_publ_author_name is not a good key for _publ_author

[Herbert J. Bernstein]

Dear James,
  Having an unambiguous key is a fine idea, but shouldn't it just be the
ORCID id, as in _publ_aithor_id_orcid
  Regards,
    Herbert

On Tue, Jun 23, 2020 at 12:51 AM James Hester via coreDMG <coredmg at iucr.org>
wrote:

> Dear Core DMG,
>
> Please see proposed new definitions for the publ_author category, as
> suggested in my previous email (below). If no objections are forthcoming, I
> will be updating the dictionary a week from today.  Note that this change
> will in turn pave the way for adding author roles to a CIF file.
>
> best wishes,
> James.
> ===========
>
> save_PUBL_AUTHOR
>
> _definition.id                          PUBL_AUTHOR
> _definition.scope                       Category
> _definition.class                       Loop
> _definition.update                      2020-06-30
> _description.text
> ;
>      Category of data items recording the author information.
> ;
> _name.category_id                       PUBL
> _name.object_id                         PUBL_AUTHOR
> _category.key_id                        '_publ_author.id'
> loop_
>   _category_key.name
>          '_publ_author.id'
>
> save_
>
> save_publ_author.id
>     _definition.id              '_publ_author.id'
>     _definition.update          2020-06-30
>     _description.text
> ;              Arbitrary identifier for this author
> ;
>     _name.category_id                       publ_author
>     _name.object_id                         id
>     _type.purpose                           Key
>     _type.source                             Assigned
>     _type.container                         Single
>     _type.contents                          Code
> save_
>
> On Tue, 26 Mar 2019 at 17:28, James Hester <jamesrhester at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Dear Core CIF group,
>>
>> The publ_author category has _publ_author.name as the category key,
>> meaning that _publ_author.name can be used to select a unique row of the
>> loop. However, it has been pointed out that _publ_author.name is
>> insufficient as a key for the _publ_author loop, as some authors have the
>> same name (there are apparently 40 entries in the COD with this feature).
>> One way to fix this is to add a further disambiguating data name to
>> _publ_author. The suggestion is that something like "_publ_author.id"
>> could be defined, which would contain an arbitrary code and which would be
>> added to the category key.  The lack of this dataname in historical CIFs
>> can be worked around by assuming it has a constant value, and CIF curators
>> can auto-generate it when a situation is encountered with multiple
>> identically-named authors.
>>
>> An alternative approach would be to define "_publ_author.id" as the new
>> key of the category that can be auto-generated from each packet. While in a
>> formal sense this makes all current CIFs non-conformant, I can't imagine
>> that it would affect most software, which will continue to work with _
>> publ_author.name.
>>
>> Please indicate your preference or alternative solutions. Particularly
>> important is the perspective of software authors who may be impacted.
>>
>> thanks,
>> James.
>>
>> --
>> T +61 (02) 9717 9907
>> F +61 (02) 9717 3145
>> M +61 (04) 0249 4148
>>
>
>
> --
> T +61 (02) 9717 9907
> F +61 (02) 9717 3145
> M +61 (04) 0249 4148
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