Research Topics & Essay Suggested Methodology in Cataloging & Classification: A Summary of the Literature, 1995-

Compiled by the Policy and Research Committee of the ALCTS Cataloging & Classification Section

2002

Research Topics Essay suggested methodology

This compilation of short essays by the Policy & Research Committee (PRC) members summarizes and provide commentaries onrecent research in cataloging and classification. This is not a comprehensive literature review. Rather the focus is on further possibilities for research. The essays are not peer-reviewed.

PRC members, working on assigned topics, have reviewed the published literature and described research accomplished from 1995 to date. Some members' essays include suggestions of future research topics, and all include citations to the most important articles. The compilation is intended as an informal, practical tool for those in search of a useful research topic or a quick review of recent research.

The committee will reassess the topics each year, adding new ones as time permits and updating individual essays as necessary. Old essays will have their dates closed out. New topics will be added as research begins to emerge.

Suggestions for writing an essay

• Review any existing essay.
• Perform a literature search. Cast your net as widely as possible. Consider:
       Library Literature
       Library and Information Sciences Abstracts
       Charles Bailey's Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography
       Journals on your topic in Library Science as well as other related fields
       New monographs on your topic (including conference publications)
       Be sure to consider electronic resources, online discussion groups, presentations, etc.
  
• Many sources begin with a survey of the current literature and include a section on areas for further study or research. Refer to these sections as well as areas for further study that the article provokes in your own mind.
• The essay should include a bibliography of articles consulted. Following Library Resources & Technical Services, use the Chicago Manual of Style author-date system (see chapter 16).

   Topics covered include:

• Authority Control: 1995-1998
• Cataloging Personnel, Education, and Training: 1994-1998
• Changing Roles of Professional and Paraprofessional Catalogers: 1990-2000
• Electronic Resources: 1999-2001
• Metadata Systems: 1995-2000 | 2000-2001
• New Technology: 1995-1999
• Outsourcing: 1995-1998
• Subject Indexing and Classification: 1995-1998 | 1998-2001
• Use and Contents of Catalogs and Other Databases: 1996-1997 | 1998-2001

A search in the online version of Library Literature of the term "authority control," limited to the years 1995 through 1998, produced 66 matches. Of these records, 11 were news item or committee reports, which do not usually contain or imply topics for further research. Of the remaining 55 articles, 18 were three pages or less.

The most easily recognizable characteristic of this body of literature is its international scope. Many of the articles appeared in such journals as International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control (17, many of these are fairly short reports from the International Seminar on Authority Control held in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1995), Catalogue and Index (4), Herald of Library Science (India, 1), Library Review (Scotland, 2), and others. Authority control is a concern throughout the libraries of the world and is not limited to the West. However, only 3 articles were in languages other than English—German, Italian, and French. Of the library science serials published in the United States, Cataloging and Classification Quarterly contained 10 pieces; Library Resources &Technical Services, 5; and Technical Services Quarterly, 4.

The recent literature falls into four categories: retrieval issues, cost issues, international cooperation, and cross-thesaurus problems. The issue of retrieval is at the core of authority control, and in essence, all authority work is about retrievability and most of the articles touched upon it in some way. Some of this literature is about the controlled headings as they appear on the bibliographic record, and some concern the contents of the authority record itself. For example, one study compared subject searching on two OPAC systems, one with and one without authority control (Wilkes, 1995). Another explored the "information seeking behavior" of catalog users and how this behavior was helped or hindered by the contents of authority records in the OPAC (Bangalore, 1995). Chan and Vizine-Goetz (1995) examined Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) for errors and obsolete elements and attempted to determine their effect on retrieval.

The cost of doing authority work was the most common theme appearing in the literature over the past four years. One article explored the cost effectiveness of post-cataloging authority work compared to pre-cataloging authority work (Greever, 1997). Another proposed that the concept of "utility" be considered when deciding when to create an authority record (Younger, 1995). Pappas (1996) discusses the creation of a "preferred list" of libraries that contribute to RLIN; the purpose was to speed cataloging and increase effectiveness. The topic of international cooperation is discussed by several authors, two of whom are from the British Library. Oddy (1996) describes the British Library’s participation in the Anglo-American Authority File, and Danskin (1998) addresses the need for more international standards and a couple of current international projects. Danskin also touches on a topic closely related to international cooperation, searching across different thesauri, including thesauri of different languages. Miller (1997)contributed to this discussion by comparing LCSH and Moving-Image Materials: Genre Terms. The idea of worldwide authority control, with all the issues surrounding it, is probably the most important subject in the future of authority control.

The following topics for further research in authority control were either explicitly stated in the current literature or were inferred from it.

1. Comparing keyword searching with subject searching in catalogs with and without authority control
2. Determining any correlation between length of subject headings and probability of error
3. Determining the cost-effectiveness of authority control for subject headings used only once in OPACs
4. Research on the online information seeking behavior of users
5. Research on cross-mapping and compatibility of thesauri used in OPACS
6. Research on compatibility and uniformity of headings among different types of databases (periodical indexes, catalogs, etc.)
7. International authority control—language issues, authority of various agencies, governance issues
8. Comparison study of authority errors that affect retrieval and those that do not influence retrieval
9. Cost of local versus vendor-supplied authority control
10. Research on the possibility more and different levels of completeness and authoritativeness of authority records

Works Cited

Bangalore, Nirmala S. 1995. Authority files in online catalogs revisited.Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 3 (1995): 75-94.

Chan, Lois Mai, and Diane Vizine-Goetz. 1997. Errors and obsolete elements in assigned Library of Congress Subject Headings: Implications for subject cataloging and subject authority control." Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 4 #295-322.

Danskin, Alan. 1998. International initiatives in authority control. Library Review 47, no. 4 #200-5.

Greever, Karen E. 1997. A comparison of pre- and post-cataloging authority control." Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 1 #39-49.

Miller, David. 1997. Identical in appearance but not in actuality: Headings shared by a subject-access and a form/genre access authority list. Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 3 #190-204.

Oddy, Pat. 1996. Bibliographic standards for the new age. Library Review 45, no. 2 #30-40.

Pappas, Evan. 1996. An analysis of eight RLIN Members’ authority-controlled access points for purposes of speeding copy cataloging work flow. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 22, no. 1 #29-47.

Younger, Jennifer A. 1995. After cutter: Authority control in the twenty-first century. Library Resources & Technical Services 39, no. 2 #133-141.

Wilkes, Adeline, and Antoinette Nelson. 1995. Subject searching in two online catalogs: Authority control vs. non-authority control." Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 4 #57-79.

Prepared by
Michael Krieger
Cataloger and Selector
University of Dayton
krieger@data.lib.udayton.edu

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1994-1998

Over the past three years, discussion of and writing on the preparation, training, and continuing education needs of catalog librarians have been intense. To further advance the present dialogue beyond "hot topic" toward fact-finding and problem-solving, further research is sorely needed. This brief essay summarizes the work done on this topic from 1995 to 1998 and suggests some questions for future study.

Many authors (Copeland 1997, Hill 1997, Jeng 1997, MacLeod and Callahan 1995, Meyer 1997, Vellucci 1997a) have examined the pronounced trend toward a role for catalog librarians that extends well beyond traditional cataloging. With the new role comes rising expectations for not only "soft" skills like management and training ability, leadership, communication skills, a service orientation, group process skills, and talent for creative problem-solving, but also "hard" skills like a knowledge of research methods and technical savvy with local systems, expert systems, the Internet, PCs and computing (especially with respect to the cataloger’s workstation), and metadata standards. The ALCTS Committee on Education, Training and Recruitment for Cataloging has hosted a number of well-attended meetings (Lesher 1997, Steinhagen 1995, Thompson 1998) to help catalogers and cataloging managers cope with these changes in expectations. The OCLC Institute’s seminar "Knowledge Access Management Tools and Concepts for Next-Generation Catalogers" (Chepesiuk 1998) has played a similar role.

