The Japanese Newpapers project will provide vernacular access to Yale's Japanese newspaper collection. Orbis currently does not support the storage and display of non-roman characters. Therefore, Orbis records for Japanese newspapers, as well as other non-roman materials, are stored and displayed in Orbis using roman character transliterations. Transliteration is often ambiguous and difficult for readers to search. A web-based list of Japanese newspaper records, stored, indexed, and displayed in the vernacular, will provide increased access for Yale scholars and other interested researchers world wide. The creation of such a list will also enable Yale to contribute to the Union List of Japanese Serials at Ohio State.
The initial scope of the project is narrow, and as such is perfect for the time and funding constraints of a Scopa project. However, if the project is successful, the database of Japanese newspapers can expand to include all CJK (Chinese, Japanese, and K orean) serials. The knowledge gained in this project will also apply to the eventual storage, indexing, and display of other non-roman material records at Yale.
Methodology
The East Asian Collection currently contains approximately 50 Japanese newspaper titles. With the support of East Asian Unit, Yale's Japanese Newspaper records in RLIN will be identified. A student worker will download the vernacular records from RLIN u sing CLARR. The records will then be imported into an Access database set up by the Database Administration group. The records will be updated to include links to Orbis holdings. Finally, Workstation Support will create an interface based on web pages published from the database. Upon completion of the project, Yale will submit the database for addition to the Union List of Japanese Serials at Ohio State.
Timeline
| January - July 99 | - Ongoing recon of Japanese newspaper/serial records in RLIN |
| January - March 99 | - Research migration, storage, and display of vernacular records using Unicode 2.1 |
| April - May 99 | - Design & creation of Access database structure |
| June - July 99 | - Download vernacular RLIN records & import into Access database |
| August - Sept 99 | - Creation of prototype web interface |
| October - Dec 99 | - If possible, expansion of project to include all Japanese serials |
| - Submission of written report |
Funding
Level III student worker (Japanese lang. skills) -- Project Testing 40 hours @ $7.70/hr = $308.00
Level III student worker (Japanese lang. skills) -- Record Import 40 hours @ $7.70/hr = $308.00
RLIN connection & use fees = $100.00
Total requested funds = $716.00