New Author Central look

[Lynn]

I'm not sure I like the new look/layout. It's not the worst thing ever but there's something simply functional about the current one I like better at the moment. Maybe I'll get used to it.

I still haven't gotten used to the beta KDP changes.

Sigh.

[Eric Thomson]

It may just be that I'm getting grumpier with age, but every single service provider who "improved" their front end lately made it less functional, less useful and more irritating than ever... for example, IngramSpark, Facebook, my web hosting provider, every single mobile app, etc... This "new and improved" author central is just another example of taking something that works and making it into something that no longer provides me with the information and functionality I need. Back when I was an IT executive, I knew that only 20% of my developers were capable of writing code that met the users needs. The other 80% either didn't know there were creatures such as end users or they thought they were smarter than end users and developed what they considered a better solution. I think nowadays, that 20/80 split has become more like 5/95. There are a number of underlying reasons, but they can't be discussed in polite company these days.

[Lynn]

Oh, I agree. I think there's been a lean in the direction of more (more, more, MORE) pictures for everything web related over the last ten years, and bigger, bigger, BIGGER, to the point that pages have lost more usefulness than not. :D

The new Author Central has my book covers so large and in my face, there's not much room for anything else. I wince every time I log in.

[Simon Haynes]

I agree with you.

I've been writing and selling software for well over 25 years now, and my philosophy is to present the user with the info they need and leave the flashy icons and other cr*p to marketing exercises masquerading as applications.

I wrote a rant about mp3 players on the download page for my yPlay2 software, maybe 15 years ago, complaining about computer software that was designed to look like the device it was 'replacing' - e.g. an MP3 player with fiddly little buttons and a pretty skin, instead of clearly labelled buttons and a regular Windows or Mac UI.

Sure, they look cool, but usability goes out the window.


I can't even see the new Author Central page yet, but the old one was bad enough with its list of a whole 5 books at a time. (my stuff takes up 11 pages)  Worse, they group all the different editions and only show figures for the highest-ranked, so I'll see an audiobook instead of the ebook for 6 or 7 titles.

What's wrong with listing 50-100 books at a time in a nice clean spreadsheet view, downloadable as CSV, with links if people want to view the charts? A list you can re-sort by clicking the headers. A field showing the date of the most recent review, and a total review count, and an average rating, and the current sales rank. The data is there, after all.

So much possibility, but they don't ask authors and publishers what they want.

[TimothyEllis]

I've come to the conclusion that Microsoft programmers don't actually live on this planet.

Last win 10 update added a whole heap of crap features it took me days to figure out how to turn off.

Not to mention turning on the ones they turned off without asking me.

 

[Lynn]

The new page appears at https://author.amazon.com/ for me.

[PJ Post]

I wrote a rant about mp3 players on the download page for my yPlay2 software, maybe 15 years ago, complaining about computer software that was designed to look like the device it was 'replacing' - e.g. an MP3 player with fiddly little buttons and a pretty skin, instead of clearly labelled buttons and a regular Windows or Mac UI.

This is known as a Skeuomorph. It's still a big thing in recording audio.

The stuff you learn in those bottomless writing rabbit holes...

[Gerri Attrick]

I don't yet have the new version, but I've long considered AC to be a waste of time, especially since the last update.

If reviews are 'global', then they should be the same on all AC sites, yet they're not. Adding in the ratings only helped to muddy the waters. Rankings take hours to update and I often miss their high points, so it's pointless to check (let alone worry about) them.

I only signed up for the dot com and UK sites and I'm glad I didn't bother with the rest.

[TimothyEllis]

The new page appears at https://author.amazon.com/ for me.

OMFG!

 

[notthatamanda]

When I go to AuthorCentral I can choose to go to the new site or stay with the old and familiar.

[Anarchist]

Back when I was an IT executive, I knew that only 20% of my developers were capable of writing code that met the users needs. The other 80% either didn't know there were creatures such as end users or they thought they were smarter than end users and developed what they considered a better solution. I think nowadays, that 20/80 split has become more like 5/95. There are a number of underlying reasons, but they can't be discussed in polite company these days.

[bold mine]

I'd bet at least a few of our thoughts overlap on this matter. But as you said, polite company and all. lol

[Simon Haynes]

Everything I write is for my own use, first and foremost. And I'm an incredibly fussy and impatient user ;-)

[Lynn]

Everything I write is for my own use, first and foremost. And I'm an incredibly fussy and impatient user ;-)

You can tell. I've been a fan of Spacejock software since back in the 2000s. :D I still use ycopy2 daily!

