NEW FEATURES AND DATA IN THE VERSION OF OCTOBER, 1997

- GREECE:
  - Archontis Pantsios: A Greek list of Don Rosa covers and stories

- USA:
  - Oerjan Berglund: info on various unpublished Don Rosa covers
  - David Gerstein, Harry Fluks: recent Gladstone comics and albums
  - David Gerstein: indexes of some very old WDC comics
  - Per Vedin: indexes of Supergoof, Phantom Blot and some other Gold Key comics

- GERMANY:
  - Gilbert Roser: a LOT of issues for the German index
  - Ole R. Nielsen: Tollsten Geschichten 1-75 using an index by Otto Burzlaff
  - Brix Lichtenberg: German "Mickey travels through time" albums
  - Georg Tempel (Ehapa): Info about Don Rosa's German reprints

- SWEDEN:
  - Andreas Eldh: Swedish index 1992

- FRANCE:
  - Francois Willot: new versions of the French issue index and story index

- DENMARK:
  - Ole Reichstein Nielsen: new version of the Danish issue index

- ITALY:
  - Marco Barlotti, Frank Stajano: updated Italian ("Fossati") story index

- THE NETHERLANDS:
  - Harry Fluks: updated Dutch issue index
  - Frank Jonker, Branko Collin: updates for some H-coded stories

- STORY INDEXES:
  - Shaun Craill: complete index of Shaun Craill
  - Frank Jonker: update of the index of Frank Jonker
  - David Gerstein: credits of recent Egmont stories
  - Janet Gilbert: updates on Michael T. Gilbert and Janet Gilbert

- PROGRAM CHANGES:
  * Layout of MS-Access files slightly changed (less information is lost)
  * Indications [org.art:] etc. added in the issue files (where different
    sources disagree about the credits)
  * New layout of the legend files for creators, heroes, subseries and indexers
  * Output now uses Latin-1 character set (unless the indexes are USA or Dutch)


NEW FEATURES AND DATA IN THE VERSION OF JUNE, 1997

- USA (western):
  - Johan Nilsson: 532 (!) Gold Key and Whitman issues (DD, MM, US, D&D, JW,
    SG, WDC, WDCD, WDS, WTP and more)
  - Germund Silvegren: 8 Gold Key issues
  - Various people: some issues

- USA (newspapers):
  - David Gerstein: additions to the DD silly symphonies and MM sunday strips

- USA (modern):
  - Gerd Cebulla: CBL index (with page numbers), taken from a public domain
    Barks index
  - David Gerstein: complete index of Gerstein
  - Pat & Shelly Block (via Gerstein): complete index of the Blocks
  - Jonathan Markoff, David Gerstein & Harry Fluks: recent Gladstone issues
  - Jonathan Markoff: some Marvel, Abbeville, and various issues
  - Steven Rowe: some Disney Adventures

- DENMARK:
  - Ole Reichstein Nielsen: (almost) complete Danish index

- ITALY:
  - Marco Barlotti & Frank Stajano: renewed Italian story (Fossati) index
    now also covering Almanacco Topolino
  - Ole Reichstein Nielsen: improved Italian issue (Benassi) index
  - Frank Stajano & Alberto Becattini: Italian Don Rosa index

- FRANCE:
  - Didier Ghez: French Don Rosa index (no titles, no covers)

- FINLAND:
  - Juha Tynninen: Finnish titles and update of Don Rosa index

- GERMANY:
  - Gilbert Roser: German index 1980-1988, OD 1-23, PK, KA + recent issues
  - Alexander Gruenke: German pocket books (LT 1-34)

- THE NETHERLANDS:
  - Frank Jonker (via Fluks): complete index of Jonker
  - Branko Collin: complete index of Collin
  - Pieter van Cleef / Thom Roep (GP): update H-coded story index:
    1979, 1996-1997
  - Harry Fluks: Dutch index, additions (thanks to GP) + recent issues
  - Harry Fluks: double-checked Dutch issue index with Matla catalogue

- SWEDEN:
  - Anders Engwall: 2 Swedish issues and some error corrections

- GENERAL:
  - Harry Fluks: an Index of Indexes (first draft version) has been added
    as a text file (indexind.txt).

