Disclaimer: The following represents the thoughts of Joe Bartl and not the policies or opinions of the Library of Congress.

This may seem a little off the "cm" topic, but the following illustrates, I think, both the frustrations caused by inconsistency and the inescapability of inconsistency:

I am currently working up specs for the retroconversion of seven LC Music Division card catalogs (closed in 1980) -- 3.5M cards.  As you may well imagine, these cards represent more than a century of cataloging production under various cataloging codes variously applied by several generations of catalogers and variously ignored by division non-cataloging staff deciding to add a little home-made something to the drawers.  These cards run the gamut from wholly hand-written to the beautiful print production of the last couple of decades represented in the catalog.  

In all of this incredibly diverse cataloging, I have been able to spot only one consistently applied bit of formatting: square brackets around uniform titles.  Beyond that simple bit of punctuation, chaos.

Joe  

Joe Bartl
Head, Music Bibliographic Access Section 1
Music Division 
Library of Congress
101 Independence Avenue, SE
Room LM 542
Washington, DC  20540-9420
Desk: 202-707-0013
Email: [log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Herrold, Charles
Sent: Thursday, February 02, 2012 10:39 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] More about two concerns about RDA

True enough--I suppose the matter is settled. For example, American heritage dictionary gives "cm", without a period, Wikipedia (that fount of all knowledge) has: A centimetre (American spelling: centimeter, symbol cm), and The Chicago manual of style (14th ed., at least) gives metric abbreviations without periods, all of which I confess not to have known.  But let's face it, it has been spelled cm. since the beginning of the card catalog era--though one could argue that this is simply closing punctuation--so let's not malign those who think of it as an abbreviation.  (If it quacks like a duck ...)  
     IMO, this seems like a silly thing to argue about anyway, since most American catalog users don't really know what centimeters are anyway, and if we really wanted to be user friendly we'd be better off using inches, given that the U.S. is unlikely to switch to the metric system anytime soon.  If it has to be "cm" so be it.  We can live with that, and implementing RDA will have far bigger challenges in store than that.
Chuck Herrold
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Adam L. Schiff
Sent: Wednesday, February 01, 2012 5:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] More about two concerns about RDA

Amy Turner wrote:

> We are used to using "cm." and we'll keep right on using "cm."

Better to teach catalogers to adhere to the standard, which rightfully recognizes that cm is an internationally agreed upon metric symbol which does not include a period.  The standard spells out the content of the data to be included.  To record the value cm with a period is wrong.  RDA does not require ISBD punctuation, which is really the issue here.  In my mind it is better to forget to input a period after cm when there is a 490 present than to always input an incorrect period after the metric symbol.



Adam Schiff

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