Does the category walker really works well?

[Notenschreiber]

I tried to find out, which works for 2 oboes and bassoon are available at IMSLP. If you take as starting point "Scores featering the oboe" and then restrict to trios,
there is only one score with two oboes and bassoon (Bononcini). On the other hand, there is a category "For 2 oboes, bassoon (arr)", with 5 scores for two oboes
and bassoon.???. I' am afraid, that this no accident.

[kalliwoda]

I guess this is a reflection of the library of congress cataloging system, which never includes arrangements and original works in the same subject.
Of cause, it would be very helpful if there would be a hint or even a link in the category walker to the corresponding category "...(arr)".

[steltz]

I don't know that much about the behind-the-scenes programming for the system, but it seems to me that it might not be that difficult to have buttons that cross-link. In this case:

The 2 oboes/bassoon page would show "for arrangements in this instrumentation, see [link]"

and the 2 oboes/bassoon (arr) page would show "for original works in this instrumentation, see [link]".

Can one of the people who deal with this sort of thing say if this is a complicated addition?

[Davydov]

Can one of the people who deal with this sort of thing say if this is a complicated addition?

Simple to do, but time consuming to implement manually, and it would also need to be kept up-to-date every time a new instrumentation category was created. But maybe there's a way to automatically generate the links to/from the arrangement categories, where they exist?

[Notenschreiber]

The Bononcini sonata is also in the category "For 2 oboes, bassoon (arr)". We don´t have original works for this instrumentation.

[steltz]

@Davydov: what I was thinking of was some sort of script that would read the category and either add or delete (arr) in order to get the other category, otherwise, yes, I think it would have to be manual.

@Notenschreiber: since this site is entirely dependent on volunteer work, there are many work pages where the original instrumentation hasn't been uploaded yet. In a few cases, it might never be, if original parts are lost. However, I would imagine that this is a very small percentage of the works here. It is, however, part of the uniform title system that the original instrumentation has to be notated.

[kalliwoda]

I may have misunderstand your point earlier? I assumed you wondered why the arranged works are not included in the category.

For me the category walker now results in one work for 2 oboes & bassoon - the Heinichen Trio from SLUB
and in 6 works for 2 oboes & bassoon (arr.) - including the Bononcini.

There are two things here,
Original works are assigned to categories with the tags added by the tagging team (Great work Steltz, Kenny ...!)
and arranged works depend on the arrangement title to be added to a category:
===Arrangements and Transcriptions===
=====For 2 oboes and bassoon (Notenschreiber)=====

So, is your point that some works are dropped from the category walker for no apparent reason
or that some works do not show up because something is wrong with either the tag or the arrangement title?
- in the latter case, it should just be corrected by whoever catches it...
If it is a tagging error, write a note to one of the tagging team to check.

[Notenschreiber]

@ Kalliwoda. It seems, that the result is depending on the way through the category walker. Beginning with "scores featering the oboe", then narrowed to "trios"
and then looking for 2 Oboes and bassoon one will come to Bononcini. Can you describe your way to Heinichen and the 6 arrangements?

[kalliwoda]

Ah,
Now I think I see the problem: Do you restrict to works that have the tag/are in the category "Trio"?
If you restrict to "For 3 Players" instead, you will also get works that have other titles/tags (Divertimentos, Pieces, Sonatas).

But, I do not get the Bononcini in the category "2 oboes and bassoon", only the Heinichen (I didn't try this yesterday).
Bononcini is for me now together with the others in "2 oboes and bassoon (arr.)"

To be clear, if you arrive at this page:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Special:CategoryW ... oe**Trios/
There is "2 oboes and bassoon (arr.)" now with 2 entries (Bononcini and Vanhal), but the Vanhal may have been cached yesterday, because that was a your new upload.
If you click on "show", you would get those 2 titles, but if you click on "2 oboes and bassoon (arr.)" you will get all 6 titles in this category (yesterday this would have been 5, until the Vanhal showed up).

On the other hand, if you arrive at this page:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Special:CategoryW ... 3_players/
You immediately find "2 oboes and bassoon (arr.)" with all 6 entries.

[steltz]

OK, I think I'm starting to understand this. By going through scores featuring the oboe, the list of possible categories is ordered by most popular (or populated?) first. So to start with, the "2 oboes, bassoon (arr)" comes first, on about page 3 (with six pieces), and "2 oboes, bassoon" on page 9, because there is only one piece.

This is something that might benefit from having collapsible pages, so you don't have to go through to page 9 or 10 to get all the chamber works.

[Notenschreiber]

Thank you, it´s clear now. The difficulties are caused by inconsequences of tagging the categories. Only two of the
arrangements (or its "mother-category" ) are tagged with "trios" , in spite the fact, that all 6 are definitly trios.
Another problem arises with the Heinichen sonata. It´s the only one for two oboes and continuo which is
tagged as trio, but there are plenty of others, which can be regarded as trios for two oboes and bassoon as well.
Imagine 2 Oboists and a bassoon player are looking for sheet music for this instrumentation at IMSLP. They take (in the german version)
"Gattung" , "Besetzung" then "For three players", then searching 2 Oboes, bassoon. They will just find the six arrangements, but
nothing else. The Heinichen sonata does not appear, perhaps the number of "next clicks" is restricted. If they go the way via
"trios", only two are announced, but the other can be detected by clicking on the corresponding category.
I know, it´s a lot of work to tag thousands of categorys and don' want make any charge to those who are involved. But it is a
pity that the result in some cases is really poor. Perhaps it is necessary to tag in a more open manner from a practical point of view:
3 players with two oboes and one bassoon should find all the literature at IMSLP for which it makes sense to play it in this instrumentation.

[feldmahler]

Would it be useful to let (arr) categories inherit all the properties of the regular non-(arr) categories? I.e. "Oboe and bassoon (arr)" inherits all the parent categories of "Oboe and bassoon", unless it is explicitly exempted in MW:G. If I understand correctly that is the suggestion, and it should be rather trivial to implement.

Steltz: what do you mean by collapsible? CW pages with only one type?

Notenschreiber: If you have a specific instrumentation in mind, I would also suggest simply doing a search using the search box. I searched for "2 oboes/bassoon" and got both categories you are looking for at the top of the list.

[Notenschreiber]

That´s what I a get via the search box: http://www.google.com/search?q=site:ims ... %2FBassoon. ???

[kalliwoda]

@Notenschreiber: I guess, Feldmahler used the search box on the work genres page.

Re original and arranged works for the same category: I do not understand what is implied by "inherits properties": I would just like to see the arranged and original categories in immediate vicinity (as they are e.g. displayed if you search for subjects in the Library of Congress catalog). Edit: Of cause, this is exactly how they line up if you use the search box on the work genre page.

Re collapsible pages: I have no idea, how it can be implemented, but it would be really helpful to be able to see all entries in one table, instead of moving via "next" to find categories with 1 entry after hitting "next" lets say 22 times.

Re tagging: I think the confusion starts, because "Trio" and "for 3 players" are not synonymous. The tagging team considers "Trio" a title, and if the original work has a different title (Suite, Divertimento, Sonata etc.) that supersedes the term Trio.

[Davydov]

There are also orchestral "Trios" that are tagged as such, which is why it's advisable to follow the "For 3 players" route in the category walker.

As Feldmahler's pointed out, just putting (for example) "For 2 oboes, bassoon" in the search box is another short cut to find pieces for a particular set of instruments.