Round Robin of Issues of Importance (major events/developments/concerns) to Local Institutions
These reports were distributed over the Big Heads electronic discussion list in the weeks prior to the New Orleans, LA midwinter meeting in January 2002.
For the minutes of the Big Heads meeting at New Orleans, click on http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~ulcjh/bh12002min.html
This compilation was prepared by Judith Hopkins, University at Buffalo
SOME OF THE FOLLOWING LIBRARIES DID *NOT* ISSUE A ROUND ROBIN REPORT.
Columbia University
Cornell University
Duke University
Harvard University
Indiana University
Library of Congress
National Agricultural Library
National Library of Medicine
New York Public Library
New York University
Ohio State University
Pennsylvania State University
Princeton University
Stanford University
University of California at Berkeley
University of California at Los Angeles
University of Chicago
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Michigan
University of Minnesota
University of Pennsylvania
University of Texas at Austin
University of Virginia
University of Washington
University of Wisconsin at Madison
Yale University
The library is under a hiring freeze mandated by the Governor and the University. The freeze is in anticipation of a budget cut in the next fiscal year, but we won't have any information on the extent of the cut until the end of January 2002 at the earliest. To prepare for the cut, which we think will affect only recurring funds, the Library has reviewed and prioritized our approximately 40 open librarian and staff positions in anticipation of returning the funds for those positions to the campus. We have also decided to exempt from the freeze and fill 10.75 positions in the highest category. Technical Services has a Germanic cataloger, a serials cataloger and two library assistant positions in acquisitions among the exempt positions to be filled.
Technical Services is considering ways to better use existing staff in light of the overwhelming number of low-level vendor records in the utilities, which don't easily fall into the categories of original or copy cataloging. For one week in December we experimented with all staff who could do LC classification working on the current German and Italian materials in the backlog that had vendor records. During that week we were able to upgrade approximately 1,400 vendor records using OCLC's CatMe.
We are planning to expand a pilot project in which we have been using the Academic Book Center's Book Bag and E-Link systems for firm ordering and tagging approval materials. The pilot included our math and physics libraries, and we hope to extend the use of the AcBC systems for ordering all our other science materials.
Lee Leighton
AUL and Director, Technical Services
BUDGET
Constrained budgets for the rest of this year and for next year require that we find ways to reduce expenditures. As a first step in this strategizing effort the Library Council is engaged in a process of reviewing current goals and accomplishments, focusing on what we are doing well and what we would like to do better or start doing. The next step will be to identify what we can do differently, and what we can (or will have to) stop doing.
STAFF DEVELOPMENT
Acknowledging that the Library is evolving as an organization, and staff skills must also evolve in response to new and different service requirements, a program was developed to identify required knowledge and skills, and to design programs that reflect both staff needs and Library needs.
This multi-part program includes: Computer Training, Brown Bag Lunches, Basic Supervisory Training, Performance Appraisal Training, Library Orientation.
One of our newest activities is a Management Training program that is intended for supervisors with some experience. The purpose of this program is to cultivate managers with good leadership skills in support of the Library's mission and to bring leadership and management concepts into the Library in a new way.
GRADUATE LIBRARY SCHOOL TUITION ASSISTANCE PROGRAM
The Library has created a tuition assistance program to support staff interested in completing an MLIS or MLS degree. This program complements University benefits that provide tuition remission at the University or tuition payment for an employee's first undergraduate degree.
This program hopes to encourage staff to consider careers as librarians in university research libraries while also providing opportunities for development and growth as a member of the library staff.
IMPROVEMENTS IN THE ONLINE CATALOG AND IN ACCESS TO ELECTRONIC RESOURCES
A major advance was the implementation of a new search interface developed by Epixtech for the online catalog. The new system provides faster keyword searching with full Boolean capabilities and other new features. Library staff conducted systematic usability studies with faculty and students and worked closely with the vendor in the development of the new searching capabilities.
Cataloging continues to give a high priority to rapid cataloging of newly acquired electronic resources, as one way of making their existence known to our patrons. Developing additional mechanisms to guide people through the maze of electronic resources and help them find information continues to be a challenge. The implementation of SFX has facilitated automatic access from a number of electronic indexing services to the full text of the indexed electronic resources. We are exploring the option of obtaining and loading into Horizon MARC records for the titles contained in our various aggregated electronic resource packages.
ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGES
The University's Dissertation Office, previously part of the Office of Academic Publications, has moved to the Library administratively as well as physically. The Office provides guidance to students writing dissertations, disseminating prescribed standards, helping writers to understand and follow them, and assuring quality control.
The relationship between the Library and the Office extends back to the first deposits of dissertations into the Library's collection and has expanded in the years since as issues of bibliographic control, binding, preservation, access, and archiving have evolved. The Library is well-positioned to take on the Dissertation Office's current responsibilities and to expand them to meet new needs, assisting students in understanding electronic publishing and related computer-based applications, as well as addressing emerging issues such as electronic dissertation production, digital archives, and rights management.
OUTREACH
In addition to orientation sessions for new students in specific disciplines that librarians have conducted for many years, staff have found opportunities to teach class sessions on how to use particular resources, to demonstrate search strategies that may be complex but basic to discipline, or to collaborate with faculty members in designing library-oriented assignments.
Increased use of information by faculty in teaching and research raises the issue of support for the development and hosting of Web sites and databases devoted to research materials. In response to requests from faculty, the Library has agreed to provide support for the Web site of the Society of Early China Studies and a database of early Chinese bronze inscriptions. These kind of technology applications are new activities, and the most appropriate locus of support for them within the University is unclear. A small number of collaborations between faculty and the Library will help clarify the kind of support that is needed and how it might be provided.
Judith Nadler
Associate Director
University of Chicago Library
773 702-8743
FAX 773 702-6623
judi@midway.uchicago.edu
http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/e/
University Librarian
On September 1st, James Neal assumed the position of Vice President, Information Services and University Librarian, following Elaine Sloan's retirement at the end of June. The position continues to oversee both the Libraries and Academic Information Systems. We will soon begin recruiting for an Associate University Librarian for Collections, replacing Tony Ferguson.
New ILS
Our search continues for a new integrated library system to replace NOTIS. We are currently evaluating responses to our RFP, and expect to have a decision by the end of March, with implementation planned for summer 2003.
Remote Shelving
RECAP, the remote shelving facility owned jointly by Columbia, New York Public, and Princeton, is scheduled to open on January 14th. Three modules have been constructed, with a total capacity of about 7.5 million volumes. The consortium expects to transfer and accession about 8,000 items every day for the first year of operation. For Columbia, the first modules will consolidate materials from our three existing remote shelving facilities, plus housing additional transfers from campus libraries.
Renovation, New Facilities
Renovation of Butler Library continues, with work commencing on ten subject-based research reading rooms on the upper floors of the building. Renovation of the Avery Art and Architecture Library, including construction of a new study center housing art properties, drawings, and archives, is scheduled to begin this spring. Our newest library, at the Biosphere 2 Research Center in Oracle, Arizona, is scheduled to open the week of January 17th.
Electronic Resources
We have contracted with Serials Solutions to provide MARC records with consolidated holdings information for the ejournal aggregators and packages we subscribe to, with monthly updates. In the meantime, we have loaded sets of records from ProQuest and EBSCO Online into our catalog, as well as records for netLibrary and Michigan's Making of America titles. We have also contracted with Ex Libris to license the SFX software. We have also extended web browsing capabilities for lists of our electronic journals, using a hierarchical topical subject approach based on LC classification.
Authority Control
Following the reprocessing of our entire database by LTI last spring, we have implemented LTI's monthly updating service, and are now extending that service to include updated bibliographic records as headings change.
Retrospective Conversion
Our OCLC retrospective conversion is slowing down as we near completion of our standard monograph collections. Currently, about 90% of our holdings are in the OPAC. By the end of the year, we will have about 400,000 titles left to be done, primarily serial analytics, pamphlets, microforms, and rare books.
LIBRARY MASTER PLAN
The Library is engaged in a major strategic-planning effort to develop a five-year master plan, which will take effect July 1. The plan's intended to address services, staffing, and space. As we reported in the last Cornell update, a Working Group on Olin and Uris Libraries is helping to plan the future for these two heavily-used buildings in a central campus location. Currently, a renovation of the first floor public service areas in Olin is underway.
STAFFING
In December, University Librarian Sarah Thomas announced a reorganization of the Library administration in which she created three new positions: Assistant University Librarian for Instruction and Learning, Research, and Information Services (Anne Kenney); Assistant University Librarian for Technical Services (Karen Calhoun); and Associate University Librarian for Collections (Ross Atkinson). Other parts of the Library organization remain essentially the same. Reorganizations are in the planning stage in some of the functional areas; information about these can be expected in Cornell's ALA annual report to this committee.
The Library has added several new librarians in its technical services centers:
Like others of us, the Cornell University Library is under a hiring freeze mandated by the University. The freeze, in effect through at least June 30, 2002, affects all non-academic, non-student appointments. Academic positions are exempted.
RECON: MELLON GRANT
Cornell University Library has received an $830,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to convert the remaining records in its card catalog. The grant will allow us to complete the conversion of all LC classes in Cornell's largest library, Olin.
