Goodreads Librarians Group discussion
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[ANSWERED] Find duplicates doesn't work anymore
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paperlove wrote: "the "find duplicates" link in my bookshelf doesn't work anymore. it always shows an error message "Page UnavailableAn unexpected error occurred. We will investigate this problem as soon as possib..."
Are you asking if any of your fellow GR Librarians are having this problem?
Tried it and it worked for me even though I have lots due to multiple formats.
You might check Help to see if there's any advice or other reports there.
oh yeah, sorry, forgot to type the question :D
I've noticed the same thing happening for the last two weeks.
Lauren wrote: "I've noticed the same thing happening for the last two weeks."I have solved the problem myself in the meantime. The reason for the error message is once again the Amazon bots. They have been deleting valid book editions for weeks. If it affects a book that you had marked as read, your review and rating is merged with the default edition. Then Goodreads thinks that you have added the book twice in your bookshelf, but only one edition actually exists, because the other one was deleted by the bot. This results in a corrupt book entry on your bookshelf, which makes it impossible for you to edit the review or rating, or delete the book entirely. If you delete it, sometimes you can't even access the book page anymore, it just shows an "internal error" message. And if you have such a corrupt book entry in your Bookshelf, then you will not be able to access the Duplicates page either.
Several users reported the same problem on Reddit.
I have reported it to support, but all I get back is the standard "clear cookies and cache" responses. I don't think anyone else on the Goodreads staff really cares at this point anymore, since the bots have been screwing up the whole database for months now, and this is just another consequence of that.
I just ran Find Duplicates. It found 3 legitimate duplicates. And quickly.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "I just ran Find Duplicates. It found 3 legitimate duplicates. And quickly."But are you referring to actual duplicates that you have marked as duplicates (by marking two different editions of a book as read), or are you referring to duplicates that appear after the Amazon bot has deleted the edition, that you have actually read? Normal duplicates (the ones that I have marked as duplicates myself) work fine for me too, without any error message. I'm talking about the duplicates that were accidentally created after the Amazon bot deleted the edition that i originally have read.
And sometimes the bot sent my edition to Nirvana.
e.g. https://www.goodreads.com/book/edits/... edit log #548318638. that was my Edition. And now i can't delete the book anymore from my bookshelf without getting error messages. Same thing happens when i try to edit my review. And this is just one example. It happened with another book too.
paperlove wrote: "And sometimes the bot sent my edition to Nirvana.e.g. https://www.goodreads.com/book/edits/... edit log #548318638. that was my Edition."
How do you know that was your book? There is no indication of which edition was deleted.
Look, I'm not saying there isn't a bug. I even posted earlier today that GR has so many bugs it needs to go to a de-licing station. (WWI soldiers from the front would go to those regularly. All of them were infested with lice.) I have requested - and sometimes stridently - that the bot not be allowed to change the status.
Sorry the link didn't work. I was talking about this book https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...How can I be sure? I suspect so because the only edition deleted was by the Amazon bot and suddenly my bookshelf only contained the English default edition (instead of the German Kindle edition that I have read).
I also don't understand why you're questioning my problem if we're on the same page? As I said, other users on Reddit are reporting exactly the same thing.
And I had the same problem with this book:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
You can check the edit log at Jul 13, 2023 05:15PM (#552476969)
The bot deleted my ebook edition that I had in my bookshelf.
paperlove wrote: "How can I be sure? I suspect so because the only edition deleted was by the Amazon bot and suddenly my bookshelf only contained the English default edition (instead of the German Kindle edition that I have read)."OK! So, what does Amazon say is the ASIN of the one you purchased? It's possible that your edition can be restored. Possible, not a sure thing, but worth investigating.
I do see that you have switched editions and are now able to access your review. Do you have two editions of this book, or is it that you've read it more than one time ...
By the way, through another thread and now a separate group, it was discussed that the export file does not include the ASIN. You can preserve that information by adding the ASIN of your books in the Private Notes field.A long term process, but perhaps worth considering.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "... the export file does not include the ASIN. You can preserve that information by adding the ASIN of your books in the Private Notes field."+1
It takes time and effort to add the ASINs to the Private Notes field, but then they're preserved in your export file.
Along with that, here's my tip: Export your book data often, because you never know where and when the bots will attack. I do an export almost every day.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "paperlove wrote: " do see that you have switched editions and are now able to access your review. Do you have two editions of this book, or is it that you've read it more than one time ..."No, like I already said: I can't access my review anymore. When I try to edit it, I get an error message. When I delete the Edition, I can't access my Duplicates Page or the Book Page anymore. So it's either an error message when I try to edit or completely delete an edition, or an error message when I try to access the Duplicates page or the book page. ;)
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "paperlove wrote: "How can I be sure? I suspect so because the only edition deleted was by the Amazon bot and suddenly my bookshelf only contained the English default edition (instead of the German ..."I've found the ASIN on Amazon. It's B00WTJ34L2. But I don't find any book on Goodreads with this ASIN. How can the edition be restored?
paperlove wrote: "No, like I already said: I can't access my review anymore. "I was able to access your review.
paperlove wrote: "I've found the ASIN on Amazon. It's B00WTJ34L2. But I don't find any book on Goodreads with this ASIN. How can the edition be restored"Here you go!
