The FictionMags Index Family
Change Log

The software used to generate the FictionMags Index Family is under active development. This page will discuss recent changes to the software, as well as some known problems (most of which should be addressed in a future release) and some thoughts for possible future enhancements. Feedback is always welcome on any features users would like to see added (or modified).

For a more detailed discussion of the v2 Index Project, and of the differences between the current software and the previous version, see the project log.

Recent Changes

• 31-Mar-2024
  • Several problems with aggregating items in the Names Index resolved, including:
    • Reprinted book reviews not linking to original printings
    • Problems where multiple items differed only in title additional (e.g. "An Interview with zzz" and "Interview with zzz")
    • Problems with items also reprinted in extract form
    • Items by the same author with the same title but different item types (e.g. poems and stories with the same title) are now sorted (and aggregated) together
    • Aggregated items with only a year for the issue data now correctly hyperlinked to the relevant issue
  • Fixed bugs introduced by tidying up the listing of edited items in Name Index
  • Editorial positions no longer listed in Title Index
  • Co-authors of reviewed books added in section for book author(s)
• 28-Feb-2024
  • Suppress listing of "gp" items in chronological index.
  • Book binding types ("hc", "lp", "ph", "pb" & "tp") now documented.
  • Title index tweaked to differentiate between authors of items and editors of items.
  • Handling of continuation lines in date-ordered indexes normalised.
  • Listing of edited items in Name Index tidied up to list editorial positions first, followed by individual magazine issues, followed by books.
  • Book type ("co", "pl", etc.) added to Book Contents listing.
  • Entries for uncredited items in the various indexes cross-linked to each other.
  • Variant versions of anthologies and collections identified by appending " (var. n)" to the title.
  • Square brackets used to distinguish company names and similar suppressed in item listings.
  • More duplicate entries in chronological index removed and sort order slightly corrected.
  • Subject listings tidied up to reduce duplicate entries and to truncate book subtitles.
  • Continuation lines in index by name enhanced to indicate when the items are no longer just "by" the person concerned (e.g. items edited by or about them).
  • Fixed minor bug where sometimes the publication year was omitted in the first line of a group of items.
  • Fixed bug in listing name behind pseudonym in series index.
• 29-Sep-2023
  • Modified title indexes to use expanded abbreviations for Dr., Mr., etc. when listing ranges of titles to avoid confusion about alphabetical ordering.
• 29-Aug-2023
  • Relocated list of anthologies related to a magazine to follow rather than precede list of issues
  • Standardised sorting of titles starting with "Dr. ", "Mr.", & "St. " as if they were spelled "Doctor ", "Mister " and "Saint " respectively
  • Similarly, titles starting with "No. " or "#n" are sorted as if they were spelled "Number " and an attempt is made to sort them in numeric order rather than collating sequence
• 29-May-2023
  • Removed distinction between artists and non-artists, thus removing both the Artist Index and the Consolidated Names Index
  • Some Index Names/Titles rationalised
  • Added permanent links for Series entries
  • Removed duplicated items from chronological index for items in columns/series
  • Fixed formatting problem with names of the format "The Author of xxx"
• 18-Apr-2023:
  • Fixed bug in dates for continuation pages for imprint-specific series index.
  • Streamlined the formatting of the entries for books from which items have been reprinted (e.g. removal of author name if same as main item; removal of empty fields; etc.)
  • Fixed a number of bugs in the chronological index.
• 9-Mar-2023:
  • Sort order for series changed to handle special characters in series names correctly (such as Ægypt)
  • Imprint-specific series now sorted to end of list and start on a new page
  • "By author" index for series expanded to list entries under each co-author where relevant
  • A small number of publishers have been added as imprint-specific series (e.g. Ash-Tree Press & Savoy).
  • Corrected handling of books edited under a pseudonym in series & chronological lists
  • Expanded dates of books to include month (where known) in indexes such as the chronological index
  • Fixed minor format bug listing uncredited editors of anthologies
• 23-Jan-2023
  • Links added between (selected) magazines and associated anthologies and other related books.
• 19-Dec-2022:
  • Fixed problem with "ed. " occasionally being prefixed to a list of other pseudonyms used by an author or to list of authors who used a house name.
  • Cross-references added to Books by Author indexes for "implicit" editors of books.
  • Cross-references added to Books by Author indexes for ghost-writers, names behind pseudonyms, and such-like.
  • Format of cross-references in Books by Author indexes tweaked so that titles are aligned.
  • Implicit editors now listed in contents listing in Books by Author indexes.
