> We are mapping EAD tags to Z39.50 BIB-1 use attributes and would like to
> be consistent with standard practice. Has anyone done this? Has a
> standard been set?
As Michael Fox said last week, the problem with this route is that
searching EAD-encoded finding aids shouldn't be restricted to just Dublin
Core or MARC-type elements (author, title, subject, etc.) but often can
include structural elements of the document like "inventory" or "summary
collection description". You can't map that stuff to BIB-1 attributes.
Furthermore, the mapping of the traditional access points gets difficult
with finding aids. For example, "author" is usually defined as the
repository which authored the finding aid, not the author who is the
subject of the collection. And "title" could be the official title of the
finding aid in some cases, and the <title> elements in other cases.
"Subject" includes, in our case, eight different elements with
subject-like content including the <subject> element, but not the same
elements choosen at other sites, I'm sure.
As far as I can see, there's no way to enforce consistency of indexing
decisions for EAD, even if the markup is internally consistent across
different repositories.
I think this is a very complex and difficult problem with searching
finding aids. For this reason we will be participating in a small project
with some other universities to try to develop a set of common, useful
access points for cross-collection search criteria on finding aids. The
project will be lead by the University of Michigan and minimally include
Harvard, Columbia, and Oxford. Our hope is that if we can figure out what
kinds of access are of common utility we can help to develop the Z39.50
Collections profile (or EAD profile, or whatever makes the most sense by
then).
If you're only using Z39.50 to search your own collection then it's not as
much of a problem and there are some short-term options, as others have
pointed out. But this mapping isn't quite as simple as it may have
sounded...
_____________________________________________________________________________
MacKenzie Smith [log in to unmask]
Digital Library Projects Manager phone: (617)495-3724
Office for Information Systems fax: (617)495-0491
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