Hello Everyone.
   Although I am new to this site, I see there is a wide demographic of collectors here from the highly expierenced, such as James and Max, down to many eager "Newbies" from all over the world!
   As an expierenced collector with 44 years collecting I would like to propose a method by which all expierenced collectors can standardize the way they present lamp data and a method by which the "Newbies" can learn about the lamps that they are collecting.
    I am only a lamp collector, I do not collect Lanterns/Luminares, and as such this discussion mainly concerns lamps. Those who do collect Luminares way well be able to construct their own database templates specifically for luminares and, as a consequence allow members such as myself, somewhat ignorant of luminares, to lean about them.
    I started keeping a database on paper in 1987 when my collection had got to about 2500 lamps and my memory alone was not enough to keep track of them. Since that time the number of lamps has increased four fold and the database has evolved into a 90 field bohemuth. One may feel that 90 fields is far too many, but in my expierence, they are all necessary.
    So, I will list the fields and a couple of lamps entered as examples and try to assess the interest of members by their replies......

            Field Name                 Lamp Example 1                           Lamp Example 2

 General Humanities Fields
Field No.1  BRAND......................General Electric.......................Sylvania
Field No.2  UNIQUE IDENTIFIER..........07-033.................................12-179
Field No.3  COLLECTION.................Globe Collector........................Globe Collector
Field No.4  COMPANY....................General Electric Inc...................Osram GmbH
Field No.5  MANUFACTURER...............N.E.L.A. Pk. Cleveland OH .............Spandau, Berlin

 Descriptive Fields
Field No.6  TYPE.......................160mm U.S. G.L.S. .....................CMI-T 70W/NDL/SB
Field No.7  POWER RATING...............1000W .................................70W
Field No.8  VOLTAGE....................120V Ext. .............................100V Int.
Field No.9  BULB/ENVELOPE, (Met).......PS-160/315 ............................TQt-18/100
Field No.10 BULB/ENVELOPE, (Imp).......PS-50/100 .............................TQt-5.6/317
Field No.11 Bulb Finish ...............Clear .................................Clear, U.V. Stop
Field No.12 Finishing Method ..........None...................................CeO2 doped Silica
Field No.12 Etch/Emblem................On Crown, Circular Fmt. Dk Brn ........On Cap,Txt Fmt,Bk
Field No.13 Etch Visibility............Poor ..................................Good
Field No.14 Etch Durability............Poor ..................................Excellent
Field No.15 Cap/Base (Intl. Code)......E39/40 ................................G12/30x32
Field No.16 Cap/Base (Word Desc.)......Mogul .................................Sym Pin 12mm
Field No.17 Cap/Base Materials .....Brass, Black Viterite and Lead ....Ceramic, Ni Plated Brass
Field No.19 Cap/Base Fastening ........Heat-Cured Cement .............High Temp Zirconia Cement
Field No.20 Bulb Filling ..............Argon, Nitrogen ........................Vacuum
Field No.21 Filament ..................1AX ....................................N/A
Field No.22 Arc Tube/Inner Bulb .......N/A ....................................AAXR2
Field No.23 Filament Material .........Doped Tungsten .........................N/A
Field No.24 Arc Tube Filling ..........N/A .................Ar, Hg, NaI, TlI3, CeI3, SnI4 Etc.
Field No.25 Button..................Glass Rod Between Lead Ins ................N/A
Field No.26 Button Rod..............Glass 40mm, Truncated .....................N/A
Field No.27 Heat Deflector Disc.....Mica.......................................N/A
Field No.28 Disc Position...........Clipped to Lead Ins above Press............N/A
Field No.29 Stem....................Long, 53mm ................................N/A
Field No.30 Arc Tube Contents ......N/A ..............Ar, Hg, NaI, TlI3, SnI4, CeI3
Field No.31 Electrodes ..............N/A .........Thoriated Tungsten with heat radiator coils
Field No.32 Arc Tube Seals .............N/A .........Niobium Wire through Sitnered Aluminia
Field No.33 Seals .................Dumet through Boro Glass ...Molybdemum Foil Through Silica
Field No.34 Getters ............Phosphorus Pentanitride, Red P? ....Zirconium/Aluminium Pellet
Field No.35 Fuses .....................? ...............................Moly Foils in Seal?
Field No.36 Exhaust .....Stem Concentric, Mitchell and White .............On Crown of Outer
Field No.37 Arc-Tube or Inner Exhaust ..N/A .........................During Arc Tube assembly