  • Subjects of books now listed in contents listing in Books by Author indexes.
  • ISBNs/book numbers added to Books by Author indexes.
  • Magazine Contents Lists realigned so that the tops of text and cover scan are aligned rather than the centres
• 13-Nov-2022:
  • Fixed problem with company names containing commas when used as author or artist names.
• 2-Oct-2022:
  • Fixed problem with date ordering in "imprint-specific" series
  • Fixed problem with "permanent" links
• 31-May-2022:
  • Fixed a couple of minor sizing issues in the auto-sized indexes for the Magazine Issues with Full-Text Links and the Biographical Notes.
  • New page listing "Newly Added/Improved Books" added.
  • Maximum files per folder limited to improve performance.
  • New mechanism added to allow "permanent" links to magazines, magazine issues and names in the Fictionmags Index.
  • Support added for "imprint-specific" series such as the British Library Crime Classics.
  • Series names are now listed in the Books by Author indexes
• 21-Apr-2022:
  • "by Names" index upgraded to include "see under" links and continuation pages in lower-level indexes.
  • Fixed bug in formatting of book details when author name included a trigraph that included a comma.
• 24-Mar-2022:
  • Support for Books added. It will take some time to add all the books in the underlying database to the index as the data needs a lot of tidying up, but this initial release contains 6000 books, including all the items previously listed in the Miscellaneous Anthologies Index (which has now been removed).
  • Index Structure has been rationalised with a single "by Name" index that replaces the previous "Stories by Author", "Stories by Date" and "Artists" indexes. See the document on the Index Structure for more details.
  • All indexes now auto-sized with Continuation Pages added where necessary, so indexes "flattened" to make navigation easier.
• 26-Jan-2022:
  • Added generic "Missing Issues" link to the Fictionmags Index
  • More spurious duplicate entries in Series Index removed
• 20-Dec-2021:
  • Fixed bug in links from Story Title Index to Story Author Index
  • Separate entries added to Series Level 1 Index if series listed by different types
  • Series Index page breaks added if series listing type changes or if series is overlong
  • Spurious duplicate entries in Series Index removed
  • Small number of missing entries in Series Index reinstated
  • Author sort order in Series Index tweaked to match order in Story Author Index
  • Option added to specify "primary" author(s) for a series so that, for example, in the author listing of Sherlock Holmes stories, Conan Doyle's stories are listed first
  • Problems with series listings split between pseudonyms and authors behind pseudonyms resolved
  • Added original byline to main series listings if not the same as the author name displayed
  • Count of authors in index corrected
  • Spurious trailing dates in (some) first appearance lines in Story Author Index removed
  • Problem with quoted titles containing single quotes subsequently reprinted under a different title resolved
• 25-Nov-2021:
  • Bad fomatting of story titles with %%A suffixes resolved
  • Uneven page sizes in Story Title Index resolved
  • Story Title Index now auto-sized
  • Magazine name problems at boundary of name changes fixed
  • Missing home link in trailer of some auto-sized indexes restored
  • Issue Contents Lists no longer allow page breaks between magazine header and first issue
  • For entries in the Series Index with multiple subgroups, the (about) link is only output on the first header
  • The group of items in the Series Index that are about the series now have [ref.] appended to the header
  • Sort orders in "by Date" and "by Title" series listings corrected
  • Difference between items in a series and items about a series rationalised
  • Handling of multiple cover scans for a single issue corrected
• 24-Oct-2021:
  • Tags added to all HTML headers to try to alleviate caching problems when uploading a new version.
  • Handling of special characters like ε resolved.
• 7-Sep-2021:
  • Artist, Biographical Notes, Chronological, Series and Stories by Author Indexes now auto-sized to avoid overlong or single line top pages for index.
  • Formatting problem for names like "The Captain" resolved.
  • Spurious entry for "{et al.}" in the Chronological and Stories by Author Indexes removed.
  • Indented sub-headers in Issue Index changed to nested list.
• 28-Jul-2021:
  • Handling of descriptive (rather then calendar) issue dates tidied up.
  • Problems with ambiguous links to GCP Website resolved.
• 8-Jun-2021:
  • Bug that output all the "Full Text Links" on a single page, rather than on multiple, smaller, pages has been fixed.
  • The file names have been tidied up and rationalised (this should have no visible effect but will invalidate Google searches for a while).
  • Missing hyperlinks on names in quotes fixed.
  • "Pub. Info" section inadvertently omitted from some magazines has been restored.
  • Spurious entries in the Story Title Index for items that are about an author have been removed
  • Spurious duplicate anchors on continuation pages removed.
• 28-Apr-2021: First release of new software