Two lists of competencies have significantly influenced writing and research on the topic of cataloger education in recent years. The first, "Skills and Expectations of a Catalog Librarian," appeared with the report of the task group on cataloger training for the Cooperative Cataloging Council (1994). The second, "Knowledge and Skills," appeared with the ALCTS Educational Policy Statement (1995). An examination of the two lists leaves no doubt that the traditional core competencies of cataloging—the ability to catalog monographs and serials; an understanding of authority control; and knowledge of the bibliographic utilities and the cataloging modules of local systems, Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd Edition, the Library of Congress Rule Interpretations (LCRI) and subject cataloging manuals, United States Machine Readable Cataloging (USMARC), Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), and Library of Congress (LC) or Dewey classification—have become a subset of what is expected of the catalog librarian today.

The shift toward a larger role for catalog librarians is the principal theme of recent research on cataloging, but there are several other related themes:

• the impact of electronic resources and the digital revolution on what a cataloger needs to know and be able to do (Pitti 1995, Reynolds 1995, Tennant 1998, Vellucci 1997b, Younger 1997)
• the potential for computer-assisted and/or networked training for cataloging (Hyland, Mortimer, and Higgins 1997; Geer 1996; Weiss 1995)
• new frontiers in subject analysis (Williamson 1997)
• the use of non-traditional staff for original cataloging and classification (El-Sherbini and Klim 1997; Mohr and Schuneman 1997; Younger 1996)
• cross-training of catalogers (Whiting 1998, Duchin 1997, Xu 1996)
• the organization of cataloging personnel, particularly as teams (Clack 1995)
• new kinds of cataloging jobs—e.g., telecommuting (Black and Hyslop 1995)

The following list provides some potential questions for future research on cataloging personnel, education, and training. An evaluation of the articles cited in this brief essay may lead to many more ideas.

1. Changing Role of the Catalog Librarian: Has the market for catalog librarians changed in response to new expectations on the job? If so, how has it changed? (Such a study might be undertaken by analyzing library staffing statistics, library organizational charts or staffing patterns, job titles, job ads, etc.; possibly follow studies to Xu 1996 or Copeland 1997)

2. New Competencies: Are practicing catalog librarians developing the knowledge and skills in the Cataloging and Classification Section and ALCTS lists? Have they redefined or broadened their role with respect to their libraries’ missions? What has been the impact of the ALCTS/Program for Cooperative Cataloging “Cataloging Now!” institutes, what other programs are needed, and how should they be designed? How are catalog librarians inserting themselves in systems design and in the creation of the digital library—what difference does the involvement make in the end product? How fully are they integrating technology into their work? How might the profession accomplish the needed changes? What technical training is needed? (Case studies might be appropriate; another possible research model is provided by University of California, Berkeley’s Institute on Digital Library Development; see Hastings and Tennant 1996.)

3. Entry-Level Catalog Librarians: How are library schools preparing entry-level catalogers? How are students being prepared to be the subject analysts of the future? (For example, follow-up studies to Vellucci 1997a, MacLeod and Callahan 1995, Hill 1997, Williamson 1997)

4. New Training Methods: What is the level of interest in computer-assisted and networked packages for training catalogers? How well do they work and how do such packages compare to traditional training approaches? What is the relationship to courses provided by library schools, regional networks, and institutes for continuing education?

Works Cited

ALA. Association for Library Collections and Technical Services. 1995. ALCTS Educational Policy Statement.
http://www.ala.org/alcts/policies/education/edpolicy.html. (Accessed, January 24, 1999)

Black, Leah, and Colleen F. Hyslop. 1995. Telecommuting for original cataloging at the Michigan State University Libraries. College & Research Libraries 56 (July): 319-25.

Chepesiuk, Ronald. 1998. Going the distance to learn globally: The OCLC Institute. American Libraries 29 (October): 64-65.

Clack, Mary Elizabeth. 1995. The role of training in the reorganization of cataloging services. Library Acquisitions 19 (Winter): 439-44.

Cooperative Cataloging Council, Task Group 5 - Cataloger Training. 1994. Final report. In Toward a new beginning in cooperative cataloging: The history, progress and future of the Cooperative Cataloging Council (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress). 61-70.

Copeland, Ann W. 1997. The demand for serials catalogers: An analysis of job advertisements, 1980-1995. Serials Librarian 32, no 1/2: 27-37.

Duchin, Douglas. 1997. Moving right along: changes in staffing, functions, workstation setup, and personnel. Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 2: 139-42.

El-Sherbini, Magda, and George Klim. 1997. Changes in technical services and their effect on the role of catalogers and staff education: an overview. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2: 23-33.

Geer, Beverley. 1996. Training aid in cataloging gopher sites and electronic serials (workshop report from 1995 NASIG conference). Serials Librarian 28, no. 3/4: 337-42.

Hastings, Kirk, and Roy Tennant. 1996. How to build a digital librarian. D-Lib Magazine (November). http://www.dlib.org/dlib/november96/ucb/11hastings.html (Accessed, January 24, 1999)

Hill, Debra W. 1997. Requisite skills of the entry-level cataloger: A supervisor’s perspective. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 23, no. 3/4: 75-83.

Hyland, Margaret, Mary Mortimer, and Neville Higgins. 1997. The development of CatSkill and its potential for training in libraries. Serials Librarian 32, no. 3/4: 107-15.

Jeng, Ling Hwey. 1997. Knowledge, technology and research in cataloging. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2: 113-27.

Lesher, Marcella C. 1997. Embracing the technological future: Technical services professionals and the emerging environment. Program sponsored by the ALCTS Committee on Education, Trainin, and Recruitment for Cataloging.Library Acquisitions 21, no. 4: 502-3.

MacLeod, Judy, and Daren J. Callahan. 1995. Educators and practitioners reply: An assessment of cataloging education. Library Resources & Technical Services 39 (April): 153-65.

Meyer, Richard W. 1997. The cataloger’s future: A director’s view. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2: 195-204.

Mohr, Deborah A,. and Anita P. Schuneman. 1997. Changing roles: Original cataloging by paraprofessionals in ARL libraries. Library Resources & Technical Services 41 (July): 205-18.

Pitti, Daniel V. 1995. Standard Generalized Markup Language and the transformation of cataloging. Serials Librarian 35, no. 3/4: 243-53.

Reynolds, Regina. 1995. Tools for a new age: An overview. Serials Librarian 35, no. 3/4: 223-33.

Steinhagen, Elizabeth N. 1995. ALCTS-CCS Heads of Cataloging Discussion Group met jointly with the ALCTS-CCS Committee on Education, Training, and Recruitment of Catalogers at the 1995 Midwinter Meeting. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 21, no. 1: 111-3.

Tennant, Roy. 1998. 21^st-century cataloging. Library Journal 123, no. 7: 30-1.

Thompson, Christine E. 1998. ALCTS Cataloging and Classification Section Committee on Education, Recruitment, and Training for Cataloging program meeting, ALA Conference, New York, July 1996. Technical Services Quarterly 15, no. 3: 73-5.

Vellucci, Sherry L. 1997a. Cataloging across the curriculum: A syndetic structure for teaching cataloging. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2: 35-59.

Vellucci, Sherry L. 1997b. Options for organizing electronic resources: The coexistence of metadata. Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science 24, no. 1: 14-17.

Weiss, Paul J. 1995. Getting the expert into the system: Expert systems and cataloging. Serials Librarian 25, no. 3/4: 235-41.