DIGITAL LIBRARY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
About two years ago, Cornell entered into a development partnership with Endeavor Information Systems to build ENCompass, which is a digital library management system that addresses the issues of cross-collection searching and metadata diversity. Other development partners are Kansas State University, the Getty Research Library, and the University of Pennsylvania. The partners help with system design as well as suggest and test improvements. The ENCompass team at Cornell is currently working on three collections--a set of 10,000 digitized pamphlets from the Samuel May Anti-Slavery Collection, the Cornell E-Reference Collection (a database of proprietary and non-proprietary networked resources), and the Cornell online catalog.
ACCESS TO ELECTRONIC JOURNALS
Technical services is making good progress in responding to the high user demand for easy identification of and access to e-journals. Using data from SerialsSolutions, technical services staff are creating and loading brief MARC records into the catalog for the e-journals we currently receive in aggregators. Our subscription provides data for approximately 14,000 journals in 82 aggregators. A set of automated scripts harvests the SerialsSolution data and produces new and updated MARC records. In addition, last week 4,931 brief MARC records were loaded into the catalog for titles in LEXIS-NEXIS Academic Universe.
EDI (ELECTRONIC DATA INTERCHANGE)
With Voyager acquisitions processing now well established, EDI invoicing has been successfully implemented with our larger serials vendors (EBSCO, SwetsBlackwell and Harrassowitz). EDI monograph ordering has also been implemented with Yankee Book Peddler, Blackwell's, Academic Book Center, and Casalini Libri. CUL is moving ahead with EDI testing, expecting to achieve additional staff savings by expanding EDI activity to more applications with these vendors.
PROGRAM FOR COOPERATIVE CATALOGING
In contributing over 10,000 PCC new records and upgrades in calendar year 2001, Cornell catalogers have once again made a significant contribution to the BIBCO program.
Big Heads Round Robin Report
Faculty appointments
The past six months have brought several welcome changes to UIUC Technical Services. We have filled three original cataloger positions and are now back on track with our original cataloging activity. Each of the three positions is responsible for coordinating original cataloging in the specific areas of Sciences, Social Sciences, and Humanities. We will be receiving a training update on our NACO status in the Spring and begin contributing authority records once again. We also are nearing the end of our search for a Head of Serials Cataloging.
This fall has seen the appointment of Beth Sandore as AUL for Information Technology Policy and Planning. Beth is responsible for coordinating all areas and projects throughout the Library that deal with information technology. This will encompass digital projects as well as Library electronic resources.
We also welcomed Tom Teper as Preservation Librarian and Jennifer Hain as Conservation Librarian. Both positions mark the beginning of an established Preservation program for our Library.
Special Projects
Over the summer we successfully implemented III Millennium Acquisitions. We have been using a homegrown accounting system since the early 1980's so this is a very exciting change for us. We have successfully redesigned workflows between Acquisitions and Cataloging by moving OCLC searching to the front of the process (at the point of order) and streamlined our serials check in procedures. Hopefully in the coming months we will finalize our Promptcat profile which will help with processing our Approval Plan materials.
We have also cleared the hurdles to begin construction on a High Density Remote Storage facility. Ground breaking is scheduled for Spring. The first phase of the project will house 1 million volumes with 3 more phases (1 million each) in the planning process. The facility will also house a conservation laboratory and on-site reading room. One of the requirements for housing materials at the Site will be that items are fully cataloged. This will mean a concentrated effort on retrospective conversion over the next five years.
In September the Illinois Library Computer Systems Organization (ILCSO) contracted with Endeavor in the purchase of the Voyager ILS. This system will serve our library as well as the 44 other libraries that are members of ILSCO. At the present time we are well into implementation and are currently scheduled to come up in June 2002. As Phase 1 of this implementation, the University of Illinois at Chicago brought their (Voyager) database up on December 20, 2001.
Barb Henigman
UIUC Technical Services Division Coordinator
OFF-SITE SHELVING FACILITY:
Construction is underway of the off-site shelving facility (the IU Auxiliary Library Facility, or ALF), with a completion date projected in early fall, 2002. While selecting and preparing materials for the ALF is very time-consuming, several automated processes have been developed. Unicorn reports have been created to assist collection managers in selecting items. These reports will also generate a specially designed ALF tracking field (tag 593) in Unicorn, indicating owning library, current shelving location, call number, presence of MARC holdings record, volume, year, copy, status (selected; sent), and estimated total items to be sent. A similar data string will be generated when collection managers use the ALF Selector's Form to indicate their choices. Pick lists for sending items to the ALF will be created from those records containing 593 tags. During the first year of operation, approximately 350,000 to 400,000 items will be accessioned into ALF. Two temporary full-time positions in tech services have been hired to assist in this process.
STAFFING:
The Technical Services Department has been very fortunate to receive two new librarian lines during the past year: Electronic Resources Acquisitions Librarian and Metadata Librarian. The first has been filled; the latter is still in the search process. We have upgraded a computer support position to a high level Analyst/Programmer, an extremely valuable addition to Tech Services. In December, our Head of Acquisitions assumed a new post at the University of Tennessee. An interim head has been assigned to this position and a national search is underway. (Recommendations for potential candidates are welcome!)
OPERATIONS:
As reported previously, the final push to complete recon in early June 2001 was successful. However, that success combined with implementing a new system in 2001 had serious impact on cataloging new receipts. Recognizing the need for timely access to newly purchased materials, the Libraries awarded one-time funding to the Catalog Division to reduce the cataloging queue. This funding prompted managers to review production goals and to examine procedures and workflows. Several important changes have resulted: increased output, temporary reassignments, reviewing the possibility of combining monographic receiving (approvals and firm orders) with FastCat procedures, and expanded use of MacroExpress. MacroExpress has previously been used to generate call number labels and to expedite the creation of order records. The software is now loaded on all staff machines and saves innumerable keystrokes and mouse-clicks, particularly in the Unicorn environment.
Staff continue to gain expertise with Unicorn and are gradually feeling more at home with the new system. All serial control records will be completed by the end of this fiscal year. We have begun a shelf-ready pilot project with Ingram and continue to purchase other vendor records when available. In coordination with collection managers, refinements in policies and procedures for gift and exchange materials have been made. We have devised a plan to improve tracking electronic resources expenditures and have initiated the use of SerialsSolutions. In the coming months, Wade-Giles to Pinyin conversion awaits us -- along with many other untold opportunities.
Renovation of Research Library: We are in the design phase of a major renovation and remodel project of the Young Research Library. The goals are to improve and redesign public services and staff work spaces on three of the six floors. Consolidation of public service points, a large and hospitable reading room, group study rooms, and a cybercafé are some of the renovations we hope to make during this three-year project.
Transitions: With SIRSI announcing freezing the development of the DRA Taos system, the UCLA Library is planning the process for selection of another ILS. Vendor demos and user site visits are part of the plans for early winter.
Electronic Resources Database: The Library is about to release its new database driven web pages of electronic resources. The web search interface will allow users to access the Library's collection of e-resources by broad subject and by type of resource. The database is being developed as both a management tool for electronic resources and as a discovery and delivery mechanism for e-journals, databases, and websites. Cataloging and systems staffs have developed procedures and functions that avoid the duplication of record creation in the catalog and the e-resources database.
Acquisitions Department: The implementation of the merger of the Young Research Library acquisitions dept. and serials dept. is underway. The new department is headed by Andy Stancliffe, the former head of Acquisitions. He has recently completed a planning process that has produced a new organization chart based on revised workflows and merged functional areas. Mike Randal, former head of Serials has been reassigned as Electronic Serials Librarian with half time devoted to the Biomedical Library.
Lean Budget Times: Like Berkeley, the UCLA Library is affected by a University-wide hiring freeze. All staff positions in the Library, with the notable exception of librarian positions, can only be filled if a waiver from the freeze is approved. The Library, like all campus departments, has been told to plan for a budget cut that may be as much as 15 percent. We will be carrying out a large round of cancellation projects this Spring in anticipation of a stagnant collections budget in FY 2002/03
Cynthia Shelton
Assoc. University Librarian, Collections
and Technical Services
UCLA Library
11334 Young Research Library
Box 951575
L.A. CA 90095-1575
phone: (310) 825-1201, 825-1202
fax: (310) 206-4109
email: cshelton@library.ucla.edu
Renovation
Rewiring of the Hatcher Graduate Library is in progress. Preliminary work put in place the foundation for fast, switched, full duplex Ethernet throughout the building.
In partnership with Technology Communications Services the University Library is bringing wireless computing to the Shapiro Libraries and selected areas of the Hatcher building. The initial stage of this process is to conduct a site analysis that will aid in determining the feasibility and costs of deploying wireless access in the aforementioned locations. This project is part of a larger movement to bring wireless access to significant areas on central and north campus that are frequented by the student population, such as the Michigan Union, Michigan League and campus computing sites.
Reorganization
The Ditital Library Initiatives Division was reorganized to provide more focused services to internal and external clients. The Digital Library Program Development was disbanded and a new Scholarly Publishing Office was created to enable new publishing models and partnerships with capus publishing efforts. The Library Systems Office was reconfigured creating separate Desktop Support Services and Library Systems units.
