German: is "edition" "Auflage" or is it "Ausgabe"?

Ulrich Windl
"edition" is translated to "Auflage" in German locale. I'm not very happy with it, because IMHO "Auflage" refers to the print process (number of items produced, date of production, place of production, etc.), while "Ausgabe" refers to content (revision).
So I feel "edition" in the original matches "Ausgabe" more closely than "Auflage".
What do others think (despite of the fact that most books use "überarbeitete Auflage" (roughly: "revised print")?
  • adamsmith
    that's correct, yes, I'll look into changing that.
  • Barbara Kost
    edition = "Ausgabe"? Most definitely not. Any numbered edition in German is invariably an "Auflage", without, literally, a single exception.

    Cf. any German style guide, e.g., "Duden. Wie verfasst man wissenschaftliche Arbeiten?: Ein Leitfaden für das Studium und die Promotion".
  • adamsmith
    But you don't usually cite something as a 17. Auflage unless it has been changed, do you? E.g. I have here Bölls "Die verlorene Ehre..." in its 18. Auflage, which is exactly the same as the 1. Auflage. Surely I wouldn't want to cite this? The equivalent to this simply does not exist for books published in the US.
  • Barbara Kost
    Sorry, but if both publisher and library catalogues identify a publication as "18. Aufl.", you are required to cite it as "18. Aufl."; maybe, if that level of detail is essential, as "18., unveränderte Aufl." or similar. Still, whether a user decides to identify or refrain from identifying an edition is not my point here.

    What I object to is to start calling an edition "Ausgabe", an idea for which not the least bit of support exists.
  • adamsmith
    OK, fair enough. I see your point, but it's not as clear cut as you make it out to be. If you look e.g. in the catalog of the Nationalbibliothek at an entry such as:
    http://d-nb.info/978321863
    you'll see
    "Ausgabe: 3. Aufl."
    which perfectly encapsulates the difficulty of getting this right. In citations it definitely needs to be and stay Auflage/Aufl. The label in Zotero I'm less clear on, but of course that's also less consequential.
  • Ulrich Windl
    Maybe let me add this: In German Zotero there are two different "Ausgabe" column headings; one seems to be "Auflage" (Books), while the other seems to be "Ausgabe" (Magazine Articles). I'd strongly suggest not to use two identical labels for two different things.
  • adamsmith
    Haven't checked the German translation: are you saying that edition is now translated as Ausgabe (as a column header) or are you just providing a (very reasonable) rationale why it shouldn't be?

    I'm for my part convinced that Auflage is probably the better translation, so if that's what we do right now I'll leave it alone. Otherwise I'll look at switching it (back?).
  • Ulrich Windl
    Sorry for the delay: I'm saying that there are two column titles named "Ausgabe" in the German localisation wich display two different things (I guess that one refers to magazine articles (no idea what the database term is), while the other is the edition of a book). Having one name for two different things is unfortunate.
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