Whiting, Peter C. 1998. From specialists to generalists: Issues and perspectives on cross-training catalogers. Serials Librarian 34, no. 3/4: 397-402.

Williamson, Nancy Joyce. 1997. The importance of subject analysis in library and information science education. Technical Services Quarterly 15, no. 1/2: 67-87.

Xu, Hong. 1996. The impact of automation on job requirements and qualifications for catalogers and reference librarians in academic libraries. Library Resources & Technical Services 40, no. 1: 9-31.

Younger, Jennifer. 1996. Support staff and librarians in cataloging. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 23, no. 1: 27-47.

Younger, Jennifer. 1997. Resources description in the digital age. Library Trends 25 (Winter): 462-87.

Prepared by
Karen Calhoun
Head, Cataloging, Central Technical Services
Cornell University
ksc10@cornell.edu

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   2000

Overview

In order to gain perspective on how professional and paraprofessional catalogers’ roles have changed in relation to each other the last seven years or so, it is useful to consider a starting point for when the roles began to shift. Johnson (1996) notes that prior to the early to mid 1970s, librarians handled nearly all cataloging, since searching and modifying records from the national printed catalogs were considered an intellectual exercise requiring professional training. However, she writes, with the advent of the bibliographic utilities and shared, machine-readable records, the process has become more routine and is a part of the paraprofessional’s skill set. She adds that a second tier of paraprofessionals has emerged since then, one that includes unit managers and individuals who can contribute to library planning initiatives. She posits that paraprofessionals’ familiarity with the automated system makes them well equipped to contribute to decision-making in the library.

Further, writes Johnson, while higher level paraprofessionals are tackling higher level cataloging and even taking on some managerial roles, librarians face the increasing expectation to assume roles beyond cataloging, such as strategic planning and management. They are also expected to participate in national and area conferences and publsh in order to satisfy promotion or tenure requirements. Johnson stresses the need for librarians to communicate to their paraprofessional colleagues just what it is they are doing when they are out of their offices and away from cataloging, and why. She implies that resentment and feelings of inequity on the part of the paraprofessionals might lessen with direct communication from the librarians. She adds that ensuring that paraprofessionals, who spend so much of their time in their offices performing routine tasks, may also experience a higher level of job satisfaction if they are given higher-level duties that will challenge them.

Eskoz’s survey (1990) of academic libraries conducted from 1983-84 and 1986-87 shows a gradual increase in higher level cataloging among paraprofessionals. Bénaud (1992) finds that literature from 1981 identifies the most significant trend in research about paraprofessionals as the tendency for large libraries to assign more tasks to paraprofessionals than small libraries. Bénaud’s article holds that by 1992, professional librarians are taking on more and more responsibilities that leave less time for cataloging. She addresses the need for a different kind of attitude towards paraprofessionals, in the areas of terminology (paraprofessional versus support staff versus library assistant, etc.), experience versus MLS (should higher level paraprofessionals be compensated accordingly), and supervisory experience (in certain cases, why can’t a higher level paraprofessional supervise a professional). She asserts that catalog maintenance has often become an area of paraprofessional expertise and that professional catalogers would do well to become as familiar with the details of creating and maintaining online records, loading or transferring records, etc.

In a discussion at the ALA Midwinter Meeting (Myers 1996), Intner observes that while change in cataloging (and other departments) has been occurring for a long time, technical decision-making defines what paraprofessionals are doing, while strategic decision-making defines what librarians are doing. This line of thinking supports those of Johnson and Bénaud, though those authors also suggest that paraprofessionals have also become involved in strategic decision-making, largely as a function of their growing expertise with automated and online systems. In her look at recruiting and training the paraprofessional cataloger, Nevin (1997) recognizes the importance of providing opportunities for interacting with fellow practitioners via state, regional, or national avenues, such as conferences, online discussion groups, and professional journals. In Nevin’s view, the role of the paraprofessional will only continue to intensify, due to factors such as downsizing, automation, and newly emerging library services.

And what of the changing role of the professional cataloger? El-Sherbini and Klim (1997) write that while original cataloging is increasingly being assigned to paraprofessional staff, catalog librarians are taking on priorities such as staff education and training, product quality control, and workflow management. Mohr and Schuneman's survey (1997) finds that about 77% of ARL library respondents are indeed assigning some original cataloging tasks to paraprofessionals. Reasons for such assignment include: cost savings, volume, and paraprofessional career development (support thereof). In regard to cost savings, Mohr and Schuneman concur with an observation Williams (1991) makes: compared to paraprofessionals, librarians are relatively expensive because they spend less time cataloging and more time outside of the units in which they work. Like Bénaud, Mohr and Schuneman recognize the challenge posed by increasingly high-skilled paraprofessionals working alongside librarians for lower pay. They suggest that higher-level paraprofessionals should be paid more for their experience, and, if they are supervising, should be able to sit in with librarians in policy-making arenas. They reiterate that, along with adequate compensation, challenging work can help increase job satisfaction. They outline the need for further research in how roles are changing between paraprofessionals and professionals and suggests conducting a survey of both groups, inside the library profession and within other professions. They raise the sociological question of whether the library profession is maturing or whether its highest-level professional functions are being deskilled.

In their ten-year study of the cataloging department at the California State University at Northridge, Wakimoto and Hsiung (2000) find a dramatic shift in duties between paraprofessionals and professionals. They cite such contributing factors as declining budget, the earthquake of 1994, technological advances, and current trends. Perhaps the most important factor leading to the shift has to do with the advent of integrated workstations, including access to Catalogers’ Desktop, Classification Plus, and an online cataloging manual. Whereas cataloging duties were previously divided among students, paraprofessionals, and librarians, now workflow is better streamlined, fewer staff need to handle materials, and there may be less margin for error (due to enhanced editing capability in the Windows environment). Output is apparently greater—with fewer staff, and librarians have more time to attend to outreach activities, both on campus and within the community.

Next Steps

The lines between professionals and paraprofessionals have continued to blur for a long time, and evidence suggests that this trend will only continue. Due to factors such as budgetary considerations, downsizing, and technology that has helped revolutionize the workflow and reorganization trends, paraprofessionals are playing an increasingly important role in cataloging departments. Their ability to take on higher-level skills and become involved in policy-making bodies is increasingly accepted by library administrators and is becoming more the norm. Admittedly, the need for such changes in job description, salary and changes in corporate culture to be well documented and supported is a real one. Communication between librarians and paraprofessionals, as Johnson (1996) points out, might help lessen feelings of inequity between the two parties. However, it would also be interesting to study how library administrations and department heads are (or have been) conveying the redefined roles to their staff.

In order to get a pulse on how the roles of professional and paraprofessional catalogers are evolving now and in the future, it would be important to study the literature on the birth and emergence of metadata services within technical services departments. As libraries strive to provide competitive service to their faculty, students, and other patrons, librarians may well find themselves devoting more time to activities outside the realm of "traditional cataloging," i.e., managing metadata, helping build digital repositories, networking with potential stakeholders, etc. This likely will lead to a continued reliance on paraprofessionals for maintaining databases and online systems and for continuing to help guide related policy decisions.

Works Cited

Bénaud, Claire-Lise. 1992. The academic paraprofessional cataloger: Underappreciated? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 15, no. 3: 81-92.

El-Sherbini, Magda, and George Klim. 1997. Changes in technical services and their effects on the role of catalogers and staff education: An overview. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2: 23-33.

Eskoz, Patricia A. 1990. The catalog librarian: Change or status quo? Results of a survey of academic libraries. Library Resources & Technical Services 34, no. 3: 380-392.

Johnson, Peggy. 1996. Managing changing roles: professional and paraprofessional staff in libraries. Journal of Library Administration 22, no. 2/3: 79-99.

