[CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
So you want a non-standard way to display and use what your library has? What about future moves to another ILS? What about getting your ILS to work with other systems or web services? There are reasons for standards. It is not to make our jobs harder. Bill Drew -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Matt Amory Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2012 9:00 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
Matt, Looks to me at a cursory glance that at least one Endeca implementation is still drawing on MaRC data: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/technology.html ...even if not directly using MaRC for search: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/faqs.html MaRC is simply the widest-used library standard. If you could get hold of ONIX (2.1 or 3.0) feeds, you could in theory build an LMS around that instead, or any other data format you prefer. There is at least a fair amount of interest on interoperating at least these 2 major formats: http://www.oclc.org/research/news/2010-04-09.htm (ONIX 3.0 version pending). -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Matt Amory Sent: 14 March 2012 13:00 To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
The Endeca implementation at the Triangle Research Libraries Network (and indeed, in general) is an *index* of information about items in our libraries' collections. The format of the data that's fed into the index can be (and is) variable: we're about to start loading items from our digital collections that are MARC-based into our Endeca index, where they will co-exist with traditional bibliographic information that comes out of our ILS systems. Endeca provides a public interface to library holdings: it is not and could not be an ILS, performing functions like circulation, accounting control, etc. In this respect it's more akin to Blacklight that to an ILS. Will On 3/14/12 9:28 AM, Michael Hopwood mich...@editeur.org wrote: Matt, Looks to me at a cursory glance that at least one Endeca implementation is still drawing on MaRC data: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/technology.html ...even if not directly using MaRC for search: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/faqs.html MaRC is simply the widest-used library standard. If you could get hold of ONIX (2.1 or 3.0) feeds, you could in theory build an LMS around that instead, or any other data format you prefer. There is at least a fair amount of interest on interoperating at least these 2 major formats: http://www.oclc.org/research/news/2010-04-09.htm (ONIX 3.0 version pending). -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Matt Amory Sent: 14 March 2012 13:00 To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
That was my impression... I should have mentioned the efforts just starting within my current project to map MaRC (or flavour[s] thereof!) to the open LIDO standard: http://network.icom.museum/cidoc/working-groups/data-harvesting-and-interchange.html It's interesting in that it will hopefully express a library standard (or standardS; the situation is complicated in Europe by the many MaRC variants in use) in terms of a schema developed for museum objects. In theory this is definitely possible (LIDO is built to cope with any type of objects, including Manifestation Product Types [cf. http://www.cidoc-crm.org/docs/frbr_oo/frbr_docs/FRBRoo_V1.0_2009_june_.pdf]) but it will be a challenge. M -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Owen, Will Sent: 14 March 2012 13:38 To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? The Endeca implementation at the Triangle Research Libraries Network (and indeed, in general) is an *index* of information about items in our libraries' collections. The format of the data that's fed into the index can be (and is) variable: we're about to start loading items from our digital collections that are MARC-based into our Endeca index, where they will co-exist with traditional bibliographic information that comes out of our ILS systems. Endeca provides a public interface to library holdings: it is not and could not be an ILS, performing functions like circulation, accounting control, etc. In this respect it's more akin to Blacklight that to an ILS. Will On 3/14/12 9:28 AM, Michael Hopwood mich...@editeur.org wrote: Matt, Looks to me at a cursory glance that at least one Endeca implementation is still drawing on MaRC data: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/technology.html ...even if not directly using MaRC for search: http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca/faqs.html MaRC is simply the widest-used library standard. If you could get hold of ONIX (2.1 or 3.0) feeds, you could in theory build an LMS around that instead, or any other data format you prefer. There is at least a fair amount of interest on interoperating at least these 2 major formats: http://www.oclc.org/research/news/2010-04-09.htm (ONIX 3.0 version pending). -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Matt Amory Sent: 14 March 2012 13:00 To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
