January 2005 - gutvol-d - lists.pglaf.org

Re: [gutvol-d] million book project
by Wallace J.McLean 28 Jan '05

28 Jan '05

> ----- Original Message ----- > From Juliet Sutherland <vze3rknp(a)verizon.net> > Date Thu, 27 Jan 2005 17:00:11 -0500 > To Project Gutenberg Volunteer Discussion <gutvol-d(a)lists.pglaf.org> > Subject Re: [gutvol-d] million book project > Virtually none of the other image archives provide corrected text. It is > simply cost-prohibitive to do so. What DP does as a volunteer effort > would be extremely costly to replicate. For this reason alone, I believe > that Google will be using raw OCR behind their scans. On new material, > raw OCR from a good program can be very close to 100% correct. It is the > older material that causes problems. I actually find, within limits, the opposite to be true. Material from about 1905 through to about 1955 OCRs very, very well. Material before 1905 OCRs progressively worse the further back you go, although "bright" characters on pre-acid paper are almost as good as early 20th-century stuff. And after the 1950s, I find the OCRability goes down again. Many post-PC printed books, say from the mid-1980s on, OCR almost as poorly as pre-20th century stuff; there's just something about those typefaces, I guess.

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Free Translations (fwd)
by George Davis 28 Jan '05

28 Jan '05

The following came into help@. If no one on this list wants to respond, I'll send it along to PG-EU (but would appreciate a recommendation on a specific contact there.) Thanks, [<G>eorge] ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2005 23:48:14 +0000 From: Alessandro Ronchi <aronchi(a)soasi.com> To: help(a)pglaf.org Subject: Free Translations I have opened a project to translate free books to italian language, with a translator's university. I need a list of books (in these languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Russian) never translated into Italian. If anyone from project gutemberg can send me a "wish list", I will send it to this university and some students will translate it for free, and give it back to the community. hope I explained myself, thanks in advance. -- Alessandro Ronchi http://www.aronchi.org http://www.soasi.com

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re: "cost-prohibitive"
by Bowerbird＠aol.com 28 Jan '05

28 Jan '05

juliet said: > Virtually none of the other > image archives provide corrected text. > It is simply cost-prohibitive to do so. > What DP does as a volunteer effort > would be extremely costly to replicate. > For this reason alone, I believe that > Google will be using raw OCR behind their scans. > On new material, raw OCR from a good program > can be very close to 100% correct. > It is the older material that causes problems. provided careful scans at the right resolution, from the right scanner, the right o.c.r. program combined with the right post-o.c.r. software can yield us accuracy even on "older material" that approaches error-free results. to say that it is "extremely costly" to get this is simply not true. it might have been very true three years ago or so. might've even been true last year. it is untrue now. to see how, and to issue real-world challenges, visit my blog regularly over the upcoming weeks. e-mail me for the address if you are interested... -bowerbird

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some feedback
by Aaron Cannon 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

