Happy the man, and happy he alone

[venta]

Yesterday, I wanted a book on OpenGL ES (if that means nothing to you, then read it as "specific technical area relating to computer graphics"). Being the sort of person who would, if the option is available, rather buy a real book from a real bookshop than click buttons on Amazon I trotted into town. Oxford has two reasonable academic bookshops so I thought I'd be in with a chance.

I browsed around in Blackwells' terrifying Norrington Room, found a book about OpenGL (read: related area, but not quite right) and went over to the enquiry desk. The lady behind it was on the phone. She looked up at me; not wanting to menace, I stood back a little and gazed about while I waited. After a few minutes I look at her more directly, when I eventually caught her eye she said to her phone "Oh, I'll have to go, I have a customer."

She searched for OpenGL ES for me. She said there were no books on it. This surprised me. She told me she'd tried searching for the letters G, L etc independently, which somewhat confused me. However, there were no books to be had (unless I wanted a book on "GLI" - having no idea what she was talking about I decided I probably didn't), and I went away. I've always had excellent service from Blackwells before, and she somewhat disappointed me.

I went to Borders. They've moved their computing section down into the basement. Where Blackwells had had little helpful labels on their shelves to tell you where the different sections (say, "Graphics", or "Oracle") began, Borders just had shelves. With books on them. Wandering around, I completely failed to discern what their filing system was. It certainly didn't seem to be by topic. Books huddled together in little clumps trying to look coherent, but failing. Perl reference books nestled up to Dreamweaver for Dummies. I found books about Ruby on each of the four shelving units, some in the most unlikely company. I couldn't find anything that vaguely resembled a graphics section.

Over at Enquiries, I typed "Open GL ES" into the search terminal. No results. The girl behind the desk advised me that her terminal was better and searched for me. Yup, one book, OpenGL ES for Game Development. Now, game development's not really my thing, but I figured I'd like to look at the book to see how useful I thought it'd be. We walked over to the shelves, and it became increasingly apparent that the enquiry person had no more idea than I had where the actual book might be found.

I pointed out the lack of system. She told me that she was currently refusing to work in the basement for more than an hour as the aircon was broken, and thus she wasn't prepared to sort out the filing of the computer section[*]. She advised me to look on the internet and buy it there "from a dedicated computer bookshop". I asked if there was any logic to the books at all, so I could look in approximately the right area.

"Oh yes, it's mostly Microsoft over there, while this bit's more creative stuff. Like Photoshop."
"What I'm after is probably more likely to be with things like programming languages.[**]"
"Well, games programming will be in creative stuff. There's Dreamweaver."

At this point, I realised she wasn't going to be any help at all. I appreciate that to a lot of people "computer books" are an amorphous blob, and the categories maybe don't make a lot of sense. So I said great, thanks, I'll just have a hunt about myself.

She hung about, pointing out arbitrary books "There's MIDI. As soon as they fix the aircon I'll sort their computer books out, but not before". Eventually she left me in peace, I hunted for a while, then gave up and came home to Amazon.

It seems that - contrary to what I'd been told - there aren't a few books on OpenGL ES. There is currently just one, as mentioned above. A quick online search on Blackwells' network revealed it as well. Amazon let me flick through an electronic copy, and sold me a second-hand one for a tenner.

Real bookshops: nil. Amazon: one. I realise that displaying books to the public makes them harder to find than in Amazon's massive warehouses, but really... rubbish customer service just doesn't help.

[*] She had a point - it was pretty hot. I just don't think this is an appropriate thing to say to a customer.
[**] No, this isn't really true. But when compared to things like M$ and Photoshop it was a good first level approximation.

Comments

[davefish.livejournal.com]

Only one book on the subject! Must be very niche. or the ES stands for Extremely Shy...

[venta.livejournal.com]

Actually, I suspect the problem is more that it's quite new.

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

Also there probably aren't enough potential users to justify a book. Even the users who do exist would probably mostly prefer not to spend money on a book and just rely on electronic docs.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I realise I'm in a minority. I'd always rather read things from a book than from an electronic document. Even if it's exactly the same content.

[davefish.livejournal.com]

But what if the potential users aren't computer literate, what will they do....

[venta.livejournal.com]

Then I guess they'll write very bad OpenGL ES code, regardless ;)

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I just don't think this is an appropriate thing to say to a customer.

By this do you mean that it wasn't appropriate for her to refuse to sort the books, that it wasn't appropriate for her to tell you the truth, or that she was right to tell you the truth, but did so in the wrong way?