Hi, Matt. Welcome to code4lib. Good question! Here's a quick summary of my understanding of what I think you're asking: Q1. Is there an ILS that is not based on MaRC records? A1. No, not to my knowledge. Yes, marc cataloging can seem tedious and arcane, but we have lots of tools for working with it at this point. All commercial ILS vendors that I am aware of use it, and the open source ILS products I know of also use MaRC. Q2. Is that what this Endeca based thing is about? A2. Kind of, a little. For most libraries, physical (and to some extent digital) inventory of collections is maintained by their ILS. Usually this is a commercial vendor solution, maybe even one with a six figure contract attached to it, but open source ILS solutions are increasingly viable and widespread. Migrating away from an ILS is an enormous undertaking, one that overhauls every workflow process in the library. Many libraries are in the position of not wanting to migrate their ILS, but disliking the public-facing interface provided by the ILS vendor. For years these interfaces were difficult to change and many of us felt that it was leading to stagnation in the library innovation space, because we were competing for attention with Internet based services that could respond to user desires quickly. The standard solution has been, not to switch away from MaRC or the ILS, but to index those records into a separate discovery interface, one which the library has control ove! r. That's what Endeca is, but it is very expensive. People who have implemented it are contractually prevented from saying exactly how expensive but I've never signed an NDA and I've heard numbers in the millions. There are several free open source library discovery solutions (Blacklight, VuFind, Kobald Chieftan (sp?) that you could play around with if you wanted. But these are for solving discovery problems, not for simplifying your internal metadata standards. I hope this helps. Welcome to the community and good luck to you. Bess On Mar 14, 2012, at 5:59 AM, Matt Amory wrote: Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
I did not mean to sound snarky in my earlier message but I do not understand why no one is talking about standards and why we have them. This includes standard ways to present and transmit data between systems. That is oen of the big reasons for using MARC. - Wilfred (Bill) Drew, M.S., B.S., A.S. Assistant Professor Librarian, Systems and Tech Services Tompkins Cortland Community College (TC3) Library: http://www.tc3.edu/library/ Dryden, N.Y. 13053-0139 E-mail: dr...@tc3.edu Phone: 607-844-8222 ext.4406 AOL Instant Messenger:BillDrew4 Online Identity: http://claimID.com/billdrew StrengthsQuest: Ideation, Input, Learner, Activator, Communication http://www.facebook.com/people/Bill_Drew/ From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Bess Sadler [bess.sad...@gmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2012 2:11 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Hi, Matt. Welcome to code4lib. Good question! Here's a quick summary of my understanding of what I think you're asking: Q1. Is there an ILS that is not based on MaRC records? A1. No, not to my knowledge. Yes, marc cataloging can seem tedious and arcane, but we have lots of tools for working with it at this point. All commercial ILS vendors that I am aware of use it, and the open source ILS products I know of also use MaRC. Q2. Is that what this Endeca based thing is about? A2. Kind of, a little. For most libraries, physical (and to some extent digital) inventory of collections is maintained by their ILS. Usually this is a commercial vendor solution, maybe even one with a six figure contract attached to it, but open source ILS solutions are increasingly viable and widespread. Migrating away from an ILS is an enormous undertaking, one that overhauls every workflow process in the library. Many libraries are in the position of not wanting to migrate their ILS, but disliking the public-facing interface provided by the ILS vendor. For years these interfaces were difficult to change and many of us felt that it was leading to stagnation in the library innovation space, because we were competing for attention with Internet based services that could respond to user desires quickly. The standard solution has been, not to switch away from MaRC or the ILS, but to index those records into a separate discovery interface, one which the library has control ove! r. That's what Endeca is, but it is very expensive. People who have implemented it are contractually prevented from saying exactly how expensive but I've never signed an NDA and I've heard numbers in the millions. There are several free open source library discovery solutions (Blacklight, VuFind, Kobald Chieftan (sp?) that you could play around with if you wanted. But these are for solving discovery problems, not for simplifying your internal metadata standards. I hope this helps. Welcome to the community and good luck to you. Bess On Mar 14, 2012, at 5:59 AM, Matt Amory wrote: Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 2:17 PM, Wilfred Drew dr...@tc3.edu wrote: I did not mean to sound snarky in my earlier message but I do not understand why no one is talking about standards and why we have them. This includes standard ways to present and transmit data between systems. That is oen of the big reasons for using MARC. I think at least partially because the standard (MARC21 with AACR2) is incredibly arcane with an enormous learning curve. It's hard, it doesn't make sense in lots and lots of ways, and for many applications the initial cost is just plain too steep, no matter what the eventual benefits. MARC/AACR2 is the standard I spend most of my time with, but that doesn't mean I find it easy to defend. Personally, I don't find it hard to imagine bibliographic applications where MARC cataloging is way over the top. If you only have a few thousand volumes, even something as simplistic as an RIS record for each item that includes a shelf-number will get you an awfully long way. Whether or not it gets your far enough is a different (and more difficult) question that can only be answered by the people on the ground, who know what they have and can guess at what's coming.
