Publications
Publications Related to Rail Activity in New Zealand
This page and and those linking from it will be dedicated to publications relating to rail activity in New Zealand. Publications fall into two distinct groups, Books and Periodicals. The difference between these are, books generally have a single issue (though a few subsequent editions is not uncommon), while Periodicals come out at regular intervals, daily (like a newspaper), weekly, monthly, quarterly etc for magazines. For simplicity, we will deal with three categories: Books, Magazines and Newspapers. Each are handled differently within the wiki with the first two commonly found in Libraries, but Newspaper archives being less common. This wiki therefore deals with Libraries of Books and Magazines, but Newspapers are referred to by reference only and then generally limited to what is available as scanned copies on the PapersPast website.
LIBRARIES
To help organise publications we have collections of books we refer to as Libraries, and in this wiki all Books and Magazines will belong to a Library. In setting up the wiki, I have entered the details of my own collection of books and magazines and from here on, they will be referred to as the RKBNZ Library, the detail of which can be found on wiki page Library_001. Because books and Magazines need to be handled differently, Libraries are divided into two sections, one for books and one for Magazines. The two sections of the RKBNZ Library are therefore given pagenames of Library_001B and Library_001M
While all books and magazines registered in this wiki will belong to a physical Library, there are some that only belong to a specialist library that few people would have access to. These specialist libraries (like Alexander Turnbull, Te Papa or Hocken) are not libraries that are registered as part of this wiki. They may however be referred to on various book pages. The books that might only be found in a specialist library are only included in the wiki because they are listed in Sean Millar's Railway Tramway and Bus Bibligraphy, so are there because we know the book physically exists.
The main purpose of libraries in the wiki is to let researchers know where copies of a publication might be able to be accessed. Libraries that are registered as part of the wiki are numbered sequentially as they are added. Anyone with a collection of NZ Rail books or magazines can request a Library be set up for them, see the notes further down on how to go about this. As Libraries hold copies of books and magazines, the templates for the book and magazines are held on child pages of the Library, resulting in individual copies not get their own wiki page. To try and avoid wiki pages holding too much data, separate pages that hold the book-copy or mag_copy templates are used, but as Library content grows, it may become necessary to create further splits in the future. Currently, the page named Library 001 only has links to two other pages named Library 001B and Library 001M, each holding its own collection of copy templates. For convenience, the template data on these pages is managed using spreadsheets outside of the wiki. A sample of a Template for a book-copy is as shown below.
Each library record has provision to store a library's acquisition number and a shelf ID. Because my own numbering system is still in the making, I have used Sean Millar's Bibliography numbers for those books that I have and are listed, and I have then continued the number sequence beyond his last number (942) and am currently at 1200. Sean's numbers will probably be retained as my Acquisition numbers. The shelf ID's will eventually change as I develop something akin to the Dewey Decimal system. This will enable books on the same topic to be shelved together, rather that in alphabetical order of author-name as the Bibliography has them.
In organising the RKBNZ Library each book had a numbered sticker applied on the lower-right of the back cover. I used numbered stickers I got through AliExpress which were black letters on a silver background and numbered 0001 - 1999. I have more than one set of numbers to cater for second Editions etc. I anticipate shelf numbers will be on the bottom of the spine or the lower-left of the front cover. These will likely need to be hand written, as they need to be a random decimal type number.
Including your own library
They will be given an Excel spreadsheet listing all the books registered in the wiki at that time and they can indicate which ones they have. From that Excel file, a load file will be created and imported to the wiki as the start of their library. That means there should be very few books that would need toi be manually entered.ibrary pages will therefore have a pagename like "Library001".
If you have a collection of New Zealand railway/tramway books and/or magazines that you would like to list on this wiki, you can get in touch by emailing [email protected]. Adding your library here is purely voluntary, but would be an aid for researchers who may not be in a position to acquire their own copy of certain books or magazines, or find what they need in a Public Library. Researchers who would like to access a book from a listed private library would need to make their own arrangements with the library owner. The only 'Owner' details it is intended to display are Location (Town or City) and and Email address. The only other condition of course is that the 'Library Owner' must be registered to use the wiki (as they will need to maintain their own book/mag copy data), and agree to follow the rules set out for inclusion of additional libraries.
To include your own Library in this wiki, you will be allocated a Library number with three wiki pages created for you: Library_XXX, Library_XXXB and Library_XXXM where XXX will be your number. The wiki page 'Library_XXX' will hold some necessary details about the library, with maybe a summary of the books and/or magazines held. Library _XXXB will hold the Templates for all the Books in the Library, plus a more readable table of those books. Library_XXXM will hold the Templates for all the Magazines in the Library, plus a set of more readable tables of those Magazines. To avoid having to manually enter all the details for your library books, you will be sent a spreadsheet listing all the titles already in the RKBNZ wiki and you will need to indicate which ones you have. That information will be used to create your initial Book_copy Templates (and Magazine_Issue Templates) and the data will be uploaded to the wiki and added to the Cargo database. Once it is all loaded, you will be responsible for maintaining 'your' library data, primarily additions, deletions, condition codes and value and special instruction can be given on how best to achieve that. While wiki data is generally available for public viewing, things like 'what you value an individual book at' would not be available to most users of the wiki. Processes will be able to be developed to make library maintenance as easy as possible.