Received the following message and I thought the list might be interested. >Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2005 14:18:03 +0100 >From: "Barbara Reed" <barbara(a)interpc.fr> >To: cannona(a)fireantproductions.com >Subject: Fwd: Project Gutenberg CD/DVD >Reply-To: barbara(a)interpc.fr >User-Agent: Opera M2/7.54 (Win32, build 3865) > > > >------- Message réexpédié------- >De: "David Kettlewell" <david(a)new-renaissance.net> >A: barbara(a)interpc.fr >Sujet: Project Gutenberg CD/DVD >Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2005 22:09:04 +0100 > >Dear Barbara, > >>This message is just a small note to notify you that it >>has been mailed. > >And this is one to let you know they already arrived - many thanks! > >>We have also included an extra disc for you to give >>away to a friend, family member, library, school, ETC. > >There was just one of each, but that's fine anyway, I can make further >copies: but what about this delightful label with Alice drawing aside >the curtain to reveal the door to the secrets of world literature - is >there artwork for that?! My labels don't usually come out as nicely as >that, are they done in some special way, or do you just do them at home >like the rest of us? > >>To hear about new Project Gutenberg eBooks, or get involved in >>creating new eBooks, visit >>http://www.gutenberg.org > >Yes, I certainly see myself getting involved in various in the future, >it seems such a wonderful goal and the friendly democratic profile >seems too good to be true! > >I didn't find it easy to find out how to send in suggestions - I >suppose people aren't expecting us to send paper letters to Salt Lake >City? For instance, I wonder if you can tell me where to send thoughts >like the following? - or does one send everything to info(a)pglaf.org?: > >- the letter that came with these discs should really have a sentence >for those who *don't* already have an unzipper on their computers: I >more than one Windows user who doesn't have WinZip nor have a clue >about how to get it or install it, and of course Mac users may not know >that these days StuffIt Expander also handles zipped files, since >earlier versions didn't and zip isn't a usual format for the Mac. >Another detail, if tiny, is that 'Zip' isn't a program, but a format, >rather "compressed using the Zip program" a more usual formulation >would perhaps be "compressed in Zip format" (of course they were >compressed with *a* Zip program, but there are many, not just one, and >the way it was done isn't interesting, just the result because that's >what you have to have software to deal with!) > >- there's an enormous difference in legibility between the two labels, >the DVD label would gain greatly by having the same kind of >solid-colour bar as the CD one has > >- I'm confused and alarmed by the conflict between >a) the simple happy injunction in the letter and the web-pages to share >the files or copy the disc; and >b) the standard 'small print' in every Gutenberg file which says >ominously "Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before >downloading or redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg >file"; and the even more ominous "You agree that if you distribute this >etext or a copy of it to anyone, you will indemnify and hold the >Project, its officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, >cost and expense, including legal fees, that arise by reason of your >distribution" > >- I didn't anything about how the copying of CDs and DVs works, for >anyone who might be able to contribute in this way: the reference in >the FAQs points just to the consumer's side of things > >- the index page of the CD says "The eBooks on the CD consist mainly of >text and HTML files, with a few movie files": I could only find one >movie file, landing.avi, and although it's well worth having, I don't >see how anyone could call it an eBook > >- it would be wonderful if there were a way of getting the audio eBooks >in disc collections, for those of us who don't have broad-band it's a >major project to download all those separate files ... > >- one wonders what the attitude of Project Gutenberg is to different >editions, and indeed to history in general! For example, it seems >extremely odd that there is only one version of Aesop's fables, which >contains a very strongly-worded criticism of other peoples' work, with >no mention of when it was made - the latest date I could find was 1864, >so it's evidently after that, but doesn't seem to be a modern one. >Similarly with Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, although there is a plethora >of notes I saw nothing to show when the edition was made, which is an >absolutely central feature of an intelligent reading of anything ... > >::::::::::::::::::::::::: > >I wonder which part of France you're in ... I've had very positive >experiences of Auvergne, Vendée, Bretagne, and have worked in places >like Calais and Arras, as well as Paris and Marseilles ... > >All best wishes, > >David Kettlewell >formerly professor, Tartu University, Estonia >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Musica Humana - >Music and Musicology >to educate the whole person >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ><http://www.new-renaissance.net> > > > >-- >With best wishes > From the lady of the changeable locks, soggy shazadi, duchess of darkness > and damp, Barbara Reed, and all the furry friends. Dalie asks you to > sponsor her in aid of the Brooke Hospital, you can visit at > http://www.thebrooke.org >She is walking from Nantes to Brest in 2005 and wants your money to help >working animals in poor countries. -- E-mail: cannona(a)fireantproductions.com Skype: cannona MSN Messenger: cannona(a)hotmail.com (Do not send E-mail to the hotmail address.)

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million book project
by N Wolcott 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

Here is Chapter I of the Steam House by Jules Verne. I think they have a way to go. I wonder if Google is planning to do better? To be fair the Dejavu look at the rather bad images allows them to be mostly made out, so one could reconstruct most of this page. The first line is "TWO THOUSAND POUNDS FOR A HEAD". The images are like with a 300 mp camera, so not surprizing the poor OCR. I think PG texts are easier to read. I understand the books are being destroyed after scanning: might as well put them right into the dumpster and save all the trouble. CHAPTER L ".nv<» thousand rnuNns for a hkaiv," " A tst'.WAfct* of two thousand pounds will he paid to any Mjtr who will drhVrr up, dead or alive, oik* of the prime movrr» <»f thf Srpoy revolt, at present known to he in the ifMdrney, the Nabob Datulou Taut, nnnuionly Jitu'h vv»t'i the ijotirr rratl hy the iiilialntants tif Aurun* jUitMul, mi tltr rvniiiijj uf the* 6th of March, 1807, A cojy iff the jil,u,;in! h«u! been recently affixed to the wall iif «i loiirly and ntiiuu! hunj;ulow on the hanks of llir iJitiuUttiu, *iud already the conu*r of the paper htvir- iiijj flu* j;r«'on*l fi*iiiir*-«a fiaiiir cx<,%nited hy tiuinCj .secretly Utltuii'rt) hy uthnrji'**"WiH jjone, The fiiiiti^ had Urea there^ printal in Inrjjo letters, hut If wafi torn off hy the hand of a ^solitary fakir who IKij^ed t»y that Ucst^latc *sj>c,it, The name of the Governor N Wolcott nwolcott2(a)post.harvard.edu