- FOR PROGRAMMERS (mostly Bent and Per):
  - the "gather" option now has a parameter "allowed title countries"
    (Bent Pedersen: adjust the "doit.bat" file to your wishes)
  - story codes changed as indicated by [oldcode:]. The field [oldcodea:]
    refers to the code changes in the previous version (January, 1997).
    Italian story codes have been normalised, and [oldcode:] is not used
    there. The most important change in Italian codes is
    "I 1234-A" --> "I TL 1234-A".

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NEW FEATURES AND DATA IN THE VERSION OF JANUARY, 1997

- FRANCE:
  - A first version of a French issue-index, with a few issues
    by Ole Reichstein Nielsen and David Gerstein.
  - A lot of (incomplete) issue data from Francois Willot.
    Conversion: Harry Fluks.
    (A better version is in the making...)
  - A major update to the French story index, by Francois Willot.
    Conversion: Harry Fluks.

- ITALY:
  - A first version of an Italian issue-index, with
    Paperino & C., by Marco Barlotti.
  - An incomplete Topolino index, by Benassi Miroslav.
    Conversion: Ole Reichstein Nielsen.
    (A better version is in the making...)

- USA:
  - Addition of comics from the Gold Key and Whitman period.
    By Jonathan Markoff, David Gerstein, and others.
  - Double-checking of the Dell WDC data with an old WDC index by Don Rosa.
    Checking: Harry Fluks.
  - Addition of the recent Gladstone comics. Mostly by Harry Fluks
    and David Gerstein.
  - A lot of (more than 300) Gold Key/Whitman stories got a new code, using
    data from Martin Olsen's Det Store Index. (See also the remark below
    about "oldcode".)

- HOLLAND:
  - Update to the H-coded index from Pieter van Cleef.
  - Addition of the recent Dutch comics and missing issues of
    Willie Wortels Puzzelparade, Oom Dagobert, and others. By Harry Fluks,
    with thanks to the Dutch Disney editors and Arthur de Wolf.

- DENMARK:
  A lot of additions and error corrections.
  By Ole Reichstein Nielsen (partly from Martin Olsen's Det Store Index).

- GERMANY:
  - A lot of additions of Micky Maus, Abenteuer Team and Lustige
    Taschenbuecher. By Gilbert Roser.
  - Some Don Rosa specials added. By Harry Fluks.
  - Indexes of DD Sonderheft (Tollsten Geschichten). By Ole Reichstein
    Nielsen.

- SWEDEN:
  Some error corrections. By Lars Olsson, Anders Engwall, Harry Fluks,
  and Per Starback.

- NORWAY:
  Inclusion of data from Geir Netland's Norwegian Rosa index
  (DR Indeks Norsk/Amerikansk, 3.Utgave-1996). Conversion: Harry Fluks.

- UNITED KINGDOM:
  Indexes of some old comics from the 50s. By David Gerstein.

- The indexes of Frank Jonker, Dave Rawson, David Gerstein, and Janet
  Gilbert have been updated with the help of the creators theirselves.

- The Don Rosa index was updated (as usual!)

- The Paul Murry index has been completed using data from Martin Olsen.
  Conversion: Harry Fluks.

- Various smaller updates and improvements by various members of the
  mailing list, in particular Jonathan Markoff.

- Introducktion of two new fields:
  - "xref" / "xrefd" for cross-references from/to stories. For example,
    the story H 92001 is a re-make of an old JW story, and therefore has the
    field [xref:W JW   14-?1]. And the story W JW   14-?1 has the field
    [xrefd:H 92001].
  - "oldcode" for old story codes that have been replaced by new ones.
    For example, DD 86 is now fully indexed by Arthur de Wolf. The first
    story has a new code:
    W DD   86-01   DD  O:Rah! Rah! Rah! [oldcode:W DD   86-?1]

- The database program can now produce files that can be read by MS-Access.

