"This paper seeks to provide a philosophical framework for choices made about library priorities and cataloging policy, the contexts in which they are made, and the consequences they have for users. The authors invoke the notion of utility as a philosophical backdrop for dealing with competing library choices and the fallout from those prioritizations. They then look at how general utilitarian principles can contextualize the layers of wants, needs, and resource allocations in the research library environment. Finally, they examine issues and recent developments at the Cornell University Library as a case study with which to illustrate some of these principles."

Problem statement: Cultural heritage, bibliographic and archival communities use different controlled vocabularies for the resources that they manage. These controlled vocabularies may not be recognized by very diverse user communities, and ignored by large commercial information hubs and Internet search engines. Metadata needs to flow among diverse environments and reach users wherever they are. The semantic, hierarchical, and granular relationships in controlled vocabularies are often lost when retrieved outside the environment in which they were created.

Problem statement: Creating metadata that suits local needs, readily aggregates across communities, and is easily exposed to Internet search engines remains a costly enterprise. Metadata created by libraries, archives and museums is generally not available to the user communities that look first to Internet search engines. Although mapping data structures has become a commonplace solution to integrate descriptions, real interoperability across the libraries, archives and museums communities cannot be achieved without addressing differences of description at the data-content level.

Objective: Engage the RLG partnership in adapting descriptive practice to economic realities, user expectations, and the requirements of network-level services. Set new expectations for investing in metadata creation and maintenance, model attendant workflows, and facilitate the discovery of research institutions' resources by users wherever they are.

"Cataloger's Learning Workshop is a clearinghouse portal for cataloging and metadata training resources for information workers. The scope of Cataloger's Learning Workshop includes bibliographic information training in the context of formal library and information science degree programs, as well as continuing education for library practitioners. Cataloger's Learning Workshop is a cooperative project of the Library of Congress, the Program for Cooperative Cataloging, and the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services, a division of the American Library Association.
"

The Cataloging Distribution Service, Library of Congress, has posted to its web site an announcement that the training materials posted to the Cataloger*s Learning Workshop will be available for downloading at no cost on or about 1 October 2008.

Famous Catalogers’ Course

Handy chart for interpreting German Fraktur

"OCLC has launched a pilot project to explore upstream metadata capture and enhancement using publisher and vendor ONIX metadata. Pilot partners from the publishing, vendor and library communities are assisting us in this effort. We hope the pilotwill result in ongoing processes for the early addition of new title metadata to WorldCat and enhanced quality and consistency in upstream title metadata used by multiple channels."

 

 

Deanna Marcum's response to the "On The Record" report of the LC working group (June 1, 2008)

Goals of this unit

1. To acquaint and/or refresh those who need to become familiar with current aspects of descriptive cataloging specific to serials
2. To acquaint those who need to become familiar with historical trends in serials cataloging

 

Formerly Promptcat

The Future of Cataloging: A PALINET Symposium (Thursday, May 29, 2008, The College of Physicians of Philadelphia)

 

Keynote Address:Karen Calhoun, Vice President, OCLC WorldCat and Metadata Services, will present an overview of the current state of cataloging and the future direction of bibliographic control.

 

Now updated with audio recordings and slides (from most of the presenters)!

 

 

My slides from the The Future of Cataloging: A PALINET Symposium (5/29/08).   I was part of a panel responding to Karen Calhoun's keynote address:  Traveling Through Transitions in Technical Services: From Surviving to Thriving

John Mark Ockerbloom's review of the Palinet Symposium on the future of cataloging

BIBCO's core record standards combined in chart form

This is a revision of the 1961 "Paris Principles"

 

Comments due by June 30, 2008, to Barbara Tillett, Chair, IFLA's IME ICC Planning Committee at btil@loc.gov or fax to +1 (202) 707-6629.

