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On Jan 4, 2013, at 3:57 PM, "Humpal, Nathan" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I was actually recently thinking about the difficulties inherent in the originInfo element, especially in relation to the implications of "place of publication" and "publisher". I was attempting to come up with an xsl schema that generated HTML from our MODS, and I was stymied by the fact that I couldn't really devise a consistent way to make sure that <place> was married to any specific <publisher> other than relative position. Furthermore, since using s.l., or any <place> element at all, if the place name is not known is advised against, a construction such as the following becomes ambiguous:
> 
> <originInfo>
> 	<place>New York</place>
> 	<publisher>Big Publisher Guy </publisher>
> 	<publisher>Smaller Publisher Feller</publisher>
> <originInfo>

Yes, I have the same problem, also where several places need to be associated with several publishers.

> Is New York associated with both Big Publisher Guy and Smaller Publisher Feller, or is New York only associated with Big Publisher Guy and the place associated with Smaller Publisher Feller is unknown?
> 
> I can see how the <providerEvent> element would alleviate some of this ambiguity, as two different providerEvent elements could be used for each publisher, which would allow for something like this:
> 
> <originInfo>
> 	<providerEvent eventType="publication">
> 		<geographic>New York</geographic>
> 		<provider type="corporate">
> 			<namePart>Big Publisher Guy</namePart>
> 		</provider>
> 	</providerEvent>
> 	<providerEvent eventType="publication">
> 		<geographic>New York</geographic>
> 		<provider type="corporate">
> 			<namePart> Smaller Publisher Feller </namePart>
> 		</provider>
> 	</providerEvent>
> </originInfo>
> 
> Which would eliminate that ambiguity by allowing for separate Events for each publisher....

The publication is one (collaborative) event, not two, I would think. 

Lodging place inside provider would give an unambiguous result:


	<providerEvent eventType="publication">
		<provider>
			<place><placeTerm>New York</placeTerm></place>
			<name type="corporate"><namePart>Big Publisher Guy</namePart></name>
		</provider>
		<provider>
			<name type="corporate"><namePart> Smaller Publisher Feller</namePart></name>
		</provider>
	</providerEvent>


There is one event, with two providers; both have a name, but only one of them has a place.

Cheers,

Jens

> 
> Now... as I was constructing that, I realized that perhaps I'm a little unclear on the "provider" element and how it would relate to the MODS "name" element, would it be able to accommodate subelements analogous to <namePart>? If so, would what I cobbled together up there be the desired direction or would there be something new, like, <providerPart>... For consistency with MADS, wouldn't it be better to do something like, 
> 
> <provider>
> 	<name type="corporate">
> 		<namePart>Big Publisher Guy</namePart>
> 	<name>
> </provider>
> 
> Nathan Humpal 
> Metadata Librarian
> University of Alabama Libraries/Box 870266/Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0266
> 205.348.3251; [log in to unmask]
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Metadata Object Description Schema List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Rebecca Guenther
> Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2013 1:12 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [MODS] possible future changes to originInfo
> 
> The MODS Editorial Committee is considering ways to change or enhance MODS to fix some of the problems with consistency that have been identified and to make it more compatible with the direction of the Bibliographic Framework Transition Initiative (BIBFRAME) and RDA. One area of difficulty in the current and previous versions of MODS has been the originInfo element and its subelements. Problems that have been identified include the following:
> 
> 1. Being able to specify a function within publisher.
> In MODS the <publisher> element is used in a general way to incorporate distributor, producer, publisher and manufacturer. The specific function is useful and these are separate elements in RDA. Being able to specify a function could remedy this situation.
> Note that the MODS-EC has already approved a change in MODS 3.5 to define a role attribute for originInfo to address the latter issue in the short term.
> 
> 2. Name within publisher. 
> Allow for the ability to reuse the mods:name definition within originInfo for the name of a publisher/distributor/producer, etc. This would allow for a controlled form of name or URI with additional attributes and subelements, such as role, nameType, etc. 
> 
> 3. Place.
> Places as subjects go under <subject><geographic>, but places under originInfo go under <place> and there is no way to indicate a controlled term. There is also the ability to provide <hierarchicalGeographic> under subject but not under originInfo/place. Here there is both the inconsistency and the inability to use a hierarchical place name that is related to the resource in another way than as subject.
> 
> 4. originInfo as a container for unrelated elements.
> Now originInfo includes place/publisher/dates, which need to be bound together, but it also includes some random elements that can stand alone. These include: edition, issuance and frequency.  This is particularly troublesome when there are multiple instances of originInfo: do you repeat all the stand-alone elements with each originInfo or just one (and which one)?
> 
> 5. Dates.
> There are a number of date types, e.g. dateIssued, dateCreated, dateValid,  dateOther (with uncontrolled type attribute.), etc. These need to be accommodated.
> 
> The MODS Editorial Committee has been considering ways to remedy these problems if it were not bound by the restriction of keeping MODS backwards compatible with previous versions. The following details possible solutions:
> 
> 1. OriginInfo as a container for various types of events related to the resource.
> Replace originInfo with an element <providerEvent> to encompass the various functions of making the resource available, i.e. publication, distribution, production and manufacture. An eventType attribute would be defined to specify the type of event (which would replace the new role attribute being defined in v. 3.5). 
> 
> 2. Provider with same definition as mods:name.
> A subelement, "<provider>" under providerEvent would carry the name of the publisher/distributor/producer/manufacturer and would use the same definition as mods:name.
> providerEvent is repeated for different functions with the appropriate eventType.
> 
> 3. Place
> Place would be a subelement within providerEvent. Geographic under subject is another area that needs to be cleaned up for various reasons (for instance, should hierarchicalGeographic really be a separate element or should it just be a different form of geographic and use the same element?). At a later date it will be considered whether to 1) change place under providerEvent to geographic, or 2) change geographic under subject to place, or 3) to keep place in providerEvent, but taking the same definition as <geographic> (i.e. that it can be a controlled form of name).
> 
> 4. Unrelated elements. Take edition, issuance and frequency out of originInfo/providerEvent as separate top level elements.
> 
> 5. Dates.
> Define <date> under providerEvent; the type of date is implicit in the eventType used. That is, if the eventType is "published" (or "issued"-- these have been considered synonymous) the date is publication, the provider is publisher, the place is place of publication. There are some stray dates that aren't associated with places and providers generally (i.e. dateValid). For those not related to an event, <date> can be defined at the top level and used with the type attribute (uncontrolled list). This construct will also be used for other types of dates that aren't associated with a provider event.
> 
> To accommodate the need for both transcription (how the resource presents itself) and access, there could be a subelement providerStatement under providerEvent for the transcribed form of the whole statement, i.e. place, provider, date.
> 
> The MODS Editorial Committee would like to hear comments on these proposed changes. They would be in a future major new version of MODS.
> 
> Rebecca
> Chair, MODS Editorial Committee
> Library of Congress