[Simon Haynes]

Haha - thanks! So do I, although recently I discovered Windows has a commandline tool called RoboCopy which is very nice. (I love batch files and commandline tools.)

[R. C.]

...I love batch files and command line tools.)

.vi

or

c:\>cd \
c:\>cls
c:\>ipconfig /release


Cheers,
R.C.

P.S. - If you don't know the expected result of the command, don't do it.

[Simon Haynes]

I do, as long as you take out the leading backslashes ;-)


This is one I use to back up all my writing folders inside My Documents (they all start with A - for novels, B - for publishing stuff and C - for other)

set "startdir=%cd%"

pushd %~dp0


c:
cd "C:\My Documents\

FOR /D %%I IN ( "A - *" ) DO (
cd "%%I"
call Backup.bat
cd ..
)

FOR /D %%I IN ( "B - *" ) DO (
cd "%%I"
call Backup.bat
cd ..
)

FOR /D %%I IN ( "C - *" ) DO (
cd "%%I"
call Backup.bat
cd ..
)

popd




Then inside every folder I have a backup.bat:

7z u -r "C:\[my backup path]\[backupfile].7z" *.* -wV:\Temp

[Lynn]

I know just enough to make trouble. I use a .bat file to run pandoc, make an epub and HTML file of my .odt file (I write in Libre Office) and save them to a directory in OneDrive so I can do quick read throughs and copy edits of my wips anytime I want away from the computer. I read on my phone.

[R. C.]

Is it my imagination or, are a high percentage of authors and writers current, former, or wannabe coders?

Just to start a discussion, here are some of the languages I used over my career.

(User = Paid to delivery something.)

BASIC
COBOL
FORTRAN
Assembler (370, z80, Micro, others)
ALGOL
SYBOL
LINC
LINC II
C
C++
C#
PASCAL
JAVA
HTML
.Net (various forms)
MS Access
VisualBasic
VisualC
Clipper (Loved using Clipper!)
Foxpro
Visual Foxpro
DBase
LISP (Not a lot)

Seven or eight DBs and RMDBs

More than a few scripting languages.

I think there are others but it has been more than a few years since anyone paid me for my development skills.

Cheers,
R.C.

[R. C.]

I do, as long as you take out the leading backslashes ;-)

....

That's what I get for trying to remember and not opening a COMMAND window to check.

Cheers,
R.C.

[Simon Haynes]

I have a degree in English and another in computer programming.  When doing the latter (under the Science umbrella) I told everyone who would listen that computer programming should be in the Arts dept.

Incidentally, both my daughters are very good artists across a range of media, and both earn their living in IT. (They both have degrees and work in computing - One's a programmer, the other a 3D animator.)

[TimothyEllis]

I have a degree in English and another in computer programming.  When doing the latter (under the Science umbrella) I told everyone who would listen that computer programming should be in the Arts dept.

Incidentally, both my daughters are very good artists across a range of media, and both earn their living in IT. (They both have degrees and work in computing - One's a programmer, the other a 3D animator.)

When I did my computer diploma, I failed the engineering subjects. I had to get a credit on the Assembly language test to just narrowly pass the course. I got a credit on the whole course! The engineering lecturer didn't understand it at all. He had me dusted off as a failure from the first semester.

What he didn't understand is like you said. Programming is an art form, and you don;t need to know anything about hardware to be a genius programmer. I was there to learn COBOL, but assembly was fun while it lasted.

The problem with programming these days is still the same as it ever was. Too much engineering mentality getting in the way of creativity.

[notthatamanda]

Huh. My college had Computer Science (programming) in the Science Dept and Computer Engineering (Hardware) in the Engineering Dept. Comp Scis had to take a hardware course and Comp Engs did some programming. All Engineers took some programing and a course for using spreadsheets, word processing and CAD.

[Simon Haynes]

Everywhere has programming under science.  My argument is that someone with an aptitude for 'human' languages (I speak three) - or even just their own native language - is naturally going to be good at programming (I code in half a dozen different languages.)

Basically (pun intended), Comp Sci should be recruiting from the arts department.

[TimothyEllis]

Everywhere has programming under science.  My argument is that someone with an aptitude for 'human' languages (I speak three) - or even just their own native language - is naturally going to be good at programming (I code in half a dozen different languages.)

Basically (pun intended), Comp Sci should be recruiting from the arts department.

I agree.

Although I failed human languages, so maybe I'm not the best example of it.