Known Problems

• The format of entries from the "Pub. Info." section of the Magazine Issue Listings, when displayed in the Story Author Listings, needs tidying up.
• The format of book reviews needs tidying up so that the authors names are hyperlinked in the body of the item title rather than being appended as separate references.
• If an item has multiple authors this currently results in multiple entries in the Story Title Index.
• The Inclusion of Pseudonymous Stories in Author Lists feature relies on there being a single definition of what the author's "real name" is; currently there are some problems in this area where an author was known by multiple names during their career (e.g. through marriage) or primarily used a name other than their real name (e.g. L.T. Meade or Robert Eustace). This needs to be addressed on a case-by-case basis so will take some time to resolve.
• The positioning of some of the notes in the Story Author Listings are less than ideal, but I want to review this whole area (where the code has grown very messy) rather than try to make too many other changes at the moment.
• If there are multiple editions of the same item under different titles in the index, then the item is listed twice in most places (e.g. the chronological and series indexes). This is non-trivial to fix but will be addressed at some point.

Possible Future Enhancements

The following features are being considered for future releases:

• Support for short story publishers like Tor.com - currently these are shoehorned in as if they were magazines, which they clearly aren't, so a better mechanism is needed for listing them without all the "baggage" of describing each one as a separate book.
• Better handling of series: Multiple series with the same name are distinguished by suffixes that are displayed (only) in the Series Index to differentiate them. Currently these are displayed even if there is only one such series in the current index so the intention is to check for this and to display them only when needed.
• Possible addition of "Full Text" links to the issue listings in the Magazine Issue Bottom Level Index (currently they are only displayed in the Magazine Issue Listings).
• Some pseudonyms are currently defined as being "Possibly a pseudonym for xxx" or "Probably a pseudonym for" - these are currently listed under the main author(s) in the same way as for ordinary pseudonyms but would probably be better linked to the , [?] section for the authors
• Redundant author cross-references. The database currently contains a number of "see under" links intended to help the user looking for a particular form of name when the stories are listed under a different form of name, for example "Adkin, F. J. Knight; see under F. J. Knight-Adkin". In some cases, particularly in the smaller indexes, some of these can end up next to each other in the index (e.g. "Adams, Bertram Martin; see under Bill Adams" in the WFI) which looks rather silly. An attempted solution was implemented for the CFI but never worked very well and has been withdrawn. Instead the intention is to allow a configurable "adjacency width" figure to be set for an index such that, if the target of the "see under" is on the same page and is within the specified number of lines then the link is suppressed.
• Order of ambiguous author names: When the same name is first found to have been used by multiple authors, a disambiguation is created in such a way that the "earliest" author appears first in the index. However, as more and more authors with the same name are found, it is currently impossible to maintain the chronological ordering so that some authors (e.g. John Campbell) appear out of order. A solution to this was designed almost a decade ago but not implemented.
• Named serial parts: Quite often a serial has both numbered parts and a separate title for each part but this cannot currently be handled by the data. A solution to this was designed some years ago but not implemented.
• Handling of Alternate Names. Currently if an author was prolific under both their maiden and married names a decision has to be taken as to which is the "primary" name and a full listing appears only under that name. I want to look at the possibility of providing a full listing under all such alternate names