LMS
We are nearing completion of the LMS evaluation process. Vendor demonstrations and site visits were completed in November with a final evaluative report to be presented in January.
Budget
The budget outlook is uncertain for next year. Initial indicators are that there will be no budget increase but we are still awaiting final word.
Library Book Store
The new Library Book Store managed by the Authorities and Bibliographic Management Unit was opened in August. The store was conceived as a method of finding a new use for books the library doesn't need including gifts, duplicates, and withdrawals. It is open to both the University community and the public.
Conferences
The Library and ARL will co-sponsor a preservation conference "Redefining Preservation, Shaping New Solutions, Forging New Partnerships" in Ann Arbor on March 7-8, 2002. The goal of the conference is to identify and analyze research collections preservation needs as well as the scholarly community's need for access to those collections.
On November 8-9, 2001 the Library and ARL co-sponsored an ILL conference "Shaping Inter-library Loan/Document Delivery in the 21st Century" held in Ann Arbor.
______________________________________
Leighann Ayers
Head, Acquisitions/Serials Division
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1205
Three candidates visited the campus for public interviews in December and recommendations are due to the EVPP in early January. Tom Shaughnessy's retirement was official as of December 31. Peggy Johnson has been named interim director.
After two years of renovation and remodeling Walter Library will reopen on January 22, 2002 as the new Digital Technology Center. The Science and Engineering Library and the Libraries Learning Resources Center will occupy a portion of the building. A certificate of occupancy was granted on December 26 and work to move collections back from storage in the Andersen Library and from temporary quarters in the Norris Gym began immediately on receipt of the certificate. While the collections were dispersed work was done to classify the periodical collection. Simultaneous with the move back the periodical collection is being relabelled and reorganized. Staff are very excited about the beautiful building, but exhausted from last minute planning as the occupancy date remained in question. The Libraries units expect to be open for service on the first day of second semester, January 22. A grand opening celebration will occur in spring.
Intense planning is underway to prepare for the migration to the Ex Libris Aleph ILS in June 2002. Trainers and implementation groups have been named and begun their work. Preliminary review of record conversion has begun. This migration is a piece of the larger implementation of the MNLink concept. Coordination of the University of Minnesota implementation with the parallel implementation at the Mankato server site remains a challenge because of the different needs and circumstances at each site. Fretwell Downing was awarded the contract for the inter-library loan piece of MNLink in December.
We continue to make inroads in cataloging historic arrears of special collections and non-book formats. We continue to make extensive use of macros for large projects related to collection moves and record clean up prior to migration. We finally loaded our pin yin records and have started work on related authority clean up.
Personnel:
Sandra Kerbel, late of the University of Virginia,
assumed the position of Associate Director of Libraries for Public
Services in the Summer of 2001. We are currently in the process of
recruiting an Assistant Director for Instructional and Research Services.
This is a reworked and significantly beefed up Head of Humanities and
Social Sciences Reference position. We also hope to go back out for two
positions in technical services: a Serials Cataloger and a Metadata
Librarian. We tried to cover both areas with one position last Spring but
couldn't come up with a candidate with the right mix of skills.
Digital Initiatives:
Among our many activities in support of the
digital side of the library, Penn recently has become a development
partner with Endeavor Information Systems on their ENCompass product.
Retrospective Conversion:
As this is being written, the final
records for our circulating collection should be wafting their way to us
from Utah. Assuming that they do arrive, "all" that remains for us to
convert are portions of our rare book collections, microforms, some
analytics and a few thousand dead serial records. Many of our converted
records still need work so we may publicly declare victory while
continuing to toil away in the background.
Collection Management:
Oh, for the good old days when we
cataloged a book for a certain location and it stayed put. Our
collections now seem to be in a state of constant motion. All of our
campus libraries are overcrowded and we are pushing material out to our
high density storage facility which is located a few blocks from campus.
Since July 1, 2001 we've sent over 100,000 volumes to the storage
facility, half by bulk transfer, half through curatorial review. Since
the state of our bibliographic records vary significantly (see above),
especially serials records, an enormous amount of cleanup work has
devolved onto tech services staff. In support of other collection
management initiatives such as collection rationalization we find
ourselves being inundated with transfers, reclassifications, etc.
Balancing these activities with the need to push more new material
through is what makes our work life interesting!
Budget:
The Penn libraries continue to enjoy fairly stable
funding of our materials budget. This is both a blessing and a curse for
tech services in that we see no dimunition of the intake of new print
resources while seeing a significant increase in the acquisition and
cataloging of digital resources. From reading other round robins, I know
that this is a "problem" that some of you wish you had. I will say that
if Penn's endowment continues to do as badly as it has recently it won't
be an issue much longer for us.
Library of Congress Update
LIBRARY SECURITY
U.S. Postal Service delivery to the Library has been
suspended since October 17, after a letter delivered to Senate Majority Leader
Thomas Daschle’s office in the
STRATEGIC INITIATIVES/NATIONAL
DIGITAL LIBRARY
National Digital
Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program
The primary focus of the Associate Librarian for
Strategic Initiatives in fiscal 2001 was strategic planning for Congress’s
fiscal 2000 appropriation of $98 million to develop and implement the National
Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP), in which
the Library is to spend an initial $25 million to develop and execute a congressionally approved strategic plan. Congress specified that, of this amount, $5
million may be spent during the initial phase for planning as well as the
acquisition and preservation of digital information that may otherwise
vanish. The legislation authorizes as
much as $75 million of federal funding to be made available as this amount is
matched by nonfederal donations, including in-kind contributions, through
American Memory Collections
The National Digital library has reached a total of
over 7.5 million digital items available on the American Memory Website. At present American Memory has
over 100 collections available online.
Collections added since the ALA Annual Conference in
June include two LC/Ameritech Competition award-winning collections: Chicago Anarchists on Trial: Evidence from
the Haymarket Affair, 1886-1887, from the Chicago Historical Society; and The Church in the Southern Black Community,
1780-1925, from the Libraries of the University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill. Also new is The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, the first
release of the Douglass Papers, from the Library of Congress's Manuscript
Division, containing approximately 2,000 items (16,000 images) relating to
Douglass's life as an escaped slave, abolitionist, editor, orator, and public servant. The papers span the years 1841 to 1964 [sic], with
the bulk of the material from 1862 to 1895.
In fiscal 2001, twelve new online historical collections were added to
American Memory and four LC/Ameritech award-winning collections were
added. Through the LC/Ameritech
competition, thirty-three institutions have received $1.75 million to support
twenty-three digitization projects.
Minerva Project and September 11 Web Archive
An ever-increasing amount of the world’s cultural and
intellectual output is presently created in digital formats and does not exist
in any physical form. Such materials are colloquially described as "born
digital". This born digital realm
includes open access materials on the World Wide Web. The MINERVA Web Preservation Project was
established to initiate a broad program to collect and preserve these primary
source materials.
The
Library of Congress, in collaboration with the Internet Archive,
WebArchivist.org and the Pew Internet & American Life Project, is creating
a collection of digital materials called the September 11 Web Archive,
available at September11.archive.org (http://150.156.112.3). The Archive preserves the Web expressions of
individuals, groups, the press and institutions in the
ACQUISITIONS
DIRECTORATE
With the online conversion of over half the active
serials completed, the Serial Record Division was able to cease all manual
check-in this past August in favor of online check-in to the LC ILS. Decentralized check-in began in April with
two pilots, in the Western and European Acquisitions Section, European and
Latin American Acquisitions Division (ELA), and the other in the Government
Documents Section, Anglo-American Acquisitions Division. This is a major business process improvement
project intended to assess the costs and benefits of having serials checked in
at the front-end of the processing pipeline by staff in the “acquiring”
divisions of the Library.
ELA took the lead in the German Digital Project, with
the goals of increasing acquisitions of German digital publications, and
developing the capability to transmit and receive electronic data interchange
(EDI) transactions. Working with the
Library’s German approval plan dealer (Harrassowitz) ELA gained access to
dozens of German electronic journals to which the Library had
subscriptions. It also laid the
groundwork for conducting EDI transactions and began placing orders
online.
The German Digital Project gave way to the Digital
Acquisitions Project (DAP), a similar project without geographic
limitation. By the autumn, ELA had
obtained access to approximately 130 e-journals. In September, it signed a contract with
TDNet, Inc., for an electronic journal management system. By year’s end, ELA was ready to move EDI into
production for receiving and paying invoices for serial subscription orders.
Increasing the number of vendors that provide initial
bibliographic control records (IBCR), especially in Central and Eastern Europe,
became another goal of the DAP, because the capability of creating and
transmitting bibliographic records in MARC format is a necessary precursor to
conducting business with EDI. The
Hungarian approval plan dealer, Batthyany Kultur-Press, became the second
Central and Eastern European Acquisitions Section vendor to provide MARC 21
bibliographic records electronically for the titles they supply. The Library’s Peruvian approval plan book
dealer, E. Iturriaga & Cia, also adopted a MARC program and began to create
MARC-formatted bibliographic records.