[notthatamanda]

My point was more that you don't have to know everything about the hardware end of it, but some basic knowledge would be useful. Maybe my college was just a little more proactive that way. Mechanical Engineers had to take a circuit class.

[TimothyEllis]

Mechanical Engineers had to take a circuit class.

I had 2 semesters of circuits. And I was only there to learn Cobol.

And none of the circuitry ever came in useful. Not even when I was building PCs for a living.

[notthatamanda]

It was useful when I got into sales/tech support. The applications were mechanical but the product was electrical. I kind of like knowing how everything works so even as a boiler designer I was glad to have an understanding of the generator. To each their own I guess.

Edit - Here's a theory for you guys.

In tests that distinguish "verbal" and "math" ability (SAT, GRE), math ability is more correlated with an aptitude for programming than verbal ability, further suggesting a difference with human language. Anecdotally, there is a high correlation between music aptitude and programming ability, suggesting some relationship with the temporal structure of music.

https://www.quora.com/How-similar-is-learning-a-programming-language-to-a-foreign-language

Sorry, I have a bit of an interest in language development in children. Reactive and responsive language develop independently which I find fascinating as the as they are the two basic halves of communication. Maybe evolution worked it out that way so if one went wrong the other would still be available. And now we are way off topic so I will stop procrastinating and leave you guys alone.

[Simon Haynes]

I've been building my own PCs for decades now - and I've always been keen on electronics. And I agree that logic is essential, although anyone who can solve Sudoku puzzles will do just fine.

One of my weakest subjects in school was math. I can figure things out (and I'm fine with mental calculus etc), but ask me to tell you the difference between COS and TAN and I'll be stuck. (But when I need one or the other I'll just look them up.)

I spent 20 years writing and maintaining share market software btw, so I did improve my math skills ;-)  I wrote a parser so the users could write their own code in my language.

[LilyBLily]

The foregoing is all Greek to me. I went to a small liberal arts college that had no computing courses. About a century ago. 

[TimothyEllis]

My math ability stopped dead at quadratic equations. I could could work them out the long way, but couldn't do them in my head. Calculus? Forget it. Cos and Tan? I don't even remember what they are.

I don't 'get' sudoku. But my dad was very good at it.

I never was into electronics. As far as I was concerned, it was all a 'black box'. You fed something in, and something else came out, and that's all I needed to know to program.

I was highly methodical, particularly with math.

I found the logic of writing programs simple, while everything the programs ran on was too hard to even think about. Besides, it was irrelevant to writing code.

Alas, my brain doesn't work that way anymore.

[R. C.]

... I told everyone who would listen that computer programming should be in the Arts dept. ...

I have been, literally, laughed at when I tell people "programming is an art."

I was well into my career when I realized the part that keep me in the game was the creative aspect of developing something new.

I hated the corporate culture but I loved creating (and the money).  Now, the artist's lament: I create and there is no money. 

Go figure.

Cheers,
R.C.

[cecilia_writer]

I went into programming in 1970 with a history degree and no idea about computers. However someone told me more recently that a predictor of programming ability is being good at languages, which I always have been.
I've recently retired from my day job 50 years later and I just wish more people were capable of the logical thought processes you need to bring to computing work - it would help them a lot in other areas of life too.
(Yes, there is creativity involved too)

[notthatamanda]

... I told everyone who would listen that computer programming should be in the Arts dept. ...

I have been, literally, laughed at when I tell people "programming is an art."

I was well into my career when I realized the part that keep me in the game was the creative aspect of developing something new.

I hated the corporate culture but I loved creating (and the money).  Now, the artist's lament: I create and there is no money. 

Go figure.

Cheers,
R.C.

This is how my husband feels. But the product is so old and the code base so large and there is so much maintenance required that even though technically he has new development to work on they are always pulling him off it to do something else. Pile on the corporate crap and you've got major disgruntlement.

[Simon Haynes]

I'm lucky because almost all of my computer programming work over the years has been self-directed. In other words, I have a problem, I write a program to solve it, I share the program with others.

That's how yWriter came about in 2002 or so. Now it's on version 7 and tens of thousands of people use it to write their novels. Possibly hundreds of thousands - I don't track usage so I have no idea.

[Vijaya]

I have a degree in English and another in computer programming.  When doing the latter (under the Science umbrella) I told everyone who would listen that computer programming should be in the Arts dept.

