The ComicBase Livestream thread!

[Gregory Hecht]

Hi folks!  

Just in case you didn't know, Battlin' Pete Bickford has been running a livestream on the ComicBase YouTube channel each Wednesday at 4pm Central US Time.  You can use this thread to make topic suggestions, request demos, or post questions for Pete to answer!  

[Adam Sternberg]

Thanks for the heads-up; I'd had no idea.  As the YouTubers say, I subscribed and hit that bell! ?

[Gregory Hecht]

A reminder to everybody to bring your "beverage of choice" to this Wednesday's ComicBase livestream session and to share what you're enjoying in the chat!

[Peter R. Bickford]

Just posted the full list of secret keyboard shortcuts alluded to in last week's Livestream here:

 

[Gregory Hecht]

Hi folks!  During today's Livestream, Pete suggested that we set up a dedicated thread here in the forum for people to post their syntax etc. for the Advanced Searches that they do.  I set up the thread over in the "Tech Support" section of the boards and pinned it, so it should be easy to find.  Or you can just click here and go straight to the thread!

[Edison R. Brito]

Hello Pete,

Thank you for taking the time from your busy schedule to post your weekly Comicbase Livestream show on Youtube. I look forward to watching it every Wednesday.

As mentioned in your recent livestream video, I have a suggestion for your show that I wanted to share:

My brother and I follow several comic book collectors on Youtube who share their comic book collections with their viewers. We find these videos quite entertaining, especially from collectors that have been collecting for a many years and who show off some of their recent hauls as well as some of their older hard to find books. Since you mentioned you have a large collection and that you have been collecting for many years, would you consider dedicating some time during your weekly livestream show to show off some of your favorite books? I think this would increase your viewership by bringing in viewers from outside of the ComicBase community. In addition, these new viewers may end up subscribing to your Youtube channel and more importantly, may end up becoming new customer's as well. 

Regards,

Edison Brito

[Gregory Hecht]

This post is a potential topic for the Livestream.  

[Gregory Hecht]

I would also like to see this topic addressed in the Livestream.  

[Lance Fittro]

It would be interesting (to me at least) to have a better understanding of how database corrections are processed when they are submitted through CB via the "Submit New or Corrected Data" feature. Filling in an empty field seems pretty straightforward, but what if the correction is deleting duplicate or extraneous information? If someone thinks they have found a new title, is it appropriate to create an entry in CB first and submit it that way, or would that be better for the message board? How much headache do I cause when I upload a correction, immediately realize that I left something out or spelled something incorrectly, and then upload a corrected correction? What happens when I am trying to submit a corrected or larger cover image without any other data changes, and the CB software doesn't ask me for my cover? Did I just submit a "correction" that matches the master database 100%, and does that cause any confusion? Even if not, what is the best way then to get that cover-only correction to the team?

I think having a better idea of how the corrections are processed or compared against the master database could help users decide whether it's best to submit something through CB, take it to the message board, or send a direct e-mail, and do so with the minimum amount of confusion for the CB team having to figure out the intent of the user while wading through multiple and duplicate submissions.

[Edison R. Brito]

@Lance Fittro You read my mind Lance. I have the same exact questions as you when I "Submit New or Corrected Data" in CB. It would great if @Peter R. Bickford answered these questions.

[Gregory Hecht]

6 hours ago, Lance Fittro said:

Filling in an empty field seems pretty straightforward, but what if the correction is deleting duplicate or extraneous information?

For deletions, the best bet would be to either email support or post on these boards.  The correction submission function from your database doesn't really handle deletions... and deletions often require some sort of explanation anyway, so best to do that via email or public board posting.     

 

6 hours ago, Lance Fittro said:

If someone thinks they have found a new title, is it appropriate to create an entry in CB first and submit it that way, or would that be better for the message board?

Generally speaking, go ahead and create the entry in CB and submit.  

But, if you are entering something that is complicated for some reason, then posting to the boards can generate some helpful discussion.  

Also, if you can't find a fairly common title, it might be best to post on the boards for assistance before you create an entry.  Hypothetical example: you can't find the 1970's Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man series... posting on the boards will result in somebody pointing out that the title is already in the database as Spectacular Spider-Man, The.  

6 hours ago, Lance Fittro said:

What happens when I am trying to submit a corrected or larger cover image without any other data changes, and the CB software doesn't ask me for my cover?

Usually the reason behind that occurrence is that the existing cover file is larger than the cover file that you want to upload.  The fix is to email the cover to support.  

Good rule of thumb:  if the thing that needs correcting is complex and/or nuanced, please post on the boards!  Even though these boards aren't necessarily a high traffic location on the interwebs, there is a pretty good pool of expertise here (from both HC and from CB users) that things often get sorted out pretty quickly.  ?

 

 

[Lance Fittro]

A more in-depth discussion of UPC's, Alt-UPC's, ISBN's (including difference between ISBN-10 and ISBN-13) might help clear up some confusion. In addition to the newsstand vs direct market UPC differences for the same issue (perhaps not a universal thing for all publishers, but definitely there for post-"Spidey face box" Marvel for instance), it appears a large number of floppy comics in the database show ISBN's which I would expect to apply only to books, or at least comics bound in a book format. Are these auto-generated based on the UPC input? Also, it appears the ISBN-10 format is generally what is stored in the database, which is not necessarily the same as the ISBN-13 minus the first three characters.

