Okay, so another goal of a model railroad magazine index should be to index a wide diversity of subject matter, right?  For me, if a magazine is about model or prototype trains in any scale, I will usually try to find some way to add it to my personal library.  Although I model in N scale, and my home layout is based on the Milwaukee Road in 1984, I'm still interested in reading about logging railroads, Asian railroads, European railroads, early 19th century railroads, 21st century railroads, T scale, S scale and anything else that has to do with trains.  As my wife likes to say (and she is a modeler too), "good modeling in any scale is worth looking at."

To summarize the goals so far:

• The index will be free to use by the general public and not require a membership login to perform searches.
• The index will not be restricted to a small subset of periodicals but will include as many different publications as possible that relate to trains and model railroading.
• Since the main focus will be bibliographic details, the index will not be used to serve the complete text of articles; but for content that is available under public domain or other permissive license, the full content may become available.
• Users will be able to search for articles by keyword and the search program will include algorithms that understand common model railroading abbreviations.
• Index users will be able to provide immediate feedback on index search results; the feedback could include error correction or additional keywording to improve future searches.
• Interested volunteers will have an easy method for participating in the work to index material that is not already indexed.

Is there anything else that should be included as a goal of the project?  Additional considerations and implementation details, although not strictly goals of the project, include:

• The index should be hosted on a web server that does not give the appearance of bias to any particular set of publications or model building preferences (the suggestion was that the NMRA would be a good host to avoid systemic bias).
• Advertisements related to trains and model railroading could be displayed to help support the hosting and bandwidth costs of the project but the ads themselves will not be presented as part of the search results.
• Interested donors should have an easy way to help support the project financially.
• The pending work list should be dynamic and self-maintained through integration into volunteers' participation.

Okay, the next step is to solicit "resumes" for someone to lead this effort. I have the ability, but I don't have the time. I'm willing to help get the organization effort started and then hand it off to someone willing and able to lead the charge.

So consider this the official notice for resumes of those willing to lead this initiative. Use the "contact us" section on this site and notify us using the other option - and hand your resume to me. I will collect the resumes and decide on a lead for this effort and officially hand it off to them.

Please post to other boards and forums that we're looking for someone to lead this effort and that we're accepting resumes. This is a totally volunteer effort, and the idea is whether or not Kalmbach agrees to release the assets, we will stand up a comprehensive model railroading magazine index and turn it over to the NMRA.

The NMRA has agreed the resulting index will be publically available to all and not behind a login, which I believe is a key goal of this effort. The index must not be a propriety offering and it must remain forever freely available to all.

So consider this the official notice for resumes of those willing to lead this initiative. ...

The NMRA has agreed the resulting index will be publically available to all and not behind a login, which I believe is a key goal of this effort. The index must not be a propriety offering and it must remain forever freely available to all.

Way cool, especially with NMRA willing to host it.  I'll forward my details in email later this evening. 

 Clint Hyde and I (mostly Clint) have been working on this and we should have a prototype up in a couple of days.  We need to move stuff from his machine to my public server.  I'll post a note here when that's done, so people can look at this for feedback.  

We're focusing on an open source solution that should have zero licensing costs and be widely portable and sustainable (by volunteers.)

dave (emery@grebyn.com)

" Please post to other boards and forums that we're looking for someone to lead this effort and that we're accepting resumes. This is a totally volunteer effort, and the idea is whether or not Kalmbach agrees to release the assets, we will stand up a comprehensive model railroading magazine index and turn it over to the NMRA.

The NMRA has agreed the resulting index will be publically available to all and not behind a login, which I believe is a key goal of this effort. The index must not be a propriety offering and it must remain forever freely available to all."

You are referenced on www.the-gauge.net . I used the link there to get here. I'm very happy to see that this project is moving forward. Most of the rancor, has died down since information of this project came out. I understand Kalmbach's situation, and their decision to discontinue hosting the index. Unfortunately, I do not have the skills to be of any help in recreation the index, but I can keep my eyes and ears open for anyone who might be able to help, and send them your way.

It was good seeing you at the NMRA convention.

Pete ( GCLaser )

Joe, I see your note is also cross-posted to Railroad Line Forums.  I'll cross-post to a few other places.  [Edit: Posted to Trainboard N Scale, N Scale Talk, Railroad.net, the "N Scale" YahooGroup and the Atlas Forum in the HO Scale section.]

As a user of the Model Railroad Index for the writing of the Unofficial Micro-Trains Release Report, I very much appreciate your efforts.  My programming skills are not what are required for this work (and they're from the last century) so I won't be submitting a "resume" but I'll see what I can do to help the cause.

Cheers,

George in Ellison Park NY

What about eZines?  Should they be included as well?

As a subscriber to MRH I have every copy on my computer's external hard drive, as well as most of The Keystone Modeler, B&O Modeler, Seaboard - Coast Line Modeler and C&NW Modeler.  Talk about a wealth of information.  While not all issues of the railroad specific eZines are still on-line they can be bought at a reasonable price on CD.

What about including eZines in the index? You won't get any argument here!

If we can get a volunteer for that given magazine/eZine who would agree to tabulate each issue as its released and send it in for addition to the index, then there's no limit to what publications that could be included.

If this is to be a useful resource for the model railroader, every article in every type of model railroading publication as well as prototype railroad publications should be included.  If someone is looking to model something from a specific prototype, it would be nice if articles on that prototype were listed whether it was from a model railroad mag, E-zine, or prototype railroad mag.

 I used the index from time to time and found it very helpful.

I'm not sure I understand or believe Kalmbach's explanation for dropping it.  Regardless, I think the NMRA's library and/or website is a better place for it.  It is stunning that a twenty year old program can not be adapted to todays technology.  I hope Kalmbach will donate it to the NMRA and some one with a programming background will be able to make it work once again.