From: SMTP%"LISTSERV@BINGVMB.cc.binghamton.edu" 1-JUL-1998 14:47:35.48 To: CIRJA02 CC: Subj: File: "INDEX-L LOG9805D" Date: Wed, 1 Jul 1998 13:44:29 +0000 From: BITNET list server at BINGVMB (1.8a) Subject: File: "INDEX-L LOG9805D" To: CIRJA02@GSVMS1.CC.GASOU.EDU ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 May 1998 21:58:20 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Nancy Ball Subject: alphabetizing foreign articles This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_01BD8503.916121E0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dear folks, I'm indexing a book which contains lots of names of artistic works written in another language. I triple post each work with foreign (original) title, English title, author as below: Der baal shemtov (The Baal Shem) (Brind), 188 The Baal Shem (Brind), 188 Brind, Nachin, 188 (works are included as subentries, if there are a bun ch of references) The English title is alphabetized without the article "The". Should the foreign title also be alphabetized without the article (e.g., under B for Der baal shemtov)? In most cases, I can recognize the foreign article, but I wonder if I'll hit them all? Any opinions on this? Thanks. Nancy Ball Nota Bene Indexing nball@kendaco.telebyte.com ------=_NextPart_000_01BD8503.916121E0 Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable


Dear folks,
I'm indexing a book = which contains lots of names of artistic works written in another = language.  I triple post each work with foreign (original) title, = English title, author  as below:

Der baal shemtov (The = Baal Shem) (Brind), 188
The Baal Shem (Brind), = 188
Brind, Nachin, 188 (works are included as subentries, if = there are a bunch of references)

The English title is = alphabetized without the article "The".  Should the = foreign title also be alphabetized without the article (e.g., under B = for Der baal shemtov)?  In most cases, I can recognize the foreign = article, but I wonder if I'll hit them all?  Any opinions on = this?
Thanks.

Nancy Ball
Nota Bene = Indexing
nball@kendaco.telebyte.com



------=_NextPart_000_01BD8503.916121E0-- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 09:33:33 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: TennWords Subject: Tennessee Regional Group's Web Site Grand Opening! Good Morning to All! The Tennesee Regional Group of the American Society of Indexers would like to invite you to the Grand Opening of its web site, all day today, Friday, May 22, 1998. Cyber coffee and donuts are available for everyone! Check out our chat room where we plan to have online meetings; the bulletin board where we will post questions and announcements; Tennwords, our online newsletter; and us, the Tennessee Regional Group. We are small, but we are energetic and it's contagious! http://members.aol.com/tennwords/home.html The chat room will be staffed at the top of the hour, from 11:00 a.m. until 8:00 p.m. to answer questions about the group, or just chit chat. Come join us! People from all different servers and Internet providers can participate. If you've been to Seattle for the conference, come tell us about it!! We hope to see all of you there today! Dawn Spencer Contact for the Tennessee Regional Group of the American Society of Indexers indexlady@aol.com tennwords@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 16:26:00 +0200 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: jgreene Subject: Re: Indexing process Hi Barbara, I am presently working my way through the SI Training in Indexing courses and the book you mention below is the second book in the series. At this point I am about to complete the test on the second unit and will hopefully move on to the third unit in a couple of weeks. I am also about to complete the USDA Basic Indexing course (with only the last two lessons to complete). I felt that in the USDA course the process of selecting index entries and developing them (through the use of cross-references and double posting, etc.) was not adequately covered. Unit B delves into this area more deeply. It begins by examining the intellectual process of selecting entries and the identifying the categories of concepts that are indexable. In one short section, five excerpts of different types of text are given with an index to each excerpt shown. In another section six professional indexers tell how they approach indexing. It is much like the thread "Indexing Process" which has been running through the Index-L recently and it was my favorite part of the text. Finally, another helpful section goes into the formation of headings, how to handle synonyms, antonyms, homographs, use of conjunctions and prepositions, etc. This last section also briefly explains the use of thesauri when writing an index, which I don't remember the USDA course covering. (This subject will be covered more fully in Unit D.) The remainder of the book was mainly a repeat for me (having read Nancy Mulvaney's book and Chicago Manual); it covered the formation of headings for different kinds of names and different formats of location references. At the end of the book is a self-administered test. I found it to be more challenging than some of the lessons in the USDA course which covered the assigned reading material--I had to search beyond the immediate text for the answers. One of the questions provides an extract of an index which the student is directed to evaluate, identifying faults and inconsistencies. This is an excellent exercise. Answers are provided for most of the questions. I liked this feature very much--it is a confidence builder for me as I learn my way through all of this material. Although I have seen subjects in the book covered in different places, mainly in Index-L messages and reprints from past "Indexer" journals, it is good to have them all collected into one place. I hope that my summary has been helpful to you as you decide whether or not to obtain this material. Regards, Joyce Barbara Mullinix wrote: > I have a question I think is related to this thread. Has anybody seen > "Unit B: Choice and Form of Entries" by Pat F. Booth and Mary Piggott? It > is advertised on the back of The Indexer (assuming you have received your > copy of the Indexer, of course). Since it is fairly expensive, it would > not be a casual purchase for me; so I was wondering if it is a good value, > whether the same material can be found in a less expensive resource, etc. > Is someone willing to do a review? > > Thanks, > > Barbara Mullinix > Beeline Index Writing Service > Emmitsburg, MD ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 11:44:32 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: nobility, indexing titles and names of Hello, all - Need a little help; not a big rush--index is due June 1. I am indexing a trade book about the Indianapolis 500 (Diane Worden... are you there? :-). It is most definitely not a scholarly book. The book has 400 pages, lots of pictures, and a few pages of statistics and interesting facts from each race (1911 to present day). The publisher wants every name of every driver, owner, manufacturer, engine type, chassis type, brand name, race car, auto parts manufacturer, etc., indexed. And that's about *all* they want indexed. I tell you all that to give you an idea of the audience. This is for people who want to look up a name. I have two royal drivers, referred to in the text as Count L. Zborowski Prince de Cystria How do I index these? Chicago Manual of Style would (I think) dictate this: de Cystria, Prince (CMofS 17.84 applies here, I think. And 17.106 for the alphabetization under "de", yes?) Zborowski, Count L. (also 17.84?) But... I can imagine people wanting to look up "That prince that drove in the early 1900's" at some point. How would you put the names in the index so this reader could find them? Would you add these three entries: Count L. Zborowski Prince de Cystria royal drivers or is that inappropriate? Suggestions? Thanks, Ann Norcross Crossover Information Services ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 11:47:48 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Wright, Sharon F." Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of It's only inappropriate if either the author or the editors object. Given the nature of the book, anything you can do to aid the user is fine. -- Sharon W. > -----Original Message----- > From: Ann Norcross [SMTP:norcross@IX.NETCOM.COM] > Sent: Friday, May 22, 1998 11:45 AM > To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L > Subject: nobility, indexing titles and names of > > Hello, all - > > Need a little help; not a big rush--index is due June 1. > > I am indexing a trade book about the Indianapolis 500 (Diane Worden... > are you there? :-). > > It is most definitely not a scholarly book. The book has 400 pages, > lots of pictures, and a few pages of statistics and interesting facts > from each race (1911 to present day). The publisher wants every name > of every driver, owner, manufacturer, engine type, chassis type, brand > name, race car, auto parts manufacturer, etc., indexed. And that's > about *all* they want indexed. I tell you all that to give you an > idea of the audience. This is for people who want to look up a name. > > I have two royal drivers, referred to in the text as > > Count L. Zborowski > Prince de Cystria > > How do I index these? Chicago Manual of Style would (I think) dictate > this: > > de Cystria, Prince (CMofS 17.84 applies here, I think. And 17.106 for > the alphabetization under "de", yes?) > Zborowski, Count L. (also 17.84?) > > But... I can imagine people wanting to look up "That prince that drove > in the early 1900's" at some point. How would you put the names in > the index so this reader could find them? Would you add these three > entries: > > Count L. Zborowski > Prince de Cystria > royal drivers > > or is that inappropriate? Suggestions? > > Thanks, > Ann Norcross > Crossover Information Services ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 08:32:53 LCL Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: David Leonard Can someone please post the price and ordering address for the following book? Thanks. David Leonard Barbara Mullinix wrote: > I have a question I think is related to this thread. Has anybody seen > "Unit B: Choice and Form of Entries" by Pat F. Booth and Mary Piggott? It > is advertised on the back of The Indexer (assuming you have received your > copy of the Indexer, of course). Since it is fairly expensive, it would > not be a casual purchase for me;. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:04:22 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: nicknames, indexing Also in this book about the Indy 500 (See my post about nobility for a description) I have nicknames to deal with. We have items such as W. H. "Speed" Gardner Travis "Spider" Webb who are later referred to as Speed Gardner Spider Webb I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as Gardner, W. H. "Speed" Webb, Travis "Spider" Does that seem correct to you? Chicago Manual of Style section 7.30 mentions the quotation mark method when writing about people, but the indexing section (section 17) does not say how to index this form of a name. Thanks, Ann (never voluntarily doing another name index thank you very much :-) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:12:30 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Larry.Baker@GALE.COM Subject: Re: Booth and Piggott book At the risk of sounding like a commercial, I find Amazon.com to be extremely quick and useful as a reference tool. I can't think of anything I wasn't able to find--either because I was interested in purchasing it, or because I need bib information fast. The Booth and Piggott book was listed as out of print. (The "Unit B" part of the title wasn't listed, but I found it by doing an author search.) David Leonard on 05/22/98 04:32:53 AM Please respond to "Indexer's Discussion Group" To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L cc: (bcc: Larry Baker/GRI/International Thomson Publishing) Subject: Can someone please post the price and ordering address for the following book? Thanks. David Leonard Barbara Mullinix wrote: > I have a question I think is related to this thread. Has anybody seen > "Unit B: Choice and Form of Entries" by Pat F. Booth and Mary Piggott? It > is advertised on the back of The Indexer (assuming you have received your > copy of the Indexer, of course). Since it is fairly expensive, it would > not be a casual purchase for me;. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:15:48 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing In a message dated 98-05-22 12:08:31 EDT, norcross@ix.netcom.com writes: > I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as > > Gardner, W. H. "Speed" > Webb, Travis "Spider" > > Does that seem correct to you? Chicago Manual of Style section 7.30 > mentions the quotation mark method when writing about people, but the > indexing section (section 17) does not say how to index this form of a > name. I think that's a perfectly acceptable way of dealing with nicknames. A form I have also used is: Gardner, W. H. ("Speed") Webb, Travis ("Spider") which uses nicknames as qualifiers to the "correct" name. Fred Leise Between the Lines Indexing and Editorial Services ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 09:17:00 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Pam Rider Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of In-Reply-To: <199805221549.IAA15772@powergrid.electriciti.com> My family members who follow this stuff assure me they would look up the last name and not titles. They tell me that would be a shared mindset. They know the family names. Trust me. They know the names. You should be very safe in following CMS. Pam Rider Trying to walk cheerfully on the Earth prider@electriciti.com prider@tsktsk.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:41:49 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SCTopping Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing Ann: The way you want to deal with Speed and Spider is fine -- race fans want to know. As for the royals, why not ask the editor to get the author's preference -- perhaps the author knows first names for them as well. Let me know the title of the book -- my son is a NASCAR freak and has begun to contaminate his "little" brother and new sister-in-law as well. Soon the whole family will be watching the cars go round and round....aarrgghh.... Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:47:07 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: names, first name unknown And another name question: What do I do with people who did something important, but we don't know their given name? "Two years later, when Rayfield filed bankruptcy, the special racer was sold to an amateur sportsman named Thompson. It was never heard from again." Thompson (purchased Hughes-Rayfield Special), 17-18 is the entry I have. Is there a convention for unknown given names? I found myself wanting to put in "Thompson, ?" or even "Thompson, *" 'cause it could be any old Thompson, anywhere. Too many computer books, I guess. Ann (Argh! Just received job #2 due on June 1st. From the publisher's cover letter (emphasis added by ME): "I don't think the index needs to be exhaustive. What I'd like to be able to find when I use it, are the NAMES OF INDIVIDUALS, and the NAMES OF UNITS... I would like the photo captions included in the index, so if someone is looking up [a NAME] they can find his photos." Oh well. I guess I'll have mastered name indexes here in a week or so :-) :-). ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 13:05:42 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: names, first name unknown In a message dated 98-05-22 12:50:09 EDT, norcross@ix.netcom.com writes: > Thompson (purchased Hughes-Rayfield Special), 17-18 > > is the entry I have. Is there a convention for unknown given names? > I found myself wanting to put in "Thompson, ?" or even "Thompson, *" > 'cause it could be any old Thompson, anywhere. Too many computer > books, I guess. That qualifier is what he did. It should more properly be who he was, i.e., Thompson (amateur sportsman) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 10:08:46 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sonsie Subject: Re: names, first name unknown At 12:47 PM 5/22/1998 -0400, Ann Norcross wrote: >Ann (Argh! Just received job #2 due on June 1st. From the >publisher's cover letter (emphasis added by ME): "I don't think the >index needs to be exhaustive. What I'd like to be able to find when I >use it, are the NAMES OF INDIVIDUALS, and the NAMES OF UNITS... I >would like the photo captions included in the index, so if someone is >looking up [a NAME] they can find his photos." Oh well. I guess I'll >have mastered name indexes here in a week or so :-) :-). Name indexes are a PITB. I'm tussling with one right now that was originally supposed to be all the names in the book...including authors cited in the text. Jones & Smith, 1983, should be indexed under both names, and of course some poor soul (me) must go to the bibliography for each and every occurrence in order to provide first names or initials. I spoke to the editor and requested that I be allowed to pull out the names of persons actually DISCUSSED in the text, and put them in the subject index, which makes much better sense to me. This would leave me with a "subject" index and an "author" index...much more usual in the social sciences. Of course, many of the "subject" names also are famous writers who appear in the "author" index when their works are cited. How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a "subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything back into one single "name" index? As I said before, name indexes are a PITB. =Sonsie= ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 13:40:20 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Locatelli wrote: > > In a message dated 98-05-22 12:50:09 EDT, norcross@ix.netcom.com writes: > > > Thompson (purchased Hughes-Rayfield Special), 17-18 > > > > is the entry I have. Is there a convention for unknown given names? > > I found myself wanting to put in "Thompson, ?" or even "Thompson, *" > > 'cause it could be any old Thompson, anywhere. Too many computer > > books, I guess. > > That qualifier is what he did. It should more properly be who he was, i.e., > > Thompson (amateur sportsman) Ah yes! So we have: Thompson (amateur sportsman), and Hughes-Rayfield Special ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 13:42:09 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Sonsie wrote: > > At 12:47 PM 5/22/1998 -0400, Ann Norcross wrote: > > >Ann (Argh! Just received job #2 due on June 1st. From the > >publisher's cover letter (emphasis added by ME): "I don't think the > >index needs to be exhaustive. What I'd like to be able to find when I > >use it, are the NAMES OF INDIVIDUALS, and the NAMES OF UNITS... I > >would like the photo captions included in the index, so if someone is > >looking up [a NAME] they can find his photos." Oh well. I guess I'll > >have mastered name indexes here in a week or so :-) :-). > > Name indexes are a PITB. I'm tussling with one right now that was originally > supposed to be all the names in the book...including authors cited in the > text. Jones & Smith, 1983, should be indexed under both names, and of course > some poor soul (me) must go to the bibliography for each and every > occurrence in order to provide first names or initials. I spoke to the > editor and requested that I be allowed to pull out the names of persons > actually DISCUSSED in the text, and put them in the subject index, which > makes much better sense to me. This would leave me with a "subject" index > and an "author" index...much more usual in the social sciences. Of course, > many of the "subject" names also are famous writers who appear in the > "author" index when their works are cited. > > How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a > "subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything > back into one single "name" index? > > As I said before, name indexes are a PITB. Agreed. :-) And I have to admit that I am doing this one cheap because it is "just the names." Live and learn. Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 13:46:49 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of Pam Rider wrote: > > My family members who follow this stuff assure me they would look up the > last name and not titles. They tell me that would be a shared mindset. They > know the family names. Trust me. They know the names. Thanks for the reader info; I appreciate it. Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 13:50:10 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of Wright, Sharon F. wrote: > > It's only inappropriate if either the author or the editors object. Given > the nature of the book, anything you can do to aid the user is fine. Thanks for the response. Given your post and Pam's, I'm going with the CMoS format, and one additional entry, "royal drivers," because the book uses the word royal at some point when referring to these two men. I will not use "Prince" or "Count" as the first words of any entries. Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:04:54 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SHughes512 Subject: Re: Access 97/web site HI, I just tried visiting the site mentioned in the new Indexer as a site built using ACCESS 97. I cant seem to get connected. Has anyone else been able to get in? I used http://www.stark.kent.edu/library/new/bydate_1.htm I typed it twice but maybe I did something odd. Sharon ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:19:19 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Larry.Baker@GALE.COM Subject: Re: Access 97/web site Works for me. Maybe try setting up your user preferences to allow URL site names to be automatic hotspots. Then you don't have to rekey anything... you can just point and click and you'll automatically move over to that site on the Internet. (Don't know how universal this option is though. I use Lotus Notes.) Larry Baker Larry.Baker@gale.com SHughes512 on 05/22/98 02:04:54 PM Please respond to "Indexer's Discussion Group" To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L cc: (bcc: Larry Baker/GRI/International Thomson Publishing) Subject: Re: Access 97/web site HI, I just tried visiting the site mentioned in the new Indexer as a site built using ACCESS 97. I cant seem to get connected. Has anyone else been able to get in? I used http://www.stark.kent.edu/library/new/bydate_1.htm I typed it twice but maybe I did something odd. Sharon ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:52:45 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: Access 97/web site SHughes512 wrote: > > HI, > > I just tried visiting the site mentioned in the new Indexer as a site built > using ACCESS 97. I cant seem to get connected. Has anyone else been able to > get in? > > I used http://www.stark.kent.edu/library/new/bydate_1.htm > > I typed it twice but maybe I did something odd. > Sharon I had no problem getting connected, but be aware that the site takes a long time (45 seconds at 28.8 connection speed) to load. If you have a slower modem it might seem like you weren't getting in. Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 15:07:41 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DStaub11 Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Sonsie wrote: << Name indexes are a PITB. I'm tussling with one right now that was originally supposed to be all the names in the book...including authors cited in the text. Jones & Smith, 1983, should be indexed under both names, and of course some poor soul (me) must go to the bibliography for each and every occurrence in order to provide first names or initials. I spoke to the editor and requested that I be allowed to pull out the names of persons actually DISCUSSED in the text, and put them in the subject index, which makes much better sense to me. This would leave me with a "subject" index and an "author" index...much more usual in the social sciences. Of course, many of the "subject" names also are famous writers who appear in the "author" index when their works are cited. How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a "subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything back into one single "name" index? As I said before, name indexes are a PITB. >> Well, yes, but if you do them routinely they become...a routine. The usual thing in textbooks (at least the ones I do--social sciences/humanities/education/psychology/communications...college texts) is to index all citations as well as other names. This has been discussed before, and I think it's legitimate--but in any case it's always done so there's no point in trying to argue your editor out of it. If there are just a few citations they're mixed into the subject index; if there are a lot they go in a separate name index (and you charge more). Names of people discussed (like Emile Durkheim) go in the name index too, but if you need them as headings in the subject index you can do that too. I end up with the name of the theory: Freud in the name index, Freudian psychoanalytic theory in the subject index. Remember that for the actual person the reader can go to the name index. But if the person, themselves, not just their theory, is an actual subject in the book, go ahead and put them in both indexes. (My opinion.) Now, about process. I've recently been rethinking this, especially about clever ways to use Macrex to make it shorter. I'd love to hear people's ideas and routines, especially for how to use software. For years I've been looking up the first initials in the bibliography (no, there's no way around that, just get used to it) and writing them on the pages by drawing lines in a bright color out from each name. I do this in the evenings, when I'm talking to my partner, etc., because it takes no brain. Then I don't have to go back and forth looking them up when I'm typing. I've heard that some people type in the whole bibliography first and then type in page numbers--haven't tried that yet! I do sometimes like name indexes because they give me a breather from scholarly brain-burning and I can work on them during what would otherwise be down time. How do other people do it? Do Mi ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 12:28:54 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sonsie Subject: Re: names, first name unknown At 03:07 PM 5/22/1998 EDT, DStaub11 wrote: >Well, yes, but if you do them routinely they become...a routine. The usual >thing in textbooks (at least the ones I do--social >sciences/humanities/education/psychology/communications...college texts) is to >index all citations as well as other names. This has been discussed before, >and I think it's legitimate--but in any case it's always done so there's no >point in trying to argue your editor out of it. If there are just a few >citations they're mixed into the subject index; if there are a lot they go in >a separate name index (and you charge more). Yes, that's the way I usually do it, but I usually don't also have extensive discussions of persons as well as their names as authors. I'm about ready to go back to the "old way" and just throw all the names in the name index; this is getting too complex. >Names of people discussed (like Emile Durkheim) go in the name index too, but >if you need them as headings in the subject index you can do that too. I end >up with the name of the theory: Freud in the name index, Freudian >psychoanalytic theory in the subject index. Remember that for the actual >person the reader can go to the name index. But if the person, themselves, not >just their theory, is an actual subject in the book, go ahead and put them in >both indexes. (My opinion.) Well, that's what I'm trying to do, and some cases are clear-cut (the person really IS a subject of some discussion, rather than just a series of citations) and some cases are just not. >Now, about process. I've recently been rethinking this, especially about >clever ways to use Macrex to make it shorter. I'd love to hear people's ideas >and routines, especially for how to use software. For years I've been looking >up the first initials in the bibliography (no, there's no way around that, >just get used to it) and writing them on the pages by drawing lines in a >bright color out from each name. I do this in the evenings, when I'm talking >to my partner, etc., because it takes no brain. Then I don't have to go back >and forth looking them up when I'm typing. I've heard that some people type in >the whole bibliography first and then type in page numbers--haven't tried that >yet! That's basically what I do...only I try to hire my son or get my husband to do the looking-up. That IS mindless work, but time-consuming...time I could much better spend wrestling with the subject list. I would not want to type in the whole bibliography first and then deal with page numbers...somehow, in the books I work on, there are always a few names who don't seem to be cited in the book, and a few citations for which there is no bibliography entry. I don't see where it would be a great time-savings, either, though if it were, I'd be interested in trying it. >I do sometimes like name indexes because they give me a breather from >scholarly brain-burning and I can work on them during what would otherwise be >down time. Well, there's always that aspect! Yes, the thought process is numbingly simple, compared to constructing a good subject index...and we do get paid extra for it. Maybe I need to remember that, instead of griping... =Sonsie= ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 17:27:13 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SCTopping Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Woof! I hope you don't look up Smith and Jones individually whenever they occur. I do name indexes all the time (I get social sciences a LOT), and I make the entry "Smith & Jones, 1998". When I have entered all the citations that way, voila! they match the bibliography. At least in theory. Then I print out the index, compare it to the bibliography (what an evening's entertainment!) and add the initials to the hard copy. From there, it's a matter of adding the initials to the file, deleting the year (Smith and Jones were very prolific -- they published in 4 different years, of course), and splitting the entry into its individual components. My theory is -- when you do one operation at a time, until it is done, the whole process moves quicker. By the way -- if you work in Cindex, don't forget to turn the edit propagation feature OFF before you split the entries into components! Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:41:39 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Brackney Subject: Re: names, first name unknown At 01:40 PM 5/22/98 -0400, Ann Norcross wrote: >Locatelli wrote: >> >> In a message dated 98-05-22 12:50:09 EDT, norcross@ix.netcom.com writes: >> >> > Thompson (purchased Hughes-Rayfield Special), 17-18 >> > >> > is the entry I have. Is there a convention for unknown given names? >> > I found myself wanting to put in "Thompson, ?" or even "Thompson, *" >> > 'cause it could be any old Thompson, anywhere. Too many computer >> > books, I guess. >> >> That qualifier is what he did. It should more properly be who he was, i.e., >> >> Thompson (amateur sportsman) > >Ah yes! So we have: > >Thompson (amateur sportsman), and Hughes-Rayfield Special Ann: I agree that the qualifier should say who Thompson was as opposed to what he did, but if he is discussed in one place only, I think I'd consider using the text of the discussion as Ann did, but putting it in a nominative form: Thompson (purchaser of Hughes-Rayfield Special) This way I could just follow the text and not have to come up with a phrase like "amateur sportsman" (which, by comparison, seems too vague and begs for a modifier -- which ends up making the heading longer). Michael ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:41:51 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Brackney Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of At 11:44 AM 5/22/98 -0400, Ann Norcross wrote: > >I am indexing a trade book about the Indianapolis 500 (Diane Worden... >are you there? :-). > >It is most definitely not a scholarly book. The book has 400 pages, >lots of pictures, and a few pages of statistics and interesting facts >from each race (1911 to present day). The publisher wants every name >of every driver, owner, manufacturer, engine type, chassis type, brand >name, race car, auto parts manufacturer, etc., indexed. And that's >about *all* they want indexed. I tell you all that to give you an >idea of the audience. This is for people who want to look up a name. > >I have two royal drivers, referred to in the text as > >Count L. Zborowski >Prince de Cystria > >How do I index these? Chicago Manual of Style would (I think) dictate >this: > >de Cystria, Prince (CMofS 17.84 applies here, I think. And 17.106 for >the alphabetization under "de", yes?) >Zborowski, Count L. (also 17.84?) > >But... I can imagine people wanting to look up "That prince that drove >in the early 1900's" at some point. How would you put the names in >the index so this reader could find them? Would you add these three >entries: > >Count L. Zborowski >Prince de Cystria >royal drivers > >or is that inappropriate? Suggestions? And at 09:17 AM 5/22/98 -0700, Pam Rider wrote: > >My family members who follow this stuff assure me they would look up the >last name and not titles. They tell me that would be a shared mindset. They >know the family names. Trust me. They know the names. And at 01:50 PM 5/22/98 -0400, Ann Norcross wrote: > >. . . I'm going with the >CMoS format, and one additional entry, "royal drivers," because the >book uses the word royal at some point when referring to these two >men. I will not use "Prince" or "Count" as the first words of any >entries. Ann and Pam: I trust that some and maybe even many readers of this book will "know the names", but I doubt that all of them will -- both the ones who aren't as much in the know and the ones who don't remember everything and/or won't be able to remember everything years down the road. I think I'd use all the doubleposts suggested. Michael ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 14:41:58 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Brackney Subject: Re: names: subjects and citations At 03:07 PM 5/22/98 EDT, Do Mi wrote: > >Sonsie wrote: > ><< Name indexes are a PITB. I'm tussling with one right now that was >originally > supposed to be all the names in the book...including authors cited in the > text. Jones & Smith, 1983, should be indexed under both names, and of course > some poor soul (me) must go to the bibliography for each and every > occurrence in order to provide first names or initials. I spoke to the > editor and requested that I be allowed to pull out the names of persons > actually DISCUSSED in the text, and put them in the subject index, which > makes much better sense to me. This would leave me with a "subject" index > and an "author" index...much more usual in the social sciences. Of course, > many of the "subject" names also are famous writers who appear in the > "author" index when their works are cited. > > How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a > "subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything > back into one single "name" index? Yes, Sonsie, I think it does matter, and I agree with you and Do Mi that both types of entries belong in a subject index if there are not too many citations. You prompt me to say that it really bugs me to look up a reference to a name in a subject index and find only a citation. In fact it bugs me a bit even to _see_ such a reference in an index and imagine it _might_ be just a citation! Looking for a way to resolve this problem I've come up with a suggestion: annotating citation page refs in a subject index with "w" for "work" or "works". I should think such "w"s would be problematical in a name or author index because they'd proliferate, but in a subject index I think they'd work well. How does this idea sound? > As I said before, name indexes are a PITB. >> > >Well, yes, but if you do them routinely they become...a routine. Turning darkness into light! >The usual thing in textbooks (at least the ones I do--social >sciences/humanities/education/psychology/communications...college texts) is to >index all citations as well as other names. This has been discussed before, >and I think it's legitimate--but in any case it's always done so there's no >point in trying to argue your editor out of it. If there are just a few >citations they're mixed into the subject index; if there are a lot they go in >a separate name index (and you charge more). > >Names of people discussed (like Emile Durkheim) go in the name index too, but >if you need them as headings in the subject index you can do that too. I end >up with the name of the theory: Freud in the name index, Freudian >psychoanalytic theory in the subject index. Remember that for the actual >person the reader can go to the name index. But if the person, themselves, not >just their theory, is an actual subject in the book, go ahead and put them in >both indexes. (My opinion.) > >Now, about process. I've recently been rethinking this, especially about >clever ways to use Macrex to make it shorter. I'd love to hear people's ideas >and routines, especially for how to use software. For years I've been looking >up the first initials in the bibliography (no, there's no way around that, >just get used to it) and writing them on the pages by drawing lines in a >bright color out from each name. I do this in the evenings, when I'm talking >to my partner, etc., because it takes no brain. Then I don't have to go back >and forth looking them up when I'm typing. I've heard that some people type in >the whole bibliography first and then type in page numbers--haven't tried that >yet! > >I do sometimes like name indexes because they give me a breather from >scholarly brain-burning and I can work on them during what would otherwise be >down time. > >How do other people do it? How about using a scanner and OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software to convert bibliographies into index files? I do this on old indexes of books to be revised when there are no electronic files of the old indexes available -- if the old indexes are good enough. Should work on bibliographies too -- especially on big ones. Good OCR software is important, however. What I have available to me in a colleague's office makes a number of errors that I have to find and fix, but not enough to make the process unworthwhile. Michael ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 17:44:10 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: names, first name unknown DStaub11 wrote: > > Sonsie wrote: > > << Name indexes are a PITB. I'm tussling with one right now that was > originally > supposed to be all the names in the book...including authors cited in the > text. Jones & Smith, 1983, should be indexed under both names, and of course > some poor soul (me) must go to the bibliography for each and every > occurrence in order to provide first names or initials. I spoke to the > editor and requested that I be allowed to pull out the names of persons > actually DISCUSSED in the text, and put them in the subject index, which > makes much better sense to me. This would leave me with a "subject" index > and an "author" index...much more usual in the social sciences. Of course, > many of the "subject" names also are famous writers who appear in the > "author" index when their works are cited. > > How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a > "subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything > back into one single "name" index? > > As I said before, name indexes are a PITB. >> > > Well, yes, but if you do them routinely they become...a routine. The usual > thing in textbooks (at least the ones I do--social > sciences/humanities/education/psychology/communications...college texts) is to > index all citations as well as other names. This has been discussed before, > and I think it's legitimate--but in any case it's always done so there's no > point in trying to argue your editor out of it. If there are just a few > citations they're mixed into the subject index; if there are a lot they go in > a separate name index (and you charge more). > > Names of people discussed (like Emile Durkheim) go in the name index too, but > if you need them as headings in the subject index you can do that too. I end > up with the name of the theory: Freud in the name index, Freudian > psychoanalytic theory in the subject index. Remember that for the actual > person the reader can go to the name index. But if the person, themselves, not > just their theory, is an actual subject in the book, go ahead and put them in > both indexes. (My opinion.) > > Now, about process. I've recently been rethinking this, especially about > clever ways to use Macrex to make it shorter. I'd love to hear people's ideas > and routines, especially for how to use software. For years I've been looking > up the first initials in the bibliography (no, there's no way around that, > just get used to it) and writing them on the pages by drawing lines in a > bright color out from each name. I do this in the evenings, when I'm talking > to my partner, etc., because it takes no brain. Then I don't have to go back > and forth looking them up when I'm typing. I've heard that some people type in > the whole bibliography first and then type in page numbers--haven't tried that > yet! > Geeee, you have a bibliography? :-) I think my index for this Indy 500 book *is* the bibliography. I am having to resolve things like: Meyer, Louis Meyer, Lou Meyer, L. P. Meyer, "Large Louis" Meyer, Louie Meyers, Louis Meier, Lou etc, etc (I made some of those up, but this is what the book is like--very chatty and full of this sort of naming inconsistencies and typos). > I do sometimes like name indexes because they give me a breather from > scholarly brain-burning and I can work on them during what would otherwise be > down time. True. I've gone through and highlighted all the names of people in geren, cars in pink, and interesting Speedway facts in blue. Now I'm just typng. Now the bad news. I just talked to the editor, and we have THREE PAGES FOR THE INDEX. THREE. PAGES. I have finished indexing 91 pages of text; I have 2,114 entries in Cindex. My brain has just exploded. Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 16:13:57 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: name index techniques (Was re: names, first name unknown) In-Reply-To: <199805222129.OAA17168@pacific.net> Sandy wrote: >My theory is -- when you >do one operation at a time, until it is done, the whole process moves quicker. I agree, and I work on just these kinds of analyses of my work process. What's great about talking to others about their analyses, though, is that there are so many ways to conceive of a task and what constitutes each operation to complete it. I believe I'll try your method next time, simply because name indexes drive me crazy any way I've tried them. Not because they are hard to do, but because they are so extremely tedious, time consuming, and well... clerical. I do really like that your method addresses the issue of having to look up the same citation more than once. I have in fact both typed in the old bibliography and have had scanned the old names index, marked the initials on the pages, and then entered the page numbers into the file I'd already created. All of those steps create problems. I can see that splitting the citations would be something of a pain, but not having to retype the page numbers would be a time saver as well. Then, working with automatic sort turned off (in Macrex), I could go through the file a line at a time, with the software combining all the identical name entries at the end. Thank you for sharing your method -- now I'm almost looking forward to my next names index! Best, Victoria P.S. Sandy -- it was fun doing the Mystery Theater with you in Seattle. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 19:34:58 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: names, first name unknown In a message dated 98-05-22 15:10:27 EDT, DStaub11@AOL.COM writes: > Names of people discussed (like Emile Durkheim) go in the name index too, > but > if you need them as headings in the subject index you can do that too. I end > up with the name of the theory: Freud in the name index, Freudian > psychoanalytic theory in the subject index. Remember that for the actual > person the reader can go to the name index. But if the person, themselves, > not > just their theory, is an actual subject in the book, go ahead and put them > in > both indexes. (My opinion.) One thing I do in these cases is include a cross-reference: Freud, Sigmund. See Freduian psychoanalytic theory in subject index I have references going in both directions from name to subject index and subject index to name index when necessary. Fred Leise Between the LInes Indexing and Editorial Services ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 18:57:54 +0100 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "J. Naomi Linzer" Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing In-Reply-To: <199805221608.JAA12559@neti.saber.net> I am working (volunteering) on a project to help "index" the 12 volumes of papers used to write a history of Southern Humboldt (CA). I was told to write names with nicknames as first names as: Dirty Face Rider Easy Thompson because "this is the way people will have known them." As far as I can tell nothing will be double posted (except perhaps by accident). This is strictly a project coordinated by the head-of-volunteers at the main branch of the public library and organized by the "indexer" of the local historical society's magazine. I volunteered just to start to get my feet wet somehow while I am working on the USDA course. I am going with the flow on this one and plan to meet the "indexer" from the historical society at some point to find out more about his methodology and so forth. Otherwise, I am not organized to ask questions nor do I get feedback from my entries as I submit them. My question is, does anyone else, besides Michael (so far) think that it is appropriate to list an entry this way (especially if it is not going to have a double posting)? Up to this moment I thought it was frustrating to do just names, place names and subjects with no qualifies, sub-entries and so forth. Now, based on this thread, it seems there is a whole genre of this type of index. Is this true? >Also in this book about the Indy 500 (See my post about nobility for a >description) I have nicknames to deal with. We have items such as > >W. H. "Speed" Gardner >Travis "Spider" Webb > >who are later referred to as > >Speed Gardner >Spider Webb > >I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as > >Gardner, W. H. "Speed" >Webb, Travis "Spider" > >Does that seem correct to you? Chicago Manual of Style section 7.30 >mentions the quotation mark method when writing about people, but the >indexing section (section 17) does not say how to index this form of a >name. > >Thanks, >Ann (never voluntarily doing another name index thank you very much >:-) ******************************************************************************** J. Naomi Linzer, Humboldt County, CA Please note my new e-mail address: jnlinzer@saber.net * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "And in such indexes, although small pricks to their subsequent volumes, there is seen the baby figure of the giant mass of things to come at large." William Shakespeare: "Troilus and Cressida" ******************************************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 22:49:19 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: CorofinInd Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing > I am working (volunteering) on a project to help "index" the 12 volumes of > papers used to write a history of Southern Humboldt (CA). I was told to > write names with nicknames as first names as: > > Dirty Face Rider > Easy Thompson > > because "this is the way people will have known them." As far as I can tell > nothing will be double posted (except perhaps by accident). > My question is, does anyone else, besides Michael (so far) think that it is > appropriate to list an entry this way (especially if it is not going to > have a double posting)? ARRGH! Polish up your diplomatic skills for negotiating with the head of the project, because indexing under nicknames only will drive some of your users crazy. Me, for example. I know I had a relative named Edmondston or Edmonson who lived near Ferndale. I don't know his given name, much less any nicknames he had, but I would be very interested in anything your history had to say about him. Other geneaological researchers would also want surnames listed. AACR2 calls for the entry of a nickname (e.g. Calamity Jane) in direct order, but even then calls for a cross-reference from "Jane, Calamity) Janet Russell P.S. If you do run across my Uncle Edmonston in the course of your work, please let me know. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 19:52:29 LCL Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Kari J. Bero" Subject: Warning, difficult client Over the last two days, someone needing an indexer for a college textbook on "marriage and the family" has been turned down by two indexers specifically because of his attitude and difficult personality (though he wasn't told that this was the reason for the decisions). If you are contacted by someone about a project fitting this description, and you would like more information on the situation, please feel free to contact me privately. -Kari -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Kari J. Bero Bero-West Indexing Services indexwest@mindspring.com http://www.mindspring.com/~indexwest/ 3722 Beach Drive SW, Suite 101 Seattle, WA 98116-3000 206-937-3673 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 May 1998 01:00:21 -0700 Reply-To: Elinor Lindheimer Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Elinor Lindheimer Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing Naomi was told to index people with nicknames as first names under their first name. That's fine, if the powers that be want it--but they must also put the names under the last names, since some researchers might well look there. Even if "people will have known them" as "Dirty Face Rider" and "Easy Thompson," they might still look first under "Rider" or "Thompson." If there are subentries, I'd cross reference from "Dirty Face" and "Easy" to the last names. But if the entries are short, I'd double post. Naomi, you can tell the people in charge that your professional colleagues agree! Best, Elinor Lindheimer elinorl@mcn.org ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 May 1998 09:16:18 +0900 Reply-To: stroud@mail.netvigator.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Christine Headley and Adrian Walker-Smith Subject: Re: nobility, indexing titles and names of >From Christine Headley Ann Norcross wrote: > > I'm going with the > CMoS format, and one additional entry, "royal drivers," because the > book uses the word royal at some point when referring to these two > men. I will not use "Prince" or "Count" as the first words of any > entries. It's a pity the book has got the terminology wrong. They aren't royal. Princes are royal in England, but we don't have counts. (Earls are roughly equivalent, but there are important differences.) In Russia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, all a prince's children were princes and all a count's children were counts. Leo Tolstoy was not the oldest son, and all his brothers were counts too. All those princes and counts in 'War and Peace' had princes and counts for brothers as well. I used to work for an Austrian Count at Weidenfeld in London. So a Prince xx Romanov or xx Habsburg would be royal (possibly a few generations back), but the Romanovs were particularly generous with creating them and, I'm sorry to say, others aren't royal. Great Britain has been much meaner, only the eldest son inherits the title and other hereditary honorifics - the 'Lord' in Lord John Russell meant he was the son of an earl, lesser nobles have 'honourable' children - only pass to one generation. The Queen has cut down on future princes and princesses; Princess Anne's husband was always plain 'Captain' (his army rank) and their children have no more title than I do. There's nothing you can do about this in the index, and the motor-racers of this world probably won't care too much, but I would severely mark down a more social-science book that got it wrong. Best Christine Hong Kong ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 May 1998 20:02:47 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DP1301 Subject: dictionary software, foreign language Dear Collected Wisdom, I have a friend who works in the (U.S.) foreign service and will be posted to Uzbekistan in a few months. Since she is already fluent in Russian, she is learning Uzbek instead. She's finding it's usually the Uzbeks who learn English and not the other way around -- there are Uzbek>English dictionaries, but no English>Uzbeck. As we were discussing the usual "so what does indexing software _do_?" I discovered she's been trying to construct her own Uzbek>English dictionary. It needs to have the capability of using the Uzbek font for the Uzbek words, and any English font for the English definition, and be able to do Uzbek alpha order - a Cyrillic alphabet. Any ideas about where to look this one up? Thanks, Deborah ==================== Deborah Patton, Indexer Baltimore, MD dp1301@aol.com 410/243-4688 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 May 1998 21:39:16 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Anntrue Subject: Re: Last Indexing Lesson (Was Indexing Process) You can bet I "made" considerably less than min. wage on that Lesson 10, but I spent less than 3 mos on it, anyway. ;-) (Not having done my first *real* index yet, I can afford to feel cocky.) anntrue@aol.com (Ann Truesdale) ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 06:18:11 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Martha Osgood Subject: Re: Back in the saddle again... In-Reply-To: <199805211649.JAA05464@smtp4.teleport.com> >Martha Osgood wrote: > > >1. The book has footnotes in numerical order beginning anew in each > >chapter. The discussion of X is on page 158, and a footnote with further > >information is also on page 158. I am indexing them as notes (158n17), but > >since they are on the same page as the main discussion, do I need to really > >do this? >> > >Sandy wrote: >numbers.> >Actually, in the scholarly books that I do (what field is this book in, >Martha?) the publishers usually (actually, always) want endnote numbers >specified. In fact, this is rarely a decision I get to make myself! I think if >they ever left it to me I would go ahead and specify--a note page is usually >much denser than the text and it gives the reader a little extra help. >Tradeoff: the index looks a little messier. But maybe I would be inclined to >do this because I'm so used to it! Hi, Do Mi It's another religion book (this time an interesting, scholarly attack on the Trinity - not by an atheist, as I had first thought, but by a Georgia fundamentalist--with the title Sir in his name). His footnotes (not endnotes) are mostly simple cites for the quote in the text, but sometimes they have more substance (up to two sentences, maybe 2-6 items for the index). He seldom has more than one or two footnotes on a page. His publisher is asking for the book to be camera-ready on 8.5x11, 1.5 spaced pages, then will shoot it, slightly reduced, for the printing process. Iam working, as I go, on the actual wording I want to understand for the Meta-topic. This concept is So Useful that even if I'd gained little else, your Conference class would have paid for itself many times over just for teaching me how to use this idea. Your experience is a treasure. Martha ___________________________________ Martha Osgood Back Words Indexing index@teleport.com www.teleport.com/~index ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 09:33:47 -0700 Reply-To: JEANMIDD@prodigy.net Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: JEANMIDD Organization: Prodigy Internet Subject: Indexing Software I submitted this question to the group here during the Seattle conference but did not get any answers except from one other person who was also a beginner and interested in the same thing. She suggested I might resubmit my question since most of you were attending the conference and were not reading e-mail. I am new to indexing and just getting ready to learn and take classes. Some of you have already given me some very good advice on how to approach indexing. My specific question is Do any of you use IndexAid2 (for DOS)? The information I received sounded impressive (reviews and testimonials), but the information did come from Santa Barbara Software, the maker. I have also been considering wINDEx and Sky Index. In fact, I downloaded the Sky Index demo software and took the tutorial. However, I have nothing to compare it with yet. After I am sure indexing is what I want to do, I plan to invest in the professional version of my chosen software package. BTW, I am enjoying "lurking" and getting ideas from your questions and answers on Index-L of the issues that confront an indexer. I would also be interested in knowing how a word processing program, such as Word97, can be used for preparing an index for a nonelectronic document. Thanks for your help. Jean Middleton ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 16:04:22 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DStaub11 Subject: Re: notes Martha wrote: << His footnotes (not endnotes) are mostly simple cites for the quote in the text, but sometimes they have more substance (up to two sentences, maybe 2-6 items for the index). He seldom has more than one or two footnotes on a page. >> Oh, footnotes! In that case Sandy's right--don't give them numbers, and if the editor will let you, don't even specify the notes. (i.e. just index the page number). I'm glad the workshop was helpful! Do Mi ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 15:12:13 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing In-Reply-To: <199805230416.XAA21797@mixcom.mixcom.com> >I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as > >Gardner, W. H. "Speed" >Webb, Travis "Spider" The only thing I do differently is put the nicknames in parens.: Gardner, W. H. ("Speed") Webb, Travis ("Spider") I don't have any well-worked-out reason for doing it this way except that the parens suggests that you call the person either W. H. Gardner or Speed Gardner (or just Speed), but not W. H. Speed Gardner. Cheers, Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 15:24:15 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: alphabetizing foreign articles In-Reply-To: <199805230416.XAA21797@mixcom.mixcom.com> >I'm indexing a book which contains lots of names of artistic works written >in another language. I triple post each work with foreign (original) >title, English title, author as below: > > Der baal shemtov (The Baal Shem) (Brind), 188 > The Baal Shem (Brind), 188 > Brind, Nachin, 188 (works are included as subentries, if there are >a bunch >of references) > The academic presses I work for want me to ignore articles, whether in English or other languages. There's a terrific table of articles in Wellisch's _Indexing from A to Z_ (p. 190). Russian doesn't have any (so it's not listed in the table. Cheers, Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 15:24:05 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: names, first name unknown In-Reply-To: <199805230416.XAA21797@mixcom.mixcom.com> >How am I going to alert readers that Emile Durkheim is discussed as a >"subject" AND as an "author"? Does it matter? Should I just lump everything >back into one single "name" index? > It's bad enough that there are two indexes. Why have the reader have to look in two places for the names? Readers who don't know that Durkheim is also an author won't even know to look in the subject index. I would put *all* the personal names in the name index only. >Woof! I hope you don't look up Smith and Jones individually whenever they >occur. I do name indexes all the time (I get social sciences a LOT), and I >make the entry "Smith & Jones, 1998". When I have entered all the citations >that way, voila! they match the bibliography. At least in theory. So there'd be no entry at all for Jones?!! Ouch! Cheers, Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 18:52:03 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing Carol Roberts wrote: > > >I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as > > > >Gardner, W. H. "Speed" > >Webb, Travis "Spider" > > The only thing I do differently is put the nicknames in parens.: > > Gardner, W. H. ("Speed") > Webb, Travis ("Spider") > > I don't have any well-worked-out reason for doing it this way except that > the parens suggests that you call the person either W. H. Gardner or Speed > Gardner (or just Speed), but not W. H. Speed Gardner. Thanks; you are the second person to suggest this, and I have switched all the references. Now we just have the little, teensy problem of three pages allowed for the index and 3000 (I'm not kidding) name entries. Sheesh. I'm thinking 4 point type and an included magnifying glass... kinda like the Oxford Dictionary, yes? Ann (just kidding. I really don't know what I'm going to do. I'm putting in all the names and letting the editor figure it out. I've already cut out all the good stuff--car makes and models, car "Special" names, sponsoring companies, interesting facts about the Speedway, fatalities, etc, etc. Now it's just names. And it's still too long.) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 00:08:09 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Barry Koffler Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing In-Reply-To: <199805221609.MAA14525@ulster.net> Sounds right. That's how I've handled names and nicknames in baseball books and it was well-received. And that "chatty" bit about all the forms of Lou Meyer - I had to deal with that stuff too, and it was a PITB!! >Also in this book about the Indy 500 (See my post about nobility for a >description) I have nicknames to deal with. We have items such as > >W. H. "Speed" Gardner >Travis "Spider" Webb > >who are later referred to as > >Speed Gardner >Spider Webb > >I am planning to index all occurances of these guys as > >Gardner, W. H. "Speed" >Webb, Travis "Spider" > >Does that seem correct to you? Chicago Manual of Style section 7.30 >mentions the quotation mark method when writing about people, but the >indexing section (section 17) does not say how to index this form of a >name. > >Thanks, >Ann (never voluntarily doing another name index thank you very much >:-) -Barry oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo barkof@ulster.net Barry Koffler mid-Hudson Valley, NY the FeatherSite at http://www.feathersite.com/ lead me not into temptation . . . I can find it myself. oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 17:37:48 +1000 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Jonathan Jermey and Glenda Browne Subject: Book packagers - Australian, and money paid for indexes Hi, A while back there was a discussion on Index-L about book packagers (who organise all aspects of book production for publishers). I thought this was irrelevant to Australians - until now. I would be interested to hear from any Australians who have worked for book packagers, and to know from them, and others, whether this has had any effect on the price paid for indexes. Glenda. =================================== Jonathan Jermey and Glenda Browne Indexing, PC Training, Web Page Authoring http://www.users.bigpond.com/Diagonal Diagonal@bigpond.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 20:17:35 +1000 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Jonathan Jermey and Glenda Browne Subject: 3000 names in four pages In-Reply-To: <04083543654841@domain1.bigpond.com> > Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 18:52:03 -0400 > From: Ann Norcross > Subject: Re: nicknames, indexing > ... > Now we just have the little, teensy problem of > three pages allowed for the index and 3000 (I'm not kidding) name > entries. Sheesh. I'm thinking 4 point type and an included > magnifying glass... kinda like the Oxford Dictionary, yes? > > Ann (just kidding. I really don't know what I'm going to do. I'm > putting in all the names and letting the editor figure it out. I've > already cut out all the good stuff--car makes and models, car > "Special" names, sponsoring companies, interesting facts about the > Speedway, fatalities, etc, etc. Now it's just names. And it's still > too long.) I had a similar problem with an author/publisher who was working on a biography of a locally prominent citizen. My instructions were to put in as many names as possible so that people would see themselves mentioned in the index and buy the book. I was also told to do a cheaper, 'light' index. When I pointed out that the names alone would take up about ten pages, he suggested that I should 'use my judgement' in deciding who should go in - I blew my top and pointed out that he was the subject-matter expert and it was up to him to decide who was a likely book-buying customer and who wasn't. It ended with my agreeing to put in every single name in the book (including Acker Bilk, whose music the subject enjoyed) - and being paid extra for a heavy index - so that he could then go through and remove the 'unimportant' ones. Two weeks later I got an enthusiastic letter saying the index was wonderful and he had made extra room in the book to fit it in. What can you do (sigh)? Jonathan. =================================== Jonathan Jermey and Glenda Browne Indexing, PC Training, Web Page Authoring http://www.users.bigpond.com/Diagonal Diagonal@bigpond.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 09:36:48 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Hudson Subject: computer indexing for novices When I give training days in indexing I am often asked if it is a good id= ea to start straight away with a computer-assisted indexing program like MACREX or CINDEX, or whether it is easier to begin by using the old-fashioned cards-in-shoeboxes method. As I have been indexing since before the clever computer programs began, = I can't answer from personal experience, though I am inclined to think that= struggling with basic indexing theory and a complex computer program at t= he same time might be a bit confusing. I should be very grateful to hear the group's views, and especially anyone's personal experience of learning indexing from scratch with MACRE= X or CINDEX. With many thanks, ANN HUDSON ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 09:45:41 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Rachel Rice Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In-Reply-To: <199805250937_MC2-3E12-8B19@compuserve.com> Ann, I feel pretty certain that if I had gotten into indexing before computer programs were available I wouldn't have chosen to continue with it. I had a strong computer background already, but I found Cindex extremely easy to learn and I've heard similar about Macrex. Just me. Rachel >When I give training days in indexing I am often asked if it is a good idea >to start straight away with a computer-assisted indexing program like >MACREX or CINDEX, or whether it is easier to begin by using the >old-fashioned cards-in-shoeboxes method. > >As I have been indexing since before the clever computer programs began, I >can't answer from personal experience, though I am inclined to think that >struggling with basic indexing theory and a complex computer program at the >same time might be a bit confusing. > >I should be very grateful to hear the group's views, and especially >anyone's personal experience of learning indexing from scratch with MACREX >or CINDEX. > >With many thanks, > >ANN HUDSON Rachel Rice Directions Unlimited Desktop Services Indexing, editing, proofreading http://homepages.together.net/~racric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 12:20:07 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Chris Miller Subject: Re: Getting indexing contracts with publishers Thank you for your response! I have not even had a chance to get back to the list-serve and check my mail in some time...imagine my surprise when I had over 200 new messages. I am trying to make this happen in my spare time, and I think your idea is excellent...it probably would save me the time searching out my clients, and since money isn't really an issue for a while, this might be the best way to go. Thanks again! Kari Miller Nmbenton wrote: > You may try sub-contracting with an editorial firm. They won't pay as well, > but you will get a variety of projects and invaluable built-in evaluation > before your work reaches the client. This will give you a resume, a chance to > learn more and confidence as well. > Nell ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 12:43:58 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: STortora Subject: delayed indexes Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? I like working for the publisher I am currently doing an index for, however I find that I never know when pages are going to arrive. I called the compositor directly and finally got some sort of schedule. It seems that the 'domino effect' wins out. The author is dragging his heels which makes everybody wait. Is this normal? I am fairly new to indexing so I don't know if maybe this is the way it goes or if I should be concerned. Sue ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 11:42:30 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Susan D. Hernandez" Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices Ann, I learned indexing from scratch with Sky Index. It was very easy to learn basic data entry, and I'm using more and more of the fancy stuff as I do more indexes. Like Rachel, I'm quite sure I would have found even learning to index to be quite tedious if I had done it all on index cards and typed the index into a word processing program. There are demos and lower cost programs for people to learn with before they spend alot of money, so the startup costs are not excessive (assuming you already have a computer!) - Susan *************************************** Susan Danzi Hernandez BookEnd Indexing susanhernandez@juno.com bookend@sprynet.com _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 13:04:48 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: BECohen653 Subject: Re: delayed indexes Sue, The short answer is: This is the way things go. Scheduling snafus are part of the indexer's routine. My solution is to use Post-It flags for visualizing my schedule, so I can move the flags around on my wall calendar as each project's schedule shifts. It's the best solution I've found for blocking out my time in the face of the schedule changes. Another solution is to know other indexers who can assist to pick up the overflow, as there will always be occasional scheduling problems. Welcome to indexing's version of the trial by fire. Barbara E. Cohen Indianapolis, IN ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 14:42:33 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In a message dated 98-05-25 09:38:21 EDT, AnnHudson@compuserve.com writes: > As I have been indexing since before the clever computer programs began, I > can't answer from personal experience, though I am inclined to think that > struggling with basic indexing theory and a complex computer program at the > same time might be a bit confusing. > I used WordPerfect to prepare the indexes for the first three books I worked on. That is, I did all the alphabetizing myself and just treated in index like a regular word processing document for printing. When it was clear that I was going to be doing indexing permanently, I explored the various options for professional indexing programs and eventually settled on one. However, I should also point out that as part of the indexing class I teach for the University of Chicago Publishing Program, we spend some time using the student version of one of the major indexing programs. Several students actually found it easier to work with than trying to jury-rig indexes in a word processing program. We were only dealing with simple input and correction of index entries and did not explore groups, pattern matching, etc. Fred Leise Between the Lines Indexing and Editorial Services ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 14:47:20 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: delayed indexes In a message dated 98-05-25 12:44:48 EDT, STortora@AOL.COM writes: > Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? I like working > for > the publisher I am currently doing an index for, however I find that I never > know when pages are going to arrive. I called the compositor directly and > finally got some sort of schedule. It seems that the 'domino effect' wins > out. The author is dragging his heels which makes everybody wait. Is this > normal? I am fairly new to indexing so I don't know if maybe this is the > way > it goes or if I should be concerned. > > Sue Welcome to the club! Schedule "slippage" is a fact of indexing life. That happens when we're at the end of the line in the publishing process. So we all have to roll with the punches, so to speak. Actually, you're lucky that you can call the compositor and find out the schedule. Fred Leise Between the Lines Indexing and Editorial Services ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 12:07:22 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Katrina Lemke Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In-Reply-To: <199805251338.JAA09577@camel26.mindspring.com> At 09:36 AM 5/25/98 -0400, you wrote: >When I give training days in indexing I am often asked if it is a good id= >ea >to start straight away with a computer-assisted indexing program like >MACREX or CINDEX, or whether it is easier to begin by using the >old-fashioned cards-in-shoeboxes method. > >As I have been indexing since before the clever computer programs began, = >I >can't answer from personal experience, though I am inclined to think that= > >struggling