Assuming it was the truth, of course. Sounds like even if she had sorted the books she wouldn't necessarily have done a very good job.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Yes, I have to admit the prospect of her sorting them alarmed me a bit.

I meant that, while it may have been reasonable of her to refuse to sort the books (having worked in a hot office, even non-physical work can be quite unpleasant), it's not appropriate to drag the customer into Border's inter-staff quarrels. I don't think.

If she'd just apologised and told me they were due to be re-sorted I'd have been quite happy. Actually, if she said that the aircon was currently on the blink and that the books would be re-sorted as soon as it was mended I would have thought that was also fine and would have sympathised. It was more the manner of the telling I was objecting to.

Incidentally, I'm interested in your opinion. Which is more useful for a bookshop: Oh Really all by themselves on a separate shelf (Blackwells' approach), or interspersed among the rest as topic dictates (what I believe Borders were aiming for). Ideally, I suppose you'd want both, but space probably prohibits that. Question also applies to other series - both shops had the ... for Dummies on a separate shelf, though in Borders they'd strayed a bit.

[hughe.livejournal.com]

I recon my subject/language etc would be a better way to sort, but maybe have a o'reily featurette of popular or new books on one place in addition.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I'd say sort by subject, not publisher.

I think it's fairly easy, when scanning a shelf, to pick out the ORLY books if that's what you're after. The Dummies are even more distinctive.

[venta.livejournal.com]

The advantage of shelving the Dummies separately is that they're ordered alphabetically regardless of content. If you want to know about Myspace, you just have to look under M, as opposed to knowing which section to seek in. Which you might not know, if you're a genuine Dummy.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Good point, I might change my mind in that case.

It depends as well whether the Dummies are unusual in their area. If there are a whole bunch of Myspace books for beginners, then it seems in some sense unfair to put the "Dummies" one where potential readers will find it, and bury the rest in with the "social networking" or "online publishing" section. But if the Dummies books are fairly unique, then it makes sense to separate them from the 600-page tutorial-plus-reference efforts.

Maybe the books should be categorised first by weight, then subject. If you know you want a 500g book about CSS, that's a very different product from a 2kg book about CSS. Of course that doesn't help in your case, where there is only one book on your subject and you don't know how big it is.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Maybe the books should be categorised first by weight, then subject.

That's a great idea. It might also discourage publishers who sell beginners' how-to books from padding them with useless guff to make them seem more worth the price.

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

My goodness me. One would almost assume that classification systems for books don't exist! (snark aimed at bookshops - not you!)

But then again, Dewey and Library of Congress classification costs a fair bit of money to licence.

My opinion - sort by subject apart from popular series such as the Dummies. If subject isn't simple (or there are no specialist staff), then better to sort by author or similar than do a bad job of sorting by subject. At least then with computer catalogues the books are findable.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Actually, you might know the answer to something I was just wondering about! How has Dewey coped with computing books ? I imagine the subject has grown way beyond the compliexity originally envisaged. I know Dewey is intended to be extensible, but I could imagine some poor decisions made a few decades ago having really screwed it up.

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

I could imagine some poor decisions made a few decades ago having really screwed it up.

Yes. Computing was placed in the 000s (Generalities) rather than the 600s (Technology), which puts computing books in with encyclopedias and dictionaries. As computing becomes a way of life rather than a tool, mind you, I wonder if this was so foolish ... (I think the detailed classification works reasonably well, though programming languages are simply listed alphabetically.)

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

I thought it had now been moved from the 000s in a newer edition? I could well be wrong though, and seeing as every library used a different edition and/or version then it doesn't really seem to matter!

To answer venta's comment - I think you've hit the nail on the head! Dewey is extensible, but sloooowly - as libraries don't want to reclassify whole sections when it changes.

[sesquipedality.livejournal.com]

I believe that it's due to a flaw in the design of Dewey. A flaw that'll be shockingly familiar to anyone that programmed in BASIC in the 80s. They didn't leave enough room to put computing in the proper place, so they arbitrarily stuck it where there was still room, in generalities.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

A flaw that'll be shockingly familiar to anyone that programmed in BASIC in the 80s.

Even my Dragon 32 had "renum".

[venta.livejournal.com]

Bastards. We didn't know ours did.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

At least, I'm pretty sure it did. You've worried me now... Yes, it did.

[uitlander.myopenid.com (from livejournal.com)]

I'm probably being stupidly naive here, but I'd have been tempted to see what the Bodl online catalogue listed, and then see if the book could be summoned from the darkest depths of whereever-it-is-they-hide-them-this-week.

OK, TBH I'd probably use the Cambridge online catalogue, and use it as an excuse to go over to Cambridge, have a day out and borrow it (its such a pleasure to have borrowing rights at a copyright library), but you know what I mean.

