How will OCLC handle changes to authority records when there is more than
one person for which the same heading has been used? For example, the
British Library just edited the LC authority record for Welch, Matthew,
adding the date 1958-, and creating a new authority record for the name
without the date. LC has revised their bibliographic records, but there
are member-contributed records in OCLC that have not been revised. Of
course, sorting out which heading is appropriate to which record is often
not easy.
I an also interested in hearing how other libraries handle this sort of
change. Our authority vendor, LTI, supplies revised bibliographic records
for straightforward changes to associated authority records, but leaves the
bibliographic records unedited when it is likely that more than one heading
is involved. We use their reports to do the changes manually. This
often involves educated guesswork. For years, we had no notification of
changes to authority records, and who knows how many records have a heading
which matches the authority record for an inappropriate author. Since our
authority control is built on accepting headings which match authority
records, we will continue to add headings like this from OCLC. Perhaps
this is not really a problem in an era when people are used to sorting
through millions of hits from Google searches, but an ideal authority
control system would have a better way to link bibliographic to authority
records when the headings differ only in details such as date. I do not
use Connexion, but have looked at help. Do I understand correctly that a
link will be maintained whenever a cataloger has judged that an authority
record is appropriate to a certain heading? This seems like a great step
forward. However, the number of headings, in OCLC and in all of our
catalogs, which have not been linked is staggering. I would hope that a
way could be found to do this cooperatively, rather than duplicating the
work at various libraries.
Amy H. Turner
Monographic Cataloger & Authority Control Coordinator
Duke University Libraries
Durham, NC 27708-0190
[log in to unmask]
|---------+---------------------------->
| | "Patton,Glenn" |
| | <[log in to unmask]
| | > |
| | Sent by: Program |
| | for Cooperative |
| | Cataloging |
| | <[log in to unmask]>|
| | |
| | |
| | 11/18/2003 04:12 |
| | PM |
| | Please respond to|
| | Program for |
| | Cooperative |
| | Cataloging |
| | |
|---------+---------------------------->
>------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| |
| To: [log in to unmask] |
| cc: |
| Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] notifying OCLC |
>------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
I'd like to provide a bit of clarification. As part of the migration of
OCLC's WorldCat to a new Oracle-based database, we're moving toward having
headings in bibliographic records linked to authority records so that
changes in the authority record will cause headings in bibliographic
records
to be updated automatically. At the present time, that automatic
correction
happens only with records in which the headings have been explicitly linked
using the functionality that it available in the Connexion browser and
client interfaces. So, it's not a comprehensive process yet.
OCLC used to ask that NACO participants report OCLC bib records that were
affected by headings they were changing in authority records. We no longer
ask for those reports since we now get reports of changed authority
headings
and use those as the basis of making changes in the related bibliographic
records.
Glenn Patton
Director, WorldCat Content Management
OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc.
6565 Frantz Rd.
Dublin OH 43017-3395
Phone: +1.800.848.5878, ext. 6371 or +1.614.764.6371
Fax: +1.614.718.7187
Email: mailto:[log in to unmask]
-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Schiff [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, November 17, 2003 2:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: notifying OCLC
> then why not also notify OCLC and RLIN (to name just two proprietors of
> large bibliographic databases)? One reason might be that individual
> NACO members may not have access to those bibliographic databases--just
> like with the BL.
My understanding of some of OCLC's automation features is that now when a
1XX authority heading is changed, there is an automatic process that
results in headings in bib. records being flipped to the new form.
Perhaps someone from OCLC can confirm if this is correct.
Although NACO libraries are not required to notify the utilities of
headings that need to be changed to match authorized forms, we include
notification to OCLC as part of our workflow. Catalogers report records
to OCLC using the error reporting feature in Passport whenever they create
a heading and there are bib. records in OCLC that don't match the newly
authorized form. We consider this a useful community service, and it also
means that if we have to use one of those records later that the heading
is already in the authorized form and we don't import variant forms of an
author's name into bib. records in our catalog.
Adam
**************************************
* Adam L. Schiff *
* Principal Cataloger *
* University of Washington Libraries *
* Box 352900 *
* Seattle, WA 98195-2900 *
* (206) 543-8409 *
* (206) 685-8782 fax *
* [log in to unmask] *
**************************************
|