See form at: http://www.ifla.org/VII/s13/icc/IME-ICC_final_vote_form_200804.doc

 

 

"Planet Cataloging is an automatically-generated aggregation of blogs related to cataloging and metadata"

From Cataloging Futures: 

 

"Martha Yee has a new article available at the UC eScholarship repository, Cataloging, Compared to Descriptive Bibliography, Abstracting and Indexing Services and Metadata."

OLAC / MOUG Conference
September 26 - September 28, 2008
Renaissance Cleveland Hotel

Announcing the 13th bienniel Online Audiovisual Catalogers (OLAC) Conference. In 2008, the conference is being held jointly with the Music OCLC Users Group (MOUG). This year's conference is in Cleveland, Ohio and includes: Preconference: a one-day Map Cataloging Workshop on Thursday, September 25

A blast from the past (including good old electric erasers ;)

Now updated to include preservation and circulation artifacts, and other misc. library 'technology' 

Toward a Code of Ethics for Cataloging
Sheila Bair - Technical Services Quarterly, 2005

Cataloging is the foundation of librarianship, and catalogers are professionals with special skills that set them apart from the profession in general and give them unique ethical responsibilities.

"Steroid" Scandal Rocks Major League Libraries, a satirical response to erosion of support for cataloging at the Library of Congress, by Daniel Cohen (December 14, 2007).

From Catalogablog:

"The full text of the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) incorporating the amended definition of the expression entity as well as the errata identified to date has been made available on IFLANET in both PDF and HTML formats.

For the first time, the HTML versions of both the current text and the original 1998 text include the tables, rather than just references to the PDF version."

"This deals with with Library of Congress procedures and workflows now that the Library has moved its processing of non-roman materials to its Voyager database.

PCC members will find the information in questions 3--6 relevant to matters of languages, dual fields, bi-directionality, spacing, and the eventual use of non-roman data in authority records."

Registry of individuals (and a few companies) who do contract cataloging

"Columbia University Libraries' Robert Wolven reflects on what's next for cooperative cataloging"

Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS) of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL)response to the LC Working Group

The Chronicle covers the LC Working Group report!

"The PCC Ad Hoc Series Review Task Force seeks your comments on its "Discussion Paper on PCC Series Policies and Practices"

The paper is intended to generate comments useful in making
recommendations for the future direction of PCC series practices and policies. Any individuals or organizations interested in series control policies, practices, and services are welcome to comment.

The task force membership and charges are available
from: http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/archive/SeriesReviewTF.html

"The cataloging rules hotlinked below represent an attempt to realize and/or demonstrate what I thought I heard being described at the International Conference on the Principles & Future Development of AACR in Toronto in October, 1997, the meeting that launched the effort to design a replacement for AACR2. Perhaps those of us at the meeting were each feeling a different part of the elephant, as RDA does not resemble these cataloging rules in the least!"

Images of hand-written cards from the Penn card catalog

OLAC CAPC Video Language Coding Best Practices Task Force

Draft Recommendations (October 2007)

The task force was charged with creating a set of best practices for coding MARC 008/lang and 041 language information for videos, especially DVDs, and with using that exercise to examine whether any changes could be made to the MARC format (coding or directions) that would improve access to the multiple types of language information found on videos.

"We are pleased to announce publication of Differences Between, Changes Within: Guidelines on When to Create a New Record (revised edition, 2007). This revised edition is now available as a free, 38-page download (.pdf) and is no longer available as a print publication.

Originally intended to be an appendix to the 2002 AACR2 rule revisions, Differences Between, Changes Within evolved into a stand-alone document that supplements current descriptive cataloging rules by providing information about creating new records or updating existing records.

The document helps guide the cataloger in determining whether the item in hand can be cataloged with existing copy or requires a new bibliographic record. General guidelines are followed by specific guidelines for manifestation-level records for single-part monographs, multipart monographs, integrating resources, and serials. The text describes what constitutes a major difference between manifestations, requiring the creation of an original record, as well as detailing major changes within a serial manifestation that would lead to the creation of a new record. In addition, guidance is also provided to identify minor changes that would not require a new bibliographic record, but might necessitate updating an existing record.

