Monday, June 2, 2003
Dear PCC-er's:
Here's the latest flash from PCC Central!
The comprehensive PCC mid-year (FY2003) statistics are now
available for viewing via the PCC Web site at:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/stats/total03m.pdf ; an overall summary
of the Program statistics at a glance are to be found at:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/stats/totalstatsfy03m.html Also
available are the statistics for the multi-library NACO "funnel"
projects at: http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/stats/funstats03m.pdf" which
collates the projects alphabetically. For a listing of each project and
individual member contributions, select the link for:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/stats/funnels03m.html
The BIBCO and CONSER Operations Committees met in May 2003. The
full BIBCO OpCo report is found on the BIBCO Home Page at:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/bibco/opco03.html and summarizes the
meeting, including decisions and action items for the BIBCO Program.
Especially noteworthy is the fact that a sidebar discussion on
the issue of the ordering of notes in bibliographic records revealed
that some BIBCO members do not contribute bibliographic records that
necessitate re-ordering the notes fields in accordance with AACR2. Many
OPACs rearrange notes in numeric MARC tag order and CONSER policy states
that notes be input in MARC tag order. Consequently, BIBCO OpCo members
agreed that the Standing Committee on Standards should be asked to
consider making the 5XX note order optional for BIBCO in all formats,
and subsequently, on May 19th 2003, the Cataloging Policy and Support
Office (CPSO) issued a draft LCRI that allows for this option.
Of keen interest is the discussion which focuses on
bibliographic records in OCLC that have been contributed from Latin
American libraries. These records contain an 040 subfield coded $b spa
denoting that they were created for a non-English language based
catalog. In accordance with OCLC Enhance policies, when authenticating
non-English catalog language records for BIBCO or CONSER, PCC libraries
are to convert any existing 040 subfield $b from "spa" to "eng."
Furthermore, catalogers are to convert any elements--especially the 300
and 5XX fields-- into English, thus, in effect, eliminating any evidence
of the original language of the catalog except for the 6XXs (if there
had been any and only if they had been tagged appropriately). The BIBCO
community has in the past expressed concern with this policy, and some
libraries have decided not to authenticate as BIBCO rather than to
remove the Spanish data. This practice has caused concern among
colleagues in the CONSER community, especially as the PCC attempts to
build bridges of trust and respect across the borders. A straw poll of
the attendees revealed that indeed BIBCO would want to partner with
CONSER. A letter has been forwarded to OCLC requesting parallel
records to exist in the database rather that converting the record into
an English language catalog-based record. Regardless of the outcome,
BIBCO would not be in favor of allowing nonstandard elements into
Program records (e.g., duplicate 5xx fields in Spanish and English).
Until PCC policy is changed however, the status quo for authenticating
such records must be adhered to. Glenn Patton (OCLC) has responded that
OCLC is currently investigating a new approach to accept non-English
catalog language records.
The CONSER Operations Committee report is available at:
http://www.loc.gov/acq/conser/conop2003.html and summarizes in detail
the discussions held during the 2003 CONSER OpCo meeting.
A new Task Group to survey PCC libraries on cataloging of remote
access electronic resources has been created and charged with developing
and conducting a survey of all PCC libraries to determine the extent of
current cataloging of remote access electronic resources. The survey
should elicit information on the selection criteria and decision process
and identify areas where there is a perceived need for more access to be
provided. Please go to:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/bibco/tgeresources.html for the group's
timeframe and membership. The final report and survey results are to be
submitted in time for the Policy Committee meeting to consider at their
2003 annual
meeting and is expected to contain an executive summary with
recommendations for further action.
The updated 2002-2006 Strategic and Tactical Plan has been
posted to the PCC Web site and is to be found at:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/stratplan_02.pdf Please refer to this
Plan to read about new goals and directions in which the PCC is moving.
And with many kudos given to the previous chair of the Standing
Committee on Training, the PCC Web site has incorporated search engines
on each of its Home Pages. Appreciation is given to Carol Hixson for
this valuable suggestion!
As usual, please send any corrections in contact information
directly to me, accessible at: [log in to unmask]
Sincerely yours,
John N. Mitchell
