The E-Sylum:  Volume 9, Number 8, February 19, 2006, Article 7

THE NEW E-SYLUM ARCHIVE FORMAT

Relating to our discussion of the content of our newsletter,
Kavan Ratnatunga of Sri Lanka writes: "The archive of The E-Sylum
indexed in Google is a very useful resource."  Kavan's note reminds
me that I've been guilty of the "unpublished manuscript" disease we
discussed recently, in that I've been holding off on an announcement
about the archive while tinkering with that last 10% standing between
us and my idea of perfection. So even though some further improvements
may come along, there's no use in waiting any longer, so here goes.

First, I'd like to give a profuse public thank-you to John Nebel
of Colorado, who answered my call for some computer assistance by
developing an automated program which splits an E-Sylum issue into
multiple archive pages, one for each article in the issue.  I'd also
like to thank NBS webmaster Bruce Perdue for making some requested
fixes to older archive pages, and Bill Malkmus and Dick Johnson for
reviewing and commenting on the new archive pages.

Although no one may have noticed, I've included links to some of
these new pages in recent issues where appropriate.  Below are some
selected examples from our first nine volumes:

ORIGINAL WELCOME
v01n02a01.html

RIDDELL RIDES AGAIN
v02n05a05.html

THE GOLDEN CENTS
v03n31a08.html

DUMB AND DUMBER
v04n07a10.html

CARNEGIE MUSEUM COLLECTION
v05n15a03.html

LAMASURE MINT PAINTING WHEREABOUTS
v06n06a09.html

BOOK ON COUNTERFEIT HOLOCAUST ARTIFACTS
v07n04a06.html

NEW ORLEANS MINT DAMAGED BY KATRINA's WRATH
v08n38a02.html

ANOTHER VICTORIA CROSS DONATED
v09n02a06.html

John put a lot of volunteer time into this effort, which required
cleanup and reformatting of some earlier archive issues, plus
responding to my many "oh by the way, just one more thing..." requests.
But now it works like a charm, automatically splitting each new issue
in the wee hours of the night after NBS webmaster Bruce Perdue uploads
it to the archive.  The program creates a permanent web page for each
individual article as well as a table of contents page for each issue.
For example, here's a link to the contents of the February 6, 2006
issue (v9n6): v09n06toc.html

Each web page has a short, unique, numeric-based URL, and these
can be used by other webmasters to link to articles of interest.
For example, a web site devoted to counterfeiting could link to a
set of E-Sylum articles on Dye's Counterfeit Detectors as follows:

NOTES ON DYE's PUBLICATIONS
v04n03a09.html

DYE DETECTOR SOLD IN HEATED BIDDING ON EBAY
v04n06a08.html

DYE's COUNTERFEIT DETECTOR FOLLOWUP
v04n09a11.html

The natural question is, "So where's the E-Sylum Index?"  Well,
it would be marvelous if we had one, but that's a project for
another day.  Bill Malkmus, who maintains an index of our print
publication, The Asylum, also worked on an E-Sylum index for some
time, but computer difficulties and other problems forced him to
abandon it.  We have no up-to-date E-Sylum index, although as Kavan
pointed out, Google searches are an alternate way to find content
in our online archive.

Each of the new pages has a Google search box at the bottom.  By
clicking the "coinbooks.org" button you can restrict your search
to the NBS web site rather than the entire Internet.  The new pages
also include a set of five Google ads at the left.  These are
unobtrusive, and clicking on these links drops a coin into the
Numismatic Bibliomania Society coffers.  Over time, as more web
visitors find our pages, these ads may produce some income for the
society.

So thanks again to John Nebel for his great work on behalf of The
E-Sylum, NBS and the greater numismatic community.  There was
actually far more involved than meets the eye; for example, his
program also deals with maintaining the various links to adjoining
stories, the table of contents, etc.

I encourage readers to contact the webmasters of their respective
specialty clubs and discuss including links to E-Sylum articles
of interest to their audience.  If nothing else, suggest including
a link to the E-Sylum archive: esylum_archive.html
>From there, the table of contents of each and every issue is
accessible.    The archive has grown to considerable size, and
it can be a great resource for researchers and browsers alike,
and this new format makes it even more accessible.

  Wayne Homren, Editor

	coinbooks.org Web

The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization 
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