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On May 7-8, there was a NISO Metasearch Strategy Meeting held in Denver, Colorado. Several people on this list were in attendance. At that meeting, SRW/SRU was mentioned as being "very close to the optimal solution" for a search and retrieval protocol. At least an XML solution was desired, and folks seemed willing to take a closer look at SRW/SRU to see if it was appropriate (or if desired enhancements could be made). (FYI, a _metasearch product_ is one of the portal products that are so popular right now in the library community -- e.g., AGent, Chameleon iPortal, ENCompass, iBistro, iLink, MetaLIB, MetaStar, WebFeat, ZPORTAL, among many others.) It was suggested that SRW/SRU had one serious shortcoming where metasearching was concerned . . . "while seeking to simplify or eliminate some of the complexities of Z39.50, the notion of searching multiple databases has been dropped . . . if the databases were free this would be true, but the reality is that each one has revenue and royalty related business rules associated with it and must be distinguished from the query." There was also a desire for more result-set and record metadata. The outcome of this strategy meeting was a recommendation that NISO form several working groups. One of them was to develop "long-term best practices for search and retrieval". Seems to me that this would be a good "fit" for ZNG. If SRW/SRU is to become the recommended search and retrieval protocol for these products, we need to invite metasearch product vendors and data providers to the table. Perhaps opening up the discussion list would be a good first step. Larry ------------------------------------------------------------ Larry E. Dixson Internet: [log in to unmask] Network Development and MARC Standards Office, LM639 Library of Congress Telephone: (202) 707-5807 Washington, D.C. 20540-4402 Fax: (202) 707-0115