CATALOG COORDINATING COUNCIL MINUTES

January 25, 2007--DRAFT/2

Present: Joan Swanekamp (chair), Steven Arakawa, Helen Bartlett, Matthew Beacom, Eva Bolkovac, Ellen Cordes (recording), Sarah Elman, Eric Friede, Rebecca Hamilton, Abdul Hannawi, Robert Killheffer, Beatrice Luh, Nancy Lyon, Tachtorn Meier (Wheat), Jenn Nolte, Anthony Oddo, Dorothy Rachmat, Martha Repp, Britta Santamauro, Manon Theroux, Patricia Thurston, Stephen Young.

Guests: Katherine Adams, Rowena Griem

Absent: Edita Baradi, Marsha Garman, Ellen Jaramillo, Daniel Lovins, E.C. Schroeder, Karen Spicher, Dajin Sun, David Walls, Melissa Wisner

Announcements:

None.

Agenda items

1. Rowena and Kathy presented the report from the Access Level Record Task Force. The task force (which included Curtis Orio, Marsha Garman, Polly Chang and Britta Santamauro) had been charge with examining the PCC/CONSER access level record; specifically, the task force examined these five issues:

1)  Assess impact on current policies and recommend revisions to current policies or identify need for new policies;

2)  Identify procedures that require revision and new procedures to be developed;

3)  Assess impact on catalog users and recommend strategies for publicizing new policies;

4)  Recommend a training plan;

5)  Recommend an implementation timeline.

The recommendation of the task force, after considering the first point is that the Access Level standard be accepted. This proposal creates streamlined, full-level catalog records. It is a new national serials standard that functions as a base. It replaces the existing full and core standards. Librarians are free to employ cataloger’s judgment and add fields outside the limits CONSER specifies as mandatory. Within this proposal librarians may respond to institutional needs and the information-seeking behavior of local populations. This standard reflects a larger shift underway in cataloging. The importance of full (and even exhaustive) bibliographic description is giving way to need for end-users to identify a work within a digital context.

As to the second issue the task force was asked to consider, it determined that CPDC and CCC would need to reconsider only minor points where local policy differs from the national practices. Specifically, the elimination of uniform titles represented a departure from current practice but a huge savings in time. The task force recommended that uniform titles only be created locally if there was a conflict that caused problems from a PS perspective. There was some discussion to clarify the current understanding and the implications of the recommendation to adopt the CONSER standard on Authority control, especially on foreign titles.

The question of timing is still up in the air. Various members reported on what they heard at various ALA Midwinter meetings. Joan noted that many of the questions were still up in the air and out of our control. The timing piece depends on JSC but the current thinking seems to be that the pilot will be in March and April, analysis in April, and final report will be in May with a start up after ALA in June.

CCC adopted the task force’s recommendations. Steve Arakawa is going to hold off updating the documentation until after the final report in May/June as now it is something of a moving target; the SCCTP site will have documentation that will undoubtedly prove helpful, too. In answer to Joan’s question about kinds of training needed, Eva stated that her team will need training for maintenance issues and would prefer sit-down sessions with examples. Steve observed that the CONSER standard no longer required standard abbreviations in 362. Support staff who rely on the bibliographic description for the abbreviations of months and volume captions will now have to consult the AACR2/ISO tables of abbreviations. Joan asked that in the next couple of weeks CCC members let her know what kind of training these changes will necessitate – when they deviate from the standard; what are the implications of these changes for their units. Rebecca will talk to Curtis and Marcia to find out what they need at the time of order creation.

Manon raised the question as to whether records not coded as CONSER could still be coded as full if the cataloger otherwise followed the CONSER standard guidelines. Manon suggested that an encoding level of "full" for such records is misleading since they may have statements of responsibility and series statements omitted from the transcription if the corresponding access points are established, which is not valid practice according to current AACR2 standards. The LCRIs that have been proposed to allow the omission of statements of responsibility are labelled as applying only to CONSER records (which our records would not be). No LCRIs have yet been proposed that would allow the omission of transcribed series statements (though these may come later). Standards will change with RDA but we are currently operating in an AACR2 environment and coding our records as such. Steven A. reported that he had queried both OCLC [via the OCLC listserve] and a CONSER liaison from LC (Hien Nguyen) at Midwinter. The understanding is that if a non-CONSER library contributes a record that follows the CONSER guidelines, it should be coded as full. However, Ms. Nguyen encouraged Yale to reconsider CONSER membership.

Final observations: Rowena noted that this decision will not mean any changes for existing records. Steve A. noted that experienced CONSER catalogers thought the best part of the CONSER standard record guidelines was the appendix on title changes, which clarifies and simplifies decisions.