   General Demographic Fields
Field No.38 Country of Origin ..........U.S.A. .........................Germany (ReUnified)
Field No.39 Date and Factory Code ......Not Visible ............................q638
Field No.40 Circa Date .................c1965 ...................................March 2006
Field No.41 Lamp Aqusition Date ........28th February 2007 .....................22nd May 2012
Field No.42 Lamp Aquisition Place ...Yersin Matket, SaiGon VN .........Melbourne City Council

  Lamp Condition Fields
Field No.43 Condition ..................Works .................................Works
Field No.44 Level ......................100% ..................................20%
Field No.45 State ......................New ...................................Used/E.O.L.
Field No.46 Packaging Status ......Without Original Packet ...............Without Original Pkt
Field No.47 Packetmates ................N/A ...................................N/A
Field No.48 Packet Details .............N/A ...................................N/A

  General Family Sorting Data
Field No.49 Class ...................Incandescent Filament ...........High Intensity Discharge
Field No.50 Family ..................Industrial G.L.S. .................Metal Halide, Ceramic
Field No.51 Schema (Bulb Nesting)....SE-SJ-G ................................SdE-DJ-CQ

  Photometric Data
Field No.52 Spectrum .Black-Body Continuum .(Dop. Pres. Brdnd) Atomic Lines of Na, Tl, Ce, Sn.
Field No.53 (Corrected Colour Temp).....2700 ..................................3000
Field No.54 C.I.E. -X ..................0.453 .................................. ?  (New)
Fleld No.55 C.I.E. -Y ..................0.416 .................................. ?  (New)
Field No.56 C.R.I. ......................100 ....................................87
Field No.57 Ra Group ....................1A .....................................1B
Field No.58 Light Output, lm ............c1400 .........................6700 (Luminous Flux)
Field No.59 Light Output, Intl. C.P......c112 ........................533 (Luminous Intensity)
Field No.60 Luminous Intensity, Lux .....? ......................................?
Field No.61 Efficacy lm/W ...............c14 ....................................96
Field No.62 Efficiency ..................c30% ...................................c70%

  Electrical Data
Field No.63 Cold Resistance ..............1 Ohm .........................V High, Voltage Dep.
Field No.64 Hot Resistance ...............16 Ohms ................................c150 Ohms
Field No.65 Hot to Cold Ratio ............16 : 1 .................................0 : 1
Field No.66 Raw Electrical Data ..........7.74A@120v, 7.91A @ 125v................980mA
Field No.67 Measured Power ...............929W-989W ..............................?
Field No.68 Control Gear .Low Source Impedance 120v, 30-800Hz.. 650mH, 1.5A Choke in series off 240v 50Hz
Field No.69 P.F.C. Cap ...................N/A .........................12uF 630v N.P. Film


  Misc Data,
Field No.70 Burning Posn. ................Universal ..............................H-90
Field No.71 I.L.C.O.S. ...............IAA-C-1000-120-E39-160 .....MT-70/30/1A-H 90/S-G12-19/100
Field No.72 Nett Mass (g) ................? ...................................... ?
Field No.73 Nett Mass (lb,OZ).............? ...................................... ?
Field No.74 Gross Mass (g) ............Not Obtainable .....................Not Obtainable
Field No.75 Gross Mass (lb,OZ).........Not Obtainable.......................Not Obtainable
Field No.76 Stated Life, h ...............1000 ....................................6000
Field No.77 Statistical Actual Life ......? ........................................ ?