The new edition of Differences Between, Changes Within reflects changes through the final set of amendments to AACR2, which were issued in 2005. Some guidelines have been changed and some removed. All rule references have been verified and updated wherever necessary."

This blog has "News, research, and other information of interest to serials catalogers."

"A reference card (4 pp.) listing (1) cataloging activities authorized for each OCLC authorization level, including Search, Limited, Full, and higher, and (2) types of master record updates authorized for Full and higher authorizations. Covers both the Connexion browser and client."

Especially note the last page which notes types of record updates possible (Minimal level upgrade, database enrichment, and enhance)

 

 

"This group recommended a new level of cataloging, emphasizing data elements that allow catalog users to search for and find records, while de-emphasizing data elements that have traditionally been used in full level records to describe and identify the resource but are not as relevant to remote access electronic resources, or do not support resource discovery."

Site includes links to the report, Mandatory Data Elements, Draft Cataloging Guidelines and several PP presentations about the project

Another way to clean-up your metadata

"Cataloging librarians comprise a small but valuable subset of the library profession that provides critical but sometimes hidden services to their libraries.

With this document, the [CCS Executive Committee] hopes to provide catalogers and cataloging managers a tool for describing the critical importance of cataloging librarians.

Cataloging librarianship is, at its heart, about service. Cataloging librarians provide customer service, through their work, to thousands of users who use library catalogs and databases on a daily basis, as well as supporting future library users. They create coherent catalogs, which enable a reliable search experience for users, many of whom use the catalog remotely without access to a librarian who can interpret results or respond to questions."

Dated 6/2006; posted on ALCTS web 2007

Collections Define Cataloging's Future
B Simpson - The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 2007 - Elsevier

Mostly a review of the literature, but also a call to change the focus of catalogers to work on special collections. 

Project pulls together articles, etc. on the topic of Hidden Collections. These are uncataloged, unprocessed and/or unconverted collections, often rare or special, which are hidden from library users because they are not available in the catalog.

Creating Access to Invisible Special Collections: Using Participatory Management to Reduce a Backlog
MW Lundy, DR Hollis - The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 2004 - Elsevier

Special Collections Cataloging at a Crossroads: A Survey of ARL Libraries
BM Russell - The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 2004 - Elsevier

Basic Values and the Future of Cataloging
presentations from an ALCTS/CCS Forum, Jan. 21, 2007 from 8 to 10 am at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Seattle, Washington

This project pulls together the official documents from the LC Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control, along with various commentary on the open meetings. 1st meeting: March 8, 2007 Users and Uses of Bibliographic Data 2nd meeting: May 9, 2007 Structures and Standards for Bibliographic Data 3rd meeting: July 9, 2007 Economics and Organization of Bibliographic Data

Save the date!  The 2008 joint conference of OLAC (Online Audiovisual
Catalogers) and MOUG (Music OCLC Users Group) will take place in
Cleveland, Ohio, from Friday, September 26 - Sunday, September 28, 2008.
Preconference will occur Thursday, Sept. 25th.

A prototype of how RDA might work as an online tool

6/13/07 The co-publishers of RDA have created a short survey on user preferences for a print version of RDA. 

Home page for the working group.

Brief blog entry comparing tagging and controlled vocab.

"tagging has brought metadata to the masses"  

Two meanings of identifier = Two Functions of ‘Identifiers' => Fulfilled with only one mechanism in traditional anglo-american cataloging.

And the harm this causes.

Roy Tennant sampled 856 fields in MARC records to see whether there is a reliable method of determining the availability of the full text access based on the coding the the 856.  His results show wide variablity in the coding, and he argues for one consistant method to code for full text.

A new blog on the future of cataloging. 