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PG DVDs
by Aaron Cannon 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

I received this message a few days ago. I sent it to Greg for his opinion, but either my messages aren't getting through, or he's been busy, as I haven't received a response. Anyway, I thought I'd forward it to the list for discussion. Personally I don't see that there would be a problem, as long as the DVDs are given as gifts, and not sold. Nevertheless, what do the rest of you think? "Hi Project Gutenberg folks, First of all, thanks for all the wonderful work you do. I appreciate it so much. I had a question about using Project Gutenberg's CDs or DVDs as "free" gifts in a membership drive for an advocacy group. I'm doing some work for Public Knowledge (a DC based advocacy group that lobbies for the public interest in intellectual property issues-- I'm sure you've crossed paths with them), and I'm helping them improve their online outreach and fundraising. One of the things we'd like to do is let people show their support by becoming members. We'd like to offer people who donate gifts such as Public Knowledge t-shirts, or books like Lessig's "Free Culture", and we'd like for some of these items to be a celebration of Creative Commons licenses and the public domain. Along those lines, we're interested in giving members Project Gutenberg DVDs. Would that be possible? Are there any rights issues? And what would be the best way to get a hundred or so copies that we could send out? If there's a suggested donation when copies of the CD are made, what kind of donation would you consider to be fair? Thanks for you time, and I look forward to hearing from you, -Holmes Wilson" Sincerely Aaron Cannon -- E-mail: cannona(a)fireantproductions.com Skype: cannona MSN Messenger: cannona(a)hotmail.com (Do not send E-mail to the hotmail address.)

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Re: !@!Re: [gutvol-d] Moving and Removing eBooks
by D. Starner 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

"Michael Hart" writes: > As for the recent request to delete Shakespeare #100, I never heard > back from my reply, so I never got to the bottom line reasoning > behind that request. Perhaps it was only because of copyright, > or because it was such an early effort that it needed proofing > to bring it up to today's standards. I sent a message to gutvol-d about it earlier. It's a copyrighted edition of a public domain text, and there's nothing in that file to indicate that the edition was first published in 1931 and isn't just an electronic copy of a public domain edition. And even if it is a 1931 edition, the copyright notices are wrong; electronic editions of texts do not get a new copyright. In many ways, it's the epitome of stuff PG opposes. > There is also great, and worthwhile, concern about the Longfellow > translation of Dante. However, it is also an example that should > be preserved as an indication of history, even if we recommend > the Cary translation or any other as being of better quality. Who cares about Dante; it's Longfellow. Different translations, even different editions are interesting as long as distinguishing marks are included in the file. -- ___________________________________________________________ Sign-up for Ads Free at Mail.com http://promo.mail.com/adsfreejump.htm

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Re: [gutvol-d] Addition to PG History PT1
by Joshua Hutchinson 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

*sigh* The only thing your chart proves is that applying Moore's Law to PG production is a waste of time. 1991 is NOT when production started. It is not when PG started. It is just the point in time you chose as the starting point to attach Moore's Law. What people are saying is this: MOORE'S LAW DOES NOT APPLY TO PG PRODUCTION. WE WOULD BE BETTER OFF JUST ANNOUNCING WE HAVE "X" NUMBER OF TEXTS INSTEAD OF COMPARING IT TO A "LAW" THAT ISN'T EVEN MEANT TO BE USED THIS WAY. Admit it, Michael, 1991 is just an arbritrary date. Just because "regular production" started in 1991 ... bull. We had regular, once a year, production before that. Josh PS BTW, if you are going to say no one "read the message above," you might want to actually quote what we supposedly didn't read. As it is, I'm assuming we all read the same thing as you, but had a slightly different level of reading comprehension, since we all seemed to get something completely different from it than you did. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Michael Hart" <hart(a)pglaf.org> To: "The gutvol-d Mailing List" <gutvol-d(a)lists.pglaf.org> Subject: [gutvol-d] Addition to PG History PT1 Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 07:34:58 -0800 (PST) > > > Well, it would appear those in question did not read the message > above, at least they did not reply to any of the points made, so > I am duty bound to explain in a bit more detail, as to how there > are no other choices other than Project Gutenberg's first effort > at a regular production schedule in 1991 as a starting point. > > Here are various starting years and results for Moore's Law used > to project the growth of Project Gutenberg. > > > START TOTAL START TOTAL START TOTAL START TOTAL > YEAR NUMBER YEAR NUMBER YEAR NUMBER YEAR NUMBER ACTUAL > 1971 BASE 1971 1979 BASE 1979 1990 BASE 1990 1993 BASE 1993 NUMBER/YR > > 1971 1 1 1971 > 1974 4 4 1974 > 1977 16 7 1977 > 1980 64 1979 9 9 1980 > 1983 256 1982 36 9 1983 > 1986 1024 1985 144 10 1986 > 1989 4096 1988 576 1990 10 10 1989 > 1992 16384 1991 2304 1993 40 1993 100 42 1992 > 1995 65536 1994 9216 1996 160 1996 400 365 1995 > 1998 262144 1997 36864 1999 640 1999 1600 1550 1998 > 2001 1480576 2000 147456 2002 2560 2002 25600 4260 2001 > 2004 4194304 2003 589824 2005 10240 2005 102400 14944 2004 > 2007 16777216 2006 2359296 2008 40960 2008 409600 ????? 2007 > > As you can plainly see, starting Moore's Law at any other date than ~1991 is > inappropriate not only because the numbers make it obvious, but also because > 1991 was the first year of regular production growth for Project Gutenberg. > > > _______________________________________________ > gutvol-d mailing list > gutvol-d(a)lists.pglaf.org > http://lists.pglaf.org/listinfo.cgi/gutvol-d

