The issues I have always had with this discussion I think can be solved by
someone who understands this a whole lot better than me but
1) The MARC validates along MARC rules - subfields that are not valid in a
tag will not work in proper software that knows MARC. Required pairing of
tags, etc. MARCXML current schema or dtd or whatever it is, does NOT have
built into it this validation. You can put "silly" subfields etc in tags. It
doesn't quite know when you are kidding around. I bet that can be fixed
with proper programing and the schema/dtd/whatever it is written "tighter".
Of course that makes one ask "Do we want that ridge of a system?" There can
be a pretty clear argument that it works better when these rules are really
followed.
2) "Title" is English. "245" is more internationally recognized. I can
mark up things in MARC and it can be understood by a fellow MARC literate
person whose language is different. And I can tell what is being described
by someone else even if I can not speak their language. I've looked at
records where I do not know the meaning of the words, but I know alot about
what it is that the person was describing by the tagging. That helps me
alot.
I'm not saying that we don't need to improve - but I think we need to think
about what some of our trade offs are when we move into the future. And make
sure we understand them clearly.
On 5/25/07, Frances McNamara <f-mcnamara_at_uchicago.edu> wrote:
>
> In the discussion of MARC vs. RDF it seemed to me that people think of
> MARC as what they see on the screen of OCLC or your ILS. But actually
> MARC looks like this:
>
> 01252nam 2200265K
> 4500001000800000005001700008007001400025007001400039007001400053008004100067035001200108035002000120040002000140049000900160100002200169245033700191260006200528300005200590533014800642610003400790830006000824949003000884903000900914985006300923
> 4270827 20030530021400.0 hdrafa---baca hdrbfa---baaa hdrbfa---baba
> 000601r19221622xx
> h a 000 0 eng d a4270827 a(OCoLC)44163773
> aCGU cCGU dOCoLC aCGUA 1 aRobinson, Thomas. 10 aAnatomie of the
> English nvnnery at Lisbon in Portvgall h[microform]. bDissected and laid
> open by one that was sometime a yonger brother of the couent: Who (if
> the grace of God had not preuented him) might have growne as old in a
> wicked life as the oldest amongst them. cPub. by authoritie. (By Thomas
> Robinson of King's Lynn). 1622. aKing's Lynn : bThew and son, pub. by
> E.M. Beloe, c[1922?] a2 p. l., bfacsim. (4 p. l., 32 p.) 1
> l. c28 cm. aMicrofilm. bChicago : cUniversity of Chicago
> Library, d2000. e1 microfilm reel ; 35 mm. f(History of religions
> preservation project, MN41672.1) 20 aSion House (Lisbon, Portugal)
> 0 aHistory of religions preservation project ; vMN41672.1.
> aJRL cMicSLN e41672.1 gc.1 aMARS
> a microfm 41672.1 bc.1 cUCSLN dJRL eMic rmq7090430 sn tstks
>
>
> An application has to know the secret of how to interpret this to give
> you the display you are used to seeing. Needless to say, MicroSoft and
> other big commercial vendors wouldn't bother to be able to interpret
> this. So you have to have something like the "MARC Breaker" of the
> little free MARC Edit program to convert this to something you might
> use. MARC in and of itself can be a barrier to being able to use
> records with other computer programs.
>
> XML, though, has rules that will let lots of software written for lots
> of things be able to handle it. So whether you are using "245" or
> "title" to identify the title part, it really is easier for a
> nonlibrary-specific program to find and use the information. The XML
> version below is more verbose but storage and processor speeds are now
> much less expensive than they were when MARC was developed. If you
> limit yourself to the MARC format you limit what programs you can use to
> manipulate the data. I'm sure that's not the only aspect of this that
> people were talking about but it is useful to remember that that is what
> MARC really looks like. I'll put the XML below for comparison, or you
> can ignore it. I think with RDF it may be better in the future to use a
> word like "title" rather than "245" because software in the "semantic
> web" will be more likely to be able to read real words and make
> inferences from them. At least I think that is the intention.
>
> Frances McNamara
> University of Chicago Library
>
>
> ?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><collection
> xmlns="http://www.loc.gov/MARC21/slim">
> <record>
> <leader>01252nam a2200265K 4500</leader>
> <controlfield tag="005">20030530021400.0</controlfield>
> <controlfield tag="007">hdrafa---baca</controlfield>
> <controlfield tag="007">hdrbfa---baaa</controlfield>
> <controlfield tag="007">hdrbfa---baba</controlfield>
> <controlfield tag="008">000601r19221622xx h a 000 0 eng
> d</controlfield>
> <datafield tag="035" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">4270827</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="035" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">4270827</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="035" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">(OCoLC)44163773</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="040" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">CGU</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">CGU</subfield>
> <subfield code="d">OCoLC</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="049" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">CGUA</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="100" ind1="1" ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">Robinson, Thomas.</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="245" ind1="1" ind2="0">
> <subfield code="a">Anatomie of the English nvnnery at Lisbon in
> Portvgall</subfield>
> <subfield code="h">[microform].</subfield>
> <subfield code="b">Dissected and laid open by one that was
> sometime a yonger brother of the couent: Who (if the grace of God had
> not preuented him) might have growne as old in a wicked life as the
> oldest amongst them.</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">Pub. by authoritie. (By Thomas Robinson of
> King's Lynn). 1622.</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="260" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">King's Lynn :</subfield>
> <subfield code="b">Thew and son, pub. by E.M. Beloe,</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">[1922?]</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="300" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">2 p. l.,</subfield>
> <subfield code="b">facsim. (4 p. l., 32 p.) 1 l.</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">28 cm.</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="533" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">Microfilm.</subfield>
> <subfield code="b">Chicago :</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">University of Chicago Library,</subfield>
> <subfield code="d">2000.</subfield>
> <subfield code="e">1 microfilm reel ; 35 mm.</subfield>
> <subfield code="f">(History of religions preservation project,
> MN41672.1)</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="610" ind1="2" ind2="0">
> <subfield code="a">Sion House (Lisbon, Portugal)</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="830" ind1=" " ind2="0">
> <subfield code="a">History of religions preservation
> project;</subfield>
> <subfield code="v">MN41672.1.</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="949" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">JRL</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">MicSLN</subfield>
> <subfield code="e">41672.1</subfield>
> <subfield code="g">c.1</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="903" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">MARS</subfield>
> </datafield>
> <datafield tag="985" ind1=" " ind2=" ">
> <subfield code="a">microfm41672.1</subfield>
> <subfield code="b">c.1</subfield>
> <subfield code="c">UCSLN</subfield>
> <subfield code="d">JRL</subfield>
> <subfield code="e">Mic</subfield>
> <subfield code="r">mq7090430</subfield>
> <subfield code="s">n</subfield>
> <subfield code="t">stks</subfield>
> </datafield>
> </record>
>
Received on Fri May 25 2007 - 19:50:47 EDT