CATALOGING DIRECTORATE
New MLC guidelines: Effective September 5, the
Cataloging Management Team gave all cataloging teams the discretion to perform
regular minimal level cataloging (MLC) for any work that had been on hand
longer than two years, calculated from the date the IBC record was entered in
the LC Database (or from the accession date stamped in the item if there was no
IBC record). Teams had discretion to
perform enhanced MLC, including a subject heading and LC classification number
as appropriate, for materials that had been on hand for more than one
year. In all instances, materials were
first to be searched for copy on OCLC or RLIN, and copy cataloging was to be
preferred to either enhanced or regular MLC.
The guidelines were intended to assist teams in completing the buildup
of work on hand, recognizing that copy cataloging is preferable to MLC and that
Library of Congress professional catalogers should concentrate on original
cataloging.
Automated Copy Cataloging
Service
The Arts and Sciences Cataloging Division (ACS),
working with the Automation Planning and Liaison Office and CPSO, established a
prototype process and workflow for automatically obtaining cataloging copy from
the bibliographic utilities and completing the processing within the
division. Marcadia, operated jointly by
RLG and MARC Link, Inc., was identified as the only vendor of suitable
automated copy cataloging services. By
the end of the fiscal year, more than 9,000 records had been searched under
contract with Marcadia, with an overall match rate of 28%. Copy cataloging was completed for 1,695
titles using Marcadia records. The
productivity rate using Marcadia records was 1.57 titles per hour, nearly
double the copy cataloging rate for ASCD as a whole during the same period.
The Marcadia processing effort uses Encoding Level 7
copy cataloging procedures, in which name and series authority work is done
according to MLC guidelines and LC Subject Headings present in the copied
record are accepted with the assurance that they were constructed according to
current practice. (Specialists in CPSO
established any subject headings that were necessary to support the Marcadia
records completed in the pilot.) The
resulting bibliographic record is assigned an encoding level of 7 so that it
will not displace the original member record in the OCLC database. The Social Sciences Cataloging Division
(SSCD) also produced some Encoding Level 7 copy cataloging this year.
Bibliographic
Enrichment Advisory Team (BEAT) see also Electronic Resources Cataloging
The Bibliographic Enrichment
Activities Team (BEAT) continued several major projects that used electronic
capabilities to enrich bibliographic data.
BEAT pursued three separate projects aimed at increasing inclusion of
electronic tables of contents (TOC) in bibliographic records. In the
continuation of an ECIP TOC project initiated several years ago, publishers
send the Library electronic versions of their publications and as part of the
cataloging process staff incorporate TOC information
in the actual bibliographic record. In
fiscal 2001, of the 7,468 ECIP records produced, only 1,300 included TOC
data. The directorate worked to increase
this rate to nearly 30% of ECIP records produced in the final quarter of the
year. The Digital TOC project (DTOC)
project creates machine-readable TOC data from TOC surrogates, and materials
are subsequently HTML-encoded and placed on a server at the Library. The
process cross-links the TOC to underlying MARC catalog records,. In fiscal 2001 the
costs of provided DTOC were greatly reduced as the result of more effective
automation equipment and programming.
With these changes, production, which had been suspended, resumed and
some 500 records were created for the year, bringing the total output for the
DTOC program to 2,700.
In a third effort, an ONIX-TOC
project began this year. ONIX is a means
of representing book industry product information that some publishers are
using to communicate data electronically.
The data often include embedded TOC.
The directorate’s cataloging automation specialist was able to obtain
more than 17,000 ONIX-encoded records from a single publisher; of these, just
over 10,000 contained useful TOC data.
He then wrote programs to extract these TOC and place them on the Web
with corresponding and reciprocal links to the Library's online catalog
records.
The BECites+/Area
Portals/Subject Pathfinders initiative, in coordination with the Library's
Humanities and Social Sciences Division, enhanced online bibliographies with
hot links to online files for the tables of contents, indexes, and source
citations of works listed in the bibliographies, along with new sections on
Internet resources related to their topics.
The first online bibliographies to be enhanced covered
immigrant arrivals, Thomas Jefferson, and small business and entrepreneurship.
The Additional Analytics Access
project began in May. In this project
URLs are systematically added to serial bibliographic records and series authority
records for social science monographic series, providing hot links to the
entire electronic versions.
Cataloging in
Publication (CIP)
Effective immediately publishers
now have the option of submitting front matter plus the first and last chapter
of their forthcoming books when requesting Cataloging in Publication data via
the Electronic Cataloging in Publication (ECIP) program. ECIP formerly required the submission of the
full text of the work. Please see the
ECIP homepage <http://cip.loc.gov/>, click on <To Join> and
<Core Required Materials> for full details regarding the new minimum ECIP
application requirements.
The CIP Division has implemented
this option to mitigate the disruption of U.S. Postal Service (USPS) mail which the
Library of Congress is experiencing. Due
to the discovery of anthrax in mail facilities serving Capitol Hill, the
Library of Congress has had no deliveries of USPS mail since October 17. Receipt of USPS mail is currently dependent
upon the establishment of an off-site mail processing center for the Library
and Congressional offices. No firm date,
however, has been set for the resumption of USPS mail. Publishers who have sent a CIP application by
USPS mail since mid-October, should resubmit their application package (if the book is
not yet published) via ECIP.
While mail sent by commercial
carriers such as FedEx and UPS is currently being received, publishers are
urged to use the ECIP program. ECIP
reduces the overall turnaround time substantially while eliminating paper and
postage costs. Because all transactions are online from the outset of the
process, ECIP is also easier for LC staff to manage. Over 1000 publishers currently participate in
the ECIP program, and their response has been positive.
CIP staff will distribute a
package of information, regarding the new minimum ECIP application requirements,
to publishers exhibiting at ALA. CIP
staff will also demo the ECIP system for publishers at the LC booth at
Also during this fiscal year,
enhancements were made to the process by which CIP records created by the
National Library of Medicine are imported to the LCDB. During the first full week of September 2001,
NLM CIP records began to be imported to LCDB through overnight bulk import,
instead of the record by record process executed by staff of the Cooperative
Cataloging Team of the Regional and Cooperative Cataloging Division. (The bulk import of new NLM Name Authority
Records associated with NLM CIP records had already been in production for some
time.) In addition to accomplishing a
more consistent and timely appearance of these records in LCDB, the new
procedure frees up staff for other duties.
Development and roll out of the
NewBooks Program. NewBooks is an
initiative under which participating publishers will provide information about
forthcoming books to the Library of Congress, which in turn will make
information available on its Web page as well as through data distributed by
the LC Cataloging Distribution Service. The data may include access to the
catalog record as well as substantially enhanced information about the item,
links to publishers and to local libraries.
CIP Division chief John Celli is the principal for this project. The New
Books Website is at <http://lcWeb2.loc.gov:8081/ecip/celli/welc01.html>
Cataloging
Policy
AACR2
Amendments 2001. LC
implemented "Amendments 2001" to AACR2 on
LC
Classification. With the CDS
publication of the 2001 editions of classes BL-BQ (Religion (General). Hinduism. Judaism. Islam. Buddhism), G (Geography. Maps. Anthropology. Recreation), and KL-KWX (Law of Asia and
"Handicapped"
subject headings. On Subject
Headings Weekly List 01/46, changes were made to subject authority records that
include the word "handicapped."
The two headings "Handicapped" and "Physically
handicapped" have been replaced by the single heading "People with
disabilities." Other headings that
include the word "handicapped" were changed in a similar way. These changes are in accord with terminology
used in the Americans with Disabilities Act and approved for use by the
governments of major English-speaking countries worldwide, as well as with the
principle of “putting people first,” which is advocated by most organizations
and individuals with an interest in disability issues. 541 subject authority records were changed or
cancelled. Existing bibliographic
records are being updated.
BeOnline+.
The BeOnline+ Team is continuing the initiative to mainstream the processing of
electronic resources throughout the Cataloging Directorate. All monograph cataloging divisions will
volunteer two senior catalogers for three-to-four month, full time details to
the Computer Files and Microforms Team to learn descriptive cataloging of
electronic resources. The first two
completed their details in 2001. LC is
currently using the OCLC Cooperative Online Resource Catalog (CORC), a
Web-based metadata creation system optimized for creating bibliographic records
and Pathfinders (subject bibliographies) for electronic resources, as a
cataloging tool for resources selected for the BEOnline+ expansion and for the
MINERVA Project (see Humanities and
Social Sciences Division).
Pinyin
Romanization
The Library continues to share
information about the conversion project on its pinyin home page,
<http://lcWeb.loc.gov/catdir/pinyin>.
There are explanations of how authority and bib records converted, along
with new, detailed explanations of conversion errors and inconsistencies;
periodic updates to the project timeline; and tips for classifying and
Cuttering Chinese material after pinyin conversion, particularly Chinese
literary authors. Library staff are now
working to convert non-Chinese bibliographic records in the LC database that
contain Chinese character data; next, the remaining Wade-Giles headings,
Chinese subject headings, and former conventional Chinese place names in the LC
database will be found and converted to pinyin.