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
One thing I haven't heard anyone talk about is that while MARC can be complicated, the abundance of MARC records available makes it rather easy to populate an ILS as long as you don't have to do [mostly] original cataloging. For example, the Career Development Center on campus here uses Koha. They do not have any librarians on staff but have a collection of books they circulate. The Libraries' Head of Cataloging and I provided basic training to one of the peopel there on how to use the system and they have been largely self-sufficient since then. They are able to import MARC records for books using Koha's built-in Z39.50 interface from other libraries. They didn't need to learn the intricacies of MARC. For some special in-house things we provided a little bit of training on how to make a basic MARC record. If a system was used that didn't use MARC it is likely, at least in our experience, to be more work since things would have to all be created in-house. Of course, your mileage may vary. Edward On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 2:11 PM, Bess Sadler bess.sad...@gmail.com wrote: Hi, Matt. Welcome to code4lib. Good question! Here's a quick summary of my understanding of what I think you're asking: Q1. Is there an ILS that is not based on MaRC records? A1. No, not to my knowledge. Yes, marc cataloging can seem tedious and arcane, but we have lots of tools for working with it at this point. All commercial ILS vendors that I am aware of use it, and the open source ILS products I know of also use MaRC. Q2. Is that what this Endeca based thing is about? A2. Kind of, a little. For most libraries, physical (and to some extent digital) inventory of collections is maintained by their ILS. Usually this is a commercial vendor solution, maybe even one with a six figure contract attached to it, but open source ILS solutions are increasingly viable and widespread. Migrating away from an ILS is an enormous undertaking, one that overhauls every workflow process in the library. Many libraries are in the position of not wanting to migrate their ILS, but disliking the public-facing interface provided by the ILS vendor. For years these interfaces were difficult to change and many of us felt that it was leading to stagnation in the library innovation space, because we were competing for attention with Internet based services that could respond to user desires quickly. The standard solution has been, not to switch away from MaRC or the ILS, but to index those records into a separate discovery interface, one which the library has control o! ve! r. That's what Endeca is, but it is very expensive. People who have implemented it are contractually prevented from saying exactly how expensive but I've never signed an NDA and I've heard numbers in the millions. There are several free open source library discovery solutions (Blacklight, VuFind, Kobald Chieftan (sp?) that you could play around with if you wanted. But these are for solving discovery problems, not for simplifying your internal metadata standards. I hope this helps. Welcome to the community and good luck to you. Bess On Mar 14, 2012, at 5:59 AM, Matt Amory wrote: Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
On 2012-03-14, at 2:11 PM, Bess Sadler wrote: Q1. Is there an ILS that is not based on MaRC records? A1. No, not to my knowledge. Yes, marc cataloging can seem tedious and arcane, but we have lots of tools for working with it at this point. All commercial ILS vendors that I am aware of use it, and the open source ILS products I know of also use MaRC. Further note to this. a) All the commercial and non-commercial ILS systems used by more than one institution of which I am aware either added MARC processing or died. b) All of the systems for which I have seen the underpinnings have mapped the important values from the Marc record into various other SQL data structures. They may store the Marc on the side or assemble it on the fly at the point of demand. Marc enters and exits the system but may or may not drive the internals. Walter Lewis who would happily forget everything he learned about Marc; but honestly folks there are lots of things that make less sense in the world
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
It would probably help frame your question a bit if you went into a little more detail as to where you think the problem is. Are your catalogers struggling with some particular kind of data entry? Is it that you're trying to do stuff with MARC data (say, via an export or something) and you find the MARC structure/cataloging rules too convoluted? Or are you just trying to, say, tweak templates in your ILS's OPAC and finding frustration with the complexity of the data? Or something else? I mean, personally, I haven't met a single person that's relatively new to coding in libraries that doesn't have the idea of doing something better than MARC (and, I too, was that person). Bill has mentioned some of the problem (that is, ILS migrations), but there's also the question of where you'd get your actual catalogs records if not somewhere like OCLC (I don't imagine your library does all original cataloging). The standard (and rules) have a LOT of infrastructure behind them (40+ year old standards do that), which would be non-trivial to just throw away (cue RDA's problem with migrating to RDF here). If your problem is more like my second question to you, why not try transforming your MARC into something more palatable? http://www.loc.gov/standards/marcxml/#stylesheets -Ross. On Mar 14, 2012, at 8:59 AM, Matt Amory wrote: Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