As the designer of this wiki, I am always open to suggestions on how to make things work better, so a consensus among 'librarians' will ultimately determine what direction any suggested changes might go. Having your own books listed is certainly a good way of getting your books organised. With Library 001 being quite extensive, it involved a lot of work to get things all set up, but any library that is subsequently added, will be able to utilise a lot of the data that already exists. That means you may only have to enter a very books (if any) that are unique to your library, and 'borrow' all the rest from entries already made. You will of course have to edit your own 'Book-copy' data so it reflects your copies, but again, this would just be updating records from a copy of my data.
There are very few restrictions on what can be listed, a Library can hold multiple copies of a title, either as different editions or just several copies of the same edition, each will get its own template, which will result in a record being created in the Cargo database. It will be up to Library 'owners' to determine how individual copies are identified. Likewise there is provision to have your own accession numbers and shelf numbers. With all design work up to this point being from a single point of view, it will be good to get a wider perspective of views to make sure things progress in the best way possible
BOOK Templates
Each Book Title gets its own wiki Page where data about the book is stored in a Template, which includes a cover image. Th data held in this template automatically gets displayed on the Book-page. Book-pages are also where the book's general contents will be listed and book reviews can be entered etc. Where there is no obvious reason for including a particular book in this wiki, perhaps because of a vague Title like "Was it All Cricket?", sufficient comment should be added to the free text area to make it clear what section of the book adds to New Zealand's railway knowledge. Book information is split over two data tables: Things that relate to the whole book are stored in the Book Table, and those that relate to a particular copy/edition of a book are held in the Book-copy Table. Holding data in multiple tables is a straightforward way of managing Editions, Issues and Copies in a consistent way. My own library includes over 700 titles and most of these have now been entered, however they are in the process of being updated to new pagenames to match the more recently defined criteria. Each library-book's base data gets stored on its book page, with the data held in its own Book Template. An example Template is shown below.
Example BOOK Template Data
- Pagename: Book - North Island Main Trunk
- Full Book Title: North Island Main Trunk: An illustrated History
- Book Series name:
- Series Number:
- Author(s): Pierre W.A.
- Publisher: Reed Books
- Publication Date: 1981
- ISBN: 0-589-01316-5
- Page Count: 300
- Width (mm): 192
- Height: 248
- Publication Type: Book
- Orientation: Portrait
- Binding type: Sewn
- Cover Type: Board + DJ
- Value $NZ: 35
- Cover Image: North_Island_Main_Trunk.png
Every Book page will show a table listing the Libraries that hold a copy of that book. Likewise, going to an Author page, will (eventually) list all the Books and Articles that particular Author has written and are part of a library that is included in the wiki.
BOOKS COPY Templates
Just like books have a Template to hold information about the book in general, there is also a Book-copy Template to hold information about an individual book. Because we do not have a wiki page for an individual book-copy, the Book-copy templates are all held on the Library page the book-copy belongs to. This results in a long list of template data that is not the easiest to read so I have arranged for a table of the data to be created which is easier to read and this is placed above the list of template data.
Example BOOK-COPY Template Data
- Unique name for this record: North Island Main Trunk - Copy001B
- Book page name: Book - North Island Main Trunk
- Full_Title: North Island Main Trunk
- Library Accession No: 701
- Shelf ID: M701
- Book Condition: Very Good
- Book Value $NZ: 35
- Limited Edition: No
- Signed_Copy: No
- Dust Jacket: Clean
You will notice that both the Book template and the Book-copy Template have a Value field. This provides for situations where signed or Limited Editions can be valued differently from a general edition, or a copy that is in As-new condition can be valued higher than a copy that is perhaps in a tatty condition. As mentioned earlier, the value that is assigned to a Book-copy, will generally only be visible to the owner of that library.
Entering a new Book
Ordinarily, Books will get entered via a screen on the wiki, and this can only be accessed by registered users who have also got 'write' privileges. Before you can access this screen, you should determine what pagename you are going to use for the book. All Book pagenames start with 'Book - ' followed by what I refer to as a 'short name' which still has to be unique. This unique name needs to be entered into an preliminary window accessible via the page Special:Form/Book. One rule with page names is that no special characters should be used, i.e hyphens, quotations marks, exclamation marks etc. Once a pagename is entered, checks will be made to determine if this is a New Page or there is already an existing page with that name. If after entering your 'Book - pagename' you are told there is already a wiki page with that name, you will need to check if it happens to be the same book, otherwise you need to return to the previous screen and enter a more unique title for your book. Once you have entered a unique book pagename, you are presented the Template Form where you can enter/select data for each Template field. For some fields it will be very obvious what you enter, others need to be handled in precise ways (see the next section on Conventions).