Mohr, Deborah A., and Anita Schuneman. 1997. Changing roles: Original cataloging by paraprofessionals in ARL libraries. Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 3: 205-218.

Myers, Marilyn. 1996. Technical services report: Who does what in acquisitions and cataloging? Allocation of duties between professionals and paraprofessionals in library technical services: ALCTS Report of the role of the professional in academic research technical services departments discussion group meeting. (ALA San Antonio, January 1996). Technical Services Quarterly 14, no. 2: 65-67.

Nevin, Susanne. 1997. Recruiting and training the paraprofessional cataloger: A program for college and undergraduate library supervisors. College & Undergraduate Libraries 4, no. 2: 65-92.

Wakimoto, Jina Choi, and Gina R. Hsiung. 2000. Blurring the boundaries between professional and para-professional catalogers at California State University, Northridge. Library Collections, Acquisitions, and Technical Services 24, no. 2: 171-188.

Williams, Delmus E. 1991. Managing technical services in the 1990's: The ruminations of a library director. Journal of Library Administration 15, no. 1/2: 25-41.

Prepared by:
Sarah Young
Technical Services and Reference Librarian
Martin P. Catherwood Library
New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations
Cornell University
sy82@cornell.edu

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Electronic resources have been a hot topic in recent years. The are still evolving —both in their nature and their deliver. In the literature, one finds older articles about these resources, and it is interesting to consider how they have changed since then, and how standards have been developed and then reflected in cataloging rules. Libraries are still striving to find ways to provide optional access to them. A keyword search on the words “electrnoic resources” in Library Literature online returns 474 hits. One also finds books written on the subject. If one narrows one's search by including the keyword "cataloging," the result is 33 records, ranging in date from the mid-nineties to the present.

This essay will not address the suitability of MARC and other metadata schemes for cataloging these resources, a subject better treated in the Metadata essays.

Librarians are still considering the conceptual issues related to electronic resources and are exchanging practical advice about bibliographic control of these resources in a constantly changing online environment. We are still seeking to answer some fundamental questions: What is the nature of e-resources? How are libraries providing access to them? How are users discovering them?

For research ideas on this topic, as well as to see what has already been written, a good place to look is the Journal of Internet Cataloging. It is, in essence, an entire journal devoted to the organization of electronic resources.

Many electronic resources are delivered as part of aggregators. Calhoun and Kara (2000a) say that aggregator databases are forcing librarians to “color outside the lines”. They bring up alternative solutions to the problem of scarce resources and point to a huge volume of work related to the bibliographic control of aggregator databases. In their conclusion they discuss the spirited public dialogue among catalogers that has resulted in a greater understanding of the issues, if not a consensus. Such dialogue needs to continue, be it at professional meetings or in publications so that practitioners can share how they are dealing with these resources. Some libraries have shared their solutions to the aggregator problem, from presentations at conferences to the report of the second Program for Cooperative Cataloging Task Group on Aggregator, which presents a sampling of different approaches. More sharing of this sort would be very valuable.

Ann Okerson has written a valuable article, published in 2000, that reviews trends in electronic resources and offers some predictions for future years through 2005. This interesting article does not mention cataloging per se, except to note that another gateway to electronic resources might be a library's online catalog, where each licensed e-title is hot-linked to the content. An article like this but focused more on cataloging trends might be interesting.

In her article on cataloging e-resources for school libraries Letarte (2000) notes that there is very little literature on this subject. In May 1999, she conducted a survey to explore how school library media centers provide access to electronic resources. In her conclusion she states that further research is yet to be done on possible cooperative ventures that would involve libraries, vendors, national cooperative programs, and bibliographic utilities.

Another important question about electronic resources is how users are discovering them? Do they go to the OPAC. Lists on Web pages? By accident? Calhoun (2000) encourages people to conduct user studies. Results of these studies would provide much-needed insight.

There are many challenges and questions related to the bibliographic control of electronic resources, and much room for research to understand how people discover them and what is the best way to provide access.

Works Cited

Calhoun, Karen. 2000. Redesign of traditional library workflows: Experimental models for electronic resource description. Invited paper for the Bicentennial Conference on Bibliographic Control for the New Millennium, Nov. 15-17, 2000. Accessed Nov. 28, 2001; http://lcweb.loc.gov/catdir/bibcontrol/calhoun.html

Calhoun, Karen, and Bill Kara. 2000. Aggregation or aggravation? Optimizing access to full text journals. ALCTS Newsletter Online 11, no. 4. Accessed Nov. 28, 2001; http://www.ala.org/alcts/alcts_news/v11n1/gateway_pap15.html.

Campbell, D. Grant. 2000. Straining the standards: How cataloging Web sites for curriculum support poses fresh problems for the Anglo American Cataloging Rules. Journal of Internet Cataloging 3, no. 1:79-92.

Journal of Internet Cataloging. Published quarterly by Haworth Information Press.

Letarte, Karen. 2000. The school library media center in the digital age: Issues in the cataloging of electronic resources. Journal of Internet Cataloging 3, no. 1:13-40.

Li, Yiu-on, and Shirley W. Leung. 2001. Computer cataloging of electronic journals in unstable aggregator databases. Library Resources & Technical Services 45, no. 4: 198-211.

Ling-yuh, Pattie, and Bonnie Jean Cox. 1996. Electronic resources: Selection and bibliographic control. New York: Haworth Press, Inc.

Okerson, Ann. 2000. Are we there yet? Online e-resources ten years after. Library Trends 48, no. 4: 671-693.

Ward, David, and Diane VanderPol. 2000. Librarian, catalog thy work! Getting started integrating Internet resources into OPACs. Journal of Internet Cataloging 3, no. 4: 51-61.

Whiting, Peter C. 1999. The real world of integrating electronic resources into a Web OPAC at the University of New Mexico; workshop at the 1998 NASIG Conference. The Serials Librarian 36, no. 3-4:455-460.

Prepared by
Beth Jedlicka
Serials Cataloging
University of Georgia
bethj@libris.libs.uga.edu

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Writing a summary of the library literature on metadata from 1995 to the present is a little like trying to drink from a fire hose. Library interest in this field has exploded in the past five years, leading to a tremendous amount of published material, some in print journals but largely on the Web. It is difficult to assimilate the variety of information that is out there, let alone to transform it into a useful summary. Yet in the library domain it is still a field in the very early stages of its development, as much of the publishing that has been done is of an introductory nature. Authors more often than not feel the need to begin their work with their own brand of a definition of metadata, indicating that the concept is not yet established enough within the library profession that we can say that we all know what we mean, like we do when we say "authority control" or "classification." For 27 different definitions of metadata, see appendix 2 of the “Summary Report, June 1999,” by the Task Force on Metadata (ALA 1999).

I must note that the concept of metadata has been in use in computer science circles for decades, and that the (comparatively) recent emphasis on it in the library world indicates that librarians are collaborating with computer scientists to solve the problems of information discovery and retrieval in the digital age. The divide between librarians and computer scientists may not be as wide as Kathleen Burnett, Kwong Bor Ng and Soyeon Park (1999) seem to indicate in “A Comparison of the Two Traditions of Metadata Development.” According to the authors, librarians come from the bibliographic-control tradition, focusing on the description of individual objects with an emphasis on discovery by users, and computer scientists come from the data management tradition, encompassing the concerns of the bibliographic control tradition plus issues of security, data sharing, and data integrity. The present summary, however, in deference to the economy of space and to the limitations of its author, concentrates on library literature, and regrettably leaves even a lot of that out.

