Tellico 1.2.13 is available. The changelog is as follows:
- Fixed crashing bug when modifying fields for a collection with loans.
- Fixed bug with namespace handling for loading Tellico XML files.
- Added spell-checking for text fields.
- Added importer for GCstar data files.
- Added compatibility with yaz3.
- Added Copac and National Library of Lithuania to z39.50 server list.
The namespace bug doesn’t seem to have bitten anyone yet that I’ve heard of. I discovered it when writing the gcstar2tellico.xsl file. The data loader was using QDom’s namespace methods in some places and not in others, so it was inconsistent.
The GCstar importer is basically an update to the old GCfilms updater. It will still handle the older files, if anyone needs that. The importer currently handles books, movies, music, wines, coins, and video games. It does not handle GCstar’s custom collections yet.
So The Open Library is up and going, and they have a demo site available to try out. This is pretty cool stuff.
But most importantly, such a library must be fully open. Not simply “free to the people,” as the grand banner across the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh proclaims, but a product of the people: letting them create and curate its catalog, contribute to its content, participate in its governance, and have full, free access to its data. In an era where library data and Internet databases are being run by money-seeking companies behind closed doors, it’s more important than ever to be open.
How about their Open Library Number concept! Something akin to an ISBN, but not just for recently published books, every single book ever written! That’s pretty cool.
Obviously, at some point, I’d love to figure out a way to have Tellico interface to the database, either merely by pulling data, or actually submitting or modifying it as well. But that’s certainly way in the future. I’m just pretty astonished at what the people involved with the Open Library have been able to do so far.
I’ve been looking at designing a database schema for Tellico v2 and have had a couple of different approaches so far. The ThingDB schema used by the Open Library seems rather interesting. I wonder how well it will mesh with the FRBR approach.
It’s worth saying that Time Spalding at Library Thing is excited. He’s been a big proponent of book cataloging as a social activity for a while now. I suppose it’s also much like WorldCat, but is obviously designed to be much more free and open with its data and API.
Here’s hoping they really get this off the ground. You should help!
This amuses me, in some ways, and definitely interests me. To see how churches are handling new etiquette traditions.
At a recent Wednesday night service, Brian Huff, pastor at Church of the Harvest, took matters into his own hands - literally. When a member’s cell phone went off, Huff asked if he could answer it.
Etiquette lapses plague churches Oregon Register-Guard
The article goes on to mention fashion traditions (jeans ties, flip-flops, baseball caps) and tardiness. And the humorous final line is about gum under the pews. Heck, just the fact that they have pews makes them a old conservative church. Nowadays, you’re just as likely to get folding chairs.
During an interview with Mark Dever, pastor of Capital Hill Baptist Church, he was asked his view of the main theological dangers confronting us today. His answer was:
The main theological dangers I see confronting us today are a practical rejection of the authority of God’s word even by those who theoretically submit to it; a rejection of the sovereignty of God in favor of the putative sovereignty of man; a caricature, misunderstanding, or rejection of the penal substitution of Christ for sinners; a shallow understanding of conversion as a mere shift of opinions; a worldliness in our evangelism which deceives people about the very nature of the gospel we are hoping to win them to; an individualism that de-centers the congregation from the life of a Christian; and a carelessness of churches in addressing members in unrepentant sin, which causes untold confusion about what it means to be a Christian. I think that we deal with these dangers by understanding and teaching what God has called the local church to be and, by his Spirit’s power, working to be that.
Amen, brother.
I meant to blog about this earlier. The Copac database, the UK & Irish National Union Catalogue, has recently updated their database to offer results in the MODS format. As a result, you can now use it as a z39.50 resource in Tellico. I’ll probably add it to the list of presets, as well.
We’re going in. The robotic Opportunity rover currently rolling across Mars has been prowling around the edge of the largest crater it has visited since landing over three years ago. It has been studying Victoria crater and looking for a way in. Now scientists on Earth have decided to take a calculated risk and plan to send Opportunity right into this ancient Martian crater over the next few weeks. Pictured is Cape St. Vincent, part of the wall of Victoria Crater next to where Opportunity will descend. The wall itself appears to contain clues about the Martian terrain before the impact that created Victoria crater, and so will be studied during the daring descent. Above the crater wall, far in the distance, lies a relatively featureless Martian horizon.
Go, little rover, go!
Jérôme Rapinat recently contacted me about using GRAMPS with Tellico. GRAMPS is a genealogy program, and a very capable one at that. Tellico’s XSL import and export is capable of working with GRAMPS XML files directly.
I’m not quite sure what Jérôme may be doing with the capability, but perhaps Tellico offers a different way of looking at the data that is interesting.
Transformers is so horribly bad. The writers should be ashamed. Michael Bay should be ashamed. What a load of dumb dialog, plot holes that Optimus Prime could drive through, and just shear errors. I’m pretty sure the Rangers were wearing the wrong color of berets, for example. And all the product placement for GM, dumb eBay and WWW jokes, and weird ignorance (space travelers don’t have cell phones?) only served to emphasize that the only, and I mean only, redeeming feature of the film was the robot fights. So yeah. whenever people are on the screen, expect crap. When the Autobots are rolling out, take enjoyment there.
Tellico 1.2.12 is available, with a slew of bug fixes. Plus, a new translation, Turkish, has been added, bringing the total of languages with 70% translation to 15.
Changelog:
- Fixed potential recursion bug for dependent fields.
- Fixed bug that didn’t write image size options when printing.
- Added Turkish translation, thanks to Ali Isingor and Kunter Kutlu.
- Added ‘\%’ to bibtex translation table for comment escaping.
- Bumped automake requirement to version 1.8 or later for macro to work.
- Fixed HTML export to not rewrite file location for files referenced in the XSL file which don’t exist.
- Fixed Column View report to sort numerically when needed.
- Fixed Date fields to suppress empty date values.
- Fixed Date comparisons to work for single digits, patch from Jake Maciejewski.
- Fixed Fields Dialog to show warnings when clicking Ok.
- Changed Quick Filter to split words on whitespace.
- Fixed bug with z39.50 search freezing intermittently.