Once a Book page has been added to the wiki, it can be edited in one of three different ways. If the Template data needs editing, it is best to edit it using the Form ('Edit with Form' button); if it is data in the body of the page that needs adding or editing, you have the option of using the 'editor' or 'edit source', both found in the top menu. The Editor is more useful for those who are not so familiar with wiki-text, as formatting options are easier to apply. It does however take a noticeable time to load the editor, so for quick edits and for those who understand at least basic wiki-text it is more efficient to edit the source data.
Conventions
To be able to manage data properly, it needs to be consistent. For this reason I have adopted certain conventions in the area of Publications.
Wiki page names all need to be unique within a 'namespace', and I have elected to keep most things in a single 'namespace' at this stage. That may change as I learn more about Namespaces. This raises a few issues with Publications as there are Books that have a title that that would match another logical page name, like 'North Island Main Trunk'. For this reason I have prefixed all book 'short-names' with 'Book - '. Page name should also not use any special characters as mentioned above. Short-names are the shortest practical name by which you would refer to a particular book, and is used as the wiki page name. Use of A and The at the start of a book title are optional in the book's short-name. Most searches for a specific book should be done using key words in the title, and using the wiki's standard search functionality in the top right of the screen.
Author names So far, I have been able to restrict author names to 'Surname' followed by Initials (with a decimal point separator and terminator) like such Pierre W.A.. Mediawiki (the program this wiki is built around) provides for more that one Author name, and in such cases, the names are separated by a comma.
Multiple copies of a book Should a Library want to record the fact that they hold more than one copy of a book, this can be achieved by creating additional Book-copy records and adding a decimal number between the Library number and the 'B', e.g. North Island Main Trunk - Copy001.2B would indicate a second copy. Holding additional copies does not require the first copy to be recorded as '.1' but it can be added if that is your preference. It will not clash with other functionality.
Terminologies
Within the Publications section of the wiki there are a number of terms that need defining so everyone is clear what they mean when used here as they may have other definitions when used elsewhere.
Publication Type
There are four publication Types used
* Pamphlet - the whole publication on a single sheet, usually folded * Booklet - a thin publication of small dimensions, generally not more than 40 pages, stapled on fold, and no bigger than 150 x 200mm * Book - publications larger than a booklet * Loose-leaf - publications expressly designed for page updates using screw or ring binders
Publication Cover
There are four cover types used
* None - there is no cover * Paper - the cover is of the same or similar material as the pages * Light card - the cover is thin cardboard * Heavy card - the cover is of thicker cardboard but still flexible cardboard * Board - the cover is of thick boards that do not bend easily
Publication Binding
There are a number of binding options
* Loose - pages are not stapled, glued or sewn * Corner stapled - pages are held together with a single staple in the top left corner * Staple bound - pages are held together by two or more staples on left edge * Stapled on fold - pages are folded in half and then stapled on the fold * Glue bound - pages are glued generally with a spine (as in a paperback) * Case bound - pages are sewn together in folded sections inside a hard cover
Different Editions of a Publication
The fact that a book has more than one edition will be recorded in the main Book table in the Publication_Date field. This is a multiple-value field with individual values separated by a comma and a space. Data needs to be entered in the correct order and can include the number of reprints of an edition as a decimal vale of the year, and even indicate if a reprint had a revision by adding an 'R' . A multi edition multi reprint example is Tony Hurst's book "The Otago Central Railway: A Tribute" which would get a Publication_date entry of '1990,1991.1,1994.1R,2004,2008'. Different Editions of a book would be listed on the books main page to indicate what content is different. Book Copy data has provision to show exactly what edition that copy is.
Cover Images
The image file for covers of publications should preferably be in .png format (optimal for web use) but .jpg or .tiff are also valid. Image resolution need not be particularly high, 100 dpi is more than adequate with 50dpi still being satisfactory. Image file names ideally match the wiki page name (short-name)
MAGAZINES
Magazines or (Periodicals) are slightly more complex in that there is a wiki page for the Magazine, where you can describe the over-all magazines properties (like Publisher, year it started/ended frequency etc) then there is a table of issues with one record for each issue. Each Issue gets its own wiki page, holding data like issue number, date, cover image etc. Libraries will then hold Templates for individual copies, just like with books.