"The focus of this blog is the future of cataloging and metadata in libraries. The preparation of the new cataloging code, RDA: Resource Description and Access, is a significant issue. The future of the MARC 21 format will also be explored. ILS/OPAC's future will be touch on also, but will not be the central focus. Also, I hope to use this blog to collocate some of the important papers, articles, websites, etc. that deal with the future of cataloging and metadata.
"

Reflections on metadata, cataloging and digitial libraries

"The Program for Cooperative Cataloging is an international cooperative effort aimed at expanding access to library collections by providing useful, timely, and cost-effective cataloging that meets mutually-accepted standards of libraries around the world."

 

Roy Tennant rehashes the Coyle and Hillmann article from D-Lib

New (1/07) website at LC

The new home of the archives of the Autocat discussion list

Create image of an old catalog card, including hand-written annotations

Useful list of who to contact about different cataloging-related topics at LC

Library Journal's take on the LC working group on Future of Bibliographic Control. 

Interesting that the represented group include Google and Microsoft, in addition to the regular library reps.

The Library of Congress announced a Working Group to discuss the future of Bibliographic Control.  

They will sponser several regional forums to gather info. and release a draft report for comments by Sept 2007,

with a final report by Nov. 2007

I believe that this is the follow-up promised following the announcement of the changes in series access

announced earlier in 2006. 

Several working documents discussing how to make RDA less English-centric.

This PDF doc has a useful list of specialized cataloging tools, mostly format or language focused tools. 

Revised development schedule:
* March-June 2007: Review of revised chapter 3
* July-September 2007: Review of revised chapters 6-7
* December 2007-March 2008: Review of part B
* July-September 2008: Review of complete draft of RDA

RDA is scheduled for release in early 2009.

The virtual reality site Second Life has several virtual libraries and is now looking for catalogers to help with
creating a virtual catalog for their virtual resources [yes, this is for real  - or is it???]

The 'classic' list of high probability typos in library catalogs.

An interesting interview with Barbara Tillett describes the process by which LSCH is changed, and responds to some of Sanford Berman's criticisms of LCSH.

Simple tool will create a MARC record based on the Amazon metadata.  Just insert the ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number = ISBN or other standard number).   Subjects and name headings are a bit suspect, but the descriptive looks OK.   I didn't try the download feature, so I'm not sure if the records are true MARC (to move to another system).

Informal presentation by Mary Charles Lasater (Vanderbilt) on making SACO proposals based on MESH terms and other thesauri.   Since LCSH terms are generally based on literary warrant from print monographs, often new terminology will appear in journal articles first (particularly in the sciences).   Using these other sources increases interoperability between LCSH and other thesauri.

OLAC:  Online Audiovisual Catalogers

Believe it or not--Inside Higher Ed reports on a cataloging topic!  The article is a basic summary of the LC series decision with references to the Karen Calhoun report and Thomas Mann's rebutal.  

The draft of part A, chapters 6-7 of RDA (formerly known as RDA part II) is available for comment until Sept 1 2006

The main RDA page on the JSC website.  Includes background and FAQ and drafts for review.

The final version of LC's series policy as implemented

LC issued this FAQ 5/31/06 in preparation for their implementation of the new series policy

PDF file:  LC Professional Guild, AFSCME 2910 resolution on LC's Series Decision

by Deanna Marcum, Library of Congress

Implementation delay until June 1 2006

Created by the ALCTS CCS Committee on Education, Training and Recruitment for Cataloging (CETRC), this outline and bibliography is a useful tool for training catalogers.   (PDF)

 

LC's Press release on Karen Calhoun's report  "The Changing Nature of the Catalog and Its Integration with Other Discovery Tools"

PDF report at:  http://www.loc.gov/catdir/calhoun-report-final.pdf 

Links to several essays on the future of cataloging, including a recent (April 2006) addition by Thomas Mann which is a review of Karen Calhoun's report on the topic.

Blog report of conference presentation by Roy Tennant, California Digital Library and Andrew Pace, North carolina State University (NCSU). Nice summary of issues

URL for Word doc. is:  http://www.iub.edu/~libtserv/pub/Future_of_Cataloging_White_Paper.doc

URL for white paper is:   http://libraries.universityofcalifornia.edu/sopag/BSTF/Final.pdf