with basic indexing theory and a complex computer program at t= >he >same time might be a bit confusing. > >I should be very grateful to hear the group's views, and especially >anyone's personal experience of learning indexing from scratch with MACRE= >X >or CINDEX. > >With many thanks, > >ANN HUDSON Hi Ann, I did my first professional index using index cards, entered it into Excel for preliminary sorting and then imported into Word for editing. I feel that it was valuable to learn (albeit brutally) the actual physical structure of the index. I've just purchased indexing software and as I've started learning to use it, I feel I have an understanding for what the software is doing (and hopefully will never underestimate it's wonderous miracles). I do think it was worth doing one index from scratch and seeing a book-length index in it's rawest form. Katrina Lemke Fisheye Indexing > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 15:24:34 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Nmbenton Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices I did my first index on cards and felt like a little kid while I sat on the livingroom floor alphabetizing my little piles! It was quite fun once. More than once would have been deadly I'm sure. The experience gave me a great appreciation for Cindex, the rudiments of which you can learn almost as fast as you can type. (Word97, in comparison, is terribly difficult for me) If I were teaching I'd give my students a choice. Nell ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 13:31:22 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Nancy Mulvany Subject: Receipt of The Indexer Thanks to all of you who responded to my inquiry regarding receipt of The Indexer. It seems that copies of the journal are making their way slowly westward. We are investigating a more efficient mode of delivery. Soon the April 1998 issue will be mailed. At that time I will again ask those of you in Canada and the U.S. to let me know when you receive that issue. Many of you included very nice notes with your email messages. We are pleased that you enjoy and look forward to The Indexer. What 'till you see the next issue, there are some great photos in it! Nancy Mulvany Associate Editor, The Indexer I am now talking off the hat of Associate Editor and putting on my beanie so that I may speak as an ASI member. I am very dismayed by an ASI Board of Directors' decision to stop providing The Indexer as an ASI member benefit. The Indexer has been delivered to ASI members for 26 years. In Seattle your Board made a decision that no other ASI Board in 26 years has seen fit to make. I suggest that you make your feelings know to the current Board. If you agree that The Indexer should no longer be provided as a member benefit, tell them. If you want The Indexer provided to you as a member benefit, tell them. If you agree that The Indexer should not be a member benefit, but should be offered by ASI at a separate subscription rate, tell them. Following are the email addresses of the current ASI officers and directors. Officers: President, Lori Lathrop 76620.456@compuserve.com Vice President/President-elect, Janet Perlman JPerlman@aol.com Secretary, Margie Towery MTOWERY@aol.com Treasurer, Carolyn Weaver CGWeaver@aol.com Immediate Past President, Alexandra Nickerson alexandrex@aol.com Directors: Maria Coughlin mariac@indexing.com Fred Leise Locatelli@aol.com Peg Mauer Pmauer@aol.com Kate Mertes kmertes@riag.com Sandi Schroeder Sanindex@xsite.net Enid Zafran ezafran@bna.com Also, feel free to copy me on your notes (nmulvany@well.com). -nancy Nancy Mulvany ASI member Past president, ASI ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 14:35:04 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Mary S Stephenson Subject: The Indexer To all, Like Nancy Mulvany I too am very dismayed and unhappy about the decision to eliminate The Indexer as a benefit of ASI membership. Yes, there have been delivery problems in the recent past, but eventually we do receive the issues and that's what counts. It's the combination of Keywords [highly practical with an American focus] and The Indexer [practical, but also with more scholarly aspects, plus a look at what's going on "on the other side of the pond"] that makes for an outstanding overview of the field. I can only assume that economics was your basis for the decision, but I would be willing to pay slightly more for dues to ASI if it would mean we got both journals. Yours, Susie Stephenson mss@unixg.ubc.ca ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 13:31:22 -0700 From: Nancy Mulvany To: Index-L Subject: Receipt of The Indexer I am now talking off the hat of Associate Editor and putting on my beanie so that I may speak as an ASI member. I am very dismayed by an ASI Board of Directors' decision to stop providing The Indexer as an ASI member benefit. The Indexer has been delivered to ASI members for 26 years. In Seattle your Board made a decision that no other ASI Board in 26 years has seen fit to make. I suggest that you make your feelings know to the current Board. If you agree that The Indexer should no longer be provided as a member benefit, tell them. If you want The Indexer provided to you as a member benefit, tell them. If you agree that The Indexer should not be a member benefit, but should be offered by ASI at a separate subscription rate, tell them. Following are the email addresses of the current ASI officers and directors. Officers: President, Lori Lathrop 76620.456@compuserve.com Vice President/President-elect, Janet Perlman JPerlman@aol.com Secretary, Margie Towery MTOWERY@aol.com Treasurer, Carolyn Weaver CGWeaver@aol.com Immediate Past President, Alexandra Nickerson alexandrex@aol.com Directors: Maria Coughlin mariac@indexing.com Fred Leise Locatelli@aol.com Peg Mauer Pmauer@aol.com Kate Mertes kmertes@riag.com Sandi Schroeder Sanindex@xsite.net Enid Zafran ezafran@bna.com Also, feel free to copy me on your notes (nmulvany@well.com). -nancy Nancy Mulvany ASI member Past president, ASI ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 14:47:26 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sonsie Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices At 03:24 PM 5/25/1998 EDT, Nmbenton wrote: >I did my first index on cards and felt like a little kid while I sat on the >livingroom floor alphabetizing my little piles! It was quite fun once. More >than once would have been deadly I'm sure. >The experience gave me a great appreciation for Cindex, the rudiments of which >you can learn almost as fast as you can type. (Word97, in comparison, is >terribly difficult for me) I started indexing in 1978 or thereabouts, and of course had no computer to help me. I bought a heavy-duty card file and ordered index cards in bulk from one of the few mail-order business supply houses then in operation. While I'm sure I wouldn't want to go back to that method, it was a great education! I got my first computer in 1988, and had an index due to a client probably not more than a week after that. They wanted it in WordPerfect, which of course I had never used (nor had I had very much experience with computers, though I had used rental Macs occasionally). So I not only learned the PC, but WordPerfect as well, in about a week! If I had also had to learning indexing at the same tim, well, I'm sure I would have given it all up as a terrible idea. =Sonsie= ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 14:53:31 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: delayed indexes In-Reply-To: <199805251644.JAA05057@pacific.net> Sue asks: >Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? Just to share a recent horror story: 3, count 'em, 3 large jobs all slipped their schedules recently, which meant I had to carry a heavy workload to the ASI conference. I was certainly less present at the conference as a result. I was fortunate enough to get some help while there, thank goodness. I'm now in my last two days of finishing them all up. A slippage of quite this magnitude had never happened to me before... let us hope it was an anomoly. The publishers have been fairly generous with extending the original deadlines, but that didn't take into account the fact I'd planned to be out of town. Needless to say, I'm exhausted. --Victoria ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 18:36:22 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Jngcain Subject: Re: The Indexer Dear all, As i just wrote to Lori Lathrol, ASI President, I JUST joined ASI in order to get The Indexer. I haven't even received my first issue! Sad and Indexerless, Jennifer Cain ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 19:30:28 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: STortora Subject: Re: delayed indexes Thank-you all for your responses. I feel better about the situation and will simply treat delays as a 'fact of life'. Sue ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 16:46:10 +0100 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "J. Naomi Linzer" Subject: dictionaries In-Reply-To: <199805230249.TAA17559@neti.saber.net> I am curious as to what basic dictionary sits on an indexer's desk and should be purchased by one who is just setting up one's library as a new indexer? (I have been hobbling along with Webster's Seventh New Collegiate that I got for some occassion in 1967. I know the different dictionaries each have their strengths and want to know if it makes a difference for an indexer to choose one over the other. Thanks for your past responses to my question about indexing software, WP programs and the nicknames I'm encountering in my volunteer indexing project.] Naomi ******************************************************************************** J. Naomi Linzer, Humboldt County, CA Please note my new e-mail address: jnlinzer@saber.net * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "And in such indexes, although small pricks to their subsequent volumes, there is seen the baby figure of the giant mass of things to come at large." William Shakespeare: "Troilus and Cressida" ******************************************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 19:40:14 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Rachel Rice Subject: Re: delayed indexes In-Reply-To: >In a message dated 98-05-25 12:44:48 EDT, STortora@AOL.COM writes: > >> Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? I like working >> for >> the publisher I am currently doing an index for, however I find that I >never >> know when pages are going to arrive. I called the compositor directly and >> finally got some sort of schedule. It seems that the 'domino effect' wins >> out. The author is dragging his heels which makes everybody wait. Is this >> normal? I am fairly new to indexing so I don't know if maybe this is the >> way >> it goes or if I should be concerned. >> >> Sue My first index slipped from June to October. I'm currently awaiting one that I was supposed to get in March. I have one client whose indexes always arrive on time, and as far as everyone else, I don't think I've ever gotten one on time. I have always gotten the index in on deadline, however (just had to throw that in). In some cases I have been expected to keep to the original deadline even when the book ends up arriving only a day or two before it. In those cases I have not made deadline, however. RR Rachel Rice Directions Unlimited Desktop Services Indexing, editing, proofreading http://homepages.together.net/~racric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 20:37:02 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: JPerlman Subject: Re: delayed indexes All, Among my clients, I treasure most those whose indexing page proof arrives on time, as promised, or who keep me informed if there is some (slight) slippage. This becomes one of the intangible factors I take into account when evaluating my clients. Those whose page proof is always or almost always on time will usually go to the top of my list in terms of my availability to them and in terms of my own flexibility in rates and due dates. As indexers we roll with the scheduling punches as best we can. Delay is often unavoidable. It is a fact of life for us. But some publishers and/or packagers are more often on time than others. They are the valued few. Janet Perlman Southwest Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 20:42:01 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: delayed indexes JPerlman wrote: > > All, > > Among my clients, I treasure most those whose indexing page proof arrives on > time, as promised, or who keep me informed if there is some (slight) slippage. > This becomes one of the intangible factors I take into account when evaluating > my clients. Those whose page proof is always or almost always on time will > usually go to the top of my list in terms of my availability to them and in > terms of my own flexibility in rates and due dates. > > As indexers we roll with the scheduling punches as best we can. Delay is > often unavoidable. It is a fact of life for us. But some publishers and/or > packagers are more often on time than others. They are the valued few. Well said; this is exactly how it works for me, too. Ann Norcross Crossover Information Services ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 18:52:51 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Barry Koffler Subject: Re: delayed indexes In-Reply-To: <199805251850.OAA14143@ulster.net> >Welcome to the club! Schedule "slippage" is a fact of indexing life. That >happens when we're at the end of the line in the publishing process. Gee, do you know some point in the publishing process that isn't prone to schedule slippage? I also do proofing and some editing and such, and half the jobs don't come in on the expected schedule (but I've yet to see an early one). -Barry oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo barkof@ulster.net Barry Koffler mid-Hudson Valley, NY the FeatherSite at http://www.feathersite.com/ lead me not into temptation . . . I can find it myself. oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 18:58:47 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Barry Koffler Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In-Reply-To: <199805251945.PAA17391@ulster.net> >I did my first index on cards and felt like a little kid while I sat on the >livingroom floor alphabetizing my little piles! It was quite fun once. More >than once would have been deadly I'm sure. I did *many* indexes on index cards. Computers sure are nice!! But I think the experience would be good for all students--it's a hands-on experience that really shows all the ins and outs. And my first computer was a Tandy TRS-80 (affectionately known as the TRaSh-80) which was almost as bad as working on a typewriter (anybody remember them?). -Barry oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo barkof@ulster.net Barry Koffler mid-Hudson Valley, NY the FeatherSite at http://www.feathersite.com/ lead me not into temptation . . . I can find it myself. oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 18:47:40 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: dictionaries In-Reply-To: <199805252349.QAA01222@pacific.net> At 04:46 PM 5/25/98 +0100, you wrote: >I am curious as to what basic dictionary sits on an indexer's desk and >should be purchased by one who is just setting up one's library as a new >indexer? Webster's Collegiate, most recent edition, was the mainstay of publishing when I started in 1975, and it still is. The 10th edition is current. Other dictionaries are used, and I've been required to purchase various of them for specific clients or jobs, but generally, you're safe with that one, in the U.S. at least. Best, Victoria ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 May 1998 22:18:46 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Caroline Parks Subject: June 20 - Indexing Workshop in New Mexico "Considering Your Audience for a Quality Index" ...a workshop conducted by Anne Leach The A to Zia Indexers (ASI's newest chapter, in New Mexico!!) invite you to join us on Saturday, June 20 (10:00 - 2:30) for our summer meeting. A panel of local indexers who attended the annual meeting in Seattle will report on the activities they participated in, and after lunch Anne Leach will present her workshop. This will be a great workshop for both experienced indexers and those who are just getting started (see workshop description below). The meeting will be held at the Lomas/Tramway branch of the Albuquerque Public Library (908 Eastridge Dr NE, Albuquerque, one block west of Tramway off of Lomas). Bring your own lunch; dessert will be provided. The $25 charge for this special meeting will cover workshop materials and help defray our guest=92s travel expenses. For more information, contact Carolin= e Parks (505-286-2738; caroline@rt66.com). Please register before June 12th by printing and filling out the registration form (at the end of this message) and mailing it to Nancy Ford, 66 Skyland, Tijeras, NM 87059. To register after June 12th, contact Caroline Parks at the above phone number. Workshop description: Considering Your Audience for a Quality Index =85a workshop conducted by Anne Leach Every book can be expected to have at least two audiences=97maybe even more than two=97and the indexer must keep them all in mind when designing main headings and subheadings. In this two-hour workshop, Anne will discuss term selection for multiple audiences for each of the following types of works: technical material, textbooks, and scholarly publications. Participants will do exercises including examples from published indexes, including Wilson Award winners. In 1985, Anne agreed to write an index as a favor to a writer friend. With a degree in English and 15 years in the corporate accounting world, Anne figured an index couldn=92t be that hard to do. The surprise was that she enjoyed it. Seeking further information about a career in indexing, she contacted the late BevAnne Ross, joined the Golden Gate Chapter of ASI, took the USDA course, and slowly gained regular clients. She=92s been indexing freelance ever since. She has been continuously active in a local chapter of ASI (the SoCal chapter since her move back to the Southland), served as chair of ASI=92s Publicity Committee for two years, was elected to two three-year terms on the ASI Board, and for six years was editor of Key Words. =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D REGISTRATION FORM INDEXING WORKSHOP -- CONSIDERING YOUR AUDIENCE FOR A QUALITY INDEX Please enclose $25 and mail to: Nancy Ford 66 Skyland Tijeras, NM 87059 (Make checks payable to A to Zia Indexers) Name ___________________________________________________ Company ________________________________________________ Address ________________________________________________ ________________________________________________ Phone ___________________________ Fax _____________________________ Email address __________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 01:37:27 -0400 Reply-To: LKing@grolier.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group Comments: Warning -- original Sender: tag was Postmaster@GROLIER.COM From: Linda King Subject: June 20 - Indexing Workshop in New Mexico-REPLY I am out of the office and will be back on Friday, May 22, 1998. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:50:32 +1000 Reply-To: Michael Wyatt Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Wyatt Subject: Book packagers - Australian, and money paid for indexes Glenda wrote: A while back there was a discussion on Index-L about book packagers (who organise all aspects of book production for publishers). I thought this was irrelevant to Australians - until now. I would be interested to hear from any Australians who have worked for book packagers, and to know from them, and others, whether this has had any effect on the price paid for indexes. Yes I have and no it hasn't. As far as your business relationship is concerned, it is identical to working for a publishing company. In fact, some small Australian publishers also act as packagers for large companies, and all you know about it is the bibliographic details on the reverse of the title-page are not what you expected, and the book may use American spelling. Michael Wyatt Keyword Editorial Services 22 Kendall Street Surry Hills NSW 2010 Australia Phone 0500 539 973 Fax (02) 9331 7785 Email keyword@ozemail.com.au ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 02:35:07 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Thomas P. Copley" Subject: ANNOUNCE> Summer Dynamic Duo Workshops On XML and DHTML Open +-----------------------------------------------+ | THE DYNAMIC DUO WORKSHOP: XML & DYNAMIC HTML | +-----------------------------------------------+ The Dynamic Duo Workshop: XML & Dynamic HTML is a six-week workshop conducted entirely via email and the World Wide Web (WWW). It introduces the beginner and somewhat more advanced user to the Extensible Markup Language (XML) and dynamic HyperText Markup Language (HTML). For further information about the workshop, please see the URL: http://www.bearfountain.com/arlington/duo.html HOW TO SIGN UP Two Dynamic Duo Workshops are scheduled for this summer: June Session June 8 - July 17 July Session July 6 - August 14 Sign up for ONE session of each workshop only unless you plan to take it more than once. To sign up, please send an email message to the address: majordomo@arlington.com and in the body of the message, include the words: to subscribe to: subscribe duo-jun the June session of Dynamic Duo subscribe duo-jul the July session of Dynamic Duo This will automatically put you on the mailing list for more information about each workshop, and you will receive an acknowledgment with the particulars about signing up, and unsubscribing, should you decide not to participate. If you have any difficulty with this procedure or fail to receive a response, please send email to the address in the signature line. The workshop leader, Thomas P. Copley, Ph.D., has successfully taught several on-line courses in the past, including most recently, Tune In the Net Workshop , first offered in 1997 and Make the Link Workshop , introduced in 1995. ________________________________________________________________ THOMAS P. COPLEY tcopley@arlington.com Dynamic Duo Workshop www.bearfountain.com/arlington/ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 08:23:27 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SCTopping Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Carol: You must have misread my previous message about doing name indexes -- of course Jones would have his own entry -- when I finished adding the correct initials and "breaking the entry into its component parts". It's a much faster method than consulting the bibliography during either the marking/reading or entering steps. Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 05:44:37 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Pam Rider Subject: Re: dictionaries In-Reply-To: <199805252352.QAA11709@powergrid.electriciti.com> Naomi asks a really good question. Ninety percent of my indexes are for one publisher. That house specifies Merriam-Webster's 10th, which is the specified dictionary of APA style, my primary editing guide. BUT, if another publisher specified New World or whichever other dictionary, I think it would be a good idea to have that dictionary. Each dictionary varies from others in ways that could lead to an indexing inconsistency with text, if I am referring to a dictionary other than that employed for the rest of the book. Pam Rider Trying to walk cheerfully on the Earth prider@electriciti.com prider@tsktsk.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 08:50:37 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SCTopping Subject: Re: Smith and Jones I don't know if this was already posted (AOL blinked -- again) and I thought the message was lost, so if this is a duplicate -- sorry. Carol: Perhaps you misread my original message about name indexes -- of course Jones would have his own entry. I said that I ENTERED names as Smith and Jones (1997) and that when I finished, I compared my index with the bibliography, added first names or initials and then broke each entry into its component parts -- meaning that I create individual entries for each name. This process is much faster than consulting the bibliography repeatedly either during the marking process or while making entries. Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 08:59:46 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Wright, Sharon F." Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices Just to chime in my 2 cents, our in-house training program began with indexing from cards. I agree that it was valuable to learn how an index is structured in its rawest form. Incidentally, we still generally don't key our index entries directly into the indexing computer program. We dictate them into a dictaphone and have them keyed in by much faster typists. Dictating entries definitely gives you an entirely different perspective! :-) Makes the review interesting, too! But it is fast, once you get the hang of it (and have a great support staff who can key very quickly!). Not the most efficient system, but it works. -- Sharon W. > -----Original Message----- > From: Sonsie [SMTP:sconroy@SLONET.ORG] > Sent: Monday, May 25, 1998 5:47 PM > To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L > Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices > > At 03:24 PM 5/25/1998 EDT, Nmbenton wrote: > >I did my first index on cards and felt like a little kid while I sat on > the > >livingroom floor alphabetizing my little piles! It was quite fun once. > More > >than once would have been deadly I'm sure. > >The experience gave me a great appreciation for Cindex, the rudiments of > which > >you can learn almost as fast as you can type. (Word97, in comparison, is > >terribly difficult for me) > > I started indexing in 1978 or thereabouts, and of course had no computer > to > help me. I bought a heavy-duty card file and ordered index cards in bulk > from one of the few mail-order business supply houses then in operation. > While I'm sure I wouldn't want to go back to that method, it was a great > education! > > I got my first computer in 1988, and had an index due to a client probably > not more than a week after that. They wanted it in WordPerfect, which of > course I had never used (nor had I had very much experience with > computers, > though I had used rental Macs occasionally). So I not only learned the PC, > but WordPerfect as well, in about a week! If I had also had to learning > indexing at the same tim, well, I'm sure I would have given it all up as a > terrible idea. > > =Sonsie= ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 09:49:37 +0000 Reply-To: connolly@neca.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Dan Connolly Organization: WORD FOR WORD Book Indexing Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices Along the lines of this thread, I have a question. I have recently purchased the student version of CINDEX and am nearing the last lesson of the USDA course. My plan was to learn CINDEX while completing Lesson 10 (yes, I'm good at multitasking). Anyway, I almost landed a real job last week and I was concerned with the process of doing it. Is it possible to create several index files (since the student version only holds 375 records) and merge them into Word in order to do a full-length index? This will help me assess my ability to tackle paid jobs at this point. Thanks for any help....DAC -- ========================================= Daniel A. Connolly mailto:connolly@neca.com WORD FOR WORD Indexing and Editing Services www.wfwIndex.necaweb.com Woodstock, CT, USA ========================================= ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 10:09:37 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Psvenndex Subject: indexing a CD Good Morning Everyone, My minister is beginning a sabbatical writing data for a software program for churches to use for stewardship. I asked him if this CD would have an index, there will be no manual. He is going to check with his editor to see if there is interest. Since I have not had a "real index job" yet and this (I am assuming) would be a non-paying job (he is not being paid) I am asking the list participants what I need to know and any special programs (I have SkyIndex Pro) that would be required. I remember reading some information about indexing CDs on the list before but did not keep the posts. Perhaps this project (if any) is above my ability both as an indexer and in my computer knowledge. Please e-mail me directly if you feel that is more appropriate. Thanks! Pamela Venneman Lighthouse Indexing Services ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 11:04:50 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: FixUrTypo Subject: Training? Hi everyone ~ I am newly-subscribed to this list, so forgive me if this seems like a repetitive topic to you all. I am most interested in finding a local, "live" training course on indexing. I live in the Washington, DC area. Those I have found are 1) the USDA correspondence course and 2) a short (2-day), expensive ($550), basic indexing class taught by an organization called EEI. Does anyone have any suggestions as to where else I might look? Or, does anyone have any experience with either the USDA course or the one taught by EEI? Thanks very much for your help. Barbara Garrett ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 11:07:56 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: CGWeaver Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In a message dated 98-05-25 21:30:52 EDT, you write: > I did *many* indexes on index cards. Computers sure are nice!! But I think > the experience would be good for all students--it's a hands-on experience > that really shows all the ins and outs. And my first computer was a Tandy > TRS-80 (affectionately known as the TRaSh-80) which was almost as bad as > working on a typewriter (anybody remember them?). How about an AppleII-c with Appleworks? With an astounding 128k memory and no hard drive. And a 50k file maximum. But it worked nicely for my first indexes in the early '80s and got me thru graduate school. When I hear people complaining about their grossly underpowered Pentium 166s with only 16mb RAM and 2 gig hard drives, it does bring back memories! (My FIRST indexes were done via the shoebox method; compiling the file in the Appleworks database was a definite technological improvement!) Carolyn Weaver Bellevue, WA ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 12:08:37 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Lori Lathrop <76620.456@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: The Indexer All -- Although INDEX-L is not the place to discuss ASI business matters, I just want to let you know that the Board truly appreciates all of the messages we have received in response to Nancy Mulvany's posting. We want you to know that I will be composing a letter addressing your concerns which will be forwarded to the ASI Webmasters so they can upload it to the ASI Web site (http://www/asindexing.org). The ASI Board needs input from members in order to make sound decisions ... and to know when it is necessary to reconsider some decisions. I'll submit a letter to the ASI Webmasters by the end of this week. Also, I need to let you know that my e-mail box on CompuServe has a limit of just 100 messages; after messages exceed that number, all messages start bouncing. :^/ (That's why I subscribe to INDEX-L in digest mode.) I apologize in advance if your messages to me bounce, as they probably will when I am out of my office next week. Happy indexing! .... Lori *********************************************************************** Lori Lathrop ---------->INTERNET:76620.456@compuserve.com President - 1998-1999, American Society of Indexers Lathrop Media Services, 7308-C East Independence Blvd., #316 Charlotte, NC 28227 / Phone: 704-531-0021 URL - http://idt.net/~lathro19 (note: that's a "nineteen" at the end) *********************************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 12:42:13 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DStaub11 Subject: Re: delayed indexes Sue asks: >Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? > My entire April schedule (four textbook indexes and an encyclopedia due later) slipped into May this spring. A little, but not much, worse than usual. In other words, this is just part of the job. I make sure my clients are clear that I'm committing to a specific due date, and that the commitment is dependent on my getting the pages when they said I would. When it slips, we renegotiate. That said, I try to get it to them when they need it, including all-nighters and bringing work to Seattle. But I'm always in a position of telling them what I can do instead of being commanded. This time around, since several of the jobs came from the same clients, I got them to replace the work so I had something to do in April; some of the May stuff slipped into June so there was more room in May, one of the jobs now has a longer deadline than they really wanted because they didn't want to lose me as the indexer, and I gave up one of the jobs. I should have given up the giant encyclopedia, which is ran into my summer vacation (no, I'm not taking it with, just pushing right before) but it was so much money that I couldn't stand to. It all works out eventually, but it is one of the downsides of this profession that I can't feel particularly in control of my time. Sigh. Do Mi Stauber ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 12:44:13 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DStaub11 Subject: Re: delayed indexes Oh, I should add that my clients know that once I commit to a due date (and the pages arrive as promised) they can absolutely count on getting the index on that due date. This makes them more happy about the whole renegotiation process. I sometimes even remind them that I'm being careful what I promise, since I always deliver on my promises. Do Mi ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 12:22:18 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Joanne E. Clendenen" Organization: AfterWords Indexing Services Subject: Re: delayed indexes STortora wrote: > > Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? Sue, unfortunately this is quite normal. Some of my clients (editors) don't even call to ask if I can do a job until the proofs are ready to go (of course they risk my being busy at the time). My university press has the author contract directly with the indexer, about 2-3 months ahead, and then I often run into slips in schedule prior to the page proofs being ready. I put in my contract letter to the author that my availability may change if the schedule changes, and that I may have to charge a rush fee, or be unable to do a job if things slip too much. Most of the time we can work it out, though, partly because they often give me a whole month to do a book that would normally take a week or two. Joanne -- AfterWords Indexing Services Joanne E. Clendenen email: jbclend@bigfoot.com http://www.flash.net/~jbclend ---------------- "Change: A bend in the road is not the end of the road... Unless you fail to make the turn." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 13:55:56 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Psvenndex Subject: indexing a CD Sorry to repost, but I think the bottom line was deleted this morning.... Good Morning Everyone, My minister is beginning a sabbatical writing data for a software program for churches to use for stewardship. I asked him if this CD would have an index, there will be no manual. He is going to check with his editor to see if there is interest. Since I have not had a "real index job" yet and this (I am assuming) would be a non-paying job (he is not being paid) I am asking the list participants what I need to know and any special programs (I have SkyIndex Pro) that would be required. I remember reading some information about indexing CDs on the list before but did not keep the posts. Perhaps this project (if any) is above my ability both as an indexer and in my computer knowledge. Please e-mail me directly if you feel that is more appropriate. Thanks! Pamela Venneman Lighthouse Indexing Services psvenndex@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 14:34:09 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Peakae Subject: Re: Training? How does one get the USDA correspondence course? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 14:54:59 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: FixUrTypo Subject: Re: USDA In a message dated 5/26/98 2:35:52 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Peakae@AOL.COM writes: << How does one get the USDA correspondence course? >> They have an extensive web page at http://grad.usda.gov/corres/forms.html ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 14:58:35 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Rica Night Subject: "Book Index on Net Only" article Today's Librarian's Site of the Day points out the following article: http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,22387,00.html The article describes a Simon & Schuster book that contains no index in the printed volume, but for which the index has been posted on the Web. Included are some interesting quotes from the book's author and editor. An intriguing trend, no? (Imagine--*no* space limits!) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 14:03:01 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Kay K. Schlembach" Subject: Re: delayed indexes Hang in there DoMi ! I understand about all-nighters and taking work on vacation. I hope your vacation is someplace beautiful. Kay DStaub11 wrote: > Sue asks: > >Does anyone have trouble with indexes that get delayed? > > > My entire April schedule (four textbook indexes and an encyclopedia due later) > slipped into May this spring. A little, but not much, worse than usual. > In other words, this is just part of the job. > > I make sure my clients are clear that I'm committing to a specific due date, > and that the commitment is dependent on my getting the pages when they said I > would. When it slips, we renegotiate. That said, I try to get it to them when > they need it, including all-nighters and bringing work to Seattle. But I'm > always in a position of telling them what I can do instead of being commanded. > > This time around, since several of the jobs came from the same clients, I got > them to replace the work so I had something to do in April; some of the May > stuff slipped into June so there was more room in May, one of the jobs now has > a longer deadline than they really wanted because they didn't want to lose me > as the indexer, and I gave up one of the jobs. I should have given up the > giant encyclopedia, which is ran into my summer vacation (no, I'm not taking > it with, just pushing right before) but it was so much money that I couldn't > stand to. It all works out eventually, but it is one of the downsides of this > profession that I can't feel particularly in control of my time. Sigh. > > Do Mi Stauber ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 15:47:29 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: John and Kara Pekar Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article Rica Night wrote: > The article describes a Simon & Schuster book that contains no index in the > printed volume, but for which the index has been posted on the Web. Included > are some interesting quotes from the book's author and editor. > > An intriguing trend, no? (Imagine--*no* space limits!) Actually, it seems potentially elitist to me. You don't mention what type of book it is (and I was unable to access the site when I tried.) If the book is a college textbook, for example, one could readily assume that a reader would have access to the index through the college's computing center. OTOH, if the audience is more general, then the reader's access to the Internet cannot be assumed. While the percentage of households with computers is growing in leaps and bounds, it still does not encompass a significant portion of the population. The costs of computers are still prohibitive for some families and individuals. Of those households with computers, not all are or can be online. In rural areas particularly, even having a computer does not mean that the Internet is easily available or affordable -- although companies like AOL appear to offer access from anywhere, in practice that means a long distance call from many locations, which can quickly double or triple the monthly access costs. One can't even assume the local library will offer access, or that readers can get to the library easily if it does. Two additional concerns come to mind: A. How long will the index be posted on the Web? If a reader tries to use the book in five or ten years, will the index still be available at the address listed in the book? B. How much more time is used by logging on, accessing the webpage, and downloading or using the index online, compared to looking it up in the back of the book? If eliminating the index from the book in favor of posting it on the Web is indeed a trend, it is one I find alarming. I am excited by the technology and potential of computers and the Internet. I believe they have tremendous positive implications for the future of information dissemination. As we are becoming increasingly aware, the technology brings with it new challenges and problems as well. I'm concerned that in their rush to make use of the advantages of these technologies, companies may be losing sight of the best interests of their customers. Kara Pekar jkpekar@crosslink.net ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:05:36 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Seth A. Maislin" Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article In-Reply-To: "John and Kara Pekar" "Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article" (May 26, 3:47pm) Kara wrote (among other things :-) > ... if the audience is more general, then the reader's access to > the Internet cannot be assumed. While the percentage of households with > computers is growing in leaps and bounds, it still does not encompass a > significant portion of the population. The costs of computers are still > prohibitive for some families and individuals. Of those households with > computers, not all are or can be online. This is true, and can even pretend to sympathize to those people who don't have computers, let alone online access. However, the trends in the United States at least show that more people are online that you'd think. Although I could be wrong (I'm remembering these statistics from memory), I understand that 1 household in 3 has a computer. That's a lot. And, among all computer users, people are connected to the Internet for 10 hours per week, on average. That's also a lot. When information is placed online only, you are always leaving out a significant portion of the population, though -- at least two-thirds (if you believe my statistics above :-). But this *is* a trend -- and it's a trend that bookstores aren't catching onto either. If you publish a book on CD instead of on paper, the bookstores will shove that book into the software sections, not with the books. There's no way around this yet. So publishers are quite reluctant to publish software without also publishing books. This S&S book is no exception: a print book, with an online element. Bookstores can't handle CD-only books in a way that makes them accessible and competitive. It's an interesting dilemma for publishers -- they are moving away from paper and onto electronic media, and yet the bookstores still want to sell "books." This transition is a tough one. There doesn't seem to be any decent compromise between "print only" and "electronic only." Simon & Schuster has made an attempt, and it's one that in theory I applaud. They reduced the paper consumption, and they are still providing everything to the user. But I say in theory because -- come on, separate the INDEX from the book? I completely disagree with this. Ancillary materials can often be separated; it's like publishing the text book on paper and the workbook online. What if they decided to put the table of contents online and not with the hard copy? A TOC contains way less information than index -- and is much less useful for most searches -- and yet I can't imagine a publisher making this choice. Still, indexes do appear online. O'Reilly & Associates puts ASCII versions of books indexes in their online catalog (http://www.oreilly.com/catalog), perhaps as a selling point. And in one case, O'Reilly beat Simon & Schuster in putting an index online only by mistake. Production got so difficult that the book went to press without the index (it had to appear at a show); a note was put into the books that said the index was online. Still, when the book was reprinted, the index was included. In other words, not only was Simon & Schuster not the first publisher to publish an index online and not in the book, but the publisher that *did* so it corrected the problem as soon as possible. :-) - Seth -- Seth A. Maislin (seth@oreilly.com) O'Reilly & Associates Focus Publishing Services 90 Sherman Street 89 Grove Street Cambridge MA 02140 Watertown MA 02172-2826 (617) 499-7439 phone (617) 924-4428 (617) 661-1116 facsimile smaislin@world.std.com URL: http://www.oreilly.com/~seth co-webmaster, Amer Soc of Indexers: http://www.asindexing.org ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:11:38 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Wright, Sharon F." Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article > ----Original Message----- > From: John and Kara Pekar [SMTP:jkpekar@CROSSLINK.NET] > Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 1998 3:47 PM > To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L > Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article > > Actually, it seems potentially elitist to me. You don't mention what type > of book it is (and I was unable to access the site when I tried.) > ... > If eliminating the index from the book in favor of posting it on the Web > is > indeed a trend, it is one I find alarming. I am excited by the > technology > and potential of computers and the Internet. I believe they have > tremendous positive implications for the future of information > dissemination. As we are becoming increasingly aware, the technology > brings with it new challenges and problems as well. I'm concerned that in > their rush to make use of the advantages of these technologies, companies > may be losing sight of the best interests of their customers. > > Kara Pekar > jkpekar@crosslink.net > I agree with Kara. I accessed the site and it's as bad as it sounds. It's supposed to be a general interest book, nonfiction book. The reason given for not including the index in the book is to prevent people from "ego surfing" (i.e., looking in the index for only their name) and to force the reader to read the entire book. The author and publisher state that they are intentionally making the index less accessible to encourage people to read the whole book cover-to-cover rather than picking out specific things. They even mention that in the future, they may experiment with putting things like footnotes and endnotes online only. This is a horrible attitude! They are placing their short-sighted interest in increased sales above the convenience of the customer! Of course, the question then becomes Who in their right mind would buy this book and jump through all of these hoops in order to use it? I certainly wouldn't, no matter who wrote it! I know that authors can be an egotistical lot and like to dictate how their material is read and interpreted, but this is going a little too far. Personally, if I picked the book up in the bookstore, flipped to the index and found a website URL, I'd put the book right back on the shelf and find myself a more user-friendly research tool! I don't think that this will be a continuing trend... at least I hope not! -- Sharon W. