it treats translated works as wholly separate... (full message at <https://matrix.chatbrainz.org/_matrix/media/v3/download/chatbrainz.org/gDVttNbeEjDBMWuIICVvUmYP>)
2025-12-18 35229, 2025
jwillikers[m]
On Edition Groups, they are really just intended for different formats and versions of the same book, like the ebook, paperback, hardcover, and limited editions of a work. They don't include translations, which is pretty different from how most other platforms group together all "editions" under a single "book" or "work". Also, I highly recommend adding audiobooks to MB and not BB. BB is not nearly as good at handling audio data
2025-12-18 35230, 2025
jwillikers[m]
like MB is. I've had this discussion previously, and we think it would be better to integrate MB in BB to supply audiobook information instead of duplicating audiobooks in BB.
