LIS 901B: Summer 2005 Lecture 7

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LIS 901B Summer 2005Lecture 7

• Cataloging Authority Control
• Online Catalog and Database Management

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AUTHORITY CONTROL IS

• the process of maintaining consistency in the
  verbal form used to represent an access point in
  a catalog
• the further process of providing interconnections
  among names, works, and subjects which display
  any significant relationship

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AUTHORITY CONTROL IS

• the process of ensuring that every entry name,
  uniform title, series, or subject that is
  selected as an access point for the catalog is
  unique and does not conflict, by being identical,
  with any other entry that is already in the
  catalog or may be included at a later date.

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Goals of Authority Control

• Facilitate the identifying and collocating
  functions of the catalog
• Users can assume that a consistent term or phrase
  will refer to a particular name, title or
  subject, and that variations will be brought
  together under the one form

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Problems with Personal Names

• Pseudonym or pen name
• Initialized first name
• Omitted first name
• Non-roman alphabets
• Married name vs. maiden name
• Compound surname
• Names with nobility
• Changed names

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Authority Control

• Not so difficult 66 of all authors write only
  one book in one edition. But the remaining 34
  can be very difficult--changing names,
  variations, translations, different alphabets,
  etc.

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Patterns of Chinese Names

• Lin Yu-tang
• Ching-chun Hsieh
• Nelson Chou
• Jack Kai-tung Huang
• Nancy Ou-lan Hu Chou

• Surname first
• Surname last
• Chinese first name dropped
• English first name adopted without dropping
  Chinese first name
• Womans married name with English first name

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Married name vs. Maiden Name

• Good example
• Elizabeth Taylor

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Authority Work

• Includes the research work and intellectual
  effort involved in creating and updating
  authority records
• Determines if a relationship exists between names
  or subject heading terms
• Establishes and links the names that could refer
  to the same person
• Establishes relationships between subject heading
  terms
• Includes recording the authority data of
  preferred form, variants, history, scope, and
  links to other authority records

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Steps of Authority Work

• Researching for variants
• Choosing one among many
• Analyzing parts of the term
• Adding, omitting or modifying the term
• Handling special language cases
• Linking the used and the unused
• Document the process

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Rec stat c Entered 19820305 Type
z Upd status a Enc lvl n
Source Roman Ref status a Mod
rec Name use a Govt agn
Auth status a Subj a Subj use a
Series n Auth/ref a Geo
subd n Ser use b Ser num n
Name a Subdiv tp n Rules
c 1 010 n 82029644 2 040 DLC c DLC d
DLC d DGPO d DLC d OU 3 005
19980505051956.0 4 100 1 Clinton, Bill, d
1946- 5 400 1 Clinton, William J. q
(William Jefferson), d 1946- 6 400 1 Blythe,
William Jefferson, d 1946- 7 400 1
Klintåun, Båil, d 1946- 8 400 1 òKlinòton,
Bil, d 1946- 9 510 1 Arkansas. b Governor
(1979-1981 Clinton) 10 510 1 Arkansas. b
Governor (1983-1992 Clinton) 11 510 1
United States. b President (1993- Clinton)
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SYNDETIC STRUCTURE

• Means Connective and is derived from classical
  Greek
• Conceived by Charles Cutter who defined syndetic
  catalog as that kind of dictionary catalog which
  binds its entries together by means of
  cross-references so as to form a whole.
• Great cocktail party term

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Authority Record

• Result of authority work
• A record which shows a heading in the form
  established for use in the catalog
• Lists cross-references to be made to and from the
  heading
• Cites the sources consulted in establishing the
  heading

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Authority File

• Set of authority records
• Lists the names, series and subject headings that
  have been established and used in a catalog and
  provides links to related subject headings,
  titles and names

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Authority Files

• Needed for efficient cataloging and searching in
  library networks
• Reduce effort involved in entering headings
• Avoid duplication of work
• Improve the quality of catalogs

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Four Functions of Authority Files

• Authority function support consistency of
  headings
• Finding function provide links from variants and
  other authorized headings
• Information function show usage and scope of
  headings
• Maintenance function support manual and
  automatic error detection and correction