2) Matthew presented his report on a proposed policy for 856 links in bibliographic and holdings records. He reported on his work with CPDC. The initial straw man proposal was to establish a policy that across the board all 856 urls be removed from the BIB records for tangible collections materials. In the CPDC meeting, however, members came up with a list of exceptions to this rule. Upon further consideration of this issue from the user’s perspective, CPDC took another approach. Given fuller consideration of the whole range of issues--especially work flow for copy catalogers--CPDC rejected the restrictive “straw man” policy for URLs in Orbis records. Instead, CPDC recommended a policy that accepts URLs in member/LC records for tangible resources and defines the conditions for including URLs in original cataloging. URLs in records for batch loads will be case by case. For example, GPO loads will include the URLs to the remote document. URL maintenance will be performed retroactively by Catalog Management through the use of link checking software, and problem identification and resolution routines.

Eva reported that there are 200-1600 broken urls per month but that a high percentage of those are “time outs’. The report does not distinguish between urls that Yale pays for and those for which there is no access for Yale users. CCC accepted the recommendation that the Library leave 856s coming in on copy cataloging as is with the assumption that they link to valuable materials. If there are complaints from PS staff or patrons, the Library will remove the links. Eva asked if the Library could look into PURLs and the OCLC service. Joan asked that the document make it clear that the examination of the url be post-cataloging and automated. Next steps: CPDC will create a procedure and policy document for 1) original cataloging, 2) copy cataloging, and 3) maintenance issues vis-à-vis the 856 articulating when it is okay to link from tangible to digital. Serials are an obvious exception as are electronic versions that we have purchased – policy dictates that separate records are made for electronic copies. It is okay for BRBL, LWL, and Map Collections to link to digital copies from the records for the original. The use of PURLs again was encouraged to handle the renaming or movement of servers as in the recent case of the new server in the Map Collection.

Nancy Lyon announced that the Manuscripts Committee would be forwarding soon to CCC a recommendation on how to formulate urls in the 856 for digital assets including the distinction between groups versus single items. Matthew and Joan will work with Karen Kupiec about creating an internal service or contract for a PURL service.

3. After presenting background on the VCAS (Voyager Cataloging and Authority Support Committee), Patricia put forth 3 action items: Action 1. Move to dissolve the Voyager Cataloging and Authorities Support (VCAS) Committee as the various elements of the charge have either been completed, or have evolved into independent routine processes. Action 2: Move that the MacroExpress Subcommittee become a committee that reports directly to CCC. Action 3:Move that the Voyager Tag Table subcommittee become a committee that reports directly to CCC.

Discussion centered on the perceived shortcomings of the last release. One of the goals of this committee was to standardize testing of new releases by creating a script that could be re-used for each release to insure that nothing was missed. Manon felt that the existing script was too short and that there was a lack of communication within the Cataloging Department. All information was channeled back to Melissa with the result that testers within the unit did not know what others were doing. Eva reported that Melissa had a great system in place and that perhaps using a Wiki next time might address some of the communication and coordination concerns raised by the recent experience. Joan noted that the process of testing and communicating about the process helped jog people’s memory to insure that everything was tested. Joan will have a follow up discussion with Melissa and Audrey Novak and invite them to CCC meeting to insure that everything happens next time that needs to happen. Eva reported that at Melissa had created a very complete and complex table for testing at Uconn and that this would serve as a great model.

4. Steven Arakawa gave a demo of a new solution to the problem of directing patrons from one record to another when there are multiple titles (or a change in titles) bound together in a single volume. [See example in Orbis HX15 .Y25 1979 1 (LC).] The issue is that the circulation status is attached to only one of the records and in order to see the circulation status or place a request the patron needs to call up another record. Depending on the situation – analytic, title change, bound with, etc. – the directions for doing this look up can be complex and baffling to the user. Steven showed the test record with the 856 in the MFHD and the proposed hyperlinked circulation message:

For circulation status, and to place requests, search series title: Yamamoto Senji zenshu.

He discussed the advantages and disadvantages: the dependency on the long term existence of the BIB ID. [We transferred the NOTIS bib number, but will we want to do this again with our next system.] Does the clarity of the message and ease of the hyper link out way the maintenance issue? Can we manage the urls in an automated way? The use of this technique does become a conversion issue. [As an aside, Joan noted that we will probably begin looking for a new system in about 2 years time.] Eva proposed that we do away with the whole idea of the bound-with, artificial MFHD procedure as it was terribly complicated, confusing and time-consuming. Eva and Steven will send out especially complicated examples for CCC to consider. Manon made a final observation that Cornell does a collection level record with cataloger’s titles and then lists the titles in the 505 field.

The meeting ended at 12:05.

Respectfully submitted by E. Cordes.

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