>>>>> "RG" == Rebecca S Guenther <[log in to unmask]> writes:
RG> Interesting what you've done with these dates. In your examples,
RG> "inferred" doesn't mean anything to me. Is there a better more
RG> descriptive name for that attribute? This is a limitation on the
RG> accuracy of the date. Any ideas?
I was groping for a term that might reflect that a date is from a
non-proscribed source, or deduced by some means, a generic term that
might include the AACR2 forms like [1834] and [not before 1842]. As I
said, not well thought out, for purposes of illustration only.
RG> We had figured that if you have a date and there is no encoding specified
RG> that it is assumed to be free text. That's why we didn't add anything like
RG> "unstructured". In a number of places in MODS the lack of encoding or
RG> authority means unstructured or uncontrolled. Is it necessary to
RG> explicitly say that? If so, I would think that in terms of dates, it would
RG> be encoding="unstructured", rather than type (also since we now might have
RG> type=copyright under dateIssued).
Point taken, elements in general are implicitly uncontrolled in the
absence of some specific attribute.
I think it is a problem in MARC that dates are stored in two locations
with different conventions. It made sense when it was done, but a
present it seems at best an opportunity for typographic errors. In
MODS there is an opportunity avoid inheriting, or at least discourage,
that problem.
That said, it is probably impossible to support all forms of
transcribed dates from normalized forms, even just thinking of western
usages such as "anno 18." If supporting the full range of AACR2
transcibed date forms is important, my argument for storing only the
normalized form of a date has just collapsed in a heap of rubble.
Even so, there should be some formal encouragement or preference for
dates to appear in their normalized forms, with uncontrolled forms
available when needed.
Tod A. Olson <[log in to unmask]> "How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
Sr. Programmer / Analyst "If you weren't mad, you wouldn't have
The University of Chicago Library come here," said the Cat.
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