Would I be wrong to assume that the Bod is as hopeless at Computing books as it was at Archaeology (it had declined to take 90% of the subject books prior the the undergrad degree happening on 'space' grounds)?

[venta.livejournal.com]

Well, I was only told I wanted this book at about 4pm, so probably wouldn't have been able to retrieve anything from the stacks til today. I foolishly assumed that I'd be home with my book from Blackwells by 5.

Also, I anticipate wanting the book for reference over a period of time so my own copy makes more sense.

I actually don't know about the Bod's policy on computer books (which live in the Radcliffe Science Library, not the Bod Proper). When I wanted them as a student the problem was more too few copies; I don't know what it's like now. I'm inclined to forget about the usefulness of a deposit library on the doorstep, though, so thanks for the reminder!

(I must investigate how to search the catalogue on the interweb these days; I believe OLIS has been shot in the back of the head and replaced with something friendlier.)

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

I believe OLIS has been shot in the back of the head and replaced with something friendlier.

The replacement has been postponed again. More than that I cannot say, except not to get your hopes up.

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

I believe OLIS has been shot in the back of the head and replaced with something friendlier

Ha! *insane laughter*

Postponed indefinitely this time! But it will still be called OLIS, as it was before the current system too. But the program behind it will switch from GEAC Advance to VTLS or Virtua. Bet you really wanted to know that :)
The bad news is - no telnet version, which I like using.

[uitlander.myopenid.com (from livejournal.com)]

TBH I was also thinking you could use the Bod to browse and select or reject any possible books you might find online. CUL lets me keep books for ~3 months on my MA card IIRC, which would probably cover most short terms needs, but not a reference book I wanted to keep.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Bearing in mind that Oxford doesn't actually offer all that much in the way of computing degrees(*), and so undergrads don't have much need for books about particular technologies... it probably has the lot.

(*) This is not intended as a slur on Oxford computation as such, just that they seem to take a very academic approach. There are other universities where you can turn up and do nothing but courses on 3d graphics, games programming, network architecture, web technologies, and what-have-you. Stuff that will find you a job the following year, but is out of date the year after that :-)

[leathellin.livejournal.com]

Arrrg - well done you have successfully triggered a mini-rant :-)
I'm currently having problems with the Spanish degree system which is very vocational. The flaw would seem to be that the produced computingers ('tis a word) have done a small module on virtually everything (see the keywords on the CVs) but when actually required to do anything have vast holes in their knowledge up to and including actually being able to do anything with said language (XSLT being my current infuriating example).

I'd imagine it depends a bit more on the course than I am noticing so far or at least I hope it does.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I said it would get the a job, not that they'd necessarily be any good at it once they had it :-)

As they'll learn before they apply for their second job, there's a big difference between having read a book / sat a course about a programming language, and having used it in anger. Somewhere between those two lies the point where you can reasonably mention it on your CV under "other technologies".

Unless their XSLT course included a sizeable project with a practical purpose, there's no way they're going to (a) remember the basic syntax without prompting, or (b) know how to deal with the particular practical difficulties and gotchas of XSLT.

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

I don't know how much of its entitlement to computing books the Bodleian takes these days, but for something up-to-the-minute like this the risk is that even if it's arrived, it may not be processed for months.

(In this case, it looks like the book venta found arrived at the RSL in 2005, but it's since been sent to the Cheshire salt mines, so it won't be available immediately.)

[venta.livejournal.com]

it's since been sent to the Cheshire salt mines

Presumably the library equivalent of transportation for hard labour.

[qatsi.livejournal.com]

I realise that displaying books to the public makes them harder to find than in Amazon's massive warehouses

This is, I guess, a corollary of the Bodleian's logic of sorting books in the stacks by their size. Or is that just an urban legend?

[venta.livejournal.com]

I've certainly heard that; I don't know if it's true. If addedentry happens by again he might be able to tell us.

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

I believe it's true. I reluctantly instituted an oversize section at home when I found that my two copies of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy were of different heights. Very different heights: a paperback from the days before paperbacks got big ideas and some shiny special edition more than twice its height and width.

(Big American university libraries have open stacks through which readers are allowed to wander, and no doubt play kiss-chase; these might not be so strict about size.)

[qatsi.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's so tempting to make some crack about Americans having larger books to go with the generally larger waistline, or the books being larger so that they can be large print. But I won't.

(I am, however, now reminded about the one in which the George W Bush Presidential Library is destroyed in a fire. Both books were destroyed; particularly tragically, he hadn't yet finished coloring in the second.)