F0r those of you who are interested… here is the database layout. Its kind of hard to read without the table boarders, but I couldn’t convince WordPress to let me override the style on the table. I’ll post it in separate file in another day or so.

I’d like to know what comic book cataloging software you’ve used, which ones you’ve like why and why not. What are the pros and cons of each.

Also if you used any web sites to catalog your comic books — let us know that too.

I’ve purchased two software packages: ComicBase by Atomic Avenue/Human Computing and IntelliScanner Comic Edition by IntelliScanner. I prefer IntelliScanner Comic Edition because its cross platform (I’m a Mac user) and it came with a bar code scanner. I liked ComicBase as well as it comes with a huge database of Titles and Issues which is updated weekly. Though on the downside, you had to pay every year for an update to the software or else you could no longer receive updates to the database.

As far as web sites that I’ve used to catalog comic books, I only have experience with the My Collection feature on the Comic Book Database (CBDB). Its fairly rudimentary as editing issues after you’ve entered them is a royal pain. However it does have on distinct advantage over local cataloging software packages in that its available wherever you have an internet connection!

I’ll post an more in depth review of each software package in later blog post.

Respond in the comments section with cataloging software you’ve used.

For the purpose of cataloging you comic books, are annuals considered separate titles from the regular title? Or are they considered part of the regular title? If not, is each year that an annual is published considered a separate title?

On the Grand Comic Book Database (GCD) they have taken a mix of approaches, sometimes classify each year an annual is published as a separate title, sometimes all annual fall under one title and sometimes a combination of both. For example the title Fantastic Four Annual (1963) has issues 1 – 27 (years 1963 to 1994) are under one title, but the annuals from 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001 are each a separate title. I don’t have access to all of these issues, but for the ones I do have, a different title appears in the indicia than on the cover or the regular title and this could be the reason. However, I feel this is very confusing.

I prefer the methodology that the Comic Book Database (CBDB) uses, where they include the annuals with the issues of Title that was active in the year the annual was published. For example the Fantastic Four (1961) contains annuals 1 – 27 and the Fantastic Four (1998) contains annuals for 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001 (these annuals were not assigned numeric issue numbers on the cover or in the indicia).

What methodology do you prefer? I’d to hear from you.

And did you ever notice that the first Fantastic Four annual was published in 1963 and not 1961 the first year the Fantastic Four were published. Also there were no Fantastic Four annuals published in 1972, 1974, 1975, 1982, 1986, 1996 and 1997. Finally there haven’t been any annuals published since 2001? Why. Please respond with a comment if you know. Thanks.

I just got done adding a new page to the site that will let you submit your email address so that you can get notified when the beta is up.

From the home page, just click the Beta Notification menu item on the left.

Once the beta is posted, I’ll send out an email to all those to asked to be notified.

Don’t worry we will only use your email address to contact you when the beta goes live, no other email messages will be sent. Also we won’t share or sell your email address with any other third parties.

Ok, I’d like some input on what data to track for publishers, series and issues… I think to meet the end goal which is to offer a web service / REST service to comic book software, that we’ll need to have fields commonly carried by these programs.

If you could, list the name of the program, the fields it carries and which ones you find useful and what ones you would like to see.

Thanks.

I don’t know if anyone tried either the contact us or the development email yesterday but there was a small snafu with the email system. Any email were rejected. If you sent anything please resend, sorry for the inconvenience.

Well, I’m working on getting some admin type activities done today… got the blog set up, tweaked the WordPress blog settings, set up the FeedBurner feed, got email address set up, etc. Now to get on with some actual development work… Currently I’m working on getting the table lay outs created.

Tables so far are:

• publisher – holds the list of publishers, imprints and brands
• series – holds the titles for each publisher along with info like: type of series (limited, one shot, continuing), publication dates, continuity info
• issues – holds issues for each title. This is where the UPC and issue number are kept, along with info like: variant info, which printing (1st, 2nd, etc.).

After I get the tables layout done I will create them (using MySQL for the database) and get to work on the GUI – hopefully it won’t take too long to get a beta up and running. I have to do the UPC lookup page and a results page and pages to browse and add/edit: publishers, series and issues! Boy thats a lot of pages. The first pass might be a little rough

Welcome to comicbookUPCdb.com’s blog. I’ll be posting here periodically with news and info on development along with question asking for input and opinions on how the site should work.

As I said on the home page if there is anyone interested in helping please email me.