Various communities (e.g. the archival community, the museum community, the education community, the geographic and spatial data community, etc.) have been working to develop a plethora of metadata systems to enable the organization, searching, and use of their particular data. Comprehensive lists of metadata systems and metadata projects are easily found on the Web. International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) maintains an impressive list; the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) site “Links to Metadata Web Pages” (itself a useful list) describes the IFLA site as "the Metadata Gateway [which] should be the first stop for any search for information on digital libraries and metadata resources." Also useful is the site maintained by UKOLN, "Metadata Resources."

These long lists can be rather overwhelming, however, unless one has had an introduction to metadata and its uses. One of the most accessible introductions from the library perspective is Jessica Milstead and Susan Feldman’s “Metadata: Cataloging by Any Other Name…” (1999), which defines metadata and identifies the need for it in terms catalogers will understand: "If all documents carry the same fields, and also use the same controlled vocabularies, then we should be able to improve searching." Milstead and Feldman's companion article “Metadata Projects and Standards” (1999b) identifies some of the players on the metadata scene (International Organization for Standardization, World Wide Web Consortium, etc.) and gives short descriptions of a few dozen of the most famous metadata projects. Milstead and Feldman also refer to Dempsey, Russell, and Heery of the DESIRE project's “A Review of Metadata: A Survey of Current Resource Description Formats” (1997), which classifies metadata projects into three groups: Band One, or simple formats employing mainly unstructured data automatically extracted and indexed, such as Yahoo, Lycos, etc.; Band Two, or structured formats supporting user discovery of resources and some human intervention in the task of indexing, such as Dublin Core; and Band Three, or richly structured formats, which require elaborate tagging, such as MARC or TEI. Judith Ahronheim's article "Descriptive Metadata: Emerging Standards" (1998) is helpful to those trying to sort out the alphabet soup of metadata-speak. She gives short explanations of SGML, RDF, XML, TEI, FGDC and others, and provides a useful “Basic Resource List”, that includes the Web sites of the above-mentioned systems.

It is no accident that writing on metadata issues increased exponentially in 1995. That year saw the beginning of the Dublin Core (DC) Metadata Initiative, which over the past five years has emerged as the metadata system of broadest interest to libraries, as well as the one in which librarians have had the most influence in creating (aside from MARC, of course). The DC workshop reports available, from March 1995, April 1996, September 1996, March 1997, October 1997, and November 1998 (the seventh and latest DC workshop, in October 1999, did not have a report as of this writing) are the best sources for the theoretical discussions that have contributed to the DC. The system has developed from a 13-element set for describing primarily textual DLOs (document-like objects) to a 15-element set adaptable to images and other materials. At its heart, however, it has remained an attempt to enable users to discover huge numbers of worthwhile Internet materials, by using simple (in comparison to MARC format) embedded metadata creatable by authors and non-catalogers. No actual research exists as of yet measuring the cost savings resulting from using DC instead of MARC, or documenting how using DC vs. MARC affects retrieval, both of which issues are commended to future research by Clifford Lynch (1998). Another area for future research is into whether Web authors know about DC and use it and, if so, how well they apply it.

The DC has been used in many metadata projects around the world; an extensive list of these projects can be found on the DC Web site. One of the more famous projects is the Nordic Metadata Project, which involved an evaluation of different metadata formats and the selection of the DC, and the development of a “toolbox”: a means of conversion from DC to MARC and vice versa, a DC syntax, user environment and user interaction, and a DC metadata-aware search service (Hakala et al. 1998). Another important project is CORC, an OCLC-sponsored project to create a database of both DC and MARC records for selected Internet resources. CORC stores records in XML and delivers them to users in their desired format (Medeiros 1999). As the initial phases of many projects draw to a close, we can expect more case studies and project reports to be published.

Harold Thiele's article "The Dublin Core and the Warwick Framework: A Review of the Literature, March 1995-September 1997" (1998) does a superb job of reviewing and categorizing DC literature during that time period. Thiele proposes several areas for future DC research, including user studies comparing the effectiveness of DC with other metadata systems in satisfying searcher needs and in improving precision ratios in retrieval. The effect of using DC on improving cache performance in the search process and reducing bandwidth problems is another area of research proposed by Thiele. Also needing investigation is whether DC favors centralized indexing search engines like AltaVista over non-centralized indexing engines like Harvest, and whether including DC metadata in some Web pages will separate Internet resources into the “academic” group, using metadata, and the “non-academic,” not using metadata. Thiele's conclusion that “[m]ost of the literature up to this point has been of a descriptive nature” still largely holds true, save perhaps for the following debate.

At the fourth DC workshop, a debate emerged in the DC community between the “minimalists" and the "structuralists" (Weibel, Iannella, and Cathro 1997). The minimalists believe the primary value of the DC is its simplicity and suitability for authors and others untrained in cataloging, and so argue against extensions to the 15 elements. The structuralists believe richer metadata is necessary for it to be useful and support a variety of qualifiers (called the Canberra Qualifiers, in honor of the host city to the fourth workshop) to be added to the original 15 elements. Roger Clarke (1997) argues forcefully for the structuralist position in what he terms "a reaction against what [he] perceives as the dangerous simplicity of the Dublin Core." Clarke is particularly concerned with the paucity of rights-management information in DC records, which he feels will be problematic as more and more Web sites charge for access. It would be interesting for future research to track whether this prognostication is indeed true. The theme is picked up by Godfrey Rust in his article "Metadata: The Right Approach" (1998), where he alleges that "rights metadata will have to rewrite half of the Dublin Core or else ignore it entirely." He declares further: "Dublin Core has seemed to be the only metadata game in town, and that is precisely why it is dangerous."

But Rust exaggerates, of course, as DC is by no means the only metadata game in town. Marcia Lei Zeng (1999) describes a project to provide metadata for digital images of clothing for a historical fashion collection. While DC was one of the candidates evaluated by the project team, it was deemed still too text-centric and not useful in describing the visual information they needed to describe. The project ended up using a modified VRA Core system with some additional elements. VRA Core was chosen particularly for its understanding of subject elements as capturing more "ofness" rather than "aboutness" as subjects are intended to do in DC (and in MARC, for that matter.) Bipin C. Desai (1997) argues for use of the Semantic Header rather than DC or other schemes because it provides more information so that users can find out more about a resource before they actually access it, which will be increasingly important to users if the Internet ceases to be largely free. Stuart Sutton (1999) describes the creation of GEM, metadata for instructional materials on the Internet, to be accessed by teachers, parents, and students. GEM begins with the 15 elements of DC, then adds 8 elements, derived from a study of the search habits of educators. In addition, a Java metadata-creation software application (GEMcat) was created to hide the metadata framework from the user, so the metadata creator has only to fill in the content of the surrogates. All of these articles are mainly descriptive, and follow-up research is necessary for these and the hundreds of other projects like them to assess their effectiveness for the user.

With the large variety of metadata systems being developed by specialists in various fields, the question of how to translate metadata from one system to another must arise. "Mapping" or the development of "crosswalks" is necessary in order to make metadata available to a wider audience, limit duplicate creation of metadata in various formats, and present the user with seamless access to a wide variety of resources. The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) White Paper "Issues in Crosswalking" (St Pierre and LaPlante 1998) outlines several steps to greater interoperability among metadata systems: harmonization, or the ensuring of consistency in terminology between metadata specifications; element to element mapping, in which slight differences in semantic interpretations of elements must be accounted for;, and the development of a fully specified crosswalk, consisting of both a semantic mapping and a metadata conversion specification. The authors conclude by suggesting the development of a "metadata specification language" and a standard method for crosswalk writing. One crosswalk that has been developed is the "Dublin Core/MARC/GILS Crosswalk" by Library of Congress (LC) (1999); progress toward an FGDC/MARC21/DC crosswalk is also underway (Chandler, Foley, and Hafez 2000).

