Hi Ted, In your quest of finding a web-cam or smart-phone with a barcode reading capability, your probably best, for your Librarian's sake, and for productivity and ease, be easier to spend per say $150-$300 on a cheap but decent barcode scanner.
As you would probably find your librarian would get frustrated very quickly with having to look at a screen and line up the items barcode with the webcam and wait 4-5 seconds for the computer to register the barcode with Evergreen or Koha. If you have a barcode reader, your librarian just scans the barcode and it immediately reads and registers the barcode on the computer, because a barcode reader just acts like a normal keyboard connected to a computer. Hope this of some help. Best Wishes, Joel > From: "G. T. Stresen-Reuter" <[email protected]> > Reply-To: Evergreen Discussion Group > <[email protected]> > Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2012 13:51:56 +0000 > To: Evergreen Discussion Group <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] Bar Code Readers, ISBN, and Amazon > > On Mar 14, 2012, at 12:58 PM, Hardy, Elaine wrote: > >> Ted, >> >> The Z39.50 gateway is a clientÂserver protocol for searching and >> retrieving information (http://www.loc.gov/z3950/gateway.html#about) and, >> as Ben says, generally involves MARC (Machine Readable Cataloging) >> formatted records entered according to cataloging standards >> (Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, 2nd ed or AACR2). More information on >> the MARC format can be found at http://www.loc.gov/marc/ . You can also >> find a discussion of MARCXML and other standards on the Library of >> Congress (LC) website -- http://www.loc.gov/standards/ >> >> Amazon probably stores their data in ONIX, which is a publishing protocol >> for bibliographic data. While there are crosswalks between the two, >> differences make it a little difficult to do a complete machine-based >> transition. Another issue is the crosswalk between the ONIX data and >> AACR2. My understanding is this will be a little easier once we implement >> our new standard RDA (Resource Description and Access). My understand also >> is that ONIX is much more flexible in transcription of bibliographic data >> than is AACR2. > > Ben and Elaine, > > Excellent information. Thank you so much for the detailed explanations. I've > discussed the issue (briefly) with our librarian and she's assured me that the > (old) existing catalog can export data in MARC format so if I can resurrect > the system, we can probably import the data into either Evergreen or Koha > (have narrowed it down to these two and leaning toward Koha). > > I spent a little time exploring bar code reading via webcams and smart phones > to see if that would help with data entry for new items and found a few > potential resources but nothing that screams: "This is the solution to your > problems" so the hunt continues. > > Thank you again for all your help and input. > > Sincerely, > > Ted Stresen-Reuter