  Asthetic Data
Field No.78 Justification ............North American Realm Lamp ....Power Ball, Sylv bgd Osram
Field No.79 Uniqueness ...........Only one in this collection ..  Only one in this collection
Field No.80 Asthetics ............Impressive Large,........Curious Looking Complex Intreaguing
Field No.81 Comment 01 ...........Axial Filament ..............Sylvania Branded , Osram Patent
Field No.82 Comment 02 ................Bits of Biotite in Disc ..........Strong Thallium Line

  Economic Data
Field No.83 Economic Status......Foreign Within Australasian Realm ............Import
Field No.84 Capital Cost at time of production .....$?    .......................Euro?
Field No.85 Price Paid to Acquire ............25000VND .............................Nil
Field No.86 Intrinsic Value ...................AU$ 250 .............................AU$ 25
Field No.87 Extrinsic Value ...................AU$ 30 ..............................AU$ 10
Field No.88 Depreciation .......................30% ................................75%

    Other
Field No.89 Identicals .........................None ...............................None
Field No.90 Providence .............Used by U.S. Forces in VN War ......Used in St Kilda Road
Field No.91 Comparasons ..................None ......................................12-178
Field No.92 Set Members ..................None in this Collection ...................12-178
Field No.93 Fate .............................Primary ................................Primary
Field No.94 Industrial Standard ..............A.N.S.I. ? ...........................?
Field No.95 Geographical Realm .............North America ..........................Europe
Field No.96 External Symmetry .........x = Inf, Y = Inf, z = 1 .............X = 2, Y = 2, Z = 1
    


    Many of these fields use industry standard notation, e.g for bases and caps. Everybody here would know the cap on a PAR-38
this is designated E27 or E26 in short notation, but because of the collar the notation is often extended to include the diameter
of the large part of the collar and the length, so it becomes E27/39x51 (in metric mm) for this specific type of cap.
    Some of the fields here use a modified form of code, based on the industry standard, but embellished to delineate nuances.
The type "A" arbitary bulb shape is a case in point. In the European realm the neck is short and thick and the bulb to neck
transition has a small radius. The European A-60 (and other sizes) also has a pronounced "shoulder" at the neck to cap transition.
By contrast, the North American Realm bulb has a large radius curve from the bulb to cap and no shoulder at the cap. The codes
"AE" and "AA" are used to delineate these forms. A small letter "t" indicates the presence of an exhaust tip on the bulb crown.
Numbers following the type indicate the dimensions in mm (metric) and eighths of an inch(imperial).
    Some codes have been totally artificially concocted because age-old industry standards are inadequate. The two cases in point
are filament structure and arc tube codes. Unlike any industry standard filament codes, the codes used here commence with a number
or sometimes numbers and conclude with Roman letters or sometimes Roman Letter/Arabic Numeral combinations.
The numbers indicate the number of support wires, and if more than one, groups of support wires whilst moving from the crown to the cap.
So a flat grid projection lamp with three upper supports on the crown end and two lower supports at the cap end will possess a code
like 3,2FG. If biplane, then 3,2BP. Axial filaments, parallel to the axis of symmetry of the bulb get a suffix, "AX", whilst those
parallel to the equatorial plane or in the equatotial plane get "TV", for "Transverse".
    Arc tubes get similar treatment, with the first letter delineating the material, G = Glass, Q = Fused Silica, A = Sintered Aluminia.
C = composite/graded seal types. The electrode chambers get a letter, C = conical, R = Spherical, C = Cylinderical. Other letters
indicate probe or starting electrodes at crown or cap ends (or both) and any corona wires, bi-metallics or screen printed "antennas".
In the case of aluminia arc tubes, the number of assembled pieces is listed.
    