RDF functions as a sort of "super-crosswalk" in that it allows different metadata systems to work together to describe an object. As an XML application, RDF uses the namespace feature to define the metadata system from which each descriptive element is taken (as in: <DC.Creator>John Smith</DC.Creator>) so that the semantics of each element are perfectly clear (Miller 1998). Its first official specification published just in March 2000, RDF was developed largely out of PICS, another W3C project, which was originally conceived as a method whereby parents and educators could use a selective rating system to block certain Internet sites from access by children. PICS can also be used for any selection/de-selection purposes (Resnick and J. Miller 1996). Needless to say, PICS has sparked some controversy among those concerned about censorship. See, for example, Simson Garfinkel's article "Good Clean PICS" (1997).

There are those who believe that MARC format is still the best metadata system to describe Internet resources. Amanda Xu (1997) argues that metadata in other formats should be converted into MARC format in order to be integrated into a library's OPAC. This is important in providing the user with seamless access to a variety of resources which may use different metadata systems. Z39.50 gateways offer the possibility of seamless searching, but only a few metadata systems have Z39.50 profiles. For other systems, Xu proposes a scheme for converting data into MARC format. Others express the concern that other metadata systems do not provide complete enough information for effective searching. Vianne Sha (albeit in 1995, near the beginning of libraries' involvement in metadata) cites the established mechanisms for sharing MARC records, the limited capacity of OPACs to handle anything but MARC records, and the role of libraries in ensuring that the public will be able to search and access Internet resources through their catalogs, whether or not they can afford Internet access, as arguments in favor of using MARC format. Michael Gorman (1999) suggests that there should be different "levels" of cataloging, depending on the worth and permanence of the resource. Higher levels of worth would indicate MARC format is necessary; lower levels may be serviced by DC or simply by leaving them to the mercies of search engines. While she does not argue for MARC format only, Sherry Vellucci (2000) points out that though some metadata systems have the capacity to support authority control, most, except for TEI and EAD, do not even officially recommend the use of controlled access points and vocabularies. Whether authority control is applied depends on the directors of each particular project, so the quality of the metadata is highly variable.

As can be seen from this short summary, research in the field of metadata systems in libraries has just begun, and possibilities for future research are vast. An important goal facing all members of the metadata community, according to Jennifer Younger (1997), is the creation of "a data registry delineating each [metadata] scheme and identifying common and unique elements between and among them" (483-484). Not only would this foster an awareness of existing systems, thus encouraging metadata creators to use an existing system and so increase the standardization of existing systems, it would also support conversions from one system to another. The DESIRE project has begun such a project with its recent development of the DESIRE Metadata Registry Framework (Heery et al. 2000).

Acronyms Expanded:

CORC: Cooperative Online Resource Catalog

DC: Dublin Core

EAD: Encoded Archival Description

FGDC: Federal Geographic Data Committee

GEM: Gateway to Educational Materials

GILS: Government Information Locator Service

MARC: Machine Readable Cataloging

OPAC: Online Public Access Catalog

PICS: Platform for Internet Content Selection

RDF: Resource Description Framework

SGML: Standard Generalized Markup Language

TEI: Text Encoding Initiative

VRA: Visual Resources Association

XML: Extensible Markup Language

Works Cited:

Ahronheim, Judith R. 1998. Descriptive metadata: Emerging standards. Journal of Academic Librarianship 24, no. 5: p 395-403.

ALA. Association for Library Collections and Technical Services, Cataloging and Classification Section, Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access. Task Force on Metadata. 1999. Summary report, June 1999.Accessed, Mar. 10, 2000 http://www.ala.org/alcts/ccs/ccda/tf-meta3.html.

Burnett, Kathleen, Kwong Bor Ng, and Soyeon Park. 1999. A Comparison of the two traditions of metadata development. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50, no. 13: p. 1209-1217.

Cathro, Warwick. 1997. The Dublin Core: Simplicity or complexity? Accessed, May 16, 2000 http://www.nla.gov.au/nla/staffpaper/cathro2.html.

Chandler, Adam, Dan Foley, and Alaaeldin M. Hafez. 2000. Mapping and converting essential Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) metadata into MARC21 and Dublin Core: Towards an alternative to the FGDC Clearinghouse. D-Lib Magazine 6, no. 1. Accessed, May 9, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january00/chandler/01chandler.html.

Clarke, Roger. 1997. “Beyond the Dublin Core: Rich Meta-Data and Convenience-of-Use Are Compatible After All." http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/DublinCore.html (Viewed May 2, 2000)

Committee on Institutional Cooperation. Links to metadata Web pages. Accessed May 17, 2000 http://www.cic.uiuc.edu/cli/metadatalinks.htm.

Dempsey, Lorcan, and Rachel Heery. 1997. A review of metadata: A survey of current resource description formats. Accessed, May 2, 2000 http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/desire/overview.

Dempsey, Lorcan, and Stuart L. Weibel. 1996. The Warwick Metadata Workshop: A framework for the deployment of resource description. D-Lib Magazine 2, no. 7. Accessed May 1, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/july96/07weibel.html.

Dempsey, Lorcan, Rosemary Russell, and Rachel Heery. 1997. Arts and Humanities Data Service: Discovering online resources. In at the shallow end: Metadata and cross-domain resource discovery. Accessed Mar. 13, 2000 http://ahds.ac.uk/public/metadata/disc_07.html.

Desai, Bipin C. 1997. Supporting discovery in virtual libraries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 48, no. 3: p. 190-204.

Garfinkel, Simson. 1997. Good clean PICS. Hotwired (3 February 1997). Accessed May 12, 2000 http://hotwired.lycos.com/packet/garfinkel/97/05/index2a.html.

Gorman, Michael. 1999. Metadata or cataloguing? A false choice. Journal of Internet Cataloging 2, no. 1: p. 5-22.

Hakala, Juha, et al. 1998. The Nordic Metadata Project: Final report. Accessed May 16, 2000 http://linnea.helsinki.fi/meta/nmfinal.htm.

Heery, Rachel, et al. 2000. DESIRE metadata registry framework. Accessed May 16, 2000.http://www.desire.org/html/research/deliverables/D3.5/.

Hill, Linda L. et al. 1999. Collection metadata solutions for digital library applications. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50, no. 13: p. 1169-1181.

International Federation of Library Associations. Digital libraries: Metadata resources. Accessed May 17, 2000 http://www.ifla.org/II/metadata.htm.

Lagoze, Carl. 1996. The Warwick Framework: A container architecture for diverse sets of metadata. D-Lib Magazine 2, no. 7. Accessed Apr. 25, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/july96/lagoze/07lagoze.html.

Library of Congress Network Development and MARC Standards Office. 1999. Dublin Core/MARC/GILS Crosswalk. Accessed May 16, 2000 http://lcweb.loc.gov/marc/dccross.html.

Lynch, Clifford. 1998. The Dublin Core descriptive metadata program: Strategic implications for libraries and networked information access. ARL Newsletter 196 (February). Accessed Jun. 24, 2000 http://www.arl.org/newsltr/196/dublin.html.

Medeiros, Norm. 1999. Making room for MARC in a Dublin Core world." Online 23, no. 6. Accessed Mar. 13, 2000 http://www.onlineinc.com/onlinemag/OL1999/medeiros11.html.

Miller, Eric. 1998. An introduction to the Resource Description Framework. D-Lib Magazine 4, no. 5. Accessed Mar 16, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/may98/miller/05miller.html.

Milstead, Jessica, and Susan Feldman. 1999a. Metadata: Cataloging by any other name..." Online 23, no. 1. Accessed Mar. 13, 2000 http://www.onlineinc.com/onlinemag/OL1999/milstead1.html.