Headings which could have 'double-converted' have been checked to make
sure that they converted correctly.
The Library's official JACKPHY
records reside in RLIN. Strategies for converting Wade-Giles elements in these
records will be discussed with the Research Libraries Group.
Approximately 1,000 Chinese
serial records have been marked for review and correction. In addition, OCLC converted 652 non-Chinese
CONSER records, of which 490 are LC records. All of these records will be
manually reviewed and corrected, since most headings for personal names were
not converted, and the records on which they are found were not marked.
After corrections have been
completed to certain identified records, a final sweep will be conducted to
identify Wade-Giles strings that were had not been otherwise identified. We
will search for former Chinese conventional place names, Chinese subject
headings, and the most-used personal Chinese names; particular syllables that
may have converted incorrectly, and individual Wade-Giles syllables. There will be inconsistencies in
capitalization of terms such as Sheng
(province), Xian (county), and Shi (city) on converted records because
the conversion program capitalized these terms when they appeared in certain
subfields (most portions of access points), but not in other subfields
(descriptive subfields, such as 245$a and 440$a). Other generic terms for
jurisdictions were not capitalized by the machine program (such as Zhou (district)
and Fu (prefecture). Capitalization errors will be corrected when they are
encountered. Finally, 880 (parallel)
fields that converted differently than roman fields will be corrected on an
as-encountered basis.
Please send questions concerning
conversion specifications, romanization practices, and converted authority and
LC bibliographic records to Philip Melzer at pmel@loc.gov.
Program for
Cooperative Cataloging (PCC) Activities
NACO (Name Authority
Cooperative) participants, including institutions from which some 175
catalogers were trained this year, contributed 143,031 new name authority
records and 9,410 new series authority records, and modified 40,621 name and
series authority records, an 11 percent increase in contributions over fiscal 2000.
The NACO Participant’s Manual, 3rd edition, has been revised
and readied for publication and a NACO/BIBCO Trainers’ Web page will be
unveiled at the 2002 Midwinter Meeting, containing links to pdf. copies of all existing BIBCO, NACO, and Series training materials.
This year, libraries belonging to the monograph
bibliographic program, BIBCO, created 73,115 new bibliographic records for an
increase of 11% last year. There are
currently a total of 43 BIBCO libraries which, over the life of the program,
have created a total of 428,751 program records for use by the global library
community. Recently, three new
libraries: New York University Law Library,
The BIBCO Operations Committee
(OpCo) has been focusing on issues related to continuing resources processed in
BIBCO and CONSER
institutions; modification of the MARC
format encoding level "i" ; and terms of OpCo membership. The group also provided input and review to
the draft BIBCO Participants' Manual
being edited under the auspices of the Standing Committee on Training. The final report of the BIBCO Core Record
Study conducted by David Banush (
During
fiscal 2001, participants in the subject analysis program,
CONSER
Work began on revisions to the
CONSER Cataloging Manual and CONSER Editing Guide, to be published in late
2002. Two new courses are under development for the Serials Cataloging
Cooperative Training Program (SCCTP) and test sessions were held during the
fall. PALINET sponsored a test of the
Advanced Serials Cataloging Workshop, and the Michigan Library Consortium
sponsored a test of the Electronic Serials Cataloging Workshop. Both courses will be released in 2002
following train-the-trainer sessions in
Participants in the CONSER
Publication Pattern Initiative set goals for pattern contributions. Two new documents are available on the CONSER
pattern Website. One (by Diane Hillmann,
Cornell) outlines what it means for an ILS to be compliant with the MARC 21
Holdings Format; the other (by Ellen Rappoport, Albany Law) is a statement
of functionality for a universal holdings
record that was created for OCLC as it continues with its system redesign. The
documents are available at: http://lcWeb.loc.gov/acq/conser/patthold.html.
CONSER catalogers worked with
OCLC to develop specifications for a pilot project for CONSER members to use
PURLS in CONSER records. The pilot will be discussed at the CONSER At Large
meeting at ALA.
Cataloging (Books and Serials) Production
FY01 FY00
LC Full/Core-Level Cataloging 176,636
159,091
Copy Cataloging
31,652
22,477
Minimal-Level Cataloging 23,204
16,080
Collection-Level Cataloging 4,073 3,009
TOTAL records created 235,565 200,657
TOTAL volumes cataloged 270,801 224,544
Authority Records
Names
91,880 86,992
Series 8,279 6,772
Subjects
6,933 7,494
TOTAL 107,092 101,258
For more
information contact: Beacher J. Wiggins, Director for Cataloging, Library of
Congress, LM 642, Washington, DC 20540-4300 (telephone: 202-707-5333 or
Internet: bwig@loc.gov).
Cataloging
Distribution Service
Temporary Cessation of US
Postal Service Mail Delivery to the Library of Congress: Because mail
delivery to the Library has been temporarily halted, the Cataloging
Distribution Service reminds customers that until further notice they send
orders and payment for all products via fax, telephone, or courier
service.
Library of Congress
Classification on the World Wide Web: CDS has completed product development
for Classification Web, a new
fee-based service offering Web access to LC Classification schedules and LC Subject Headings to libraries
worldwide, and anticipates having the product on the market early in 2002.
Demonstrations of Classification Web will take place in
the LC exhibit booth theater at
Cataloger’s
Desktop and Classification Plus: There will be a demonstration of Cataloger’s Desktop and Classification Plus in the LC exhibit
booth theater at 11:00 am on Sunday. In
addition there will be continuous demonstrations at one of CDS’s booth modules.
LC ILS
(Integrated Library System)
The Library of Congress expects
to upgrade its integrated library system to Voyager 2000.1.3 in February. The data conversion is currently scheduled to
begin on Friday evening, February 15. Training in Voyager 2000 for staff is
scheduled to begin January 7 and conclude February 15. The data migration and regeneration of indexes
are expected to take from one to two weeks, during which time LC staff will not
be able to perform work in the LC ILS production database. The Cataloging Distribution Service will not
distribute records, except for CONSER and JACKPHY-language records,
during the downtime period. Staff and public users will be able to search
against a "frozen" OPAC during the upgrade period. Cataloging and acquisitions divisions have
developed contingency plans to keep CIP galleys moving through the cataloging
pipeline and to ensure that all staff who work in the production database
either have meaningful work or are taking prearranged leave while the
production system is unavailable.
The ILS Program Office is
preparing for its reassignment to the Library Services Operations Directorate
later this year, in conjunction with a reorganization of the Operations
Directorate. Staff
continue to prepare for the migration of Congressional Research Service
(CRS) and the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped
(NLS/BPH) files to the LC ILS later this year.
The LC ILS Coordinating
Committee, on the recommendation of testers in the ILS Program Office, has endorsed the
implementation of Voyager 2000 without the "Web Authorities"
feature. LC is still working with
Endeavor to fix some problems in the Web Authorities software, including lack
of support for the MARC 21 character set and lack of Z39.50 for authorities,
before LC can accept it. The Library’s
implementation in February will also not include vernacular display of JACKPHY
characters.
The LC ILS primary database
resides on a Sun E10000 server and includes nearly 12.5 million bibliographic
records; approximately 12.5 million holdings records; over 12.9 million item
records; approximately 5.4 million authority records; over 28,400 patron
records; data for circulation and acquisitions transactions; and over 32,200
vendor records, ledgers, funds, tables, and keyword and other searchable
indexes.
Additional information can be
found on the public ILS home page at: <http://lcWeb.loc.gov/ils/>
Network
Development and MARC Standards Office (NDMSO)
Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard
(METS). The Metadata Encoding
and Transmission Standard is an XML schema designed for the purpose of
describing digital objects in library collections. The schema provides a standard form for
the recording and transmission of structural, administrative, and technical
metadata. The schema is currently at the alpha draft stage, draws on the
experience gained in the Making of America projects. The development of METS is
an initiative of the Digital Library Federation. The NDMSO is participating in
the development effort and will also serve as the maintenance agency for the
proposed standard.
