Break

Monday is a holiday and I'm taking off Tuesday, making this a long weekend. South Padre here we come. So there will be no more posts until Wednesday. I'm not taking a laptop or PDA. No technical reading. Just a break from thinking. Hope y'all can do the same.

Metadata

A few recent articles by Roy Tennant in Library Journal provide a good introduction metadata.

Digital Libraries- Metadata As If Libraries Depended on It

Digital Libraries- The Importance of Being Granular

Digital Libraries- The Consequences of Cataloging

I like his definition "cataloging by those paid better than librarians."

GILS

Just received this notice about the Government Information Locator Service:

Through the efforts of several people, we now have a draft Web Services Description Language (WSDL) file for the GILS search service, available for review.

This draft only defines GILS search using "HTTP Get", following the extended ZURL. The search response message follows the definition given. (BTW, these definitions align with the ZX client from Dave Vieglais.)

Future discussions of GILS as a Web Service will be conducted mostly on the GILS Version 3 Discussion List. Subscribe to the GILS V3 list.

Z39.50

A new version of YAZ has been released, May 22. Here is the notice:

"The current version of YAZ includes experimental support for the industry standard ZOOM API for Z39.50. This API vastly simplifies the process of writing new clients using YAZ, and it reduces your dependency on any single toolkit. Future versions of YAZ may include support for other emerging IR protocols through the same interface."

Art Metadata

Another resource from the Getty Institute is the Categories for the Description of Works of Art (CDWA). This is the description from the introduction:

"The Categories describe the content of art databases by articulating a conceptual framework for describing and accessing information about objects and images. They identify vocabulary resources and descriptive practices that will make information residing in diverse systems both more compatible and more accessible. They also provide a framework to which existing art information systems can be mapped and upon which new systems can be developed."

I've had the pleasure of hearing Murtha Baca speak at the ALCTS Metadata and AACR2 Institute. If you get the opportunity to hear her talk about what the Getty is doing, it is well worth the time.

MARC21

The following additional proposals are available for review by the MARC 21 community. They will be discussed in a meeting of the MARC Advisory Committee on June 15-16, 2002 in Atlanta. A draft agenda for that meeting is available.

The following papers are now available:

Proposal No. 2002-12: Coding for Publication Pattern at the First Level of Enumeration in MARC 21 Holdings Records

Proposal No. 2002-13: Changes for Faceted Application of Subject Terminology (FAST) Subject Headings Changes in Field 008 in the MARC 21 Holdings Format

Proposal No. 2002-14: Proposal No. 2002-14: Changes for UKMARC Format Alignment

Proposal No. 2002-15: Defining field 065 (Other Classification Number) in the MARC 21 Authority Format

Metadata

"The MD3 (Metadata3) Project takes a different approach to metadata - instead of having to create and implement new systems to handle new types of metadata, why not make new types of metadata work with our current systems?" The plan consists of transforming metadata from one format, say RDF, into another, such as MARC. The other component involves peer to peer (P2P) sharing of the records. Something like the Docster proposal.

Semantic Web

Two items today from a 'blog I recently found, usr/lib/info! This looks like an interesting site. Not much available yet, however.

The Semantic Web and Libraries by Art is "a column I am working on for InsideOLITA and would welcome any and all feedback."

Resource Description Framework

OCLC, as part of the Dublin Core project, has made available an open source toolkit for RDF, the EOR toolkit.

"The EOR toolkit is a collection of extensible Java classes and services which serve as a code base, demonstrating by example functions and services common to RDF applications, i.e., metadata capture, search engines, etc.. The current release provides services designed to validate RDF, build and search RDF triple stores (HTTP and Java API) and render RDF data using XSLT."

The latest issue of Information Technologies & Libraries (2002), v. 21, no. 1 pp. 27-31 has an article on the toolkit. "The EOR Toolkit: An Open Source Solution for RDF Metadata" by Harry R. Wagner.

Library Catalogs

Another open source library catalog. PhpMyLibrary version 1.0.4b has been released. It consists of Webpac, Record import, Cataloging and Holdings modules. It takes MARC records.

"The new version has been released. The file can be downloaded PhpMyLibrary-1.0.4b here! This is a version that have a Holdings and Cataloging Modules Added. The recent module only consisted of WebPAC module and Record Import module, now you can make your own catalog entry, put an accession to it, and you're done. Your new book or material are ready for browsing online."

Spelling

Here is another listing of misspelled words found in our catalogs, Common Spelling Mistakes. Not sure how it was compiled or the relationship to the list by Terry Ballard, Typographical Errors in Library Databases. Thanks to David Schuster for pointing this one out to me.

Controlled Vocabularies

The Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning (McREL) has a standards database. If considering curriculum-enhanced MARC it could be a useful tool.

Curriculum-Enhanced MARC

At the Friday meeting curriculum-enhanced MARC was discussed. A good overview of the standard is available at NWOET.

It requires field 520 Summary, 521 Target Audience Note and 658 Index Term, Curriculum Objective.

Cataloging

Seen on a button from OCLC "Cataloging is a public service."

Geographic Cutters

From the latest WAML News & Notes:

"California regional and city geographic cutter numbers (G4362 and G4364) have been updated by Traci Penrod of the Earth Sciences and Map Library and the University of California, Berkeley. These lists are on the web:
Region Cutters
City Cutters"