    Some of the higher numbered fields may be somewhat cryptic, such as Field No.51, "Nesting Schema". This indicates whether or not
the lamp is single bulbed or double bulbed, such as a Mercury Lamp with an arc tube inside an outer bulb. This also indicates whether
the bulb is double ended or single ended. A typical code would be "SE-SJ-G", which reads as "Single Ended, Single Bulbed, Glass Bulb".
Whereas "SdE-DJ-CQ" reads "Single Ended outer, double ended inner, Double Jacketed, Sintered Alumina Ceramic inner, Fused Silica
"Quartz" outer. Thus these codes give one an overall quick impression of the lamp being described. A lower case letter in the centre
group, i.e "SE-tJ-QQG" indicates that there is triple nesting with one nested bulb atmosphere unsealed. e.g Sylvania HSI-MP 100W CL/4K
with a silica explosion shield around the arc tube.
    Some other fields are...
78 "Justification", i.e Why did you include the lamp in your collection?
79 "Uniqueness", i.e Is there another like it in the collection, is it a rare lamp?
80 "Asthetics", This is a field which can be difficult to fill for a male, but hold the lamp up in front of your wife or
girlfriend and ask her if she thinks it is ugly! Try to get her to quantify jusy how beautiful or ugly it is!

86 "Intrinsic Value". i.e Of what value is the lamp to you. How much effort and time did you expend to acquire it? How far did you
travel to get it? How difficult was it to separate it from its previous owner?
87  "Extrinsic Value". How much could you convince an insurance company to "cough up" for it if it were destroyed? How much would you
expect to get for it if you sold it on E-Bay say?
92 Here is listed the unique identifiers of any other lamps which are related to this one. E.G. If you have a Sylvania H37KC250DX from
Trois Riviers on Quebec made in 1978, and you also have a Sylvania H33GL400DX from the same plant and roughly the same age, listed
in the same product catalogue, then the two a "brothers" and part of the same "SET". Whereas a General Electric H37KC250DX from
Ravenna Ohio with a girder frame would be listed in the "comparisons" field, as not the same set, but an equivalent from a different
company, branded differently and made in a different plant!


93  "Fate" Is it your only one?. Would you swap or sell it if someome else asked you. "Primary" means that it stays in your
collection at all costs. "Secondary" means you might swap for something equally as good but you loose your "breakage spare".
"Tertiary" means that you have three and it is generally available for sale or swap.




    If we were all to keep such a database, comparing lamps, sawpping lamps and getting the story for each lamp would be much more
uniform. I'm sure that stamp and coin collectors would possess a much more uniform way of describing what they have to each other.
I'd love to see a new word in the dictionary for "lamp collector", much akin to the word "philatelist" for a stamp collector.
I feel that this would give a much more solid label to what we do and what we are interested in. Maybe we should all submit a word
which we think would describe what we do and then we could all etymogically vote for the best term agreed by us all to describe us
best.
   Currently I am trying to get a web-site up and operating, but getting all the bits to "talk" to each other is a nightmare.
A hind-end database , such as S.Q.L. is required. A Wiki-Like fromt end is also needed to handle the user's queries and something to generate html
pages for each lamp queried from the database is also needed to get the pictures, data and other relevant stuff and display it to
the user/surfer. A non-wiki static part of the web-site is also needed to hold all the technology, history and other stuff relaated to
lamps in general.

Your collective comments please!



   Below are images of the two lamps in question....

That sounds like a good concept. I used to have something similar for vacuum tubes. As time permits, I will slowly implement this, at least to some extent. I currently have a database of the most basic information, mainly for my regular lamps that I have in stock. That way when I need a lamp, I can look it up easily in the database without having to paw through all my lamps in stock!

There basically is something similar, thats the fields you can fill when uploading stuff to the gallery

There are many fields, most of them you have nothing to fill in anyway. (ballast = nothing to fill in "filament type", incandescent lamp = nothing to fill in "ballast type")

Some are redundant ("socket" and "base")

Some are confusing ("use" can be read as "purpose" or as "amount of use this lamp been in")

And so on

I dont think more fields can help in that. They will see very limited use



I'd suggest to shrink the amount of fields and allow custom fields, which you can select or write your own for a specific gallery item, thats something we dont have now

Also some fields can be grouped together, and allow you to choose a field set - standard field set for hid lamp, filament lamp, ballast, etc. And after that you can customize the fields too

But this might have a problem of its own in implementation

The database table to implement this need to be :

ID key | gallery item no. | field name | field value

While currently, it might be something like (and i hope its not) :

ID key | permanent field 1 | permanent field 2 | ....