The real key to moving libraries away from MARC will probably be transformation of the sharing situation. Open linked data gives promise of being able to do this (if everyone was able to harvest whatever triples they needed for whatever they wanted to describe) -- but wouldn't there need to be hubs that provided reliable data and were available to harvest from, at scale, (or, something like linked data torrents perhaps)? And enough standardization of the data to support common library discovery and delivery functions? It isn't clear what the economic model to support this would be. Meanwhile... how does one get hold of ONIX? Laura (list newbie, plese be kind) Laura Akerman Technology and Metadata Librarian Room 128, Robert W. Woodruff Library Emory University, Atlanta, Ga. 30322 (404) 727-6888 lib...@emory.edu -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Walter Lewis Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2012 2:28 PM On 2012-03-14, at 2:11 PM, Bess Sadler wrote: Q1. Is there an ILS that is not based on MaRC records? A1. No, not to my knowledge. Yes, marc cataloging can seem tedious and arcane, but we have lots of tools for working with it at this point. All commercial ILS vendors that I am aware of use it, and the open source ILS products I know of also use MaRC. Further note to this. a) All the commercial and non-commercial ILS systems used by more than one institution of which I am aware either added MARC processing or died. b) All of the systems for which I have seen the underpinnings have mapped the important values from the Marc record into various other SQL data structures. They may store the Marc on the side or assemble it on the fly at the point of demand. Marc enters and exits the system but may or may not drive the internals. Walter Lewis who would happily forget everything he learned about Marc; but honestly folks there are lots of things that make less sense in the world This e-mail message (including any attachments) is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message (including any attachments) is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender by reply e-mail message and destroy all copies of the original message (including attachments).
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
Thanks for all the responses. Perhaps I woke up thos morning on the wrong side of MARC. What I'm really after is a way to display links to project Gutenberg titles in III Encore and not having MARC records is one technical hurdle, as is not having consistent display of URLs from field 856. Thanks in advance for your thoughts! Matt Sent from my iPhone
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 9:37 AM, Owen, Will o...@email.unc.edu wrote: Endeca provides a public interface to library holdings: it is not and could not be an ILS, performing functions like circulation, accounting control, etc. In this respect it's more akin to Blacklight that to an ILS. One could build the catalog part of an ILS around Endeca or one of the solrmarc based discovery engines, though they don't maintain real-time circulation data etc internaly, so the existence of an external circulation system is required. An idea of some of the functionality that is needed from outside can be gotten from the vufind ILS driver spechttp://vufind.org/wiki/building_an_ils_driver ; one might argue that different parts of the functionality could come from different systems, which makes the driver the integrator. A lot of functionality bundled up in the monolithic ILS could be delegated if there was some Protocol for Interchanging Circulation information that was standard enough to interoperate with. If it weren't for UNC's ERP project, I would probably still thing that accounting controls, purchase management, ought to be handled outside the ILS. Simon
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
Matt, you also may want to explore the exciting world of batch Marc record editing. Pick a language with a well maintained Marc library and you can fix those records with data you harvest online. Bess On Mar 14, 2012, at 12:53 PM, Jon Gorman jonathan.gor...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 2:41 PM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: Thanks for all the responses. Perhaps I woke up thos morning on the wrong side of MARC. What I'm really after is a way to display links to project Gutenberg titles in III Encore and not having MARC records is one technical hurdle, as is not having consistent display of URLs from field 856. Thanks in advance for your thoughts! I remember reading about a project to generate MARC records for Project Gutenberg. I can't find the details, but on the page http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Gutenberg:Offline_Catalogs they have two types of MARC dumps. Haven't tried either of them yet though. Jon Gorman
Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?