MARC 21. Nine proposals and
seven discussion papers were prepared for discussion at the Midwinter 2002 MARC
Advisory Committee meetings. The MARC 21 LITE Bibliographic Format was
released online at www.loc.gov/marc/bibliographic/lite/ in July 2001. It is a subset of the markup defined in the
full MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic
Data. It includes all essential data
elements that are needed to create bibliographic descriptions of information
items and thus allows libraries from all over the world in adopting and translating
the format. It links to but does not
list many of the data elements that are used by specialized populations of MARC
21 users. Update No. 2 to all five MARC
21 formats was published in October 2001 and will be released to the public in
January 2002. It includes changes
resulting from proposals which were considered at meetings in 2001. The online and print editions
of the MARC 21 Concise Formats was
also updated in January 2002. NDMSO is
exploring the development of an XML schema for a bibliographic element set that
may be used for a variety of purposes particularly for library applications. It
contains a subset of MARC data elements and is intended to carry selected data
for existing MARC records or to be used for the creation of original resource
description records
Vendor records. LC has now Batthyany Kultur-Press, in
PRESERVATION DIRECTORATE
Strategic
Directions for fiscal 2002 in the Preservation Directorate include:
-Mass-deacidify
150,000 books and install a sheet treater
-Carry out first
year of a $6,000,000, five-year preventive conservation project to:
-monitor pollution and develop a
mitigation plan
-stabilize general and special
collection materials using basic treatments
-evaluate and assess efficacy of
paper splitting for stabilizing too brittle to serve materials
-develop preservation
specification for collection storage systems
-Investigate
magnetic media and film deterioration problems and devise solutions
-Continue to
develop our collections care facility for general collections materials
-Stabilize sound and moving image
materials prior to their relocation to LC’s
-Participate in
the National Digital Information and Infrastructure Preservation Program
-Develop the
knowledge, skills, and abilities of preservation staff to support these efforts
For more
information see the Preservation Directorate Web page at URL
<http://www.loc.gov/preserv/>
Mass
Deacidification Program
The Library has awarded a
contract to Pittsburgh-based Preservation Technologies L.P. (PTLP) that will
save 1 million books and at least 5 million sheets of unbound paper-based materials from
further acid deterioration. This
contract, the third with PTLP since 1995, calls for ramping up treatment during
the remaining four years of the contract, fiscal 2002-2005, increasing annual
deacidification from 100,000 to more than 250,000 books per year by the fifth
and final year.
As the national library and the
official library for the U. S. Congress, the Library of Congress has focused
its early mass deacidification efforts primarily on collections of
Under the new contract, the
Library will continue to provide training and oversight to PTLP staff who select books for treatment; charge out, pack, and ship
volumes to the deacidification plant in
Preservation Technologies has
engineered new horizontal treatment cylinders that it uses to offer
deacidification services to libraries and archives for the treatment of loose
manuscripts and other items in unbound formats. The Library's new contract
authorizes PTLP to build and install a paper sheet treater and a Bookkeeper
spray booth in a Library building on Capitol Hill. This will enable the Library
to treat large quantities of paper-based materials in non-book formats, such as
newspapers, manuscripts, maps, music scores, pamphlets, and posters. Additional
information about the Library's mass deacidification program is available on
the Library's Website at www.loc.gov/preserv/carelc.html or by
contacting the Library's preservation projects director, Kenneth Harris, at
(202) 707-1054 or by e-mail at khar@loc.gov.
CD Longevity Project
A project is currently in
progress to investigate if laser engraving on audio CD’s used to mark them as
Library of Congress property has any effect on their long-term stability. A
natural aging program for studying the long-term effects of routine handling
and storage on the playability of CD collections has been in progress for the
past four years. This program started
initially with a sample population of 125 CD’s.
With the increased testing capacity now available
with the new testing system, this study
population has now been increased to 625 disks, thereby substantially enhancing
the confidence level of the findings that would result from this study.
In an earlier effort to explore
the use of security labels for CD’s we tested a label that extended across the
full face of a CD. Accelerated aging of
these CD’s with this label suggested that it may shorten the life of CD’s. An ongoing dialog with manufacturers of security
strips has resulted in at least one vastly improved option for labels that
cover only the hub of the CD where no data resides.
New Audio Disk Cleaning
Solution
After Freon solvents became
unacceptable for cleaning of audio records because of their environmental
impact, this Division undertook a comparison of commercially available cleaning
solutions for audio records, and recommended one of them for use. Because of a change in the composition of
this product introduced by the manufacturer, it began to grow mold within a few
months of storage. The need for a
cleaning agent with a generic formula that could be controlled by the Library
became evident. A
formula for an effective water-based, environmentally friendly cleaning
solution that works equally well with acetate, shellac, vinyl records and CD’s
has been developed and will soon be available on our Website.
Veterans’ Oral History Project. H.R. 5212 [P.L. 106-380] directs the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress to develop and coordinate a program to collect and preserve at the Library the audio and video recorded oral histories and documentary materials such as diaries and letters of America’s war veterans. The Library has been working closely with interested groups, such as veterans organizations, to coordinate the project and make the collections available to the public, including online presentations. American Association for Retired Persons [AARP] has provided $3 million for the project, and several Members of Congress have participated in providing documentary materials and expressed strong support for the project.
ILS
On September 12
NLM upgraded to release 2000.1.3
of Endeavor's Voyager Integrated Library System. OPAC performance
improved dramatically with the installation of this new release.
In August and December, NLM staff participated in meetings of the newly constituted National Libraries Endeavor Advisory Board. In addition to NLM, members include the Library of Congress, the national libraries of Scotland, New Zealand, and Finland, the Royal Library of Sweden and the State Library of Victoria, Australia. The purpose of the group is to advise EISI of strategic directions being taken by national libraries and to identify issues related to the use of Voyager and other Endeavor products of particular importance to libraries with national responsibilities.
Discussions with Endeavor on NLM's contracted binding module continued. Testing of the beta release 2001.1, which includes a binding module, will begin in the next few months. NLM also is working with Yankee Book Publishers to setup testing of bulk loading of embedded order data.
NLM will conduct a 90-day test of Endeavor's new Web Authorities product on the Library's test server. In addition, we have purchased ENCompass, which will be used to provide access to NLM Finding Aids and Index Catalogue. Installation will take place in 2002.
Electronic Journals
Licenses from 28 publishers were approved for NLM Reading Room use in
2001. Walk-in users at NLM now have access to over 1000 electronic
journals through its OPAC, Locatorplus. Of the 1000 journals, over 740
are also linked from articles to full text through PubMed LinkOut.
Serial Subscription Contracts
NLM has begun the re-competition process for its serial subscription
contracts for European, U.S., Canadian and U.K. journals. The library's
current contracts expire in August 2002. The new contracts will cover the
period 2003-2007.
NLM Classification on Web
NLM completed essential work on its Classification Editor and has begun
updating the index and class schedules online. The Cataloging Section/
Technical Services Division expects to complete the editing process by
late spring of this year and will then make the new online edition of
the Classification available. After the NLM Online Classification is
rolled out, it will be made available to the Library of Congress
Cataloging Distribution Service for addition to the Cataloger's Desktop.
Progress on Metadata and Permanence Ratings for NLM Web
Resources
In January, NLM will complete installation and testing of TeamSite
software for Web document management and, as training is completed, will
begin to supply metadata for all electronic resources it publishes.
Metadata templates are being developed that will allow NLM/DC metadata,
including permanence ratings, to be incorporated easily in Internet
resources. Permanence ratings will indicate to users the extent to which
the availability, identifier, and/or content of NLM's Web resources are
guaranteed to remain unchanged.
Progress on Pinyin Conversion
NLM has developed a plan for conversion of approximately 6000-7000
authority records and 8000-10,000 bibliographic records in Locatorplus to
the pinyin romanization scheme and intends to utilize OCLC pinyin
conversion services for this effort. NLM expects to undertake the final
automated phase of this project in the spring of 2002.
Once pinyin conversion is completed, NLM will redistribute all Chinese bibliographic records to licensees and will resume regular distribution of newly completed and edited bibliographic records for Chinese materials.
XML Output
NLM is actively working to develop an XML output format for NLM
bibliographic data resident in Locatorplus. This XML-formatted product
is intended to support integrated retrieval of indexing citations and
records for books, audiovisuals, and electronic resources via the NLM
Gateway as well as to provide an improved mechanism for data distribution
to NLM's collaborating special partners. We will also continue to
distribute records in the MARC 21 communications format.
Progress on NLM's Cataloger's Desktop
An electronic version of the internal staff NLM Cataloging Manual,
created using RoboHelp software, a product of eHelp Corporation in San
Diego, became available on December 20, representing an important
milestone in the creation of the automated cataloge r's desktop at NLM.
The web accessible documentation provides hypertext linking of related
issuances and glossary definitions to library and NLM specific terms used
in the tool, as well as an online table of contents, index and text-word
search features.
MeSH Browser on LC Desktop
Beginning with 2002 the Library of Congress's Cataloger's Desktop will
provide access to the NLM's MeSH Browser. The Browser is an online
vocabulary look-up aid designed to locate descriptors of possible
interest and to show the hierarchy in which the descriptors appear.
Grey Literature
In August 2001, NLM entered into a cooperative agreement with the New
York Academy of Medicine for selection and cataloging of grey literature
in the area of health technology assessment. The purpose of this "Grey
Literature Project" is to enhance NLM's biomedical and health services
research related databases by expanding the Library's coverage of grey
literature relating to health policy and public health, providing
bibliographic control and making the records available in NLM's web-based
online public access catalog, Locatorplus.
OPAC Records Linked to PubMed Bookshelf
The Cataloging Section is providing a link from bibliographic records in
the OPAC to the PubMed Bookshelf. NLM's National Center for
Biotechnology Information's in collaboration with book publishers, is
adapting selected textbooks for the Web and linking them to articles in
PubMed, the biomedical citation database. The idea is to provide
background information for articles in PubMed, so that users can explore
unfamiliar concepts found in PubMed search results. Books are accessible
by direct of the NCBI website, by invoking links from PubMed abstracts
and now through a URL in the NLM OPAC.