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 15:18:57 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Erika Millen Subject: Re[2]: "Book Index on Net Only" article Seth writes: << But I say in theory because -- come on, separate the INDEX from the book? I completely disagree with this. Ancillary materials can often be separated; it's like publishing the text book on paper and the workbook online. What if they decided to put the table of contents online and not with the hard copy? A TOC contains way less information than index -- and is much less useful for most searches -- and yet I can't imagine a publisher making this choice. >> The decision was apparently made by the author. Here's a quote from the article: Book indexes have long been the crutch of overworked college students and other quick readers in search of specific bits of information. But in this case, Burn Rate author Michael Wolff decided to use the Internet to prevent users from getting that quick hit. "I didn't want people to just look themselves up in the bookstore," Wolff said today. "The book is a book to read, not a research book, and it only really works if you read it straight through." ... Maneker [the editor] acknowledged that many people consider an index indispensable, and so the online index was a compromise. Erika Millen Indianapolis ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:27:48 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Richard Evans Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article At 04:11 PM 5/26/98 -0400, you wrote: >The >reason given for not including the index in the book is to prevent people >from "ego surfing" (i.e., looking in the index for only their name) and to >force the reader to read the entire book. The author and publisher state >that they are intentionally making the index less accessible to encourage >people to read the whole book cover-to-cover rather than picking out >specific things. Reminds me of a video store that opened up near me several years ago. The tapes were in no particular order and when I asked why I was told that the manager thought that people might rent more tapes because they might stumble on something of interest while searching for the tape they came in for. That store never got any of my business and has since gone under. Dick Evans ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 16:35:19 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Dafydd Llwyd Talcott <75711.1537@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: "Book Index on Net Only" article I haven't read this article yet, but the whole idea sounds bizarre. Good way to lose customers, I should think. Or "an unfortunate misuse of technology". IHMO dllt ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 10:51:53 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: computer indexing for novices In-Reply-To: <199805260405.XAA29797@mixcom.mixcom.com> When I started indexing, Cindex was not yet available for the Mac. So I wrote my indexes (2 yrs' worth) in MS Word. I never bothered with index cards, mind you--just keyed in right in Word. Although indexing programs are wonderful and make the work ever so much pleasanter and faster, indexing *concepts* and *skills* are stand-alone, so to speak. When I teach indexing courses, although I tell my students about indexing software, that is never my focus. I prefer to spend the time analyzing the text with them and discussing things like phrasing of subentries. Cheers, Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 13:44:35 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Pam Rider Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article In-Reply-To: <199805262010.NAA22004@powergrid.electriciti.com> I am appalled. I would refuse to accept work for a back-of-the-book index that only appeared at a web page. Sometimes people need to think before trying something out. The author's rationale is so goofy, it's evidence to me that there's unlikely much in the book of overriding value. Why buy it? Pam Rider Trying to walk cheerfully on the Earth prider@electriciti.com prider@tsktsk.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 18:04:37 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article Erika Millen wrote: > The decision was apparently made by the author. Here's a quote > from the article: > > Book indexes have long been the crutch of > overworked college students and other quick > readers in search of specific bits of information. Well, this sentence leaves me (almost) speechless. "Crutch?" "Quick readers?" "Specific bits of information" dismissed as a Bad Thing? Good god. I can't even come up with something semi-literate and polite to discuss abut this dreadful event, though many others on this list are doing an admirable job. Continue to discuss, please, whilst I sit in a corner moaning to myself about the fate of civilization as we know it, the barbarians at the gate, and These Kids Today. Ann (crutch? CRUTCH??! Like crutches are a BAD thing? Ask anyone without the complete use of both legs--crutches are a Good Thing. OK, ok, end of rant. For now.) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 20:28:50 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: indexer@INETCOM.NET Subject: Re: names, first name unknown I've enjoyed reading the comments on processes for doing name indexes. I've tried several different approaches, and granted while it is _fairly_ mindless it can still be mentally taxing due to the awesome scale of names involved in some scholarly texts; especially given that you still have all that other work to do on the subject index. You can get quite sick of seeing "et al", knowing full well that means perhaps 5-10 bizarroid names each with 2-3 initials! I am a strong believer that all things including mental energy are conserved. So very often when I'm doing a new edition of a text with many citations, it is quite clear that the previous edition's indexer (often perhaps the author) used up all their mental energy doing the name index. The result is often a pathetic subject index and a name index where the more active academics have 50 or more undifferentiated locators. If ever there was a place for automatic indexing perhaps it lies in doing name indexes! I recently tried going the scanning route with a HP scanjet 5P. This turned out to be more trouble than it was worth. Perhaps with better OCR software? Actually it did a fine job reading the names, perfect in fact, but put in all sorts of weird formatting things that were a major pain to edit out. I do think there is a lot of promise to this approach, particularly if the references are in one huge section like I mention below. Anyway what I now do is sit down with the page proofs and a red pen (to contrast with blue that I will be using to markup subject index terms). I keep the bibliography pages in a stack to the right and enter page numbers next to the appropriate citation as they come up. As each is entered next to the correct citation, I cross out the text reference with the red pen so I know it's been covered. If a name comes up that I feel is significant and is not part of a citation I circle it in red and enter it when I do the subject index. The text I'm working on at the moment (Psychology) has the citations in the back of each chapter. This is a huge plus since I've worked on Psych books that had easy 50-150 pages of references at the end of the book and it can be a major pain to wade through these on each reference. At this time I also determine ranges if the material cited continues to succeeding pages. Then when all the citations have been picked out, I type in all the names and their associated page references. Now this step goes like lightning because I'm not referring back and forth between the text and the biblio pages. Also for the really productive folks once I confirm they're all the same person I can take care of scads of references by typing in only one name. So in summary I focus what little brain effort is needed on the first step, then the second step is completely mindless (and thus very fast) typing. This approach is similar to the "marking up text first" approach for subject indexes, only the second step there usually has a fair bit more mental energy involved, but still significantly less than the markup step. Kevin Mulrooney ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dyslexics of the world untie! First State Indexing (302) 738-2558 276 East Main Street Indexer@inetcom.net Newark, Delaware 19711 http://www2.inet.net/~indexer/kjm.html ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 20:42:38 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: SCNDX Subject: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs Hi Everybody: I'd like to find out how you all handle multiple revisions of page proofs while indexing a book. I'm now on my second revision (third indexing) for the page proofs of a book. I have an intuitive feeling that even this is not the end. (Never having had this problem before, I did not provide for it up front.) Thanks for any input. Anita Levy Space Coast Indexers 1101 S. Atlantic Avenue #401 Cocoa Beach FL 32931 407-536-8431 scndx@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 19:58:17 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Jacque Childress Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article Greetings, I've been reading this thread with much interest. I'll first tell you that I'm not an indexer but I am a very interested librarian who is intrigued by your profession. I, too, am appalled that an author would request an index not be included for the reasons you have stated. First of all, I continually encourage patrons/students to use indexes because they are marvelous time-savers (you're right, that's not a 'bad thing') and secondly, I will not even consider purchasing a reference book (for our libraries) _without_ an index! Thank you, indexers, for all that you do! Jacque Childress School Library Consultant Cross Plains, TX ISD Ann Norcross wrote: > > Erika Millen wrote: > > > The decision was apparently made by the author. Here's a quote > > from the article: > > > > Book indexes have long been the crutch of > > overworked college students and other quick > > readers in search of specific bits of information. > > Well, this sentence leaves me (almost) speechless. "Crutch?" "Quick > readers?" "Specific bits of information" dismissed as a Bad Thing? > Good god. I can't even come up with something semi-literate and polite > to discuss abut this dreadful event, though many others on this list > are doing an admirable job. Continue to discuss, please, whilst I sit > in a corner moaning to myself about the fate of civilization as we > know it, the barbarians at the gate, and These Kids Today. > > Ann (crutch? CRUTCH??! Like crutches are a BAD thing? Ask anyone > without the complete use of both legs--crutches are a Good Thing. OK, > ok, end of rant. For now.) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 20:59:09 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: BECohen653 Subject: Re: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs On unexpected revisions: You might ask to be compensated for the revised pages as though they are new indexable pages, since you essentially have to re-index any pages with changes. In other words, just tack the new number of pages onto the total when calculating the bill, assuming you are indexing on a per-indexable-page rate. My confirmation letter includes a per-hour billing rate to be used when problems arise, which would be another way to handle any variations after the job begins--next time, as I assume you didn't have an emergency clause in your current contract. This sort of thing, which doesn't happen all that often, is a good reason to use a contract or confirmation letter. To my mind, the worst part about this sort of occurrence is the level of frustration involved--I'd much rather index 1,000 new pages than index the same 200 pages five times! I think my concentration is better too, when I'm not repeating the same text endlessly. Perhaps you are indexing the book version of that film "Groundhog's Day." Barbara E. Cohen Indianapolis, IN ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 22:42:03 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: indexer@INETCOM.NET Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Ann wrote: > >Now the bad news. I just talked to the editor, and we have THREE >PAGES FOR THE INDEX. THREE. PAGES. I have finished indexing 91 >pages of text; I have 2,114 entries in Cindex. My brain has just >exploded. > During the ASI meeting I wrote a post about the indexing process. I talked about how I like to markup text first so I can get a feel for the "levels" of information contained in the text. In this case it would be owners, drivers, cars, chassis, etc. This is a textbook case of why this process is so important. Without being aware of how each level brings with it a given volume of terms index size can get completely out of control. As soon as I read your first post I sensed trouble. Here are the levels Ann mentioned the publisher wanted her to cover: >The publisher wants every name of every driver, owner, manufacturer, engine type, >chassis type, brand name, race car, auto parts manufacturer, etc., indexed. When you mentioned all these levels to be indexed I sensed at least half were inappropriate for a general book; but I assumed perhaps you'd been given carte blanche and tons of money; a situation I have no experience with whatsoever. I do have a lot of experience estimating orders of magnitude of levels of information. If any of my clients presented me with the list of levels they wanted you to index I would have probably laughed at them. Or better yet asked for twice the money which would have effectively solved the problem. Your task is pretty simple: In the space allotted you must determine which levels of information can be included, i.e. completely covered, to meet the goal size. Right off the bat including the names of drivers and owners would amount to about 150+ names and kill at least 1-1.5 pages depending on 2 vs. 3 columns. If the races are discussed individually it may be appropriate to have a term with chronologically ordered subs, as in: Indianapolis 500 1911, 20-25 1912, 25-28 1913, 28-30 ..... accidents, 350table race statistics, 10table This is in fact what I assume the book is about so being able to look up the individual Indy 500s would seem to be a total nobrainer. Let's see now we're up to 1.5-2 pages. That leaves perhaps 2 levels of information, since each will consist of approximately 75 terms since that is roughly the number of races. Of those listed I would go with manufacturer and race car. I consider several of the others to be laughably insignificant to a trade book. (Ann this is no reflection on you; only on the unrealistic demands of the publisher). In addition they are readily accessible by looking up individual cars. Alternatively, if there is a table that lists all relevant data in summary form that would be ideal. Then all these levels can each be covered with one single term each, as in Engines, 10table; Chassis types, 10table, etc. Then you can proceed to include some other cool stuff to fill up the space. Look on the bright side: this will make a great indexing story when it's all over!! By severely limiting your degrees of freedom they've actually made your job much easier although it probably doesn't seem that way now. Also it's better to find this out when you're 100 pages in then when you're almost done. The big problem will be disabusing them of their notions of what a 3 page index can include. Kevin Mulrooney ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dyslexics of the world untie! First State Indexing (302) 738-2558 276 East Main Street Indexer@inetcom.net Newark, Delaware 19711 http://www2.inet.net/~indexer/kjm.html ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 23:41:17 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: DStaub11 Subject: Re: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs Barb Cohen said what I would have about getting compensated for the extra time when they dump revisions on you during the process. I want to add that professional indexing software can help a lot. If they've just moved everything in a chapter over two pages, Macrex can do that automatically. When text is being shifted around on the pages, as is often the case, I put the index in page number order, boldface the old page numbers, and compare it to the marked pages (so I can see which sections are moving and what I indexed on them). So it isn't quite as bad as re-indexing those pages, although if the book is fairly simple it probably takes just as much time. :-( Which is why you make sure they pay you extra! Do Mi ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 21:37:58 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Roberta Horowitz Subject: Los Angeles Meeting Web Design/Maintaining With all the recent discussion on Index-L about the Web, I thought this meeting would be of interest to those of you in the LA area. Roberta Horowitz LACASIS Los Angeles Chapter of the American Society for Information Science June Program and Business Meeting Joyce Adams, Web Site Operations Manager for Experian (http://www.experian.com/) will present tips and tools that will help make designing and maintaining your Web site easier. This practical session will include discussion of topics ranging from HTML to Java; including design considerations for planning your Web Site. Date: June 10, 1998 $24 LACASIS Members Cost: $28 Non-members $18 Student, Retired, or Unemployed 6:00 pm Hospitality Hour 7:00 Dinner Business meeting (Dudee Chiang) 7:50 Presenting the slate of nominees Recognition to board members Time: Recognition to program committee Introduction of the program (Linda McCann) 8:00 Program: Maintaining Your Web Site: Tips and Tools by Joyce Adams Olympic Collection Place: 11301 Olympic Blvd., Ste. 204 Los Angeles, CA 90064 Phone: (310) 575-4585 Buffet dinner includes: California Salad with Tomatoes and Cucumbers, Sliced Fresh Fruit Platter, Menu: Penne Pasta with Fresh Grated Parmesan Cheese, Melange of Seasonal Vegetables, Marinara or Bolognese Sauce, Garlic Toast, dessert of Home Baked Brownies. Parking: Complimentary parking in underground structure. Registration deadline: Friday, June 5, 1997 Delia Blanquart 492 S. Arroyo Blvd Pasadena 91105 Phone: 213/977-3147 Please send payments promptly. ------------------------------------------------------------------ Name: (Check here if LACASIS member Affiliation: Daytime Phone: Address: City/State/Zip: I enclose for registration: to attend LACASIS November 11th meeting. TOTAL ENCLOSED: To register online, go to LACASIS' home page at http://www.usc.edu/Library/LACASIS For driving directions, try BigBook at http://www.bigbook.com/ y ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 01:00:16 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Locatelli Subject: Re: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs In a message dated 98-05-26 20:43:50 EDT, SCNDX@AOL.COM writes: > I'd like to find out how you all handle multiple revisions of page proofs > while > indexing a book. I'm now on my second revision (third indexing) for the > page proofs of a book. > I have an intuitive feeling that even this is not the end. > (Never having had this problem before, I did not provide for it up front.) My initial reaction is to start charging an hourly rate as soon as you get beyond the first set of proofs. Or just keep charging for each set of proofs at your regular per-page rate. That is, if you have had to index a page twice, they (publisher or author or whomever) get charged for two pages. Fred Leise Between the Lines Indexing and Editorial Services ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 09:32:36 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: MaryMort Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article I agree with what others have said about the undesirability of separating the index from the text. Have you looked at the index itself? It's on this Web page: http://www.simonsays.com/burnrate/players.html It's only an index of personal and company names, with no subentries (check out the long strings of locators in the entries for AOL and Microsoft, for example.) There are hyperlinks for many, but to the companies' Web sites, not to the text of the book. There are no entries for concepts that I can see, although the following claim precedes the index: "The editors at Simon and Schuster (the ones who usually work on paper) have put together this unique and useful index of the characters and companies and concepts that populate Burn Rate. It's available only online, only here, and only to those who dare to click. It's a history of names in the making and remaking of the Internet, and a hotlist of today's movers and shakers." If the reference to editors is true (and not just a publicist's fluff), a professional indexer was not involved, at least. And the index itself is not too long, so it wouldn't be difficult to print the Web page and keep the hard copy with the book! Mary -- * Mary Mortensen * marymort@aol.com * Lawrence, Kansas, USA ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 07:15:59 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Laura M. Gottlieb" Subject: Literary references to indexing 27 May 1998 Here's a series of quotations about indexing from Penelope Lively's 1984 novel, _Perfect Happiness_, which may be of interest to you. p. 152: "Frances had almost forgotten about him. And now his face...prompted a response that was purely reflexive: positive....They began to talk about Venice....And then, the job, and he told her about the progress of his book and his problems with compiling such things as bibliography and index. 'I'm a mere journalist,' he said. 'I've never had to deal with these refinements before.' 'I once did an index for Steven [Frances's recently deceased husband],' said Frances. 'It's not so difficult. The thing is to have all these little cards....' Morris Corfield nodded gravely as she talked, appearing to take careful note. The conversation, it occurred to Frances, was becoming somewhat banal. She said, 'All this is rather dull.' Morris nodded in acquiescence and then jumped slightly. 'Not at all. Absolutely not.' p. 192: "'I've been putting into practice your advice about indexing,' [declares Morris Corfield]. The thing begins to look more shapely.' 'Good,' said Frances. And beamed. 'It's nice to be useful.'" I squirm at the implication that talk about the indexing process is inherently dull and banal, but it's interesting to run across *any* literary references to indexing! And here's to more "shapely" indexes! Laura Moss Gottlieb, Freelance Indexer ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 09:57:13 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Wright, Sharon F." Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article Ok, I have to share this-- it's too funny! I just went to the website as Mary suggested, and decided to click on some to the hypertext links randomly to see where they went. The one for Drew Barrymore gave me "URL not found." The one for Aldus took me to the Adobe home page (presumably a product of Adobe? I don't know. There was nothing by that name immediately on the page). The one for Paul Allen took me to the Starwave news site-- I assume he is somehow associated with it? I don't know. The one for Jack Benny took me to a classic radio site. Ok, at least tangentially related. The fun came with the one for George Bush. It gave me an message from my company webmaster telling me that access to that website had been blocked as it was a violation of the company's HR policy. It then gave me a list of the categories that had been blocked: Adult entertainment, drugs, gambling, hacking, illegal (an interesting choice for a legal publisher), militancy, pornography, racism, sexuality/lifestyles, tasteless and violence! Now, this provides a rich source of possible political jokes, but I wonder which of these categories they think George fits into? I mean, he may not have been my favorite all-time president, but I really don't see him fitting into any of those categories! By the way, the index is what Mary said-- nothing more than a list of personal and company names with a string of locators. It wouldn't have been particularly useful even if it HAD been printed with the book! -- Sharon W. > -----Original Message----- > From: MaryMort [SMTP:MaryMort@AOL.COM] > Sent: Wednesday, May 27, 1998 9:33 AM > To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L > Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article > > I agree with what others have said about the undesirability of separating > the > index from the text. Have you looked at the index itself? It's on this > Web > page: > http://www.simonsays.com/burnrate/players.html > > It's only an index of personal and company names, with no subentries > (check > out the long strings of locators in the entries for AOL and Microsoft, for > example.) There are hyperlinks for many, but to the companies' Web sites, > not > to the text of the book. > > There are no entries for concepts that I can see, although the following > claim > precedes the index: > > "The editors at Simon and Schuster (the ones who usually work on paper) > have put together this unique and useful index of the characters and > companies and concepts that populate Burn Rate. It's available only > online, only here, and only to those who dare to click. > > It's a history of names in the making and remaking of the Internet, and > a hotlist of today's movers and shakers." > > If the reference to editors is true (and not just a publicist's fluff), a > professional indexer was not involved, at least. And the index itself is > not > too long, so it wouldn't be difficult to print the Web page and keep the > hard > copy with the book! > > Mary > -- > * Mary Mortensen * marymort@aol.com > * Lawrence, Kansas, USA ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 08:41:33 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group Comments: Warning -- original Sender: tag was maryann@ITASCA.REVISOR.LEG.STATE.MN.US From: Maryann Corbett Organization: Revisor of Statutes Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article This is not the first time we've discussed the subject of books/authors/publishers who specify that a book has not been indexed because more people will buy the book if they have to read the whole thing instead of simply looking up names (mostly their own) in the index. It has come up often enough now that I'm starting to believe we ought to find out more about this idea. Who believes it? Is it, as I hope, an idea held only by publishers of books that are just quick ways to make a buck? Are they mostly about politics, entertainment, or what? Those readers who only want to see whether they themselves, or their colleagues, are mentioned in a book--are they for real? Who are they? What can we do to keep the idea from spreading, apart from cheering the librarians who won't buy books without indexes, and making certain kids are taught how to use indexes? I'd suggest an ASI subcommittee to look into this sort of thing, except that if I do, I probably ought to get it rolling, and I don't have the publishing connections that would be needed to do this. Further thoughts? -- Maryann Corbett Language Specialist Office of the Revisor of Statutes Minnesota Legislature 612-297-2952 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 10:22:27 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: indexer@INETCOM.NET Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Oops I guess I should have read _all_ my backed up e-mail before writing that last post about Ann's quandry. I see from a later post she's done indexing and is dealing with trying to shorten it. Guess my comments were a day late and considerably more than a dollar short. However this topic of indexing "levels" is one of my push button topics; my post during the ASI meeting explains in considerable detail where I'm coming from. Also John Grey would probably say I was acting like a Martian and giving unsolicited advice instead of just commiserating! Sorry about that! Kevin Mulrooney ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dyslexics of the world untie! First State Indexing (302) 738-2558 276 East Main Street Indexer@inetcom.net Newark, Delaware 19711 http://www2.inet.net/~indexer/kjm.html ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 08:31:50 -0600 Reply-To: aelser@uswest.