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Re: [gutvol-d] etext 1842 Michael Sstrogoff
by Joshua Hutchinson 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

Forgive me, but I'm not real sure what the point of this was. strgf10.txt and strgf11.txt are both in the directory listing. However, like all our texts, the latest version of each format is listed in the catalog entry. This is completely normal. Is this an errata report on the HTML? You mention the first letter of each chapter. If you could make your message a little clearer, I or someone more knowledgable will do our best to figure out the answer. Josh ----- Original Message ----- From: "N Wolcott" <nwolcott(a)dsdial.net> To: "Project Gutenberg Volunteer Discussion" <gutvol-d(a)lists.pglaf.org> Subject: [gutvol-d] etext 1842 Michael Sstrogoff Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 11:23:13 -0500 > > The catalogue currently indicates an 1842 -10 html and 1842-11 txt. > Previously I had a 1842-10 txt which no longet appears. These appear to be all > the same text, although 1842-10.txt and t842-11.txt differ in length by 2K > bytes (change in header?). The source for all was apparently Judy Boss, and as > there will be no errors in her text, unless she herself submitted it twice, > all the texts should be identical. Since the html was converted from Boss's > text there is the possibility of an error in the conversion. The html > capitalizes the 1st letter of each chapter, not in the original etext. > Otherwise a robot conversion. Too bad all the versions do not appear on the > catalogue list. > > N Wolcott nwolcott2(a)post.harvard.edu > > > _______________________________________________ > gutvol-d mailing list > gutvol-d(a)lists.pglaf.org > http://lists.pglaf.org/listinfo.cgi/gutvol-d

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Magic books / Image versions
by Juhana Sadeharju 27 Jan '05

27 Jan '05

>From: "David A. Desrosiers" <hacker(a)gnu-designs.com> > > Let me know what you're missing, and I'll try to see if >anything I have might be able to fill in the gaps. Hello. I found the shop again. Perhaps it was a temporary network error when I tried it a year ago. :-( The url is "http://www.lybrary.com/". I have purchased the following set of books (collector's editions): The Art of Modern Conjuring anonymous (?) Later Magic Prof. Hoffmann (1911) Magic Ellis Stanyon (1901) Magicians Tricks Henry Hatton and Adrian Plate (1917) Modern Magic Prof. Hoffmann (1876) More Magic Prof. Hoffmann (1890) Our Magic Nevil Maskelyne and David Devant (1911) Sleight of Hand Edwin Sachs (1885) The Art of Magic T. Nelson Downs (1921) The Magicians Handbook P. T. Selbit (1901) The Modern Conjurer C. Lang Neil (1902) But now the most important: how we could get magic books to the PG collection? Lybrary is doing good in making these books available for a relatively cheap price, and convenietly in electronic format. But "competition" never makes harm. Could volunteers here check if the above books are available? The books I have are in one-image-per-page format but I would like to have better quality images (for readability). The text versions could be produced later if people want them; I prefer the original look available in the image versions. Image versions saves much time too. For example, check "http://theses.mit.edu" for good quality image versions of theses. They would have never made them if they would have choosen the same text approach as PG. We too should prefer image version as a first version -- as a fastest version to produce. A digital camera would be fastest way to digitize the books, I'm sure. But how to match the people who have access to these books, the people who have digital camera (or scanner), and the people (like me) who have time and interest to digitize? I have a scanner if somebody would be nice enough to send me books for the digitization. But for the scanner, I would have to lift up, turn, and slightly press flat the books at every page. The 1890 math books I scanned were not harmed in the process, but the scanner is not best apparatus for digitization in this context. Juhana -- http://music.columbia.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-graphics-dev for developers of open source graphics software

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