Origami Database - Frequently Asked Questions

• Q: Can you send me diagrams?
• Q: Are all the diagrams available?
• Q: Why do I get errors when trying to submit data?
• Q: Why can't I see the thumbnails?
• Q: What do all the fields means and what information should I put in?
• Q: I can't find .... I get too much ...
• Q: How do I use My Library?
• Q: Why is my booklist empty?
• Q: How do I set up my cookies?
• Q: What format/size would you like for photographs and cover scans?
• Q: How can read I the database in an offline program or Palm device?

Q: Can you send me diagrams?
A: No. The diagrams are protected by copyright. Many are only available from the book mentioned. However it is possible to download many diagrams from the web. Use the drop-down box on the search panel to select 'Website' if you want to search the web for diagrams.

Publication Data

• Type:- a drop down list to say what type of publication (Book, Magazine, website) etc. use one of the options given in the list
• Author:- Please use the convention FamilyName, GivenName.
• Title:- This is the title of the book or magazine or .. IF YOU ARE ENTERING A WEBSITE, PLEASE USE THE FULL URL i.e. http://www.mysite. etc.
• ISBN:- This is a bit of a misnomer as many items on the database don't have an ISBN. If you regard it as a straightforward unique identifier, then everything will be fine.
  Usual conventions for ISBN (in priority order):
• ISBN (if there is one), or
• Publishers name followed by number (many publishers issued their own numbering systems pre-ISBN)
• for websites use WWW followed by the name of the individual or the Society (e.g. WWWBOS), or
• for magazines use the Society abbreviation followed by M followed by the 3 digit issue number (or volume and issue) e.g. OTM092 for the Origami Tanteidan Magazine 92
• for convention books use the Society abbreviation followed by C followed by the year (or year/issue) e.g. BOC951 is British Origami Convention for 1995 Spring
• Some other unique code (i.e. make it up and hope someone else hasn't used it!)
• Language:- Language (or main languages) that the book is written in
• Pages:- Fairly obviously the number of pages, but for CDs and Websites it's meaningless so leave it as 0
• Comments:- a Brief description of the book (please use a space if you do not want to add anything to this field)

• A1: The most common one is simply that no-one has added it to the database yet!
• A2: Spelling errors contribute to a number of failed searches.

We try to keep the database as accurate as possible, but sometimes things slip through! If you spot an error, please tell us.
• A3: The creator name is the wrong way around.

There is a small problem that we hope to fix sometime. All creator names are held as FamilyName, GivenName so if you want to find models by Jeremy Shafer, typing 'Jeremy Shafer' won't find anything. Typing 'Jeremy' will return every model by anyone with Jeremy as part of their name and 'Shafer' will return all models by anyone with 'Shafer' as part of their name. The way around it is to type 'Shafer, Jeremy'.
• A4: You're searching for someone with an apostrophe (') in their name.

SQL (the search language) doesn't like this as it is used to mean something else. We hope to fix this problem, however be careful when searching for O'Hare, O'Hanlon and d'Auria etc. Using Hare, Hanlon and Auria respectively in the search field should get around this for the moment.
• A5: You've put the name of the creator in the model name search.

Many models in origami are commonly referred to by the name of the creator (e.g. Brill's Horse, the Kawasaki Rose etc.) In general these models will be entered by the model name as given by the creator (i.e. horse or rose) and the creator's name placed in the designer field. So searching for 'Kawasaki Rose' as the model name will bring up fewer answers than searching for rose with Kawasaki in the designer field.
• A6: Too much information.

Try restricting the search by adding in more data to the search fields. Use the drop down menu at the top of the box to search only in 'Books' or 'Magazines' etc. Add the creators name. All these should reduce the number of entries returned
Another trick is to put a space after and/or before the word you want to search for. This forces a sort of 'whole word only' search.

For this to operate correctly, you should have cookies enabled, at least for the ODB site.

Once you've registered you will be able to login to the ODB Click on 'Login / Register My Library' and enter the username and password that you registered with. After you've logged in, you'll be directed back to the Main Page where you should notice a couple of changes.

1. The stats area now has an extra section telling you how many books you have in the database and how many model diagrams are contain therein.
2. There is an extra search option 'My Library' as well as the original two (Full Database and Web Only)
3. One of the Links is now 'Add Books to My Library'.
4. An extra link 'Browse My Library

If you do not see these changes, then your cookie settings are preventing you from utilising the My Library features. Please see below for instructions on how to modify your cookie settings.

Click the 'Add Books to My Library' link.

You can now browse through the books and magazines held in the database. If you see one that you own then there should be an 'Add' button. Click this button. Unfortunately it will often appear that nothing has happened (this is due to many browsers over-riding the cacheing options). You will have to navigate your way to this page again to see any change (but you can click on any number of books on the same page). If you've chosen a book in this way it should subsequently appear in this list with a tick beside it and a 'Del' box to allow you to delete it from your collection should something unthinkable happen (or you loan it out to someone who doesn't return it!)

'Browse My Library' is simply a list of the books that you own (similar to the Book Listings section).

Note: Each time you leave the site and come back, you have to login again (Click 'Login / Register My Library' and fill in your username and password) to access the 'My Library' features. But you only have to register once.

• In Tools->Internet Option
• 1: (Recommended option) In Internet Explorer it is possible to allow cookies only for a particular site. Go to the site and then on the menu bar of the browser
• Click Tools->Internet options.
• Select the Privacy Tab. At the bottom you should see a panel that says 'Web Sites' containing a button that says 'Edit'.
• Click the 'Edit' button.
• In the box marked 'Address of Web site' type either db.origami.com or http://db.origami.com/ (Some versions of IE only accept the latter format)
• Click 'Allow'.
• Click OK.
• Click OK.
• 2: Set Security Level to Low, or
• 3: Add www.origamidatabase.com to the 'Trusted Sites' and make sure the security level is 'Low' for trusted sites, or
• 4: Privacy Tab ->'Advanced' and set the cookie settings appropriately, making sure that 'always allow session cookies' is enabled, or

• For cover scans we'd prefer the width to be around 200 pixels.
• For creator photos we'd prefer the width to be around 400 pixels.
• For model photos we'd prefer the width to be around 400 pixels.

For more about submitting photographs, please see our Photo Guidelines