Incidentally, both my daughters are very good artists across a range of media, and both earn their living in IT. (They both have degrees and work in computing - One's a programmer, the other a 3D animator.)

very cool

[Eric Thomson]

Well, they just forced me onto the new Author Central, so I took their survey and made it clear I think it sucks donkey ****. Considering I can no longer see ratings and rankings at a glance for all my catalog on just two pages, I'll pass on using this POS dreamed up by hyperactive monkeys who think end users are like unicorns - they don't exist.

[Simon Haynes]

Go here to access the old one (US): https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/metrics/rank

And UK: https://authorcentral.amazon.co.uk/gp/metrics/rank

I'm still using them even though I switched last week.

[Eric Thomson]

Go here to access the old one (US): https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/metrics/rank

And UK: https://authorcentral.amazon.co.uk/gp/metrics/rank

I'm still using them even though I switched last week.

Thanks, but it doesn't bring me to the old "Books" page, where I could see ratings/US ranks. It'll show me the old "Sales Rank" page, with I don't find useful and if I click on "Books", it brings me to the new abomination devised by retarded c*cker spaniels pretending to be developers. After all the other insults from idiots who shouldn't be allowed near computers (IngramSpark, Farcebook, etc), this just reinforces my belief 95% of developers are useless mouth breathers who should be mucking out hippopotamus enclosures in the Nile.

[notthatamanda]

I had a little bit of hope that "Show Category Rankings" might show us all the categories the book is in, which would be nice. Not the case, it just takes you to the book page.

[TimothyEllis]

I just got migrated.

What a sick joke! Half the display functions don't even work.

Simon, that link only goes to the rank page. If you click anything else from there, it goes to the new format.

I filled in their survey expressing everything as a total fail.

[Simon Haynes]

I have a link that still takes me to the books themselves, but click the index on that page and it goes to the new system

I'm sure they'll redirect the links I just gave soon, as well.

I even tried the DE and JP author pages, but they've auto converted now.

[TimothyEllis]

I'm beginning to think the Amazon IT manager is either INSANE, or just totally incompetent.

I'd have fired everyone responsible for implementing this system, just on the basis of how much of it doesn't work on the first page you get put.

If this was tested before going live, then major incompetence is involved.

[Eric Thomson]

Having just had a lengthy discussion with my wife, who is vice-president of our publishing company, on the subject, it dawned on me that it could be a deliberate result of Jeff Bezo's philosophy, "Your margin is my opportunity." They reduced the amount of useful information readily available to us as publishers and that does hamper our ability to take a snapshot in time of where our business sits within the ecosystem.

Sure, never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence, and after a long career in IT, I well know most developers and project managers are idiots, but still...

[notthatamanda]

I'm sorry for you guys, I'm not having trouble seeing any of the stuff.  I hit view sales rank and it gives me a list of the books (no going to page 2 anymore) On the first page I can change it and look at the paper formats rather than having to click on the book to see it.

My oldest book I can see a graph of sales rank going back to 2014. You can sort by market or book with a pull down.
You can also sort by market or book for reviews.

I thought maybe you guys were using the data in a way I couldn't understand but now I think it just isn't working for you somehow. Everything I click on works fine. Sorry for the frustration.

[Lynn]

The beauty of the new sales rank page is that all my books are on one page. I used to have to click through multiple pages to see everything. That's nice. https://author.amazon.com/marketingAndReports/salesRank

It has good and bad points, for sure. I really wish thumbnails and all that white space were smaller.

[CoraBuhlert]

I just headed to Author Central to add a book and got hit by the new disimproved redesign. It may look pretty, but it's completely useless.

Listen, I know what my book covers look like. I don't need to see large versions of them, when a list of books would be that much more useful. And I don't want to see only three books, when I have more than a hundred.

[TimothyEllis]

Listen, I know what my book covers look like. I don't need to see large versions of them, when a list of books would be that much more useful. And I don't want to see only three books, when I have more than a hundred.

This.

And putting my only anthology paperback first, which has long been discontinued, is just adding insult to injury, since it has a 4 million rank now.

[CoraBuhlert]

For me, they put some anthologies to which I contributed first, even though those are the books I'm least likely to check out or edit their listings.

[TimothyEllis]

For me, they put some anthologies to which I contributed first, even though those are the books I'm least likely to check out or edit their listings.

Exactly.

Whoever built it, didn't bother asking any authors about priorities.

[Simon Haynes]

I just use https://author.amazon.co.uk/marketingAndReports/salesRank

Unlike the old pages, you can see all books not just 5 at a time.