Stacks Addition
Preservation and Collection Management Section staff has been working
with architects and NIH engineers to plan a new addition to the NLM
stacks that will provide optimum environmental conditions for storage of
paper-based and audiovisual materials.
Title Overlap Project
NLM is working with the New York Academy of Medicine on a pilot project
to identify older monographs in need of preservation that are held by the
Academy, Harvard's Countway Library or the College of Physicians of
Philadelphia, but not by NLM. OCLC's Automated Collection Assessment
and Analysis Services will be used to compare holdings of the four
libraries. The Academy's project report will include recommendations for
next steps toward establishing a national approach to preserving the
biomedical literature.
SERHOLD
NLM is working with OCLC on several initiatives involving batch-updating processes for SERHOLD, the National Biomedical Serials Holdings Database.
The OCLC to SERHOLD batch updating program is currently being rewritten for the new DOCLINE/SERHOLD system so that holdings input into OCLC will be updated in SERHOLD. NLM is also working with OCLC on a pilot project to update OCLC with holdings data from SERHOLD. If the pilot project is successful, libraries will have a choice of updating their holdings either in SERHOLD or in OCLC and have the information batch loaded into the other system.
Integration of MedlinePlus in NLM's Authority Records
The Cataloging Section has begun using its existing authority file to
store variant names for organizations and identify those variants as the
preferred form of name for use by other NLM components. New local fields
and subfields have been defined that allow NLM to tag a 110 or 410 as a
preferred form of name for a particular database. We have begun testing
the use of these new fields by identifying organizations in the Library's
consumer health database that correspond to names already in the NLM name
authority file. Headings are coded so that relevant data can be
extracted for the consumer health database while still retaining the
standard AACR2 heading for use within the integrated library system. In
the near future, we hope to add the preferred form of organizational
names used in other NLM databases such as ClinicalTrials, DIRLINE, etc.
Because this local coding is suppressed upon distribution, NLM is still
able to share our name records through NACO.
MARBI has recently had some papers discussing how libraries might deal with situations where different preferred headings for the same concept (subject or name) need to be stored, and whether a single or multiple record approach is preferable. The results of the NLM experience may prove useful in deciding the best way to deal with this.
Acid Paper Update
Two surveys of the NLM collection were completed in 2001. The following
findings may be of interest:
Staff News
We will be recruiting shortly for a new head of the Serial Records
Section. In October we were fortunate to hire a new Russian cataloger.
Duane Arenales
Chief Technical Services Division
National Library of Medicine
8600 Rockville Pike
Bethesda, MD 20894
Voice: 301 496-6133
Fax: 301 402-1211
arenales@nlm.nih.gov
Offsite shelving facility.
We are about to sign on the dotted line for a site in
Cataloging upon Receipt.
In January we will finally begin to add copy cataloging to the receiving function for our YBP receipts. We have rewritten job descriptions to broaden staff responsibilities and are requesting the upgrade our three remaining junior level staff positions in TSD. This will leave us with only two grades for all technical services work.
Copy Cataloging Quality.
We continue to struggle with the growing flavors and inconsistent quality of cataloging copy contributed by vendors and libraries. The cataloging managers are identifying categories of copy that we will set aside for batch searching rather than take the time to edit and enhance.Recruitment.
We are recruiting for area studies specialists for Africana
and the
Serial cancellations.
We have cancelled over 250 subscriptions for indexes, abstracts, and journals that are now available electronically. 66% of our materials budget is being spent on serials, and 22% of the serials budget is now devoted to subscriptions for e-resources.
*****************************************
Carol Pitts Diedrichs
Assistant Director for Technical Services and Collections
Editor, Library Collections, Acquisitions
and Technical Services
The Ohio State University Libraries
1858 Neil Avenue Mall
Columbus, OH, 43210-1286
tel: 614-292-4738
fax: 614-292-7859
Internet: diedrichs.1@osu.edu
*****************************************
PERSONNEL MATTERS
We are currently recruiting for two key positions: Electronic/Digital Resources Cataloging Librarian and Head of Access Services.
LMS
SIRSI'S Unicorn system became fully functional in July 2001 when the last of the clients, Acquisitions, came online. We’re looking forward to what the new system can bring us this year as we work with the additional functionality. After bringing up the Cataloging module in April 2001, the Cataloging Services Department has no backlog of current receipts. The migration process demonstrated to us how important it is for libraries to work closely with company consultants in order to fully understand the ramifications of the policies that are being established.
HERSHEY MEDICAL CENTER
The Hershey Medical Center will be joining our SIRSI catalog in January 2002. We look forward to jointly making our resources available to our patrons and look forward to the opportunities that this partnership affords us.
PROJECTS
During the summer we completed a periodical bar coding project. Our goal was to barcode as many of our heavily used periodical titles as possible to allow for easier circulation and tracking of materials using SIRSI.
We have started a project to retrospectively catalog 30,000 maps from our Maps Library to make them more readily available to our users. Some of this project will involve the creation of minimal level records as a temporary measure.
E-RESOURCES
We have acquired many e-resources packages this year. Among them are Kluwer, Elsevier, PsychInfo and PsychArticles, Nature Weeklies, SportsDiscus and Wildlife Worldwide.
AUTHORITY CONTROL
Ongoing automated authority control began in August 2001. OCLC/WLN is providing this service to us. An additional half time staff member was allocated to provide additional assistance in this area.
STATE RESOURCE CENTER
Additional funding from the state for our status as a state resource center is allowing us to investigate a potential role for Penn State with virtual reference and to build our collections in a variety of subject areas. We have also received funding to digitize materials from our Special Collections Department having to do with Pennsylvania. We are working closely with the State Library, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh and Free Library of Philadelphia with this initiative.
SPEAKERS
We hosted a number of noteworthy speakers since June. On September 25, 2001, Denise Troll, Distinguished Fellow, Digital Library Federation and Associate University Librarian, Carnegie Mellon gave a presentation. On November 15, 2001, Donald Waters, Program Officer for Scholarly Communications, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation joined us to present information on recent Mellon projects.
Two areas figured prominently in Technical Services activities over the last six month: continued reorganization of cataloging and acquisitions to make the best use of our integrated system, the 2000 release of Endeavor's Voyager; and planning for the opening of the joint Columbia-Princeton-New York Public remote storage facility.
Reorganization:
As noted in the summer 2001 report, we
successfully
consolidated receipt and cataloging of some of our major English and
other European language approval plan materials in Catalog Division. We
are confident enough of the value of this approach to have just
completed moving all additional approval plans (Princeton has about 30,
exclusive of East Asian languages) along with some staff from
acquisitions to cataloging. While we had hoped to report on shelf ready
initiatives, we are not quite to that point. However, we are
successfully loading records for approval books from two of our large
English language plans, and for our German, Italian, and Greek approval
plans as well.
Remote storage:
There is little to add that hasn't been
covered either
by Columbia or NYPL. We are busy getting ready for the opening of the
facility on January 14, a bit later than the anticipated October 2001
date. There are a number of major renovation projects underway in
different parts of the campus. Several of these will involve either the
significant reduction or complete elimination of existing library space
in favor of increases in classroom and research space. Most of our
transfer operations will be geared toward creating alternative space for
these collections in other branch libraries or creating swing space for
collections that have to be temporarily relocated. A second major focus
will be dealing with the critical space situation in the main library
(Firestone) accelerated also by a recent major campus building project
which created a new student center where the Near East library used to
be with the latter's collection being squeezed into Firestone.
Digital resources:
In June we hired a Digital Resources
Coordinator to
manage acquisition and licensing for electronic resources. We are still
working on bringing greater order to this frontier. We expect that we
will also hire a metadata cataloging specialist, using one of several
vacant lines in cataloging. We are increasingly working to move routine
cataloging, both with and without copy to support staff to free
professionals for tasks like metadata cataloging.
EDI:
Following on the comments above regarding records for
approval
books being loaded into our Voyager system, we can also report that we
have EDI claiming for journals up and running with five vendors, are
placing EDI orders for monographs with four vendors, and continuing to
expand that. Our goal is to eliminate as much paper as possible in the
acquisitions process. To that end we are in the early stages of an
initiative with collection development to allow a pilot group of
selectors to use vendor online services to select materials.
Acquisitions staff then exports the records from the vendor database,
imports them into Voyager where the import process creates purchase
orders.
Document management:
In line with our goal to reduce paper we
are
beginning a project, with support from the University's Accounts Payable
operation, to scan all incoming invoices for library materials. The
intention is to provide us with greater control over invoices in
process. The scanned images of invoices will be used as our official
invoice file. We will be able to both track our paid, and more
importantly our unpaid, invoices. We expect that we will not only have
much better control over the entire invoicing process, but will see real
economies by not having to file paper copies.
Circulation issues:
We have seen a significant increase in
requests via
our OPAC for on order and in process titles, such that our main
circulation desk is busier than ever, even though use of space in the
main library (Firestone) has slightly decreased over the past year. We
are also increasing our e-reserves offerings and have moved from Adobe
Acrobat to Déjà vu as our software, which has made processing more
efficient.