Should a situation arise with a Periodical where some of its major details change, a new Periodical record can be created to match that. In such cases the new record should have the same name as the old with ".1" added after it. Subsequent changes would create .2, .3 etc. A note should be added to both old and new pages explaining what has been done.
Every wiki page for a particular magazine publication (i.e. the head page) will include a list of all the issues, from which individual issues can be selected. Likewise, Author pages will include a list of all Books and Articles a given Author has produced.
Magazine numbering
For a magazine (sometimes referred to a periodical in this wiki), issues are numbered sequentially from the first one issued. Using Railfan as an example, Railfan1 equates to the first issue (December 1994) and I believe the last issue was in March 2020 so Railfan102.
It is the intention to create pages for the following Periodicals in this wiki:- Rails, New Zealand Railfan, The New Zealand Railway Observer, the 3 NZR publications (Railway Magazine, Staff Bulletin and Railway Bulletin), Yarn, NZ Model Railway Journal, Tramway Topics and the more recently started Linesider. There is nothing stopping any others being added at any stage. The wiki page for individual issues will include a list of the main articles that are New Zealand rail related with potential to add a summary of those articles, as well as a summary of each item of New Zealand News. In this way considerable detail of magazine content can become searchable text within the wiki enabling rapid identification of articles that match search criteria.
As an example of the first level of magazine data, I have entered the Table of Contents of all copies of Railfan with some expansion when it comes to news items
Because I have elected to use consecutive numbers for issues of periodicals, I need a way to reference issues where the periodical itself does not use issue numbers. For this I will create a chart on the Publication page for that periodical showing Years as columns, and Months as rows, with the relevant issue number in the appropriate cell. I have included a portion of the Rails Magazine table as an example below, there are still 13 years of issues in addition to what is shown. The Issue-numbers are hyperlinks which can take you straight to the page for that issue, but as I have not had the time to create pages for all issues yet, you will notice that those I have created are displayed in blue, and those yet to be created are displayed in red.
This is also a good example of a magfazine where the volume numbers do not match a calendar year. For this reason, alternate volumes are shaded with volume numbers both above and below the block of issue numbers
Where issue frequency changes, it is sometimes preferable to add an extra December row above January to help keep thing aligned.
As Some editors had problems keeping track of issue numbers (or even month and year), determining issue numbers if one does not have the complete set is nigh impossible. Changes in frequency of publication can also cause problems, and for those reasons, I will have to leave the Model Railway Journal till last, as there are many problems with the issue numbers and I do not hold a complete set.
NEWSPAPERS
Newspaper records are an enormously valuable source of rail heritage information, but collections of newspapers are generally restricted to libraries, and then they might only hold some local titles. There is probably no national newspaper lollection. This means it would be pointless catering for a wiki page for individual issues of newspapers, so I have gone to the next level up and that is a wiki page for each Newspaper. The only reason to have wiki pages for newspapers is to have somewhere logical to store templates that hold data about where in which newspaper you can find information on a particular rail related topic. I am sure all researchers would be making significant use of the PapersPast website where many old newspapers are available as scanned images. They have all been processed through OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software with most output text being quite readable. However, with poor quality newspapers, the OCR text needs considerable editing with frequent referrals back to the scanned image. I have developed a method whereby important 'rail' information can be recorded and/or bookmarked with a reference held in this wiki. This avoids the need to search Paperspast pages to find the one you want if someone has already done that and logged an entry in the wiki. This has now been developed to the extent that a wiki page can be created for any Newspaper on which can be stored any rail references in any issue of that paper, and these will in turn be saved in a Cargo table so they can be queried and made available to other users, and integrated with other wiki functionality.
The steps required to create a Newspaper page are as follows:
1. From Special pages/Forms select Newspaper 2. Enter the name of the newspaper as found on the Paperspast website 3. If that newspaper's page already exists, it will present the page in 'edit' mode and you can skip the next two steps. 4. Complete entry of the newspaper's details and for 'Brief history' copy the text from the data block on the Paperspast page. 5. Select the only option from the drop-down for 'NewsRecords' 6. Press the 'Add NewsRecord' button to bring up the Recorditem page. 7. Enter the details for the NewsRecord and 'Save' the page.
If you know a Newspaper page already exists for the paper you want to work with, you can start by entering the name in the search bar at the top of the screen and select the name from the list as soon as it appears. You could also enter 'Newspapers' in the search bar which will take you to the head page for all newspapers where you can see a list of the regions the country is divided into. On selecting a particular region, you are presented with a list of all the newspapers in that region. selecting any of those will bring you to the page for that newspaper. While a particular paper may appear on a Region's list, it does not necessarily mean that the page has been created, All names in 'blue' indicate they have pages whereas the names in 'red' indicate they do not have pages yet. If the newspaper you want does not have an existing page, follow the steps above from Point 3 on.