I've been flogging this dead horse forever, but why not again? This is why ISBD characterizes this as "preceding publication". Ideally, the 4XX tag would automatically generate ". -- " before displaying its content, obviating the need to perform somersaults at the end of the 300. It's sad, but aside from some well-delineated cases (e.g., parallel titles, serials numbering), MARC and ISBD are sufficiently well aligned that most preceding punctuation could be automatically generated by any properly programmed system. In theory, such a system could even receive MARC records with embedded ISBD punctuation--the default in our world--and strip any redundant punctuation prior to loading.
Ed Jones National University (San Diego, Calif.) -----Original Message----- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jonathan Rochkind Sent: Thursday, November 11, 2010 10:51 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [RDA-L] 300 Punctuation Yes, I think it's ridiculous to try and write ISBD punctuation directly in MARC, instead of having presentation software supply it later if desired. RDA theoretically is meant to get us away from such things, but the need to shoe-horn it into MARC, and the reluctance to give up on manually entering ISBD, keeps us mired in a confusing situation where you need to consult several different (not very well aligned standards) to figure out how to enter the data -- and in general, need to consider more 'context' to figure out how to enter data. (Is there a 490 following? Why should I care when deciding how to enter the publication data, what does this have to do with publication data? It also means that that if the status of the 490 on a record ever changes, you've got to go back and possibly reformulate the 300 too?) This really starts getting in the way of the savings to cataloger time, and rationalization of data recorded, that RDA aims for. I wonder if there is another approach. Like, perhaps, not worrying about ISBD punctuation when recording data. Software can determine at the time of display if there is another 'ISBD area' following the 300 in the display, and if so, what punctuation should be supplied. If that's actually needed at all for our users. But the goal of RDA is to be presentation-independent, and recording punctuation based on your predictions/assumptions about how a given system will display the data recorded (like whether a 490 will be immediately following or not) is not that. Makes the data less flexible AND increases the amount of time catalogers need to spend with idiosyncratic (not "principles based") rules. J. McRee Elrod wrote: > Christopher Case said: > > >> I was just curious how one would punctuate the 300 field, >> specifically final punctuation in $c ... >> > > According the samples, and the explanations given by others, you now > know that there is a final period only if a 490 follows 300, despite > the fact that there are now three new 3XX fields between. > > This seems ridiculous to me. In any given OPAC display, the 490 may > or may not be displayed following the 300, and may or may not be in > the same paragraph. > > It seems to me there should be a final period after all elements (as > with a sentence), regardless of what follows. A dash should be > considered the ISBD display introduction of the next element in the > same paragraph, not a period dash. Most OPACs today use labels, not > dashes, between elements. > > SLC will supply the period after cm at the end of 300 if lacking. > This is an angels dancing on pin sort of distinction which makes us > look silly. > > > __ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod ([email protected]) > {__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/ > ___} |__ \__________________________________________________________ >