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NEW FEATURES AND DATA IN THE VERSION OF SEPTEMBER, 1996

- ITALY: A new version of the Italian index by F. Fossati is included in the
  "I-coded.stories" file. Data checking: Marco Barlotti.
  Conversion: Frank Stajano.

- USA: Addition of many comics from the Gold Key and Whitman period.
  By Jonathan Markoff and Ole Reichstein Nielsen.
  Some corrections/additions from a Supergoof index. Per Starback.
  Also: addition of the recent Gladstone comics. Mostly by Harry Fluks
  and David Gerstein.

- HOLLAND: The complete database of stories produced in Holland from 1980
  to 1996 has been included. Data: Pieter van Cleef and Jos Beekman.
  Conversion: Harry Fluks.
  Also: addition of the recent Dutch comics and double-checking of the Dutch
  index (Harry Fluks).

- DENMARK: A lot of additions and error corrections.
  By Ole Reichstein Nielsen (partly from Martin Olsen's Det Store Index).

- GERMANY: A lot of additions. By Gilbert Roser.

- SWEDEN: A lot of additions and error corrections. By Lars Olsson, with
  contributions by Anders Engwall.

- FINLAND: Addition of an index of the Finnish albums by Henri Sivonen.
  Conversion: Harry Fluks.

- The indexes of Frank Jonker, Dave Rawson, David Gerstein, Janet
  Gilbert, Jos Beekman, and Byron Erickson have been updated with the
  help of the creators theirselves. Also, the Don Rosa index was updated
  using input from several people, including Don Rosa.

- Update of the appearing characters in the Gottfredson strips, using an
  index by Stefan Schmidt. Sent in by Harald Havas. Conversion: Harry Fluks.

- Various smaller updates and improvements by various members of the
  mailing list.

- A lot of new features in the database program, a.o. leading to a more
  consistent database. Possibilities to generate output in various
  formats (e.g. 132 characters per line, web-pages, ...). More about this
  later...

- New (and fewer) abbreviations for creators (writers, artists, etc.)

- The internal files have changed a bit (again), both the format and
  the names. (This is not of interest to "normal" database users.)

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NEW FEATURES AND DATA IN THE VERSION OF MAY, 1996
(previous version: January, 1996)

- Added data from Markoff, Gerstein, Engwall, Olsson, Van Eijmeren,
  De Wolf, Fluks.
  A.o. almost all Gladstone comics from their 2nd run are included.

- The indexes of Jan Kruse, Frank Jonker, and Janet Gilbert have been
  updates with the help of the creators theirselves

- All lines in the output files (except maybe a few header lines) are
  at most 80 columns wide (I hope you like this, Carey)

- The internal files have changed a bit: all issue entries are in
  ENTRIES.INT or UNSOLVED.INT, all stories are in STORIES.INT
  (so no more STORIESW.INT - this change is probably only of interest
  for Per)

- Files added with indexes for subseries:
  Goofy-History, Mickey-Mystery, Goofy-Look-At, MM-Sleuth

- German Don Rosa index by Gilbert Roser,
  Finnish Don Rosa index by Jyrki Vainio,
  and updates for Sweden, Denmark, Holland, USA.
  (Per: so the old ftp files 'don-rosa.index' and 'don-rosa.germany' can be
  removed)

- A first attempt has been made to include the German index by Gilbert
  Roser. The data is not complete yet.

- The Italian index by F. Fossati is included in the "I-coded.stories"
  file. Thanks to Ole Reichstein Nielsen

- The file "heroes.legend" now also lists a story where the hero appears.
  If possible, the first appearance is listed.

- (Only of interest for indexers:)
  I formulated some rules for mentioning appearing characters. For instance,
  the appearance of DD and HDL in a US story is normal, so need not be
  mentioned. The rules are included in the file "format.legend"
