You're right! How do we clear out the gobbledygook?
Elise
Elise T. Zappas
Humanities Cataloger &
Automation Librarian
Drew University Library
Madison, NJ 07940
973-408-3667
ezappas_at_drew.edu
>>> Tim Hodson <hodson.tim_at_GOOGLEMAIL.COM> 9/30/2006 6:28 AM >>>
>
> I would have thought that access is the only point. If someone
could
> come up with a better machine way of accessing data, that would be
> great.
Access to data is most certainly NOT the only point. What is the good
of
finding a record only to churn out a load of gobbeldygook to the user?
At
the very least, the user should see a sensible representation of the
record. So when the record is for an audio recording with a number of
tracks, the tracks should be presented in the correct numbered order as
a
list. NOT as a big text blob on the page - currently a sensible list
could
not be reliably parsed from the MARC record.
There are plenty of perfectly efficient ways to access data stored
electronically. What is lacking in the library world is sensible ways
of
DISPLAYING that data. Current non normalised MARC records are NOT a
sensible way of storing data for display.
When MARC was designed it was designed as a replacement for card
catalogues
and as such the web did not exist, so the need to display the data in
the
record was limited, and mostly the systems churned out verbatim copies
for
libraruans to read.
But now sitting in the future, we find that users are being expected to
do
their own reading of card catalogues in different formats (screen,
print,
mobile, pda, txt - and whatever's next). So a catalog MUST be based on
a
normalised format that allows a machine to parse and reinterpret that
bibliographic record.
Once the MARC record is normalised (i.e. one, and only one, piece of
information in every field/subfield, or at a push with some sensible
in-field delimiter). You can design any indexing/browsing/faceting
scheme
that is appropriate to your audience.
Tim
On 28/09/06, Elise Zappas <ezappas_at_drew.edu> wrote:
>
> I would have thought that access is the only point. If someone
could
> come up with a better machine way of accessing data, that would be
> great. When I was in library school, AI was the wave of the future.
> What happened to that? In any case, I'm not voting for the status
quo
> or defending what we currently have; I'm only saying that current
> systems are utilizing data to the best of the systems' abilities as
they
> are right now. I'm setting the record straight on what is and isn't
a
> problem in so far as current systems go. Let's not waste time
> complaining. Let's focus on problems that do exist and how to make
> systems better.
>
> Elise
>
>
> Elise T. Zappas
> Humanities Cataloger &
> Automation Librarian
> Drew University Library
> Madison, NJ 07940
> 973-408-3667
> ezappas_at_drew.edu
>
>
> >>> Ross Singer <ross.singer_at_LIBRARY.GATECH.EDU> 9/28/2006 9:48 AM
>>>
> This is hardly the point. They may be 'accessible', but they aren't
> formatted and it's difficult to do anything with them from a machine
> standpoint.
>
> This is exactly the problem we're talking about.
>
> -Ross.
>
> On 9/28/06, Elise Zappas <ezappas_at_drew.edu> wrote:
> > Notes fields (including 505 contents fields) are not inaccessible.
> With
> > a keyword search and the proper indexing of one's catalog
virtually
> any
> > data are searchable in a MARC record. Recently, in fact, 505
> contents
> > field author/title information has been placed in subfields (r and
> g)
> > which can be indexed to search by author and title searches as
well
> as
> > keyword.
> >
> > Elise
> >
> >
> > Elise T. Zappas
> > Humanities Cataloger &
> > Automation Librarian
> > Drew University Library
> > Madison, NJ 07940
> > 973-408-3667
> > ezappas_at_drew.edu
> >
> >
> > >>> "K.G. Schneider" <kgs_at_bluehighways.com> 9/27/2006 10:50 AM >>>
> > This is a marvelous post, and while in my Thinking Unit (a long
hot
> > shower)
> > it inspired me to come up with a 95% facetious rule: abolish all
> > non-fixed
> > fields. This would reduce the temptation to stuff valuable
metadata
> in
> > notes
> > fields. But it would need a corollary rule, which would be that
> every
> > month
> > we (LibraryLand) would be required to establish at least ten more
> > fixed
> > fields whether we needed them or not. Then a third rule would be
> that
> > proposed fixed fields would be discussed in a weekly global
> > teleconference
> > in which a simple majority vote established new fields, and that
> > demerits
> > would be issued to libraries that suggested fields without solid
> > evidence to
> > support their suggestions. (I'm not sure what the punishment would
> > be.)
> >
> > The less silly ruminations I had were related to what KC has
called
> > "the
> > slow-moving barge" effect. I recently shopped for TV stands on
> several
> > store
> > websites. I was able to browse by facets that were useful for
> me-first
> > the
> > larger category itself (TV stands), and then by size, material,
and
> > color.
> > These companies knew these facets were useful for me. How do *we*
as
> a
> > huge
> > profession know what fields are useful, establish these fields,
and
> use
> > them
> > in meaningful ways? We pride ourselves on standardization, and
> indeed
> > that
> > has its charms. But are we also paying a steep price for it?
> >
> > Karen G. Schneider
> > kgs_at_bluehighways.com
> >
>
--
Tim Hodson
informationtakesover.co.uk
www.timhodson.co.uk
Received on Tue Oct 03 2006 - 08:56:37 EDT