Date: 10 May 2004
Present: Steven Arakawa, Sarah Elman, Fanny Hsieh, Maria Hunenko, Mickey Koth, Cécile Mandour, Rick Sarcia, Manon Théroux (chair and recorder)
1. World Biographical Index
The online version of World Biographical Index (WBI) has changed. The site used to be hosted by the Braunschweig University Library; the new site is hosted by the publisher K.G. Saur. The URL on the "Authority Control at Yale" website has been updated.
However, using the new WBI for NACO work is problematic. Date information in the biographical entries is not reliable. The index is supposed to be compilation of various printed indexes issued by the publisher, but the dates do not match. Specifically, "circa" and "questionable" birth and death dates are no longer labelled as such and "flourish" dates are translated using an odd scheme. The site should NOT be cited in authority record 670 fields for this reason. A message will be sent to YULCAT warning staff about the problem.
2. Leave of Absence
Mickey reported that she will be taking a leave of absence this summer to work on a book about music uniform titles.
3. RLIN21 Links on "Authority Control at Yale"
Manon has updated the RLIN section of the "Authority Control at Yale" website to include various RLIN21 links, including the logon page, the help files, and the searching guides.
4. Meeting with RLG
Karen Smith-Yoshimura from RLG visited the Library on April 29th to discuss this summer's upcoming switch to the RLIN21 environment. Members of the committee who participated in the meeting included Steven Arakawa, Sarah Elman, and Manon Théroux. Manon reported on questions and answers from the part of the meeting that was devoted to NACO topics:
Exporting
Will we be able to use the “Export to Disk” function for authority records as well as bib records? Yes.
Will we be able to start exporting authority records and bib records at the same time? Yes.
Will the “Export to Disk” function be free? Yes.
Timeline & Hours
When will we be able to test NACO inputting using the new RLIN21 client? August 1. We will use a test database to practice authority record inputting using the new client from Aug. 1-31. During that month, "real" NACO record creation will continue to be done using current methods. There might be a short moratorium on NACO contributions.
When can we actually start contributing NACO records using the new RLIN21 client? September 1.
RLIN21 documentation says that inputting will be available on weekends. Does this include NACO inputting? Yes, the system should be available 24/7 except for 3 hours on the weekends.
Diacritics
Once we begin inputting NACO records in RLIN21, we will be following Unicode standards which means putting diacritics after the letters to which they pertain rather than before, correct? Yes. However, when those same authority records are loaded into Orbis, the diacritics will display before the letters. Later, after Yale converts Orbis to Unicode, the diacritics will display after the letters in both RLIN21 and Orbis.
Credits & Charges
Currently, NACO contributors get a credit for each record they contribute to the NAF; will this continue in RLIN21? No. The whole system of credits and charges is being re-evaluated.
Currently, the “prp” and “st s” searches in the NAF are free; will this continue in RLIN21? Yes.
Currently, an “id” search in the authority files is half-price; will this continue in RLIN21? It will be a free search.
Currently, one is charged according to the number of searches made not by the number of records viewed; will this continue in RLIN21? Browse searches ("heading phrase" and "group" searches) will be free but we will be charged for each record viewed. Index searches will be charged according to the number of searches not the number of records viewed.
Currently, one is not charged for +/-V commands; will this continue in RLIN21? No, we will be charged.
Local Subject Headings
We currently use fields 692, 693, 694, 695, 690, 691 for local subjects in our bib records; the first four get mapped to 696, 697, 698, 699 when the records are loaded into RLIN. Will indexing of local subjects coded 69X in bib records be the same in RLIN21 as in RLIN? Not sure. [Follow-up from RLG: Yes, indexing of variable fields in RLIN21 will be basically identical to RLIN. Namely, the local subjects will be indexed the same way as the parallel MARC 21 fields, i.e. 696 = 600; 697 = 610; 698 = 611; and 699 = 630].
Logon & Session Customization
In RLIN we can set up as many customized “sessions” as we want. Many catalogers have NACO sessions that allow them to logon directly to the authority files. Will that functionality exist in RLIN21 (currently in RLIN21 you logon to the bib files and must click on a link to go to the authority files)? Not sure. [Follow-up from RLG: Eventually, you will be able to go directly to NAF both in RLIN21 and in the RLIN21 client. All of those settings aren't connected up yet].
