RandyT

So, you're saying that the countries displaying a globe do *not* actually have the flag missing in the database, there is just a problem displaying them? One would think they would be tiny icons with negligible memory requirements, with each icon tied to the appropriate country number. It would help with my Olympic Games topical collection, where there are LOTS of countries which have issued stamps for the Olympics.

I want to add a Format column on the Collection screen, but I can't find it in the selectable fields which can be dragged over to establish a column for it. "Format" is what is used to show things like "coil pair" or "booklet pane" in the Properties options, in addition to "single stamp", and I do have it populated. But by it not being on the screen (only accessible by double clicking on the row), I can't sort on that column, to get things like all the coil pairs together to work on them. It looks like all the other Properties fields are available, but not Format. Am I overlooking it? Maybe the name has changed on the Properties screen but it's still under an old field name in the column configurations screen. By the way, the column which can be added for "Condition" looks like it is a compilation of three fields 'Grade', 'Gum', and 'Hinging'', each of which can also be established as individual columns.

Thank you- this is a great help. As a 'for example'- I want to add Japanese Telegraph stamps, which are not listed in Scott. There are 10 of them. In the Sakura catalog they are listed as TE1 - TE10. So following your recommendation, I would add a new category under Japan for Unlisted- Telegraph Stamps, then I would give the individual fake Scott numbers (keeping them basically same as Sakura for simplication. So Sakura TE8 could be Scott unlTE8 (unl for unlisted). Then of course any detail such as printing, perf, etc. Then add to my collection or want list with album identifiers, page, column, row, etc. And I could manually enter value information from the other catalog (and I think I would enter the year of that catalog printing, since no automatic updates will be coming. I'm sure I will also do this for my Olympic Games collection, where so many issues came from the Desert Shiekdom countries which Scott never listed. But Michel does, so I do the exact same procedure from the Michel information, giving them fake Scott numbers which will never clash with real Scott numbers. I am torn what to do with things like Romania souvenir sheets. During the cold war years, they would issued sets and 2 or 3 souvenir sheets, and often Scott only lists one souvenir sheet and "footnotes" the other two. So these are items that Scott does mention, but doesn't assign a Scott number (but sometimes shows a value). For example A Scott set might be 1202 1203 1205 1205 1206a souvenir sheet - perf - red color footnote: an imperf souvenir sheet also exists in blue color, value $10. In a case like this, I'm thinking about adding them as 1206a.01- and go ahead and describe it as Scott did. (all of these are in the Michel catalog, by the way. This way, the stamp gets "attached" to the same set of Stamps as Romania issued it, and as Scott acknowledges in their footnote, without parking it in a whole separate Category where it would be an orphan. Any comments, suggestions, or things I've overlooked?

Scott catalog shows a price for "Israel with tabs" by set rather than by individual stamp (with some exceptions). But it does not assign either a major or minor catalog number for the "with tab" variety- it just shows an entry for it. I'm just beginning attacking the database for my Israel collection, having just finished a gargantuan effort for U.S. and Canada. Given what I learned there, I discovered that the convention for Scott "priced but without a catalog number" would be added to the database as a suffix after the next higher level catalog number. So 30 with tab would be 30.01. That way it will NEVER conflict with a Scott-listed "30a" or "30b". The only issue is- even when market values are available, it will NEVER match to suffix numbers like .01 when imported. So I'm ready to take it on if needed (Israel isn't THAT big a country)---- but I'd really like to find out whether the market values shows for major Scott numbers for Israel like "30" or "31" ALREADY are values with tabs. If so, then we need to go a different direction than adding suffixes, and simply declare that if anybody wants to list an Israel stamp WITHOUT a tab- THAT would be a suffix. (But then it's going a bit different direction than the Scott catalog has taken). How do we find out how the sources for the market values are quoting values for Israel?