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Advantages of Authority Control

• Collecting, recording and maintaining
  authoritative forms of headings
• Linking variant forms of headings together
• Providing consistency and verification upon
  creating bibliographic records
• Automatic verification
• Global change and correction
• Shared authority files
• Linkage between authority files and bibliographic
  records

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Problems with Corporate Names

• Name change
• Names in different languages
• Variant names
• Brief form of names
• Subordinate and related bodies

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Problems with Subject Terms

• Specific vs. general
• Synonyms
• Word form
• Singular or plural
• Homographs
• Direct vs. Inverted
• Popular vs Technical

• Cats or Siamese cats
• Attire, Dress, Clothing
• Armament, Disarmament
• Apple or Apples
• Bridge, Plant, Mercury
• Surgery, Plastic or Plastic surgery
• Stamp collecting or Philately

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AUTHORITY CONTROL AND PUBLIC SERVICES

• Increase quality of catalog
• Catalog searching with syndetic structure
• Answer some reference questions
• Search across various catalogs using authorized
  form once determined

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Cooperative Authority Control

• Name Authority COoperative project (NACO)
• NACO funnel projects
• Subject Authority COoperative (SACO) project
• SACO funnel projects

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Recent History of Authority Control 1980s

• 1979 - reasons for no automated authority control
• high cost
• librarians only remotely interested
• 1982 - vendors - what control?
• 1983 - vendors - heres what were developing

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Recent History of Authority Control 1980s (cont.)

• 1985 - authority and bibliographic files
• non-integrated
• partially integrated
• wholly integrated
• 1989 - research review
• major concern - amount of disk space
• related concern - slow response time

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Recent History of Authority Control 1980s (cont.)

• Research questions
• How much authority control needed?
• Really necessary to have unique access points for
  names?
• What kind of references needed?
• Could works be under authority control?
• Could subject heading authority control be
  automated?
• Local authority files necessary?

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Recent History of Authority Control 1990s

• Technology problems resolved
• New research questions
• effect of authority control or lack of it on
  retrieval
• matching algorithms for personal names
• matching algorithms for corporate names
• authority control of works
• cost of authority work

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Recent History of Authority Control 1990s (cont.)

• New research questions (cont.)
• subject authority control
• content of headings
• subject searching
• user understanding of subject strings
• form/genre access
• retrospective application of new subject headings
• Development of WWW, browsers, search engines

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Future of Authority Control

• International access control
• 1961 Paris Principles
• Universal Bibliographic Control (UBC)
• International authority file
• linked via record id numbers
• Z39.50 protocols
• UNIMARC authority records

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Future of Authority Control (cont.)

• Subject access to Internet resources
• SAC Subcommittee (metadata subjects) recommends
• simple and easy to apply and comprehend
• intuitive
• scalable for implementation from the simplest to
  the most sophisticated
• logical
• appropriate to the specific subject domain of
  implementation

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Future of Authority Control (cont.)

• Subject access to Internet resources (cont.)
• WorldCat Records in Comparison with LCSH
  Authority Records
• 3 total subject string match
• 26 used by LC, but not established because of
  free-floating subdivisions, geographic
  subdivisions, etc.
• 71 not used by LC and not established

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Future of Authority Control (cont.)

• Subject access to Internet materials (cont.)
• FAST (Faceted Application of Subject Terminology)
• based on LCSH
• designed to be used in online environments by
  people with minimal training and experience
• still a research project hope to implement in
  CORC

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Future of Authority Control (cont.)

• Subject access to Internet materials (cont.)
• FAST (cont.)
• Eight facets
• Topical
• Geographic
• Form
• Period
• Personal names
• Corporate names
• Conference/Meeting names
• Uniform titles

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Subject Access to Internet Materials (cont.)

• FAST theoretical precision problem
• LCSH
• Gold mines and mining z California
  
• Silver mines and mining z Colorado
• FAST
• Gold mines and mining
• Silver mines and mining
• California
• Colorado

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Subject Access to Internet Materials (cont.)