PRESERVATION
Stanford University (through the Library) is
exploring a potential collaboration with
Zentrum für Bucherhaltung (ZfB), a European
company that offers a full range of preservation
services. ZfB focuses on automated and
streamlined approaches to preservation and is
well known for its paper-splitting machine.
Stanford and ZfB hired Stillwater Consulting to
survey the market. Site visits to 26 institutions
will be completed by early February, and the
report will be submitted in March. At that
point, Stanford and ZfB will determine whether
or not to proceed with bringing ZfB to the
North American market, and if so, what form
the services should take.
DIGITAL ASPECTS
Through the wonders of globalization, Stanford
has become a full member of the NorthEast
Research Libraries Consortium (NERL). The
consortium objectives are to address questions
of access and cost containment through joint
licensing and possible joint deployment of
electronic resources.
We are proceeding to use METS (Metadata
Encoding and Transmission Standard) for the
data models that underlie the digital repository
managed through TEAMS. METS supports
flexibility in relating objects across formats and
across time.
NACO/BIBCO
Three new catalogers joined us in early fall, and
two more-experienced catalogers joined us by
way of the Hoover Institution transition. All
are being trained intensively in NACO and
BIBCO. Training of five "new" people is
dispersed across Cataloging with the net effect;
though everyone is very busy, our
NACO/BIBCO quality and numbers continue
to be a focus. We are nearing the end of the 18-
month term for our post-graduate cataloging
intern from the UK: we invested in her NACO
and BIBCO training, and she delivered vast
quantities of belles lettres cataloging (and
more).
OPAC
Here is the URL for the evolving view of the
Sirsi WebCat at Stanford:
http://library.stanford.edu/webcat
We haven't made it stunning yet, but it works.
The Stanford-built interface still exists and has
a fuller suite of user services, but it is available
only to Stanford people (by IP or proxy).
BUDGET REDUCTION PLANNING
Stanford University is anticipating income
shortfalls in the next 2-3 fiscal years; in
response, we are preparing budgets using
planning parameters of 5% cut in fiscal 2003
and an additional 3% cut in fiscal 2004 (and
perhaps 2005). As the Libraries plan their
strategy for the reductions, our UL has declared
a hiring freeze until our plan is clearer. We do
have a number of exempt staff positions we will
fill (including Serials Librarian and Asst. Head
of Access Services), and some non-exempt
positions are thawed now and then.
=+=+=+=+=+=+
Assoc. University Librarian for Technical Services
Stanford University Libraries
Stanford, CA 94305-6004
650.723-2015 (voice)
650.723.9325 (fax)
*************************************************************************
*************************************************************************
Beth Picknally Camden
Director, Cataloging Services
Alderman Library
P.O. Box 400108
http://www.people.virginia.edu/~bp2f
Charlottesville, VA 22904-4108
Voice: (434) 924-7791
Fax: (434) 982-4579
Internet: bpcamden@virginia.edu
Hope is a feeling that life and work have meaning. You either have it or you
don't, regardless of the state of the world that surrounds you.--Vaclav
Havel
************************************************************************
We authored a successful proposal for the state to use LSTA money to start the Washington Preservation Initiative. To better understand the impact of decisions made about purchasing paperback books instead of hardbound, we are planning to survey the physical qualities of simultaneously published hardcopy and paperback books to determine any differences in gutter size, page size, acidity, and the like. Funding for binding continues to be threatened as budgets are cut - we will be working on a system-wide policy to help guide binding decisions and to determine appropriate finding levels. A pilot project on mass deacidification will take place this spring.
REORGANIZATION OF TECHNICAL SERVICES
In December 2000, as I have indicated in previous reports, all Central Technical Services staff were reassigned from their former subject-based departments into the Acquisitions and Serials Department and the Cataloging Department. Even though new workflows were developed during the past year, we could not realize the full benefits of the new organization until the staff in the present work units were physically reorganized and the materials they process were rearranged. Following many months of planning and preparation for redesigning the workspace for about 75 staff, scheduling major work in the installation of new and relocation of some existing electrical outlets and data jacks, and the installation of modular furniture for about 1/3 of our staff, we finally completed the project last week. It has been a major goal of ours for the past year, and we are very happy with the results.
ELECTRONIC RESOURCES
In order to provide bibliographic access to the thousands of electronic journals we have licensed or have been deemed worthy for inclusion in our catalog, about nine months ago we embarked on a project to catalog more than 10,000 journals titles provided from the 50 highest priority aggregators and publishers we have licensed. In many cases, if the title was already held in paper form, a new holdings record was created and linked to the existing bibliographic record. This phase of the project was completed in late summer, but of course, this bibliographic organism requires constant feeding and attention as changes occur. From our catalog we generate monthly a list of all the e-journals which is mounted as a separate page on the library's website. This list replaces a separate Access database of e-journal titles which had been created several years ago.
LMS IMPLEMENTATION AND EDI PROGRESS
In year 3 of the Voyager (Endeavor) era we are expecting to complete this calendar year setting up the subscription patterns for all (ca. 25,000) the titles we receive on standing orders. Once this milestone is reached, we'll be able to generate claims for all of our serials out of Voyager. Another important goal for this year is to implement with our major vendors EDI ordering and claiming, and EDI invoicing of monographs. We already have in production EDI serials invoicing with our four largest vendors.
SHELFREADY PROCESSING
Over the last two years our reliance on shelfready processing has steadily increased. What began as a pilot project with Yankee Book Peddler using firm orders with selected social science funds was expanded last March to all YBP firm orders. The success we have had with the firm-ordered titles has gained us the necessary local support to extend it to the university press publications received on our Yankee approval plan. It is expected that the mapping of LC classifications to cataloging locations and fund codes will be finalized in the next few weeks, so that we'll see the first shelfready approval plan receipts by early spring.
RETROSPECTIVE CONVERSION
This project continues to make slow but steady progress in completing our LC classified collection except for some of the materials in non-Roman languages and serials. We are currently engaged in discussions with a vendor to convert a portion of the 200,000+ title collection classified in Cutter, the system we used prior to the adoption of LC.
Richard Reeb
--
Richard Reeb
Assistant Director, Central Technical Services
General Library System, University of Wisconsin-Madison
312E Memorial Library
728 State Street
Madison, WI 53706-1494
Ph: 608.262.3475;
Fax: 608.262.4861
Personnel.
Alice Prochaska assumed the position of University
Librarian on August 1, 2001. We are currently recruiting for a new Head
of Preservation and Chief Preservation Officer, a position vacated by
Paul Conway (
http://www.library.yale.edu/lhr/jobs/mppos.html)
Library Management System.
Intensive planning for Voyager
implementation
in June 2002 is underway. The challenges are greater that we expected,
with data migration as a major stumbling block. While we knew we had
many inconsistencies in practices, we have discovered many more. We are
looking forward to the new serials control opportunities, and have begun
to make plans for the management of this new set of functions. We are
also paying particular attention to training and the necessary investment
in staff. The LMS web site is located at:
http://www.library.yale.edu/orbis2/public/orbis2.htm
SFX
The Library has also purchased and recently installed SFX. It went into
production in early January and reaction is enthusiastic.
Library-wide planning.
The Library has just completed an
intensive five- year planning exercise. Goal groups submitted
recommendations in six areas: Access and Reader Services, Bibliographic
Control, Collection Development, Collection Management, Partnership and
Leadership, and Staffing Issues and Organizational Development.
Recommendations from the Bibliographic Control Group include: 1) invest
in process improvement and standardization across they Library system; 2)
address the conversion, and in some cases cataloging, of numerous special
collections; 3) develop a better training and documentation model; 4)
prioritize and plan for the cataloging of the backlog collections; 5)
restore the Associate University Librarian for Technical Services
position.
Library Shelving Facility (off-site).
The Library has begun construction of the next 3 modules of the LSF.
The first module, opened in November of 1999, is expected to be mostly
full this spring. In an effort to reduce significant stack
overcrowding, the Library is planning to transfer ca. 640,000 volumes per
year for the next three years. We are currently developing plans to
support this accelerated schedule, including the addition of staff to
resolve bibliographic problems.
Process Improvement.
Technical Services is continuing to focus
on process improvement goals. Current efforts are focused on the
organization of shelf-preparation unit and expanded use of vendor records
for approvals.
Retrospective Conversion.
This key activity continues on
target and on time. The projects to convert the Official Catalog and the
Serials Catalog will be completed in March 2002. Yale's 150,000 CJK
records should be completed by summer of 2003. Our Hebrew and Yiddish
collection is being converted by Library Associates in Los Angeles and
will be completed in 2002. The Arabic and Persian language titles are
being converted inhouse and we expect to complete that project this year
as well.
Authority Control.
Yale is still the midst of converting from
the now defunct OCLC Authority Control Service to the OCLC/WLN MARS
service. Records from the old system have been converted and most of the
corrections have been loaded. Ongoing processing is just beginning. We
hope to have the system fully implemented in time to migrate to
Voyager.
Security.
Security has been a very hot topic since 9/11 and
the Chief Acquisitions Librarian, given her prior experience in industry
and in this area, chairs the Security Working Group, which is delivering
its report to Library Management sometime in January 2002.
Ann Okerson and Joan Swanekamp
Yale University