Which would be some big work to convert (it and all the places that write or read this data - a lot of work)

one thing I think and due to lamps being posted daily here on LG, there ought be a subcatagory of lamps
that would make LG more resourceful for newbie collecor, the current LG data base of lamps is kind more thown in the box concept, and trying find any data about the lamp when some one trying to learn about them.
this can help weed out the irrevent lamps of what your searching for.
like you would not post florescent lamps in incandescent section or looking for  lamp in incandescent
i would think that would make LG far more resource full for lamp collectors.

@ Ash I also thing custom fields is a great idea Too as there is lot wasted feilds on LG for certian lamps


Jeremy the Funkybulb

I would also love to see different categories. Like you, I'd much rather have photos sorted by lamp technology, not by lamp/lantern/gear/misc. That way, say you photograph a fixture you just purchased. You take a picture of the lamps, the ballast, the fixture, and a label for example. Those four photos, though related, would have to go in four different categories. Therefore, I'd much rather see categories for different lamp technologies and maybe one for experiments, one for general electrical, and one for miscellaneous.

There is some more problem

Take for example my "chamber of secrets" play in the work i upload. There is wiring, there is some plain broken concrete, there is incandescent light fixture, switches and so on. Each belongs in its own category, and yet they are together 1 project so i dont want to break them up, i'd prefer to throw it all in misc just so that it can stay together

So we need the categories, but we need to be able to put stuff in more than 1 - by specifying more than 1 category for the same gallery item. Besides, i want to put all the stuff from 1 story together. and i dont want to open a lot of galleries in my gallery. If there would be option for user categories, i;d be able to use it to contain each project

deleated modifacation made below

@ ash for that if there was a new catagory it would fall under General Electrical catagory
that nogden propose if you think about it, that pretty much sum it up right there.
that also help member how to hook up lights or needing a wireing diagram for general electrical or code related questions.

 Eg. in US there is a code for all building lighting and branch load at 3 watt per Square foot and it used to size branch circuits loading for a building.

or your electrical demolation photos and rewriring photos with all that broken concrete in Israil

Say there is new category. Some pictures will come which dont fit in it, but would fit in another category if it would exist. Many others will fit equally more than 1 category

What i suggest is what is done in many other websites today - automated user defined categories, also known as tags. An item can be linked to more than 1 category at the same time, and new categories can be defined on the spot for items that need a new category

For example : 5ft lamp, in Popular Pack, on SRS. Would fit in : 5ft fluoresscent lamps, Popular Pack, and SRS. Each of those is a category. Now, assume that "Popular Pack" category did not exist when i uploaded the item. It was created automaically when i specified it, and resulted in a new category "Popular Pack" with just this one item. Next day you upload another PP, assign it to the Popular PAck categoy. The gallery identifies that the category allready exists, and adds it to there

Now this can be extended :

When creating the "Popular Pack" categories, i can specify that it is a subset of "Thorn" and "Fluorescent fixture". This would mean that, anything included in it, would also show up under "Thorn" and "Fluorescent fixture" (when a user is exploring through them), allthough the picture was never explicitly put in them (which allows the user to keep the amount of explicit categories to a minimum, so not create mess)

Now imagine that i upload pics of my project. I can make a category for it. That time i made the "Popular Pack" category, i made it public - which means that it can be used by everyone, and this name is associated to the category in the entire gallery. However, i can make a category "Work 1", and make it private. What does it mean ? That if you upload anything under "Work 1" for your Work 1, you will by doing that, create your own "Work 1" category, and the items won't get into mine. This will enable users to sort the items in whatever way they want, without messing up the public list of galleries with stuff like "Ash's Work 1" "Funkybulb's work 1" and so on