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Art Elser Organization: U S WEST Communications Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article I don't think I'd get too worked up about this "indexless" book. If the reading public doesn't want indexless books, they'll vote that way with their money. Fortunately, unlike our political system, the average reader's vote does count. If readers like this idea, no amount of wimpering on the part of "traditional" indexers will stop it. If, on the other hand, and I think more than likely the case, readers don't like the idea, they'll just not buy these books and the publishers will get the message. The French Academy has been trying for centuries to keep the French language "pure" with little success. So too have the Mr Higginbothem and Miss Grundy grammarians in the US tried to keep American English "pure," with little success. In cases like this, I think it's best to recognize the impossibility of holding back the tide of fashion or new ideas and find a way to live with it. In the case of indexers, perhaps it would be better to figure out a way of providing better detached, online indexes--if this trend really does take hold--than shouting our "righteous indignation." After all, aren't we just preaching to the choir? Just my two cents worth. ================================================================== Art Elser (303) 965-4825 aelser@uswest.com Information Developer, U S WEST There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts. Illusions, Richard Bach =================================================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 10:42:20 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: IndexJim@AOL.COM Subject: Re: "Book Index on Net Only" article I just e-mailed S & S a note that I would not be purchasing Burn Rate for the library I work for because of the lack of the index. BTW, the hyperlink from George Bush is to a porno site. Their link ended .com instead of .gov. Makes a world of difference. Jim Pilarski Pilarski Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 10:49:53 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Ann Norcross Subject: Re: names, first name unknown indexer@INETCOM.NET wrote: > > Ann wrote: > > > > >Now the bad news. I just talked to the editor, and we have THREE > >PAGES FOR THE INDEX. THREE. PAGES. I have finished indexing 91 > >pages of text; I have 2,114 entries in Cindex. My brain has just > >exploded. > > > > During the ASI meeting I wrote a post about the indexing process. I talked > about how I like to markup text first so I can get a feel for the "levels" > of information contained in the text. In this case it would be owners, > drivers, cars, chassis, etc. This is a textbook case of why this process > is so important. Without being aware of how each level brings with it a > given volume of terms index size can get completely out of control. You said it! > As soon as I read your first post I sensed trouble. Here are the levels Ann > mentioned the publisher wanted her to cover: > >The publisher wants every name of every driver, owner, manufacturer, engine > type, >chassis type, brand name, race car, auto parts manufacturer, etc., > indexed. Just for fun, here is the exact note I was sent: "Names of drivers, car owners, race officials, etc. in text, captions, and annual starting grids (do NOT index information in results chart at conclusion of each entry.); names of engines and chassis mentioned in text and captions; names of cars (i.e. STP Special) in text and captions; names of specific races or race courses (i.e. French Grand Prix) in text and captions; names of auto and parts manufacturers (i.e. Ford, Firestone, STP) in text and captions." > When you mentioned all these levels to be indexed I sensed at least half > were inappropriate for a general book; but I assumed perhaps you'd been > given carte blanche and tons of money; Bwwaaahhahahahahaha. Nope. > a situation I have no experience with > whatsoever. I do have a lot of experience estimating orders of magnitude of > levels of information. If any of my clients presented me with the list of > levels they wanted you to index I would have probably laughed at them. My oh my, I wish you had been here to help me talk to these people. >Or > better yet asked for twice the money which would have effectively solved the > problem. > > Your task is pretty simple: In the space allotted you must determine which > levels of information can be included, i.e. completely covered, to meet the > goal size. Right off the bat including the names of drivers and owners would > amount to about 150+ names and kill at least 1-1.5 pages depending on 2 vs. > 3 columns. Actually, 150 would be right for just *winners* and owners of winners, but, in fact, there are 25-30 drivers (and owners) for each race. So that's 75x25x2, which is 3700+ names!!! Granted, many names are repeated from year to year, so although it would in fact be 3700 locators, it would not be 3700 unique names. 3700 locators, however, take up a bunch of space. Having done just people (drivers, owners, celebrities (the editor kept stressing that on the phone) and others in captions) from 1911-1950, I have over 500 unique names already (1,954 entries in Cindex) and even at 3 column 8 point type, that's about 5 pages. Also, I felt that I could not conflate the page numbers. Because people are mentioned on page 5, and there's a photo on page 6, page 5-6 would be misleading... it is not a discussion of the guy for two pages, it's two discrete mentions. I seem to be stuck. > If the races are discussed individually it may be appropriate to > have a term with chronologically ordered subs, as in: > > Indianapolis 500 > 1911, 20-25 > 1912, 25-28 > 1913, 28-30 Well, at least I know I'm on the right track (no pun intended). I suggested this and the editor said absolutely not. > ..... > accidents, 350table > race statistics, 10table Nope. I also mentioned doing the tables this way, and as you can see from his original note, that's one thing he absolutely does NOT want indexed--the tables. Now understand that in these tables we have: names of drivers, owners, chassis, engine, and race results and stats. Accidents are not listed in a table, they are sprinkled throughout the book. I really wanted to do them; they tell a very different Indy 500 story when you see them all listed together. Dozens of names, plus the occasional "spectator, name unknown". But... no room! > This is in fact what I assume the book is about so being able to look up the > individual Indy 500s would seem to be a total nobrainer. Let's see now > we're up to 1.5-2 pages. That leaves perhaps 2 levels of information, since > each will consist of approximately 75 terms since that is roughly the number > of races. Of those listed I would go with manufacturer and race car. But there are many manufacturers in each race, and many race cars. So that's 75 x number of entries in each race, which is several hundreds of entries for each level. Do you mean: Manufacturers 1911 1912 or Manufacturers Ford Miller Novi or Ford Miller Novi or something else? That will be a huge amount of data, considering the number of entries in each race. I started doing this, and it mushroomed unbelievably fast. Of course I'm talking about pulling all the info out of the text and captions... if I could have done the tables, it would be easier to, but would actually create more entries, because not everyone in the tables is mentioned in the text. > I > consider several of the others to be laughably insignificant to a trade > book. (Ann this is no reflection on you; only on the unrealistic demands of > the publisher). In addition they are readily accessible by looking up > individual cars. Looking them up under...? I got lost here. > Alternatively, if there is a table that lists all relevant > data in summary form that would be ideal. Then all these levels can each be > covered with one single term each, as in Engines, 10table; Chassis types, > 10table, etc. Yes, except it would be Engines and then 75 locators, one for the table for each year. Same for Chassis, etc. And I can't do the tables. > Then you can proceed to include some other cool stuff to fill > up the space. :-) Space? :-) :-) > Look on the bright side: this will make a great indexing story when it's all > over!! By severely limiting your degrees of freedom they've actually made > your job much easier although it probably doesn't seem that way now. Also > it's better to find this out when you're 100 pages in then when you're > almost done. The big problem will be disabusing them of their notions of > what a 3 page index can include. What an incredibly helpful post! I don't suppose you are interested in taking on the book at this point...? Ann (May I call you?) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 11:38:39 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: indexer@INETCOM.NET Subject: Re: names, first name unknown Ann wrote: my comments are under KJM, Ann's under AN ... ... ... (AN)>Just for fun, here is the exact note I was sent: > >"Names of drivers, car owners, race officials, etc. in text, captions, >and annual starting grids (do NOT index information in results chart >at conclusion of each entry.); names of engines and chassis mentioned >in text and captions; names of cars (i.e. STP Special) in text and >captions; names of specific races or race courses (i.e. French Grand >Prix) in text and captions; names of auto and parts manufacturers >(i.e. Ford, Firestone, STP) in text and captions." > (KJM)>> Your task is pretty simple: In the space allotted you must determine which >> levels of information can be included, i.e. completely covered, to meet the >> goal size. Right off the bat including the names of drivers and owners would >> amount to about 150+ names and kill at least 1-1.5 pages depending on 2 vs. >> 3 columns. > (AN)>Actually, 150 would be right for just *winners* and owners of winners, >but, in fact, there are 25-30 drivers (and owners) for each race. So >that's 75x25x2, which is 3700+ names!!! Granted, many names are >repeated from year to year, so although it would in fact be 3700 >locators, it would not be 3700 unique names. > >3700 locators, however, take up a bunch of space. Having done just >people (drivers, owners, celebrities (the editor kept stressing that >on the phone) and others in captions) from 1911-1950, I have over 500 >unique names already (1,954 entries in Cindex) and even at 3 column 8 >point type, that's about 5 pages. Also, I felt that I could not >conflate the page numbers. Because people are mentioned on page 5, >and there's a photo on page 6, page 5-6 would be misleading... it is >not a discussion of the guy for two pages, it's two discrete >mentions. I seem to be stuck. > That's the benefit of insufficient information on my part; as in like ignorance is bliss. I realized later that they probably wanted _all_ drivers and owners as you point out which is what produced so many names. This is a ridiculous demand on their part given the space available but that unfortunately doesn't help much now. (KJM)>> If the races are discussed individually it may be appropriate to >> have a term with chronologically ordered subs, as in: >> >> Indianapolis 500 >> 1911, 20-25 >> 1912, 25-28 >> 1913, 28-30 > (AN)>Well, at least I know I'm on the right track (no pun intended). I >suggested this and the editor said absolutely not. > This is starting to look like they wanted x number of guaranteed book buyers: all the past drivers and owners at a minimum. (AN)In addition they are readily accessible by looking up >> individual cars. > >Looking them up under...? I got lost here. (KJM)What I thought was that the relevant information (engine, manufacturers, chassis type, etc.) might be at the same place the info on each race winner would be. This might (hopefully) be at the same place as the info on the individual race, so terms like "Engine types (of race winners), See specific race years listed under Indianapolis 500" Again ignorance may be bliss here. (AN)> I don't suppose you are interested >in taking on the book at this point...? (KJM)I'd love to but (see "index delayed" posts) I'm in a huge crunch. 2 late books adding to one huge project that's a smidge late plus another book on diff eq where the author first asked for me, then changed his mind and wanted to do it himself, then changed it back and now it's a semi-rush. Plus a smallish project that I sent a sample index for; though I suspect that isn't gonna pan out. All before about the 15th of June and I'm supposed to go to the Outer Banks next week! I'll be working on the beach with my lowly 286 laptop running Cindex. Sounds like you have a good grasp of the level sizes involved and can use that information with the publisher. The only thing I would do different is I would have thrown up a red flag to them immediately: Houston we have a slight problem... > >Ann (May I call you?) > Sure Kevin Mulrooney ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dyslexics of the world untie! First State Indexing (302) 738-2558 276 East Main Street Indexer@inetcom.net Newark, Delaware 19711 http://www2.inet.net/~indexer/kjm.html ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 10:33:53 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: Smith and Jones In-Reply-To: <199805270415.XAA17199@mixcom.mixcom.com> >Perhaps you misread my original message about name indexes -- of course Jones >would have his own entry. I said that I ENTERED names as Smith and Jones >(1997) and that when I finished, I compared my index with the bibliography, >added first names or initials and then broke each entry into its component >parts -- meaning that I create individual entries for each name. This process >is much faster than consulting the bibliography repeatedly either during the >marking process or while making entries. > Sorry, I must have misread it. I missed the part about breaking the entries into component parts. Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 10:57:58 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Brackney Subject: Re: Smith and Jones Dear Carol: At 10:33 AM 5/27/98 -0500, you wrote: >>Perhaps you misread my original message about name indexes -- of course Jones >>would have his own entry. I said that I ENTERED names as Smith and Jones >>(1997) and that when I finished, I compared my index with the bibliography, >>added first names or initials and then broke each entry into its component >>parts -- meaning that I create individual entries for each name. This process >>is much faster than consulting the bibliography repeatedly either during the >>marking process or while making entries. >> >Sorry, I must have misread it. I missed the part about breaking the entries >into component parts. Not just you, Carol -- I missed it too! I didn't get that "component parts" referred to individual names. Now I see that it could hardly have meant anything else. No matter, the idea is very helpful -- but there's something else I didn't get: the need to include the date of publication with the names during the entry process. Sandy, would you please say why you do this? Thanks much, Michael Brackney Indexing Service 134 Kathleen Way Grass Valley, CA 95945 530-272-7088 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 13:02:16 -0700 Reply-To: bancroft@inreach.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Kay or Larry Bancroft Subject: Periodical Subscriptions I recently completed the USDA Basic Indexing Course and hope to launch my indexing business soon. As a two-year lurker on Index-L, I think I have a good idea as to what my new career will be like--thanks to all of you who so generously share your expertise and experience. I am ordering several of the reference books that many of you have suggested are essential. However, I would also like to know what periodical subscriptions are most useful to an indexer. "Publishers' Weekly" has been mentioned--do most of you subscribe to this? If so, how do you use it and is it really worth (gulp!) $169/year? As a former librarian, our staff always preferred "Library Journal", "BookList", "Kirkus", and "Choice" for good book reviews and seldom consulted "Publisher's Weekly". Of course, this was for selection purposes, not to keep up with the publishing industry. I'll be looking forward to your advice soon. Thanks! Kay Bancroft Case mountain INDEXING ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 16:25:38 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Dafydd Llwyd Talcott <75711.1537@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: Re: computer indexing for..[sort of] Carol raises a valid and oft forgotten point, sort of "hardware" vs "software" in computer terms. And someone else mentioned, approximately, "it's nice to know what the software is doing". As a professional recording engineer it is necessary not only to know the types and characteristics of the microphones available, but also the acoustical environment in which they might be placed. In other words, a user must know BOTH acoustics [software] and microphones [hardware] in order to produce a desired result. An example in another field is mathematics. One of my calculus profs would ask the class at the beginning of each session, "any questions about the homework?" If there were no questions he would then spend the remaining time showing in fascinating detail some _applications_ and variations of the material we were studying. Excellent teaching technique, I thought. Cheers, dllt ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 17:03:12 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sandra Topping Subject: Re: Smith and Jones Sorry if I was unclear about "breaking it into its component parts" -- I meant making a new entry for each name in the original (Smith and Jones). This is how I do it. I make entries for each citation with one name per line: Smith Jones Brown, 1995 When I have completed all entries, my index should match the bibliography (which we all HOPE is in alpha order). From there, I compare the two and add initials from the bibliography to the printout of the name index. Then I type in the initials and delete the year (the year is a point of comparison with the bibliography in case the same group has published more than once or in case there are two people with nearly identical names) When I have typed in initials and deleted the year, then I duplicate the entry, deleting Smith and Jones, and leaving Brown. I duplicate the original entry again, deleting Smith and Brown and leaving Jones. Then I go to the original entry and delete Jones and Brown. Voila. Smith - Jones - Brown each have an entry. CAVEAT: ALWAYS TURN OFF THE EDIT PROPAGATE FEATURE IN CINDEX OR YOU RUN THE RISK OF LOSING DATA. Always create the additional entries from the bottom up, so that you don't lose your place on the screen. Once you get used to doing it that way, it moves with great speed. It's also totally mindless and can be done whenever you are tired of "real" indexing or just can't think any longer. Hope that helps. If I was unclear, let me know. Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 13:56:35 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: Smith and Jones In-Reply-To: <199805271758.KAA03691@pacific.net> Michael wrote: >No matter, the idea is very helpful -- but there's something else I didn't >get: the need to include the date of publication with the names during the >entry process. Sandy, would you please say why you do this? I'm not Sandy but since I'm following this discussion closely (there have been two distinct name-index-creation systems presented for consideration so far), I'll pipe back in. For this technique the dates are essential because the same last name may have different initials, and only the last names are cited in the text (Smith, 1978). For instance, there may be three or four (or seven or eight) Smiths, each with different initials. Because this technique depends on NOT looking at the bibliography while in progress, the dates are essential to designate the differences at the end. In fact, checking the biblio won't tell you how many Smith designates there are, because many of them are buried below the primary, alphabetized author. One might think that an author group "Hilberger, Herringer, and Smith" could only be referring to the same Smith throughout; however, the last names index I did had at least two separate instances in which a different "Smith" joined such a group for later publications. To avoid looking anything up in progress, the dates are essential. --Victoria ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 14:21:37 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: Smith and Jones In-Reply-To: <199805272107.OAA29847@pacific.net> Sandy wrote: >CAVEAT: ALWAYS TURN OFF THE EDIT PROPAGATE FEATURE IN CINDEX OR YOU RUN THE >RISK OF LOSING DATA. Always create the additional entries from the bottom up, >so that you don't lose your place on the screen. The corrollary to this in Macrex is to work with automatic sort turned OFF. This feature is found in the main options menu. That way you don't go bouncing around the index, losing your place. In this case, one can work top down in the index. --Victoria ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 16:23:06 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sonsie Subject: Rates Again With all this talk about dual indexes in textbooks and scholarly works, I'd like to ask folks (who are willing to share) just how they price these jobs. I had been adding a paltry 50 cents per page for the extra index, and now I realize that this is nowhere near enough. In the book I am working on now, I'd say the references for the author index amount to at least 8-10 per page (sometimes more). This is worth a lot more than what I'm charging, especially since I not only have to mark them and type them in, I have to check nearly every one in the bibliography for a first name/initials. Thoughts, anyone? =Sonsie= ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 17:51:11 -0600 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Philip and Heather Jones Subject: Smith&Jones-SKY Index In SKY index, it is incredibly easy to do these name indexes. I tag all my names with an initial X, using commas between multiple names, so they all sort to the X's. Then I use a macro to demote the names one by one and copy them (duplicate, demote, shift left, etc.) and delete the initial X. There are probably a dozen ways you could do this, depending on when you want to add the initials; you can add them all at first and then separate the names, or you can finish each entry completely one at a time. Heather /---------------------------------------------------------------------\ | There are such things as cause and effect, but they have nothing to | | do with each other... | |---------------------------------------------------------------------| | Phil, Heather, Doug and Ivy Jones hpjones@rt66.com | | Los Alamos, NM | \---------------------------------------------------------------------/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 18:58:35 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Victoria Baker Subject: Re: Smith and Jones In-Reply-To: <199805272120.OAA01880@pacific.net> Addition. I wrote: >The corrollary to this in Macrex is to work with automatic sort turned OFF. > This feature is found in the main options menu. That way you don't go >bouncing around the index, losing your place. In this case, one can work >top down in the index. I realize that "tracking entries" needs to be turned off as well... I haven't tried this yet so I'm not sure if it's both or just tracking entries. Sorry about my confusion. --Victoria ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 20:41:07 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Charles Anderson Subject: Speech recognition programs Has anyone tried one of the new speech recognition programs with CINDEX? VoiceDirect from IMSI claims their program can work with any Windows application. Any thoughts, anyone? Charles Anderson ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 00:09:00 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Efthimis Efthimiadis Subject: UW Talk 6/8/98:Indexing/Data Mining in Multimedia DBs Subject: UW Talk 6/8/98:Indexing/Data Mining in Multimedia DBs The Graduate School of Library & Information Science University of Washington and the UW Student Chapter of the American Society for Information Science invite you to a presentation: Indexing and Data Mining in Traditional and Multimedia Databases. by Dr Christos Faloutsos Carnegie Mellon University. DATE: Monday, June 8, 1998 TIME: 3-5 pm VENUE: Room 127, Suzallo Library Bldg, UW PARKING: UW parking available at $6 -------- Abstract The talk presents fast indexing methods for multimedia databases, as well as recent tools for datamining. Specifically, it examines (a) Spatial Access Methods, like R-trees, for multimedia indexing and (b) scaleable methods for lossy compression and rule discovery. For the first part, we do feature extraction, mapping each multimedia object into a low-dimensionality point; then, we store these points in Spatial Access Methods, and thus we can quickly find objects that are similar to a desirable object (e.g., 'find stocks similar to Microsoft'). We describe the conditions under which the method gives no false dismissals, and we also describe FastMap, a method that does automatic feature extraction. For the second part on data mining, we describe a method that compresses a large data matrix, such as, eg., a matrix with customers as rows, days-of-the-year as columns, and the amount spent in each cell. For such a large, multi-GigaByte matrix, we want to compress it so that (1) it fits on the disk and (2) we can reconstruct arbitrary cells of the matrix quickly. The proposed method exploits patterns in the data matrix, achieves 50:1 compression with less than 10% reconstruction error, and moreover allows visualization. ----------------- Biographical note Christos Faloutsos received the B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering (1981) from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece and the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Computer Science from the University of Toronto, Canada. Dr Faloutsos is currently a faculty member at Carnegie Mellon University. Prior to joining CMU he was on the faculty of the department of Computer Science at University of Maryland, College Park. He has spent sabbaticals at IBM-Almaden and AT&T Bell Labs. Dr Faloutsos has received the Presidential Young Investigator Award by the National Science Foundation (1989), two ``best paper'' awards (SIGMOD 94, VLDB 97), and three teaching awards. He has published over 70 refereed articles, one monograph, and has filed for three patents. His research interests include physical data base design, searching methods for text, geographic information systems indexing methods for multimedia databases and data mining. -------- Contact: Christos Faloutsos Computer Science Department phone#: 412-268.14.57 Carnegie Mellon University FAX#: 412-268.55.76 Wean Hall, room 4111 elm: christos@cs.cmu.edu 5000 Forbes Avenue URL: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~christos Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3891 ---- * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Efthimis N. Efthimiadis Associate Professor Graduate School of Library & Information Science University of Washington tel-office: 206-616-6077 Box 352930 tel-school: 206-543-1794 Seattle, WA 98195-2930 fax. 206-616-3152 email: efthimis@u.washington.edu * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 09:02:42 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Sharon Hughes Subject: Re: Speech recognition programs I bought a cheap (inexpensive) package just to see what the technology was like. It's probably not a fair comparison with programs like Dragon's products. BUT the one I have writes to a "notebook" which you can then pull into your word processor. If you speak "tab" or "comma" you get them. So my guess is that you can pull it from word processing to a spread sheet then into CINDEX for example. You have to speak a lot of prescripted material to teach it how to type the words you dictate. That takes a while but it's okay. If you index a lot of names or specialized terms, like latin names, you will probably have to spell them. The program recognizes spelling. This slows you down. I'd think that the editing time grows as fast as the typing time is cut. I'd like to know how it's working for others. The technology is interesting. It would theoretically type faster than I do, and save my wrists. Sharon ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 09:43:55 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Richard Evans Subject: Re: Speech recognition programs I haven't looked at speech recognition programs lately, but last I knew they were finicky and unpredictable. They were only good for recognizing a limited set of words, and had to be trained to recognize the user's voice for that set. Even if they now worked flawlessly for dictating whole passages, I can't imagine they'd be much use for the computer books I do that contain scads of words like: Knohmutil Kppix Krtti sascc370 CICS CSECT ... and so on and so on. Dick Evans ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 14:48:55 -0400 Reply-To: kamm@sky-software.com Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Kamm Y. Schreiner" Subject: Consortium of Freelancers and Publishers Does anyone on the list know if the Consortium of Freelancers and Publishers web site is still around? I am trying to contact Susan Wilkerson and both of the email addresses I have bounce back. Any help you can offer is much appreciated. Sincerely, Kamm Schreiner SKY Software 4675 York Rd #1 Lineboro, MD 21102 email: kamm@sky-software.com web: http://www.sky-software.com phone: 800-776-0137 or 410-374-3484 fax: 410-374-3484 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 11:57:25 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "A. Carlyle" Subject: Visiting Faculty Positions, Univ. of Washington, GSLIS This posting was sent earlier this month and is being sent again in an effort to reach as many potential applicants possible. ******************************************************************** University of Washington Seattle, Washington, USA VISITING FACULTY POSITIONS People and Knowledge: Building Information Connections! The Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Washington is searching for two visiting faculty members who subscribe to this vision to start from Fall 1998. These positions are one year appointments with opportunities to apply for future tenure track position openings. The positions require competency in an area of library and information science. Candidates would ideally teach in one or more of the areas below: * conceptual database design * management * information resources and retrieval * design and provision of information services, including children's and young adult services * information policy * organization of information Applicants should have the following qualifications: * an earned Ph.D., or near completion, in library and information science or cognate area * appreciation of the interdisciplinary nature of library and information science and an ability to integrate research areas and disciplinary perspectives * research and publications commensurate with experience. The University of Washington is a research university in an active information environment. The Graduate School of Library and Information Science offers an ALA accredited masters program. Seattle is a multicultural, modern city with numerous cultural, outdoor and athletic activities. Review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the positions are filled. We are building a multicultural work force and strongly encourage women, ethnic minorities and persons with disabilities to apply. Special interest will be given to applicants who can serve well in an increasingly diverse university community. The University of Washington is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer. Interested individuals should mail or fax their applications, consisting of (1) letter of interest, (2) a curriculum vitae, and (3) three letters of recommendation to: Raya Fidel Graduate School of Library and Information Science Box 352930 University of Washington Seattle, WA 98195-2930 USA voice (206) 543-1888 fax: (206) 616-3152 Detailed information about the school, the faculty, the curriculum, and other aspects of the program can be obtained from the School's website: http://weber.u.washington.edu/~gslis/ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 14:47:39 -0500 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Re: Smith and Jones In-Reply-To: <199805280451.XAA03780@mixcom.mixcom.com> Michael Brackney wrote: >No matter, the idea is very helpful -- but there's something else I didn't >get: the need to include the date of publication with the names during the >entry process. Sandy, would you please say why you do this? Victoria Baker added: >For this technique the dates are essential >because the same last name may have different initials, and only the last >names are cited in the text (Smith, 1978). For instance, there may be >three or four (or seven or eight) Smiths, each with different initials. I agree with Victoria about the usefulness of leaving in the dates. Just yesterday I used this technique, and I kept the dates in in hidden text--in Cindex, that's in curly brackets--so I wouldn't need to go back and remove them. But instead of typing the entries in, I scanned in the whole bibliography, deleted all but the names and dates, cleaned up typos, then imported this MS Word file into Cindex. It worked like a charm. The whole process, for 14 pages of bibliography, took about an hour and a half, primarily due to the large number of typos (my fancy new OCR software, TextBridge Pro, is still sitting in the box, darn it). Cheers, Carol Roberts, indexer and copy editor | I'm not into working out. My Carol.Roberts@mixcom.com | philosophy: No pain, no pain. Milwaukee, WI | -- Carol Leifer http://www.mixweb.com/Roberts.Indexing ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 17:38:12 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Elizabeth Tudor Subject: Scientific Names and Parens Hi all. I'm currently indexing a book with many scientific names and have run into a problem. Many of the species names are simply a genus name with the abbreviation sp. Fine so far but I'm a little confused about parens around such a designation. The editor wants parens italicized if the full scientific name is used as in: (Castanea detanta) but has not specified in the case of a partial name. Should it be: acorn (Quercus sp.) - where parens are in Roman or acorn (Quercus sp.) - where parens are italiciz ed What do you think? I would appreciate any recommendations. Thanks to all. Beth Tudor ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 09:39:27 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Rachel Rice Subject: Re: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs In-Reply-To: <57089cf7.356b655f@aol.com> On the unplanned for revisions: This has happened to me a few times. If it's a whole chapter or a a section shifting, it's easy to do in Cindex, and I'm sure in Macrex and others, and I don't charge extra. If it's just a few pages, it throws everthing off and I have had to reindex those pages. I called the publisher before starting on the revised pages and got an agreement for the same amount per page for the redone pages (I ended up making quite a lot of money on one job.) I honestly don't know what I would have done if they had said "no we aren't paying extra for those revised pages." I think I probably would have tried for an hourly rate for them, and if that failed as well, I probably would have gone ahead and done it rather than forfeit the considerable amount of work I'd already done, but would have said that in future we would handle such a thing in such and such a manner. I have only used a contract twice. No I'm rethinking that. I'm interested to hear what others do with this situation. RR Rachel Rice Directions Unlimited Desktop Services Indexing, editing, proofreading http://homepages.together.net/~racric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 17:49:10 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Wright, Sharon F." Subject: Re: Scientific Names and Parens Italicize either way. It is customary to italicize foreign (in this case Latin) names or words, even when abbreviated. Of course, this rule is not always practiced, but even abbreviations like et al. and Ibid. should technically be italicized. -- Sharon W. > -----Original Message----- > From: Elizabeth Tudor [SMTP:BethJT@AOL.COM] > Sent: Thursday, May 28, 1998 5:38 PM > To: Multiple recipients of list INDEX-L > Subject: Scientific Names and Parens > > Hi all. I'm currently indexing a book with many scientific names and have > run > into a problem. Many of the species names are simply a genus name with > the > abbreviation sp. Fine so far but I'm a little confused about parens > around > such a designation. The editor wants parens italicized if the full > scientific > name is used as in: (Castanea detanta) but has not specified in the case > of > a partial name. > > Should it be: acorn (Quercus sp.) - where parens are in Roman > > or > > acorn (Quercus sp.) - where parens are > italicized > > What do you think? I would appreciate any recommendations. Thanks to > all. > > Beth Tudor ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 18:19:19 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Nell Benton Subject: Re: Scientific Names and Parens The abbreviation "sp." can stand for various, unknown, or all species. It always follows the Latin name for the genus. So many species are not described that it is very very common to find this designation. I would always follow the same pattern whether the species is specified (NPI) or not, that is keep the same italicized parentheses. << Many of the species names are simply a genus name with > the > abbreviation sp. Fine so far but I'm a little confused about parens > around > such a designation. The editor wants parens italicized if the full > scientific > name is used as in: (Castanea detanta) but has not specified in the case > of > a partial name. > > Should it be: acorn (Quercus sp.) - where parens are in Roman > >> ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 15:45:21 -0700 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Michael Brackney Subject: Re: Smith and Jones At 02:47 PM 5/28/98 -0500, Carol Roberts wrote: > >I agree with Victoria about the usefulness of leaving in the dates. Just >yesterday I used this technique, and I kept the dates in in hidden text--in >Cindex, that's in curly brackets--so I wouldn't need to go back and remove >them. But instead of typing the entries in, I scanned in the whole >bibliography, deleted all but the names and dates, cleaned up typos, then >imported this MS Word file into Cindex. It worked like a charm. The whole >process, for 14 pages of bibliography, took about an hour and a half, >primarily due to the large number of typos (my fancy new OCR software, >TextBridge Pro, is still sitting in the box, darn it). I'm glad to hear of your success, Carol. The next thing I'd like to know is whether your new software outdoes your old in terms of reduced clean-up time. Please do tell after you get a chance to take TextBridge Pro out of the box. Michael Brackney Indexing Service 134 Kathleen Way Grass Valley, CA 95945 530-272-7088 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 18:46:33 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Nell Benton Subject: Re: Indexing for Revisions of Page Proofs In a message dated 98-05-28 18:04:26 EDT, RR wrote: << This has happened to me a few times. If it's a whole chapter or a a section shifting, it's easy to do in Cindex, and I'm sure in Macrex and others, and I don't charge extra. If it's just a few pages, it throws everthing off and I have had to reindex those pages. I called the publisher before starting on the revised pages and got an agreement for the same amount per page for the redone pages (I ended up making quite a lot of money on one job.) I honestly don't know what I would have done if they had said "no we aren't paying extra for those revised pages." I think I probably would have tried for an hourly rate for them, and if that failed as well, I probably would have gone ahead and done it rather than forfeit the considerable amount of work I'd already done, but would have said that in future we would handle such a thing in such and such a manner. Rachel, When everything hasn't shifted and I can't use the alter command I do a global find and replace, page, by page, working backwards because page "1-1" will also net you "1-12", "1-113" etc. Where bits of information have shifted to other pages I look at each reference as I go. My employer gave me the choice of working with unreliable page proofs or waiting to the end. Teeth gritted, I chose to go with the not-quite- finalized. There are a kazillion references on each page. The chapter page numbers start over so only one chapter-worth pages can be affected. I am very glad right now, that I made the choice to start early. I am doing a monster reference book and I would delay publication by many weeks if I had insisted on finalized pages. I am salaried, but if I were billing, I would charge double and find the most efficient way, i.e reindexing, using alter, or using my method. Every book is different and I would not want a client to expect free or inexpensive service for something that is so dependent on the type of problem. You deserve any extra you pocket because you're a whiz with Cindex or figured out a trick. Nell ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 19:52:10 EDT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Suellen Kasoff Subject: Re: Access 97/web site Hi I just tried and I got in. Suellen On Fri, 22 May 1998 14:04:54 EDT SHughes512 writes: >HI, > > I just tried visiting the site mentioned in the new Indexer as a >site built >using ACCESS 97. I cant seem to get connected. Has anyone else been >able to >get in? > > I used http://www.stark.kent.edu/library/new/bydate_1.htm > > I typed it twice but maybe I did something odd. > Sharon > _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 20:19:18 -0400 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: indexer@INETCOM.NET Subject: Re: Scanning Carol Roberts wrote: ... ... . But instead of typing the entries in, I scanned in the whole >bibliography, deleted all but the names and dates, cleaned up typos, then >imported this MS Word file into Cindex. It worked like a charm. The whole >process, for 14 pages of bibliography, took about an hour and a half, >primarily due to the large number of typos (my fancy new OCR software, >TextBridge Pro, is still sitting in the box, darn it). > Wow Carol can you enlighten me on your scanning technique? What sort of scanner do you use? I just got an HP 5P and I was disappointed by the results with bibliography pages. It uses OmniPage Lite but comes with an offer for OmniPage Pro. All the names and initials read in quite well, perfect in fact as far as I could tell on my test page, but the problem I ran into was there were a lot of weird formatting going on in the Word file. Part of the way down the margins would change; then change back, etc. Does this occur when you do it? Is there a trick to setting up the Word file _before_ you read in the scanned data and OCRize it? The one I'm working on now is a Psych text with about 180 bibliography pages. I would be very "psyched" if I could work out an elegant way to do this easier, since doing the subject index is intense enough! Thanks Kevin Mulrooney ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dyslexics of the world untie! First State Indexing (302) 738-2558 276 East Main Street Indexer@inetcom.net Newark, Delaware 19711 http://www2.inet.net/~indexer/kjm.html ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 May 1998 17:56:59 -0800 Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: "Marcia J. Bates" Subject: Journal of ASIS 50th Anniversary To all interested individuals... (please forgive cross-postings) Marcia Bates CALL FOR PAPERS JASIS Special Topic Issue Taking Stock for the Future: JASIS' 50th Anniversary A very special Special Topic Issue of the Journal of the American Society for Information Science (JASIS) will be coming out in 1999 (vol. 50) in order to celebrate JASIS's Fiftieth Anniversary. The topic will be "Taking Stock for the Future: JASIS's 50th Anniversary. The guest editor for this issue is Professor Marcia J. Bates of the University of California, Los Angeles. In planning for our lives, we often review where we've been, where we are now, and where we want to go. This special 50th Anniversary Issue of the Journal of the American Society for Information Science will mark information science's half-century celebration and outlook for the future. Two kinds of articles are encouraged: 1. Articles in the usual length range on these topics: *the nature of information science *the broad sweep of history of the field (not articles on very specific historical events or people) *the direction of the field--as it is or as it should be *the role of JASIS--past, present, future in the field and in scientific communication generally. 2. Brief commentary articles of a maximum 500-600 words on any of several types of topics: *brief opinion piece on any information-science-related issue *biographical sketch of some pioneer in the field *comments on future directions for the field *under-recognized research areas that should be getting more attention *forecasting JASIS' appearance and contents for the year 2049 *other imaginative topics relevant to the Journal's anniversary. People at all levels, senior and junior, in the field are urged to submit papers for this issue. We'd like to hear from recipients of the ASIS awards, faculty, researchers, and practitioners, as well as students at various educational levels. If there are sufficient suitable brief articles, some will be run in other issues during the Volume 50 (1999) year. Inquiries can be made to the guest editor by telephone or electronic mail. Authors must submit a paragraph "Statement of Intent" by June 30, 1998, in which you describe the general topic you intend to write about (for both short and long articles). All statements of intent may be submitted via electronic mail. Authors must submit four copies of the finished article (short or long) by August 31, 1998 to: Dr. Marcia J. Bates Department of Library and Information Science 230 GSEIS Building University of California, Los Angeles Los Angeles, CA 90095-1520 (310) 206-9353 (Voice) (310) 206-4460 (Fax) mjbates@ucla.edu All manuscripts will be reviewed by a select panel of referees, and those accepted will be published in this special issue of JASIS. Original artwork and a signed copy of the copyright release form will be required for all accepted papers. A copy of the call for papers will be available on the World Wide Web, as is further information about JASIS, at http://www.asis.org/ ####################################################################### Marcia J. Bates Professor Dept. of Library and Information Science 230 GSE&IS Building Graduate School of Education and Information Studies University of California, Los Angeles Los Angeles, CA 90095-1520 USA Tel: 310-206-9353 Fax: 310-206-4460 Email: mjbates@ucla.edu Web: http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/facpage/bates.html