Milstead, Jessica, and Susan Feldman. 1999b. Metadata projects and standards. Online 23, no. 1. Accessed Mar. 13, 2000 http://www.onlineinc.com/onlinemag/OL1999/milstead1.html.

OCLC. Projects using Dublin Core metadata organized by geographical region. Accessed May 17, 2000 http://purl.oclc.org/dc/projects/index.htm.

Resnick, Paul, and James Miller. 1996. PICS: Internet access controls without censorship.Communications of the ACM 39, no. 10: p. 87-93. Accessed May 12, 2000 http://www.w3.org/PICS/iacwcv2.htm.

Rust, Godfrey. 1998. Metadata: The right approach: An integrated model for descriptive and rights metadata in e-commerce. D-Lib Magazine 4, no. 7. Accessed Apr. 25, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/july98/rust/07rust.html.

St. Pierre, Margaret, and William P. LaPlant, Jr. 1998. Issues in crosswalking: Content metadata standards. NISO White Paper. Accessed Apr. 25, 2000 http://www.niso.org/crsswalk.html.

Sha, Vianne T. 1995. Cataloguing Internet resources: The library approach. The Electronic Library 13, no. 5: p. 467-476.

Sutton, Stuart A. 1999. Conceptual design and deployment of a metadata framework for educational resources on the Internet. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50, no. 13: p. 1182-1192.

Thiele, Harold. 1998. The Dublin Core and Warwick Framework: A review of the literature, March 1995-September 1997. D-Lib Magazine 4, no. 1. Accessed Apr. 26, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january98/01thiele.html.

Turner, Thomas P., and Lise Brackbill. 1998. Rising to the top: Evaluating the use of the HTML META tag to improve retrieval of World Wide Web documents through Internet search engines. Library Resources &Technical Services 42, no. 4: p. 258-271.

United Kindgdom Office for Library and Information Networking. Metadata resources. Accessed May 17, 2000 http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/resources/.

Vellucci, Sherry L. 2000. Metadata and authority control. Library Resources &Technical Services 44, no. 1: p. 33-43.

World Wide Web Consortium. 2000. Metadata activity statement. Accessed May 12, 2000 http://www.w3.org/Metadata/Activity.html.

Weibel, Stuart. 1999. The state of the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, April 1999. D-Lib Magazine 5, no. 4. Accessed May 8, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/april99/04weibel.html.

Weibel, Stuart, and Juha Hakala. 1998. DC-5: The Helsinki Metadata Workshop. D-Lib Magazine 4, no. 2. Accessed May 1, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/february98/02weibel.html.

Weibel, Stuart, and Eric Miller. 1997. Image Description on the Internet: A summary of the CNI/OCLC Image Metadata Workshop, September 24-25, 1996. D-Lib Magazine 3, no. 1. Accessed May 1, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january97/oclc/01weibel.html.

Weibel, Stuart, Jean Godby, Eric Miller, and Ron Daniel. 1995. OCLC/NCSA Metadata Workshop Report. Accessed May 1, 2000 http://www.oclc.org:5046/oclc/research/conferences/metadata/dublin_core_report.html.

Weibel, Stuart, Renato Iannella, and Warwick Cathro. 1997. The 4th Dublin Core Metadata Workshop Report. D-Lib Magazine 3, no 6. Accessed May 1, 2000 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/june97/metadata/06weibel.html.

Xu, Amanda. 1997. Metadata conversion and the library OPAC. Accessed Apr. 26, 2000 http://web.mit.edu/waynej/www/xu.htm.

Younger, Jennifer A. 1997. Resources description in the Digital Age. Library Trends 45, no. 3: p. 462-487.

Zeng, Marcia Lei. 1999. Metadata elements for object description and representation: A case report from a digitized historical fashion collection project. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50, no. 13: p. 1193-1208.

Prepared by
Patricia M. Dragon
Special Projects and Collections
Monograph Cataloging Division
University of Michigan Library
pdragon@umich.edu

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It is 2002, and by now everyone has read a dozen articles that begin with some variation on the exposition “What is metadata? Basically, it is data about data ..." But Carl Lagoze has asserted that he has yet to “read a paper that evaluates what metadata is good for" (Graham 2001, 292). Rebecca Graham's article “Metadata Harvesting" may offer one approach to answering that question. She describes the Open Archives Initiative (OAI), a project to illuminate the dark Web by making the contents of databases accessible to Web search engines, and posits that the project has the “potential to provide information about the usefulness of metadata" (290). Her questions will have to be answered through further research:

• What is the value of Dublin Core (DC) in resource discovery?
• What are other values of metadata such as those focused on preservation at Cornell?
• What are the benefits to parallel metadata sets?
• What is the best approach to mapping between DC and these parallel sets?
• What are the benefits and costs of the automated use of metadata?
• What are the OAI's impacts on inter library loan (ILL)?
• How does this use of metadata impinge upon intellectual property issues?
• How might the OAI influence the development of repositories? (295)

In her article “A Quantitative Categorical Analysis of Metadata Elements in Image-Applicable Metadata Schemas," Jane Greenberg (2001) compares the VRA Core, Dublin Core, RLIN REACH, and EAD with regard to their support of image information. She lists the elements of each standard and identifies which use of metadata each supports: discovery, use, authentication, or administration. In addition, she compares the goals of the standards, the schema granularity (application level) and the limitations of each. Citing the “artificial boundaries" created between domains by differing metadata standards, she asks how her results might “contribute to the design of a superior image oriented metadata schema" providing cross-domain image access (921).

The Journal of Internet Cataloging 4, no. 1-2, is a special issue entitled “CORC: New Tools and Possibilities for Cooperative Electronic Resource Description." While the issue contains many articles with helpful descriptions of how libraries are using CORC and Dublin Core, I have selected a few with research implications. In his evaluation of how well Dublin Core elements handle information about serials, “Dublin Core and Serials," Wayne Jones poses the larger question, worth considering in the context of the Dublin Core, but also in the context of other metadata standards: “What aspects of a serial have to be recorded in order for the resulting record to be considered complete and useful?" (144)

In the same issue, David Yehling Allen's case study, “Using the Dublin Core with CORC to Catalog Digital Images of Maps," contends that map librarians must come to some agreement about the use of the Dublin Core for map cataloging and looks forward to the Map and Geography Round Table (MAGERT) task force conclusions on this issue (166). His assertion that the simplicity of the Dublin Core makes it a good choice for map cataloging because of the complexity of map cataloging and the dearth of professional map catalogers (175) deserves empirical study.

The Journal of Digital Information (JODI) Volume 2 of is a special issue on metadata from the 2001 Dublin Core conference in Tokyo, and contains many good articles about applications of DC. Again, I have chosen a few here that seem to have research implications. John A. Kunze, in “A Metadata Kernel for Electronic Permanence," describes the ERC standard, a persistent identifier of electronic materials using a reformulation of the Dublin Core into simple kernels. ERC operates on some interesting premises that would be worthy of further research, namely:

• That metadata should be readable and comprehendible by humans in real language.
• That-easy-to-use, easy to read, and easy-to-machine--parse metadata will increase the percentage of objects with digital permanence.
• That a resource provider's express agreement to maintain a resource's accessibility is valuable in increasing digital permanence and should be coded in the resource's metadata.

In the same issue of JODI, a team-authored article entitled “Author-generated Dublin Core Metadata for Web Resources: A Baseline Study in an Organization" describes a study conducted to answer the question of whether authors are good candidates to provide metadata for their own work. Specifically, the authors set out to determine:

• Can authors create acceptable Dublin Core quality metadata?
• What perceptions do authors have about metadata in general and metadata generation activities?
• What Web form features can assist with author-generated metadata?

