A location crew divider is something entirely different, of course. Depending on the outcome of the whole unit crew/location crew debate, I'd have no problem with that. But location crew is not how I understood you talking about allowing single "groups" for visual effects when no company name is involved...

Quoting northbloke:

Quote:
What's the difference? I have a logical grouping that contains only one valid credit. Just like a song credit, you may have quite a few credits under the title but only one valid one for Profiler.

The difference, to me at least, has to do with the term 'crew teams'.  A heading of 'Montreal Crew', in the credits, indicates a crew team.  A song title, does not, but that's me.  Your mileage will, obviously, vary.

Quoting T!M:

Quote:
I agree with that, obviously, but I'm also very concerned about the bigger picture. Your point of view seems to allow for entering pretty much EVERY crew credit as a divider. From my point of view, using a divider for "<Song X> Written by" is exactly the same thing as using a divider for "<Actor X>'s Hair & Makeup by". Whether you put <Song X> in the divider or <Actor X> is immaterial - the principle is exactly the same. Every argument you gave in favour of allowing it for <Song X> would apply to <Actor X>  as well. Same for "Based on "<Original Material X> Written by" - all those would need to be put in a divider as well.

I am not sure how you are getting that from what I have said.  If there is a header, in the credits, that reads 'Montreal Crew', that gets a divider because it indicates a crew team...the team that worked in Montreal.  A credit of "<Song X> Written by" or "<Actor X>'s Hair & Makeup by" is not the same...not even close, in my opinion, so color me confused.

And if the credit is ever formatted as "<Song Title> Written by" then I agree with you, that's a custom role.
But far more commonly they are formatted as:

<Song Title>

Written by xxxx
Performed by zzzzz
Published by yyyyy
xxxx appears courtesy of aaaaa

...and so on. And in my eyes that's a group header with one valid credit below it: Written by

Quoting northbloke:

Quote:
And if the credit is ever formatted as "<Song Title> Written by" then I agree with you, that's a custom role.
But far more commonly they are formatted as:

<Song Title>

Written by xxxx

There you go! It is! You say: "if the credit is ever formatted as "<Song Title> Written by" then I agree with you", and then you go on to quote exactly that. The only difference is an ENTER. There's not even so much as a single letter different - there's just an ENTER halfway, but the credit still says "<Song Title> Written by" - exactly that. Honestly: that's the criterium: an enter in the middle means it's a divider, no enter in the middle means no divider?! Really?!

Quoting northbloke:

Quote:
Seeing how that's how it works for pretty much all other dividers, that ENTER is pretty important.

I don't see that. For my money, crew dividers actually represent something more than just a bit of formatting like the presence or lack of an enter. From the rules, I gather we're supposed to use them for crew teams. Crew listed under company names is given as an example, and I can see it working for location (like "New York Crew") or restoration crew. But not for the difference between "<Song Title> Written by X" and

"<Song Title>

Written by X"

That, to me, remains the exact same credit, no matter whether there's just a space or an enter in the middle. For instance: certain cast credits are also formatted in this manner. It's done like that in a number of TV shows - they show a picture of the actor, with:

"<Role Name>

<Actor Name>"

shown over it. Those all warrant a divider, too? I guess they do, then... 

Additionally: not all song writing credits are formatted this way. That would mean that the song writing credits in one film might be set up using dividers, but the next film might very well have to do without them. That doesn't tell you something? It does to me - either we do something, or we don't, but changing how we handle this from film to film just based on whether the guy typing up the credits included an enter in the song writing credits or not doesn't seem very consistent.

Quoting northbloke:

Quote:
We're talking about film credits here and you're talking about consistency? Simple answer - there is none!

Agreed. But that's where a standardized database comes in - they don't, but we do get to be consistent. 

Again, as I just tried to illustrate, by your logic lots of other stuff gets utterly pointless dividers as well, including a whole bunch of cast credits. I really don't want to go down that road. Additionally, you don't even get to enter the song writer credits in a consistent manner from profile to profile. It just doesn't work. Stuff like this really should be kept local.

There is a standard for the database, just not the one that you want there to be, north. No disrespect intended, but that is the problem with much of these discussions a lot of them revolve around "Iwant it to be this way' Do you tyhink that when you say standardised database there is one answer for that or that it has some meaning. The answerr to both of those comment is NO, there is no single standardised database and the words have no meaning in an of themselves. Profiler adopted a standard to standardise its database, it happens to be a standard that YOU don't like the end result is that you will go on and on about it being not standardised when it IS. The database has a standard to be applied, it is for you to adapt to the program and its not vice versa. Windows will not adapt to you as an individual user in all respects, there are many things that you can do with Windows but there are some things in every version of Windows that you as a user will not like, at that point you must either adapt to the Program or seek another OS, because Microsoft is unlikely to make many adjustments based on the wants of a single user.

The system's standard is to the film credits, this one done so it would be easy for each and every user to enter the data based on the film credits. You don't like it, that's fine, you don't have to, Profiler does give the capacity to build your own database to your own individual standards, if you want to worship at the altar of IMDb you can do so. I can tell you that when many of us started discovering the total inaccuracy of some other databases and the lack of documentation for them we were shocked. There is no consistency in data entry, it is all based on the wants of whatever user inputs the data, upside down, backwards, sideways, whatever, then it was learned that some users included themselves in a credit listing just for yucks, when they were discovered they would be removed but it sometimes has been years to be discovered and I have no doubt there is still such data there.

Sometimes Bruce Willis (or whomever) will get top billing by some user, apparently because he REALLY likes Bruce Willis, because when you review the film's credits Willis doesn't get top billing anywhere, not the opening credits, not the end credits, not a mix of the credits, not even on the cover but there he is top billed.

Are there things that can be improved in Profiler, oh hell yes and there always will be. But the foundation for the program has been laid and it IS in fact standardised.