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
As a librarian, once you have the ASIN which was deleted, you can manually add a book entering only the ASIN. You will get an error message that says that ASIN is in deleted status. There is a link within the error message! Click on the link and change the status from Deleted to Public.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "paperlove wrote: "I've found the ASIN on Amazon. It's B00WTJ34L2. But I don't find any book on Goodreads with this ASIN. How can the edition be restored"Here you go!
https://www.goodreads.com/b..."
thank you i didn't know about this until now. but of course i've never had to deal with such a bot-caused chaos until now as a librarian.
restoring the edition really did help. now i no longer get an error message on my duplicates page when i click on "view all my editions" for the particular book. so this seems to be a workaround when the bots delete my read books again.
but of course i wish the bots wouldn't delete valid editions at all. we human librarians aren't even allowed to delete/edit ISBNs anymore and amazon bots without brains can do whatever they want in the database - including deleting valid editions and other things that would have made us librarians lose our librarian status a long time ago.
paperlove wrote: " so this seems to be a workaround when the bots delete my read books again.."It's not really a work around. But it's why I encourage you to embark on retaining your ASINs in the Private Notes field. There is no guarantee that the edition won't be removed from Amazon and that you won't be able to get the ASIN you purchased. That edition *should* always be here and therefore could be restored.
As you know, when a book is deleted, all activity gets moved. But when the edition is restored, you can switch (back) to your original edition and your activity will move with your switch.
Yes, I just tested it with the other book that was deleted. And it doesn't work there. I don't get an error message, but Goodreads always tells me when I edit the review that I already have another edition of the book in my Bookshelf, which is not true. (I checked). I can click on "merge with this edition" or "view other edition", but the review is still not merged. Nothing happens. And when I mark my edition as read, it always gets a second read date, as if I had read the book twice.
I have seen that 2nd review date sometimes. I just always delete it. If you have only 1 edition, you should delete the extraneous edition - but not the one where the review and all your activity are linked! Once you are down to the one edition with the review and your activity, then you can go to the Other Editions page - from the book page - and switch editions to the one you actually have.
Yes, I know that too. But this option is not available or selectable in this case. You'll just have to believe me that deleting my editions somehow broke the system when it comes to those particular books in my Bookshelf. I've been trying to make that clear for a few posts now. The only options available in this case are "merge" and the other one. And merge doesn't work because nothing happens.
I have never seen Merge for a book on my bookshelves. Do you have two editions on your shelves now that I've restored your real edition? (You can find this by searching your shelves by author or title.)And just a note, there is a thread where a book on my shelves was deleted, so it's not like I don't know this happens.
You have only one edition of this book on your shelves. There is no duplicate to find.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
However ... that book also has an ISBN on the record which isn't correct for a Kindle edition. You may wish to contact staff to have the ISBN removed. I don't know if that ISBN was ever issued to any edition. It came from amazon_kcw.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "I have never seen Merge for a book on my bookshelves. Do you have two editions on your shelves now that I've restored your real edition? (You can find this by searching your shelves by author or ti..."I already answered this in one of my last posts:
when I edit the review that I already have another edition of the book in my Bookshelf, which is not true. (I checked).
Elizabeth (Alaska) | 8704 comments
You have only one edition of this book on your shelves. There is no duplicate to find.
Yes, that's what i've been trying to tell you the whole time. There is NO second edition on my shelf but Goodreads thinks that there is one, that is exactly the problem which causes all these problems...
paperlove wrote: "when I edit the review that I already have another edition of the book in my Bookshelf, which is not true. (I checked).."I'm sorry I got involved here. This originally had to do with a deleted book, which I resolved for you.
Whenever you have an incident to your personal shelves, you should report to support.
https://www.goodreads.com/about/conta...
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "paperlove wrote: "when I edit the review that I already have another edition of the book in my Bookshelf, which is not true. (I checked).."Whenever you have an incident to your personal shelves, ..."
That was the first thing I did. I already wrote this in one of my first posts in this topic:
"I have reported it to support, but all I get back is the standard "clear cookies and cache" responses. I don't think anyone else on the Goodreads staff really cares at this point anymore, since the bots have been screwing up the whole database for months now, and this is just another consequence of that."
I really don't know what you are trying to achieve here. There's a technical problem caused by the Amazon bot. That's all I'm trying to make clear here all the time, but apparently you don't want to understand that, so I'm not going to repeat myself anymore.
This topic can be closed.
paperlove wrote: "That was the first thing I did. I already wrote this in one of my first posts in this topic:"But you didn't do what was necessary and that is to restore the deleted book. I don't know if you have other deleted books on your shelves, but the one I fixed for you is the only edition you have on your shelves. You do not have a duplicate of that title on your shelves.
When the bot deletes an edition, it moves all activity to another edition. It does not leave the deleted edition behind creating a duplicate on your shelves.
Paperlove, THANK YOU for telling us about this problem, and also for letting us know that you've already reported it to support. I haven't seen this problem (yet), but I won't be surprised if/when I see it.Also, this is an important reminder to save each ASIN before the edition disappears. Note to self: I must add the ASINs of my Kindle books to review/private notes, then remember to export my data after I've done so. (lol)
I'm "lucky" because I don't read many ebooks, so only have 100+ ASINs to save. SIGH. ... 85 to go.
It's also a reminder that, when the bot has deleted an edition from your shelves, you need to address the problem of the deleted book and probably before you go hunting for other problems.
Thank you so much paperlove!! "Find Duplicates" hasn't worked for *months* for me, so I'll try to solve it with what you said. Any tips on how to find if a bot has deleted one of my editions? I was thinking in exporting and checking the CSV to find duplicates manually by author and then try to fix it in my shelf.
An unexpected error occurred. We will investigate this problem as soon as possible — please check back soon!"
Does anyone else have this issue too?