The more I'm typing, the more I'm thinking this may not be as much of a general-interest topic as I was originally thinking. But perhaps a simple discussion of how those fields are populated in the database, and how to use that information to find those items in the real world (when not in stock on Atomic Avenue, of course) might be useful.

 

P.S. Thank you to Greg for the advice above.

Edited January 28, 2021 by Lance Fittro

[Joe Akers]

I often find missing store variants. If I create Amazing Spider-Man 56G and support also creates a different 56G before they process my update what happens when I update my data file? By store variants I mean, for example, a Comic Mint or Unknown Comic Books cover of a Spider-Man book. What is the proper process? This is especially relevant with the unlimited amount of variants (& store variants) being produced for all the major comic book titles.

[Gregory Hecht]

16 hours ago, Joseph Akers said:

I often find missing store variants. If I create Amazing Spider-Man 56G and support also creates a different 56G before they process my update what happens when I update my data file? By store variants I mean, for example, a Comic Mint or Unknown Comic Books cover of a Spider-Man book. What is the proper process? This is especially relevant with the unlimited amount of variants (& store variants) being produced for all the major comic book titles.

If it is an older comic, the odds that two missing variants would be submitted in the same week are probably low.  

But for new and fairly recent comics, I can see this as a concern.  You can always post on these boards or email support, that gives Marc, Pete, or somebody else at HC to communicate back to you if they will be using a different variant designation than the one that you selected.  

[Mark J. Castaneda]

Store variants and online store variants are tricky for us because our solicitation data mainly comes from Diamond and Lunar distribution who don't care them.

Thank goodness for our user community who send in data for variants we aren't aware of.

Unfortunately, we can have users assign different store variants than others possibly messing up what you might have set yourself for a variant. Not sure there's a good way to get around this, you might want to email support@comicbase.com about a store variant you might have assigned just so we know not override it if a different store variant it comes in.

[Adam Sternberg]

A good example of the problems that can be created is this past week's Die!namite #4.  That issue (similar to other Dynamite and IDW comics) often have a cover gallery that will explicitly give a cover letter (Die!namite 4 lists "peanuts homage cover art" as cover H, but it wasn't listed in the database, and variant H was already used for one of the exclusives.  In that case, I'll list the letter from the cover gallery in the notes when I submit, and leave the variant letter alone.

[Gregory Hecht]

On 1/31/2021 at 10:35 AM, Adam Sternberg said:

A good example of the problems that can be created is this past week's Die!namite #4.  That issue (similar to other Dynamite and IDW comics) often have a cover gallery that will explicitly give a cover letter 

Marc, is there any chance that HC can set up their standard procedure to check Dynamite's books for cover galleries and assign variant letters in the database that match those assigned by the publisher?  This would help avoid situations like what Adam describes.

Thanks!

[Mark J. Castaneda]

21 hours ago, Gregory Hecht said:

Marc, is there any chance that HC can set up their standard procedure to check Dynamite's books for cover galleries and assign variant letters in the database that match those assigned by the publisher?  This would help avoid situations like what Adam describes.

Thanks!

All our data for Dynamite future releases come from Diamond solicitations. The variants they provided to Diamond also isn't always organized in a way the cover gallery might state inside the printed issue. Another problem is that they don't get all the variant cover info for a given issue like store variants, convention variants, etc. We typically learn of a issue's complete cover gallery on its release day when we have a physical copy to reference and/or a user sends us a correction for a variant we don't know about.

[Andrew d’Entremont]

Just caught up on the last livestream and was curious about adding CBR/CBZ files. Is there a naming convention you have to use? And where do they shjpw up after you've added them? 

[Steven L. Dasinger]

The file name would be just like a cover file (with a different extension). For example for Item # 1/A, the file would be 1-A.cbr (or cbz).

On disk, they will be in the Media folder. This is the same location as the Pictures folder, by default. You can Change the location of the Media folder using Manage Pictures and Movies (part of File Tools).

In CB, they would 'show up' as a 'play' icon in the box to the left of the covers. Click on this and the digital comics should 'play'.

 

[Andrew d’Entremont]

Thanks! That works quite well.

[Andrew d’Entremont]

One more question on adding CBR/CBZ files. Is there an upper limit of how many issues you can add? I can see all the issues I added in the media folder, but I am only getting the play icon for the first 100 issues in the series.

[Steven L. Dasinger]

There shouldn't be a limit (other than disk space). I just added over 100 digital comics to a Title and all 109 of them have the play button next to them.

If you not already done so, try to leave and come back to the Title (so it can refresh the display).

If they still do not show up, check the names of the files and ensure they match the Item #.

If you still can't see them, I would contact support.

[Andrew d’Entremont]

Just thought I'd let you know that I sorted out the problem. All the CBR files were in the correct directory, but only the first 100 issues were showing up for some reason. I removed all the files that weren't displaying from the folder and then added them again and now they all seem to be there. I'm not sure why they didn't import correctly the first time. 

[Gregory Hecht]

I noticed that there isn't a new Livestream announcement on the ComicBase homepage for today.  Does this mean that Pete is taking a break from the Livestream this week?