Bernhard Eversberg wrote:
>> fixed data elements, these were applied in a rather haphazard fashion
>> among participating libraries, rendering them virtually useless for data
>> processing.
>>
> Because there was no concept of the value of the
> Had these been covered by the rules (AACR), we'd probably be better off
> with them now. RDA might learn from that and specify things that ought
> to be coded from the start, like what used to be GMD.
Yes, it is very interesting that there is a considerable portion of the
library catalog record that is NOT covered by the cataloging rules
today. And although I have sat through countless hours of discussion at
the MARC standards meetings, I have to say that I am not at all aware of
any overarching philosophy that guides the development of that standard.
This seems odd coming from a profession that takes standards very seriously.
>
>> When I look at the RDA process, I see us going down this same road: the
>> cataloging rules will be determined without any concern about the end
>> system use, ...
> without much concern for coding and format actually, but the latest
> draft for chapter 3/4 has tables to show where current MARC21 places
> things the proposed rules prescribe.
I was thinking of "system" beyond the creation of the MARC record -- I
was thinking of indexing and display and all of the user services that
the catalog provides. The MARC record, after all, was designed to print
cards, not to carry data for an online catalog. In classic IT design,
you first decide what your end product is, then you design the data that
will feed into the system. When our end product was a catalog card, MARC
was the data structure that was developed. Now that our end product is
an online catalog, we should be asking ourselves what the optimum record
format would be.
>
>> and then systems developers are expected to come along and
>> make something out of this data that didn't get any systems design
>> concepts built into it. In the IT world, this is the classic nightmare
>> of the IT department getting specs written by the marketing department
>> that basically describe their current hard-copy practices.
>>
>
> But doesn't Google work from a much less coherent base of given
> material, the designers of which still mostly don't care at all about
> structuring their stuff, let alone metadata, despite DC having been
> around for 10 years? (And G. disregards it anyway, as you know.)
Yes, Google does work with a totally heterogeneous data base, and so we
get services based on that. This means that on Google you can't search
for author or title, for instance. Google disregards DC not because they
don't want to use it but because it has been applied (when it has been
applied) so inconsistently as to render it nearly useless. Just like the
fixed fields in MARC records, by the way. Metadata was also being used
dishonestly so it couldn't be trusted. I still think that there are
advantages to quality metadata that is consistently applied. The big
question is whether we in libraries can afford to create metadata the
way we have in the past.
>
> The big issue is probably not the rules at all but the fact that any
> cataloging rules will always produce only a small amount of data per
> document whereas search engines work from full document content.
> So, to improve end user results, more meat will have to be put on
> the RDA skeleton anyway. ToC, abstracts, reviews, ...
Right. So here's a question: if you are cataloging an item, does your
cataloging change if you know that the ToC and index terms will be added
to the record? What about a scan of the title page? A preview of the
first chapter? Shouldn't all of this be considered part of the
"cataloging" process?
>
> Reliability in known-item searching and FRBR collocation, OTOH, cannot
> be had without a good code of rules along time-proven ideas. It is only
> discovery searching that can profit from extra verbiage. But what is
> the relative importance of discovery searching vs. the other functions?
> Discussions here seem to indicate that discovery searching is the only
> thing worth talking about, but it may be it is because everybody takes
> the other functions for granted. (Google can't do them - so who needs
> them?)
I think another question is: what is the actual usage of library
catalogs for discovery? Are we seeing a reasonable cost/benefit
trade-off in cataloging for discovery? (With "discovery" in this
instance being topical searching, not known item searching.)
kc
>
> B.Eversberg
>
>
--
-----------------------------------
Karen Coyle / Digital Library Consultant
kcoyle@kcoyle.net http://www.kcoyle.net
ph.: 510-540-7596
fx.: 510-848-3913
mo.: 510-435-8234
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Received on Mon Apr 30 2007 - 07:27:44 EDT