• FAST rules (in trial)
• Topical facet to consist of LC main topical
  headings, topical subdivisions, period
  subdivisions that have topical aspects
• Geographic facet to establish names in indirect
  order Massachusetts--Worcester, not Worcester
  (Mass.)
• Form facet to be the subdivisions now being coded
  v
• Chronological facet to reflect the actual time
  period coverage for the resource

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How to do Authority Control

• In-house
• pre cataloging
• post-cataloging
• Vendor supplied authority control
• RFP
• Specs
• Exceptions report follow-up

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In-house Authority Control

• Pre-cataloging
• Automatic verification
• Post-cataloging
• Headings reports
• Participation in national cataloging programs

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Planning for Vendor Authority Control

• Determine records to be processed and records not
  to be processed
• Determine headings to be processed and headings
  not to be processed
• Rationalize local policy to eliminate practices
  that differ from national standards/LC practices

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Products Provided by Vended Authority Control

• Corrected headings
• Authority records
• Reports

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Options for Vended Authority Control

• Correction transaction records or replacement
  bibliographic records
• One-time processing or ongoing processing
• Machine-only processing or processing with human
  review
• Off-the-shelf processing or customized processing

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Implementing Vended Authority Control

• Prepare detailed project specifications
• Develop and test software changes
• Establish quality assurance procedures
• Re-design cataloging and other workflows
• Create supporting documentation
• Determine changes in staffing requirements

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Authority Control is Not Magic

• Authority control is not achieved without the
  requisite authority work carried out by
  catalogers
• Without authority control, a file cannot be
  considered a catalog

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Online Catalog Maintenance

• Error reports
• Heading reports
• Authority control
• Transfers
• Withdrawals
• Added copies/added volumes

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Error Reports

• Types
• Duplicate call numbers
• Duplicate records
• First time use headings
• Invalid headings
• Blind references

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Error Reports (cont.)

• Sources
• Patrons
• Library staff
• System generated
• Correct errors
• Resolves conflicts

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Error Reports (cont.)

• Conform to changes
• Change of name of corporations University
  Microfilms International to UMI
• Change of name of country Zanzibar to Tanzania
• Change of current terminology Negroes to
  Afro-Americans to African Americans
  Underdeveloped countries to Developing countries

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Retrospective Conversion (Recon)

• Recon is the process of converting shelflist
  cards into a machine-readable format based on the
  MARC 21 format
• Each shelflist card is matched against a vendors
  MARC database(s). Matches are done by ISBN, LCCN,
  then author, author/title, or title, etc.
• Enhancements may be made to matched MARC records,
  as specified by the library.
• Matches MARC records are saved onto disks/other
  media, or transferred electronically over the Web
  (via FTP).
• Non-matches are either keyed-in by an operator,
  or sent back to the library for in-house
  conversion.

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Recon Specifications

• Develop specifications for Recon. The vendor may
  send you a form to specify how certain fields in
  the MARC records should appear. In this case, you
  complete the form and place a check mark for the
  option you prefer

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Who Does the Recon?

• Vendor (outsourcing)
• Process
• Advantages
• Disadvantages
• Choosing a vendor
• In-House by staff. There are many options
• CD-ROM
• Fee-based Web services
• http//www.itsmarc.com (TLC ITS.MARC)
• http//www.booksystems.com (EZCat/Pro)
• LibraryCom (http//www.librarycom.com). Provided
  by CASPR Library Systems
• SUNLINK (http//www.sunlink.ucf.edu)

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Who Does the Recon?

• In-House (contd.)
• Advantages
• Disadvantages
• Issues in using MARC records from free Web-based
  services
• Combined conversion process
• Vendor
• In-house
• Advantages
• Disadvantages

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What Recon Method to Use?

• Decision depends on
• the type of library and its collection size
• the qualifications of existing library staff
• the timeline for completing the automation
  project
• the cost analysis you perform for various types
  of recon methods

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Barcoding the Collection

• Types of barcodes
• Smart barcodes
• Dumb barcodes
• Specifications for barcodes
• Your recon specifications should have
  specifications for smart and dumb barcodes
• Smart barcodes are generated during the
  conversion process
• After a MARC record is found for an item, a smart
  barcode is linked to the item.

