Methods and Procedures of Ancient-Book Collation

What methods and procedures does ancient-book collation include? There is no single agreed list; here is the author's understanding. (1) Choosing the base edition — not a method but the most decisive procedure; a good base edition is needed for any approach. (2) Photographic reproduction (yingyin) — a method; once the base edition is chosen it goes to the printer, but adding punctuation, collation notes and indexes makes it far from simple. (3) Collating (jiaokan) — an essential, most-used method and procedure; unless the original manuscript survives, collation is unavoidable and is the most demanding. (4) Recovering lost texts (jiyi) — gathering lost works from encyclopaedias, old commentaries and the Yongle Canon; rarely used for extant books. (5) Punctuation — a common, essential procedure; needed for new editions and sometimes for reproductions. (6) Annotation — a method, not always needed; high-level annotation is harder than writing one's own book. (7) Modern translation — a continuation of annotation, even rarer and no easier. (8) Indexing — a method/procedure, not always essential; computer-made indexes and full-text databases have achieved good results. (9) Preface and postscript — a procedure every finished book needs. (10) Appendix — a procedure of collecting useful materials. These ten constitute the full content of ancient-book collation work.