new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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ncm
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new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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Oh boy, now, just to get a lookup for a new DVD from Amazon (the other listed sites seem rather lame, since they couldn't find Tim Burton's Frankenweenie) one has to jump through wild hoops and join rather cloudy (sic) affiliate programs. And after navigating through them, when I went to fill in the DVDpedia Pref/Amazon sites, I was told that the first key (which I copied/pasted from the Amazon page) is not the correct one?

It's enough to growl over and possibly bite.

Your explanation page is less than helpful since the info on navigating the right Amazon pages is much too hazy and didn't obviously get me where I needed to go. Now I am an Amazon affiliate and I *still* can't use their sites to look up DVD film purchases in DVDpedia..
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Conor
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

Post by Conor »

I agree that the Amazon sign up process is complicated. Email me your details from where your getting the access key and secret key and I can better help you and let you know if that is the correct page. Amazon recently redesign their pages and interface, so the blog post also needs updating with new screenshots. But the redesign does not seem to be for all yet, seems to be in some sort of beta stage.

Frankenweenie deserves to be in our user contributed Doghouse. I have gone ahead and added that omission, so that you will be able to get results right away for "Frankenweenie" from Doghouse. Do download the latest version of DVDpedia 5.1.10.
ncm
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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Yeah. I did update to the latest version of DVDpedia. That's how I got into this mess. The version I had previously had the free Amazon access in the search field.

Ok, I used this page to access the keys needed:

<https://portal.aws.amazon.com/gp/aws/se ... redentials?>

I copied the Access Key ID and pasted it into DVDpedia's Amazon site login's first line. I pasted the Secret Access Key (obtained by clicking on the Show button as per the instructions) into the 2nd line.

Then on the same page are a AWS Account ID and a Canonical User ID, neither of which I understand. I tried pasting the AWS Account ID into the 3rd line, and later tried the Affiliate name given to me. Neither of them worked.
ncm
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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BTW, when I first pasted the Access Key into the window, I was told it wasn't the correct access key.But that was the only one I was givien, and the only one on the form reproduced in the Support page on Amazon access.
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

Post by Conor »

The associate ID is on the this page on the top left corner. It almost always has a "-two-digits" after the name.

Also please do make sure to visit the following page and simply sign in with your ID to activate the account.

With all three fields filled in DVDpedia, do let me know if you get errors and what they are.
ncm
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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Ok, I found the associate ID, but don't see where I can access the other 2 things I need. It's not available on the next page, far as I can tell. Must tell you I am accessing this from another computer as my main laptop's hard drive failed last night, sigh. Seem's it's dead. Right now I am running hardware test on it to make sure there aren't any other hardware problems and can't access it. Can do so after it is finished, using a Fire Wire clone, but will need to be on that computer to access the latest version of DVDpedia. The one I am on now maxes out at Leopard, so runs an older version of DVDpedia.

Another issue may be that the clone is 2 days old, so I may have lost those Amazon IDs I so carefully saved to a text file yesterday before the crash. Any idea where/how I can recover them directly from Amazon?
ncm
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

Post by ncm »

BTW as regards Frankenweenie, I had entered the information manually, after finding it on IMDB. There must be some reasonable alternative to Amazon if they are creating such problems.
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

Post by Conor »

After sign in at this page follow the "Manage Your Account" link and then "Access Identifiers". You will then see the Access Key and have to click to show the secret key. This is the direct link to the credentials page, but not sure if it will go directly there as sometimes it stops by the dashboard.

With the latest version do sign up for Doghouse. We do appreciate that if you don't find an entry in Doghouse after adding it manually for your own collection use the "Doghouse -> Contribute Selection" command to send it up to the shared server for the next user to find.

Sorry to hear about the hard drive, hope your able to get it back up and running without needing a full replacement. I know keep so many backups that when that happens I am able to take the clone out of it's enclosure and pop it into the laptop as a replacement without worrying about losing both the clone and the main drive. There is still the Time Capsule and Backblaze.
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Re: new DVDpedia Amazon merry-go-round

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Ok, thanks. Finally got the needed info from Amazon and input it successfully in DVDpedia's preferences. Now works. Will add Doghouse signup. I do occasionally get the odd film that isn't in the usual suspects' lists, and will be glad to add it.

Thanks for the encouragement for the failed hd. Unfortunately "popping in" a new hd or a clone isn't so easy in this model Alu Unibody MacBook Pro (late 2009). It's a real pain to get in to and I think I'll let the experts do it. I have ordered a (larger, faster 1T/7200) hard drive while I was at it and will pick it up tomorrow and get me to the repair shop.
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