Quoting m.cellophane:

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With the current system in my local db, I can link or separate any credit, whether it's Alan Smithee or the Alan Hales or Harry Stradlings, the screenwriter Arthur Miller and the cinematographer Arthur Miller, etc. Unless this new suggested system could provide that same level of distinction, I wouldn't want to change.

James:

If adopted, as i envision it, i don't believe it would impact that aspect at all. As I see it it would actually simplify it as there would be no Priority name, the only potential fly that I see is your mention of Alan Smithee, who will be credited to numerous people. Now i will have to cogitate on that.

Skip

Quoting Dr Pavlov:

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Quoting m.cellophane:

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With the current system in my local db, I can link or separate any credit, whether it's Alan Smithee or the Alan Hales or Harry Stradlings, the screenwriter Arthur Miller and the cinematographer Arthur Miller, etc. Unless this new suggested system could provide that same level of distinction, I wouldn't want to change.

James:

If adopted, as i envision it, i don't believe it would impact that aspect at all. As I see it it would actually simplify it as there would be no Priority name, the only potential fly that I see is your mention of Alan Smithee, who will be credited to numerous people. Now i will have to cogitate on that.

Skip

All of the names I listed match to more than one person.

Quoting m.cellophane:

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With the current system in my local db, I can link or separate any credit, whether it's Alan Smithee or the Alan Hales or Harry Stradlings, the screenwriter Arthur Miller and the cinematographer Arthur Miller, etc. Unless this new suggested system could provide that same level of distinction, I wouldn't want to change.

One possibility for Alan Smithee, would be to retain the "As Credited" feature ONLY for these instances where multiple people are using the same alias.  Do you know of any other instances of this besides Alan Smithee.

I agree that something needs to be done to either replace or supplement the BY functionality to cover the "Arthur Miller" situations.  I'm sure something can be devised.  Put on your thinking cap! 

Quoting hal9g:

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There is a difference with Alan Smithee, however.  That is not the "real" name of the people involved.

OK. How does your idea deal with the Harry Stradling, Sr., Harry Stradling, and Harry Stradling, Jr. situation? Do we enter a 1901 BY into the profiles where Harry Stradling applies to Harry Stradling, Sr., for example? In other words, is the distinction made at the profile level when a name applies to more than one person?

Quoting hal9g:

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There is a difference with Alan Smithee, however.  That is not the "real" name of the people involved.

So some form of Credited As will have to be retained...? After all, the program is supposed to display a direct representation of the film's credits.

Quoting m.cellophane:

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Quoting hal9g:

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There is a difference with Alan Smithee, however.  That is not the "real" name of the people involved.

OK. How does your idea deal with the Harry Stradling, Sr., Harry Stradling, and Harry Stradling, Jr. situation? Do we enter a 1901 BY into the profiles where Harry Stradling applies to Harry Stradling, Sr., for example? In other words, is the distinction made at the profile level when a name applies to more than one person?

Harry Stradling, Sr. and Harry Stradling, Jr. are not an issue.  "Harry Stradling" would need to have two entries in the table with BY added to distinguish Sr. from Jr. so that the correct ones could be linked to one another.  So no, the distinction would still be made in the actor table and applied to all profiles.

James, I realize that you have spent an ungodly amount of time linking things in your local database.  Any idea how much time?

In many cases, what you have done locally to link your profiles by actor/crew will never be shared with the rest of the community who are left to fend for themselves.

Very few people are going to put that level of effort into linking...frankly, most of us are just too lazy.

This proposal is a way for the work of the few, to be shared with the many and make the program itself a much more valuable tool for everyone.

Perhaps Ken would even consider retaining the current system as a selectable option for the local database.

Quoting hal9g:

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In all fairness, I need to point out one downside of this system.  Take for instance "Al Smithee".  Today, with as credited, "Al Smithee" has been identified to be an alias for more than one person (which is in fact the case) and only the profiles that are associated with the same person will get linked.  In the simple linking system, this cannot be done, and all people associated with the name of "Al Smithee" will get linked together.

Personally, I believe this scenario is so infrequent, that the benefits of a simple linking system far outweigh this one small flaw.  And knowing this community, it is entirely possible that someone here can come up with a solution to that problem, too.

As others have pointed out, it's not only the Alan Smithees. It's also John Doe, Jr vs. John Doe, Sr who both may use John Doe in some cases and similarly John A. Doe vs. John B. Doe. Additionally every case which uses a birth year today would be affected.

Therefore I would not say that this scenario is infrequent. As intriguing the association system looks on first sight, it's not at all mature yet.

Quoting RHo:

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As others have pointed out, it's not only the Alan Smithees. It's also John Doe, Jr vs. John Doe, Sr who both may use John Doe in some cases and similarly John A. Doe vs. John B. Doe. Additionally every case which uses a birth year today would be affected.

Therefore I would not say that this scenario is infrequent. As intriguing the association system looks on first sight, it's not at all mature yet.

Apparently, i am not being clear.  There is a very simple solution for the John Does vs John Doe, Sr vs John Doe, Jr.  situation as I described above.  BYs would be required for "John Doe" to make them "unique" and then they could be linked to the correct John doe, Jr. or John Doe Sr.

I do not understand the issue with John A. Doe vs John B. Doe at all.  Those are already unique names, so you'll have to explain to me why these would cause a problem.

"Alan Smithee" becomes a problem only because it is an alias that has been used by multiple people over the years.  It is not the actual name of the person involved, therefore, if you enter it WYSIWYT without "As Credited" there is no way to know who it actually stood for.  That situation is quite unique...unless you can point me to other instances like this.  The ones you cited are not at all the same.