If we will be able to customize sessions in RLIN21, will there be a limit to the number of sessions we can define? Not sure.
If we will be able to customize sessions in RLIN21, will we be able to change the color of the background and text as we currently can in RLIN? Not sure. [Follow-up from RLG: This is not currently planned for the future.]
Multiple Concurrent Windows
After logging on in RLIN21, you may issue the standard Windows command “Control-N” to open a new window. You are not required to login in the new window. You can, for example, use one window for searching the bib files and one window for searching the authority files. You can even tile two windows. If we do this, are we using a single port or multiple ports? Single port.
Searching
In RLIN we can “resume” searches from the NAF to the SAF and vice versa. Will that functionality be available in RLIN21? No.
In RLIN21, the default search in the authority files is “heading phrase”; the default search in the bib files is “command line”. Will there be any way for staff to customize what appears as their default search at logon? No.
Will pending records and records in “save” be retrievable using command and index searches? Yes. I thought they were supposed to be but it currently it doesn't work this way; is this because the database has not yet been converted? Yes.
Display of Search Results
In RLIN21, headings in lists of search results display with final periods added; why is this being done? Not sure; we should send feedback via RLIN21 feedback button.
If a search retrieves only a single record, the record does not display; one must click on the heading to bring up the record. Can this be changed so that the record displays automatically? Not sure; we should send feedback via RLIN21 feedback button. [Follow-up from RLG: NAF & SAF searches are designed as headings results (except for searches like ISBN, ID, etc.). Consequently, if you do a heading search, the result is in terms of headings whether one or a carload.]
Form conflicts are labelled as such in the search results and imply that records probably need correcting. However, one common cause of form conflicts is a 1xx/5xx situation where one has a second indicator “0” and the other has a second indicator “blank”; will RLG be deleting the obsolete 2nd indicator “0” during the conversion? Yes, but not redistributing the records. [Follow-up from RLG: Actually, no. We will not be deleting these indicators during the conversion because our authority records need to be exact copies of the master file. However, the conflict flags will be rebuilt when the heading files are rebuilt. We have determined that we will not include obsolete 2nd indicator "0" as part of the data that makes up the exact heading that is matched for form conflict so that category of form conflict will be eliminated.]
The RLIN21 user guide says that “prp” and “st s” searches will not display records input that day; why? How are these records to be retrieved? Not sure; we should follow up. [Follow-up from RLG: Until NAF input is available, these can be retrieved as always in RLIN Terminal for Windows. After the files are rebuilt, indexing will happen frequently during the day, so access won't be available for prp and st s only for records input/updated in the last hours since indexing was done. At least, that's what we think at present.]
Lists of search results currently display only 25 headings at a time and one must click to get to the next screen to see the next 25 records; can this be customized such that staff can specify in their preferences how many records they see at any one time? Not currently; we should send feedback via RLIN21 feedback button.
Automated Record Creation
Will we still be able to use the "gen" command in RLIN21? Yes.
Any plans to implement the equivalent of cre* for authority records in RLIN21? Not sure. [Follow-up from RLG:
Not clear. Authority record creation will likely be handled the same
way as bib record creation in that templates will be supplied and can be
added or customized for different authority record types (e.g., name
heading, series heading). The question of whether a COPY button will
appear every time a MARC authority record is displayed to a NACO
contributor has not yet been resolved.]
Any plans to include macro capabilities in RLIN21? The program should work with MacroExpress.
Validation
Will there be some way of ensuring that characters that are not MARC8 do not get entered into authority records by mistake? Yes, a validation "filter" will show you where the unidentified character appears and not let you save the record until the character has been changed.
Future Developments
Any idea when NACO contributirs will start including vernacular fields in authority records? No. [Follow-up from RLG:
This is not really an RLG question. One of the factors that
continues to delay the implementation of original scripts in NACO authority
data is that not all places that support copies of NAF for input/update of
NACO records can yet cope with all of the original scripts that might be
included in these records. In order to maintain virtually identical copies
of NAF, users are not allowed to create headings with original scripts that
might be invisible or deleted in other copies of the file.]
Site URL: http://www.library.yale.edu/cataloging/authorities/ncc.html
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