This category system will resolve most of the problems we see with the current system, as well as allow all the extensions suggested here by you all. Problem is that to make it, there may be very extensive rebuild of the gallery required

It is great to see some of you discussing the database concepts. All the ideas I have seen so far are good ones, but implementing them in software is another thing altogether.
    The fields I list above are intended only for lamps, but there us nothing stopping you generating similar for luminares/lanterns or whole personal projects and then linking them. That's the beauty of the computer age, people like uas, scattered all around the planet, can discuss things like this to better our common interests. I just want to sit and wait for more members to see this topic thread to see how they will react, but so for I am well pleased!
     Actually the list of fields above has a few missing, like "Stem", "Button Rod" and "Heat Deflector Disc". This complicated thing needs to sit in the background, like SQL, and it is interrogated when somebody wants to look at a lamp. Ideally I'd love it to generate a html page and populate it with the quieried lamp's data and pictures.
     Sorting lamps into Discharge and Incandescent for entry is a great idea. Further break Discharge down into High Pressure (H.I.D.) and Low Pressure (Fluoro, SOX, CFL). Some lamps, such as old combustion flashlamps and electrodeless induction lamps are very special categories of incandescent and discharge which need to be catered for.

    I also wish to propose a standard way of photographing our lamps, sort of like what Governments stipulate for passport photographs. Each new lamp has a "mug shot", (see my tantalum and daylight blue in the gallery), then other pictures of the same lamp are grouped with it, the base/cap, the etch/emblem, the filament/arc tube/burner etc.

    When I log lamps into my collection, as they come in I pile them into a box and mark the date and origin on them. They then sit in that box for a while until it gets full.
    After this, I turn on the database, pick out the lamp with the oldest date, lets say it was the 122nd lamp collected in the year 2012, it then gets the number 12-122.
(Other collectors use a different systtem, Stanislav Slaby-Houdeck in the Czech Republic, uses a letter follower by a number. The letter denotes the type of lamp, e.g. A=H.V. Incandescent, B=L.V. incabdescent (<100v), C = High Pressure Sodium  etc, etc.) But this is then followed by a serial number, so C 174, is the 174th High Pressure Sodium to be collected. In  this sense, Stan is trying to sort them into type as they come in, whereas I am trying to sort them by the year I collected them in. My system keeps the numbers from getting too big because it resets every new year's eve, Stan's is only limited by how many of each category he collects.
    Once the lamp gets numbered, this number is marked on it and is used to track it ever after. The same number goes into a "serial Number" field in the database and the particulars for that lamp are then filled in. It is a slow, time consuming process but the rewards are great. After all the box is done, they get their "Mug Shots" taken and these are put into a picture file, currently not connected to the database, but the profile mug gets the file name "12-122A.jpg", and the shot of the cap, "12-122B.jpg", and the Etch "....C.jpg" Etc. Etc. It is that all important number which locks and tracks it.
   After the mug shots, the numbers are replaced, (they are wiped off for the shots), any without packets are packaged in a makeshift packet and they are boxed up, The box is given a number and this is put into the database as well, The box is placed into the shipping container and it's x,y,z, co-ordinates are also recorded in the database. If somebody knocks on my door and wants to see lamp 12-122 in box 56 at location 2,5,4. Then I can go to the container, go to the box and go to the lamp in a short space of time.
     Currently duplicates do not have a database system, but I'm just starting to implement it so I can start swapping with you lot and acquire good quantities of lamps from outside my geographical realm and you lot can enrich the diversity of your collections too. I'm changing my collecting philosophy to include many more duplicates that i would have previously left behind at the source, all for the purpose of being YOUR eyes and ears in this geographical realm.
    Take a look at Brisluminous' latest pictures, they are now taken in a more standardized way after a suggestion from me. I hope you will all adopt a standardized way of presenting your lamps, no more patterned bedspreads please, pretty please. I just want to look at the lamp, in REAL DETAIL, not the room or the fancy bedspread.