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Specifications for Barcodes

• Specifications for smart barcodes should include
• compatibility with the application software
• compliance with barcode standard (symbology)
• the type indicator (e.g., 1 for materials)
• name of the library, item title, and item call
  number
• barcodes should be arranged by call number
• one barcode is needed for each item in a multiple
  copy set
• one barcode is needed for each volume in a
  multi-volume set
• you also may want to get two identical barcodes
  per each item

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Barcoding the Collection

• Pre-requisite
• attempt to close the library
• recall checked-out items
• divide shelves into sections
• Use the smart barcodes first.
• Match each call number on the barcode with that
  on the shelf before affixing the barcode
• Placement of barcodes
• Print materials
• Considerations
• Placement
• Non-print materials
• Considerations
• Placement

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More on Preparing the Collection for Automation

• Weeding
• Weed the collection based on your librarys
  weeding criteria
• Withdraw the shelflist cards for the weeded items
  so that they will not be converted and paid for.
• Weeding is essential before sending the shelflist
  for retrospective conversion (recon). This is
  because the vendor charges for converting every
  card in the shelflist into a MARC 21 format.

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More on Preparing the Collection for Automation

• Inventory
• Inventory is performed to identify items for
  which no shelflist cards exist and to identify
  shelflist cards for which materials are missing
  or lost.
• Decide on the materials to be converted
• Typically, all materials destined for recon must
  have shelflist cards.

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More on Preparing the Collection for Automation

• Shelflist Analysis
• Shelflist analysis is performed to examine the
  completeness and accuracy of the shelflist.
• The more complete and accurate the information on
  the cards is, the higher the probability is for
  finding matches in MARC databases.
• Shelflist analysis ensures uniformity and
  consistency.
• Make sure each shelflist card contains this
  information
• accurate bibliographic information (author,
  title, publication information, etc.)
• a call number and a standard prefix (R for
  reference or Ref for reference, etc.)
• no. of copies of an item
• no. of volumes in an item
• ISBN and LCCN

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Online Catalog/Database Management

• Staffing
• Separate Unit

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Reclassification

• Dewey to LC
• Dewey Phoenix
• LC changes
• Split collection?

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Catalogs past, present, and future

• Printed lists
• Card catalogs
• OPACs
• Web portals
• the Dream Machine
• the Scholars Workstation
• the Data Web
• Virtual Workspaces

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Beyond Bibliographic Data

• Patron databases
• Circulation systems
• Acquisition systems
• Licensing agreements
• Reports other derivatives
• Virtual Workspaces tool kits

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Whats a Catalog For?

• IFLA Functional requirements of bibliographic
  records 4 user needs
• find, identify, select, obtain
• Erik Juls 5th need
• use
• Metadata supports productive workspaces
• Teach, research, publish, write grants

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The Online Catalog

• Present traditional catalog
• Provides access to locally owned materials
• Provides access to artifactual materials
  (objects books, videos, etc.)
• Provides access in the forms of pointers to
  locations
• Is structured as a stand-alone bibliographic tool
• Provides remote access
• Monitors transactions

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The Online Catalog (cont.)

• Present traditional catalog provides (cont.)
• Powerful searching capacities including keyword
  searches and Boolean operators
• Links to circulation system with detailed
  holdings and status information
• Integrated authority control system with
  cross-references
• Information on titles that are on-order or
  in-process

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The Online Catalog (cont.)

• The present Web-based catalog additionally
• Provides access to materials local and elsewhere,
  owned and not owned
• Provides access to electronic information
• Provides electronic information itself, not only
  locations (and from both free and fee-based
  sources

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The Online Catalog (cont.)

