Proof Of Concept

I've been working on an implemention to reflect collaborations and how they should properly be displayed on an album page. Here are a few examples to check out:

Note that the joining character matches the album cover:
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=7629
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=6792

In this case there is no joining character so a non-alphebetic character is used instead to avoid injecting a character into the band name that is not explicitly used such as: "&" or "+" or "and". I want to avoid injecting words or characters into a band name that do not belong so chose something that would attempt to avoid misinterpritation:
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=7051

Comments?


Kevin

I like that the join character matches the album. I think you should make the band name before "members:" be a link and be in full-size text instead of smaller text. Also I think the member connections should be grouped by band as well. For example:

JIMMY PAGE CONNECTIONS:
Jimmy Page - ...

ROBERT PLANT CONNECTIONS:
Robert Plant - ...

...to make it clear that the connections don't join the two groups, and to also make it doubly clear which group members came from where, without having to look it up up above.

Only thing I'm uncertain about is for the "members" of a single-person band:

Jimmy Page members
- Jimmy Page

Robert Plant members
- Robert Plant

... looks a bit clunky to me. However, I haven't got an alternative suggestion, except to suggest:

If the band is a solo artist whose name matches the band, then suppress the "Solo Band Members" line, so it looks like:

- Jimmy Page
- Robert Plant

Then you'd also have:

- John Mayall

The Bluesbreakers members
- Aynsley Dunbar
- John McVie
- Peter Green

... and:

- Jimmy Page

The Black Crowes members
- Audley Freed
- Christopher Robinson
- Eddie Hawrysch : "Ed Harsch"
- Richard Robinson
- Steve Gorman
- Sven Pipien

... because I'm thinking ahead to things like "Before A Word Is Said" by Alan Gowen, Phil Miller, Richard Sinclair and Trevor Tomkins.

The fact that there's not actually a direct database connection between these people based on this album would be "invisible" until the user actually clicked on the individual member names.

Problem I foresee: what about an album that is a collaboration between two (or more) people, one (or more) of whom is not otherwise on the database? How would that work?

Looks pretty good. I don't mind the "members of Jimmy Page" thing. Does this work for compilation albums as well?

PK:
I'd prefer to keep the band name title associated with the member names in a small font and I'd rather not overload the page with clickable links. The band name at the top I feel is sufficient for linking purposes.

I do agree that the connections section should be deliniated by band names. I will look into implementing that.


Matt:
You have a point about it getting cluttered with the

Jimmy Page members
- Jimmy Page

Robert Plant members
- Robert Plant

I've changed the headers for solo artists to simply state

Solo artist
- Jimmy Page

Solo artist
- Robert Plant

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=7051

which reduces redundancy but still keeps the names separated so that there is no confusion as to whether the artists have connectivity or not. In the cases where there is connectivity within the collaboration, such as Frank Zappa & The Mothers Of Invention, there will be a single Band Members section which will include all members and hopefully denote connectivity (although that sort of collaboration has yet to be implemented).


Python:
Compilations will work differently as they are not collaborations. I still plan on doing a similiar full album display for a single compilation but that is somewhat distinct (albiet in the end rather similiar) from what I'm doing now. It's in the pipeline however.


Kevin

Here's an example of a collaboration between a band in the database and one not in the database:

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=6670


Kevin

I've been able to implement the use of band names in the connection title of an album featuring a collaboration. Examples:

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=7629
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=6792
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=7051
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&AlbumId=6670


Kevin