Re: [RDA-L] Feedback on RDA

[Brenndorfer, Thomas]

To cope with the FRBR/FRAD language in RDA, I've found the newly released 
Statement of International Cataloguing Principles to be useful primer:

http://www.ifla.org/files/cataloguing/icp/icp_2009-en.pdf

The RDA Toolkit, as a software product, leaves some things to be desired in my 
opinion.

Perhaps one area of ongoing potential confusion to be mindful of is a tension 
between the use of terms "record" and "data."

FRAD (Functional Requirements for Authority Data) was once FRANAR (Functional 
Requirements for Authority Numbering and Records), and FRSAD (Functional 
Requirements for Subject Authority Data) was once FRSAR (Functional 
Requirements for Subject Authority Records).

That shift suggests a developing interest in the re-use of bibliographic data 
(such as in a Linked Data environment) instead of re-using entire bibliographic 
records. Given that shift, it does appear to be very important to start 
thinking of all the data involved in cataloguing as being categorized into the 
core concepts: entities, attributes of entities, and relationships between 
entities. As conceptual containers, I've already found using this terminology 
to be far more useful than explaining the card catalogue-centric language of 
AACR2 to non-cataloguers.

Thomas Brenndorfer
Guelph Public Library

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access
> [mailto:rd...@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of Mills, Deborah
> Sent: August 30, 2010 3:14 PM
> To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA
> Subject: [RDA-L] Feedback on RDA
>
>
> I agree with a previous poster about the convoluted language being imposed,
> and am dismayed by the response from one of the RDA authors that it is
> aimed at those outside the library world. Firstly, I can't see that the
> language will be any more comprehensible to a non-library trained person,
> and secondly, if there is so much difference to the language used depending
> on the user of RDA, why not have different versions, aimed at different
> users?
>
> Deborah Mills
> Cataloguer
>
> E.P. Taylor Research Library
> Art Gallery of Ontario
> 317 Dundas Street West
> Toronto, Ontario
> Canada   M5T 1G4
>
> e-mail: deborah_mi...@ago.net
> ph: 416-979-6660 ext. 390
> fax: 416-979-6602