• The next catalog additionally
• Will be presented as a tool integrated with other
  workstation tools
• Will provide a variety of tools in addition to
  the bibliographic function
• Will provide searching through classification
  schedules (controlled vocabulary)

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Whats a Portal

• Help users easily discover what resources are
  available
• Help users discover what resources are most
  useful for their topics
• Provide cross-collection searching
• Integrate and manage search results
• Link search results to full text when possible
  to services if not
• Authenticate and authorize or block user access

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Whats a Portal

• Ability to query two distinct streams of
  electronic resources and databases
• Universal stream of unrestricted resources from
  web sites targeted for quality relevance
• Local stream of information, access to which is
  restricted to local users by license or other
  agreement
• Systems which gather a variety of useful
  information resources into a single, one stop
  web page, helping the users to avoid being
  overwhelmed by infoglut or feeling lost on the
  web

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Useful information resources

• Local catalog
• Other library catalogs
• Locally licensed full-text and abstracting/indexin
  g databases
• Public domain abstracting/indexing databases
• Finding aids for special collections and archives
• Locally digitized resources
• Vetted Web sites

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Why are we creating portals?

• Commercial search engines are deficient because
• what they search,
• how they search, and
• the fact that they only search
• (for that matter, so are library catalogs)
• Why is that?
• Quality of information
• Brute force application of keyword searching
  algorithms
• Too many keywords
• Too many ways of loading up documents with
  spurious keywords
• Too much emphasis on simple counting when
  carrying out relevance routines

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Resource discovery acrossheterogeneous objects

• You pays your money and you takes your chances
• Metadata repository
• Extension of the idea of a union catalog
• Combines metadata from many collections
• Harvested (OAI protocol) or directly contributed
• Example National Science Digital Library (NSDL)
• Federated searching
• New products from ILS vendors (generally
  speaking)
• Licensed resources (generally speaking)

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Catalog as Portal to the Internet (Thomas)

• Reduce the amount of time devoted to cataloging
  of books and reallocate the time of our
  bibliographic control experts to provide access
  to other resources, especially electronic
  resources
• Increase functionality of the library
  portal/catalog
• Increase scope and coverage of materials
• Ensure timely access to publications
• Increase the level of access from citation to
  full-text
• Incorporate features such as reference linking,
  recommended titles, relevance ranking,
  customization and personalization that make
  portals so captivating

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Catalog as Portal to the Internet (cont.)

• Libraries shouldnt go it alone. Libraries should
• Collaborate with other libraries in a coordinated
  plan for the acquisition, creation of metadata,
  access, and preservation of materials available
  through portals
• Define a clear path from the local library portal
  to the larger scholars portal
• Partner with developers of portals and search
  engines to share experience in a constructive
  way, drawing on the best each has to contribute
  to effective access to information

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Catalog as Portal to the Internet (cont.)

• Dont hide our light under a bushel. Libraries
  should
• Advertise the features of the discovery database,
  a hybrid combining some of the best features of
  the catalog and the portal
• Quantify the value of labor-saving features of
  the portal/catalog for the community of users and
  for those administering the organizations that
  subsidize them and stand to benefit from them

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What Do Our Users Want?

• Our users do more work and study away from the
  library
• Loyal to the library, but library is only one
  element in a complex information structure
• Print still important, but many users rely
  exclusively on electronic materials
• Seamless linking from one information object to
  another is expected

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What Do Libraries Want?

• Share the wealth of their resources with their
• communities
• Remain a vital resource to their communities
• Leverage investments in their collections
• Make the best use of limited budgets
• Be highly visible on the Web
• Harness new technologies
• Successfully compete with other information
• services
• Stay funded (and fundable)

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Toward a New LibraryInformation Space

• Objectives
• Unite print, digital and e-collections
• Integrate access to all library resources
• Simplify digital and resource management
• (lower costs AND improve service)

• Methods and tools
• Web-accessible lists
• New role for catalogs
• Portals
• Reference linking (OpenURL)
• E-resource management systems

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Virtues of the Catalog, and Other Virtues

• Catalogs
• Serve a defined community (focused)
• Access to structured, quality collection
  (credible)
• Consistency of descriptions (predictable)
• Preserved and maintained (dependable)
• Internet portals tend to lack catalogs virtues,
  but
• Prolific and current search results
• Better search engines and ranked displays
• Lots of full text
• Seamless linking from object to object
• More audio and images
• Convenient