There was a system developed back in the '80s which stored its records internally in a direct Entity-Relationship database and allowed inter-record linking and a rather hyperlink-like data structure. BUT... that was all internal. It allowed some very nice OPAC features and possibly easier cataloguing as authorities (basically subjects and authors) could be created once and linked into a bib record. Externally the system exchanged records in MARC. In fact in at least 15 different flavors of MARC. (It was built in Europe and was used to provide a service as a transformer for converting USMARC to various other MARC for European distribution.) MARC was, and is an interchange format, so it is the format used to ship bib records between ILSs. It doesn't have to be used internally as the above system (which sold over 3,000 copies and has about 1,000 still active today, although it has been off the market for over 13 years) and InMagic and others show. In fact almost all the commercial systems do, as someone said previously, store the MARC records, not in ISO 2709 format, but shred them into some relational structure of tuples. But MARC is the language they all speak to each other. To change that would need an infrastructure, as also mentioned previously in this thread, to allow existing ILSs and repositories, based on MARC exchange, to interoperate with new ILSs, based on some other exchange. And that does mean hubs and repositories of transforming capabilities with very sophisticated semantics - and there really isn't any commercial case to create them. And all of this is a long way from what Matt's actual question was. Peter -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Bigwood, David Sent: Wednesday, March 14, 2012 12:49 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: [*SP* 22%] Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS? Yes, there are non-MARC systems out there. I think InMagic has some. LibraryThing could be used and doesn't require MARC. There are some home inventory programs that might do for a small church library or such. But what is the problem with MARC? The structure is fairly compact, compared to XLM for instance. It does lack some granularity I'd like to see, but that would only make it more complex if flexible. It would also be nice if it were possible to do more linking from the record. But this only increases the complexity and makes it more difficult to local catalogers. Personally, I kind of like MODS, but I'm not sure how much it would save. Is the problem with the rules on how to fill the MARC record? That has mostly to do with AACR. The bibliographic universe is complex and getting more so. The rules for description and access must take that into account. It is true that the small public library won't need the same detail as a special collection or research university. Maybe there could be a simplified/stripped down AACR? Or maybe RDA, the new standard will have that basic option? Or is you problem with the fields, their order and associated punctuation? That is ISBD or FRBR. Both are based on common sense and what we experience as the necessary elements from our work. They are not based on research on what the user wants and does. However, that gets to the question Who is the user? The elementary child writing a report on the Civil War or a grad student writing their dissertation, the mechanic looking for a wiring diagram for a 69 Ford, or a birdwatcher planning their trip, the person looking for do your own divorce? Maybe Google searches could provide some answers but do people look for different things and search differently in the library and on-line? Fertile ground for some theses. The other thing to consider is the huge number of records available in MARC format. A small public library probably has very little original cataloging to do. Local high school yearbooks, some self- published family histories. Doing things differently locally would mean all the common stuff would have to be done in-house, not just down loaded. Sincerely, David Bigwood dbigw...@gmail.com Lunar and Planetary Institute Catalogablog: http://catalogablog.blogspot.com On Mar 14, 2012, at 8:59 AM, Matt Amory wrote: Is there a full-featured ILS that is not based on MARC records? I know we love complexity, but it seems to me that my public library and its library network and maybe even every public library could probably do without 95% of MARC Fields and encoding, streamline workflows and save $ if there were a simpler standard. Is this what an Endeca-based system is about, or do those rare birds also use MARC in the background? Forgive me if the question has been hashed and rehashed over the years... -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
[CODE4LIB] Alternatives to MARC (was: Re: [CODE4LIB] NON-MARC ILS?)
MARC is a pain to work with; this is a truism which most of us should be familiar with. Blindly moving away from MARC is not the solution, indeed history suggests that path leads us back to an even more complex version of MARC. MARC is complex (and thus a pain) for three reasons: (a) the inherent complexity of the bibliographic content it deals with; (b) the fact that there are many MARC-using groups who have different sets of motivations and ideas as to what MARC is for; and (c) MARC's long and complicated history. Throwing out MARC doesn't solve any of these except the last, and then only if you throw away all your data and make no efforts to migrate it. Obtaining new data from a consortia or company almost certainly buys you not only MARC's history, but some tasty local decisions on top. A far more productive discussion is to explore potential replacements for MARC. This, of course, is only productively conducted with a sound understanding of the causes of the complexity in MARC. I'll leave it to the reader to consider whether various proponents' arguments are persuasive on this point. cheers stuart -- Stuart Yeates Library Technology Services http://www.victoria.ac.nz/library/