Though the article's authors found that the participating authors for the most part produced acceptable metadata, they died point out that their experiment was confined to a particular organizational setting, and bears repeating in other settings and that their results cannot be confirmed without testing the metadata in an experiment that measures user satisfaction.

The Library of Congress Bicentennial Conference on Bibliographic Control for the New Millennium held in November 2000 gave rise to a number of papers about metadata, many of which consist mainly of general background information. Though all of the authors do tend to ask more questions than they answer, I have selected a few that seem to have particular research implications. In Regina Romano Reynolds's article, “Partnerships to Mine Unexploited Sources of Metadata," the author throws out possibilities for new sources for seed metadata, given the inability of metadata specialists to keep up with the tide of new electronic resources. These include Committee on Institutional Cooperation, the U.S. Copyright Office records, International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) registrations, and many others. Though Reynolds begins to do some mapping of elements of these metadata standards to the Dublin Core, the actual research into these partnerships needs to be done.

Sally McCallum (2000), in her paper “Extending MARC for Bibliographic Control in the Web Environment: Challenges and Alternatives" asks many questions regarding the applicability of the MARC metadata format to electronic resources, including:

• Are there “complexities in the current content of the [MARC] bibliographic record for which the time may be appropriate to consider whether they are necessary in today's environment?"
• “Do 'title pages' or their analogs in electronic documents have enough stability to make transcription as useful as it is for print or object oriented publications?
• "Are special normalized forms of some data still as critical or is research producing information identification and searching tools that require less rigor since the whole document content may theoretically be searched?“
• "Are display, retrieval, and sorting requirements different for Web resources, indicating less need for specificity?"

Ultimately, McCallum asks, "Should we re-evaluate MARC in light of electronic resources?"

As is often the case with things invented to make life easier (think of the computer), metadata can sometimes become quite complex instead. In his “Keeping Dublin Core Simple: Cross-Domain Discovery or Resource Description?" Carl Lagoze (2001) asks the question that has divided the Dublin Core community since the beginning and comes down on the side of the minimalists or simplifiers. Noting that elaborate extensions to local applications of DC limit the interoperability of the product created with other systems, Lagoze argues that “we should stick to a qualification regime that is easily deployable and generalizable and resist the impulse to introduce greater complexity until its principles are understood and the tools to deploy it are stable." However, actual empirical data evaluating the minimalist vs. complex structuralist approach is called for.

In the maze of metadata standards, practitioners may find useful the work being done on application profiles by Baker et al. (2001), who attempt to itemize applications of various metadata standards and their divergences from the standard, as well as to explore links among various standards, in order to facilitate sharing and crosswalking. In another article, “Application Profiles: Mixing and Matching Metadata Schemas," some of the same authors ask:

• How do we deal with conformance, or lack thereof, to published metadata standards?
• Can elements from different metadata standards effectively be combined?

Application profiles themselves also promise to be a good resource for research into metadata systems.

Works Cited:

Allen, David Yehling. 2001. Using the Dublin Core with CORC to catalog digital images of maps. Journal of Internet Cataloging 4, no. 1-2: 163-177.

Baker, Thomas, et al. 2001. What terms does your metadata use? Application profiles as machine-understandable narratives. Journal of Digital Information 2. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v02/i02/Baker/.

Graham, Rebecca A. 2001. Metadata harvesting.Library Hi Tech 19, no. 3: 290-295.

Greenberg, Jane. 2001. A quantitative categorical analysis of metadata elements in image-applicable metadata schemas. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 52, no. 11: 917-924.

Greenberg, Jane, et al. 2001. Author-generated Dublin Core metadata for Web resources: A baseline study in an organization. Journal of Digital Information 2. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v02/i02/Greenberg/.

Heery, Rachel, and Manula Patel. 2000. Application profiles: Mixing and matching metadata schemas. Ariadne 25. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk /issue25/app-profiles/intro.html.

Jones, Wayne. 2001. Dublin Core and Serials. Journal of Internet Cataloging 4, no. 1-2: 143-148.

Kunze, John A. 2001. Metadata kernel for electronic permanence. Journal of Digital Information 2. Accessed jan. 17, 2002 http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v02/i02/Kunze/kunze-final.pdf.

Lagoze, Carl. 2001. Keeping Dublin Core simple: Cross-comain discovery or resource description? D-Lib Magazine 7, no. 1. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january01/lagoze/01lagoze.html.

McCallum, Sally. 2000. Extending MARC for bibliographic control in the Web environment: Challenges and alternatives. Library of Congress Bicentennial Conference on Bibliographic Control for the New Millennium. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://lcweb.loc.gov/catdir/bibcontrol/mccallum_paper.html.

Reynolds, Regina Romano. 2000. Partnerships to mine unexploited sources of metadata. Library of Congress Bicentennial Conference on Bibliographic Control for the New Millennium. Accessed Jan. 17, 2002 http://lcweb.loc.gov/catdir/bibcontrol/reynolds_paper.html.

Prepared by
Patricia M. Dragon
Special Projects and Collections
Monograph Cataloging Division
University of Michigan Library
pdragon@umich.edu

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New technology is one area in which the possibilities for research and writing seem endless. The brisk development of new technologies leads to just as brisk a development in potential research topics. Each new technology brings with it new questions and the need for information sharing. The obvious questions about new technology are: what has been or is being developed? and, how is it being used.

Since new technology plays such a big role in libraries, the discussion in these paragraphs overlaps with those in essays on other topics. For example, the impact of new technology on training and development is a question related not only to but technology but also to training issues.

Many cataloging departments are faced with more to catalog and fewer people to do the work. Efficient and wise use of technology can often help meet production demands. How are people using technology to streamline workflows? Many discussion groups have documented their conference discussion on the impact of technology, especially on copy cataloging (Weber 1996; Roth 1997, etc.). In these articles, and no doubt in the discussions themselves, many topics for further research and study come to light. Conferences, in general, are fertile ground for the germination of research ideas. Regina Reynolds (1995) gives a good overview of promising technology for catalogers with their work. She talks about SGML, expert systems, and imaging technologies, among other things. Articles such as this educate the reader about current developments and also get the reader thinking about possibilities for the future. Elizabeth Steinhagen and Sharon Moynahan (1998) assert that catalogers should make technology work harder. How catalogers in different situations are successfully applying technology is a topic that gives readers an opportunity to learn from the experiences of others. Virginia Scheschy's 1998 article about using Web technology to create and maintain a local cataloging procedures manual offers such an opportunity for learning and also serves us as a sound base for future studies. She concludes by saying, “An investment by library staff in putting procedures online requires some effort initially, but will pay substantial dividends in cataloging quality and productivity." Payoffs in cataloging quality and productivity could be studied over time.

Another aspect of new technology is the human factor. What is the impact of new technology on librarians? How are people adapting to learning and using these new tools? How does it affect training or change our job descriptions? The conclusion of Hong Xu's 1996 article states that “with the accelerating development of the computer network and its extensive application in academic libraries, impact on job requirements and qualifications for catalogers and reference librarians will be more tremendous and instantaneous. This is something that needs to be explored by further study."

Finally, let us look at the question of new technology being developed for use by patrons. Janet Swan-Hill (1996) writes that the emergence of new types of information resources are making the job of constructing a catalog more difficult. What is the best way to provide access to these new resources? Eric Childress, ERic Jul, and Eric Miller (1998) write that in recent library and computer science literature, it is easy to learn two things: “the electronic information commons is a rich, vast, but unevenly accessible global resource; 2) everyone and their neighbors are busy trying to develop information access technologies and standards to make the commons easier to organize and navigate." In her 1997 article on resource description in the digital age, Jennifer Younger writes about making documents bibliographically accessible as well as developing standards, and how well MARC and AACR2 work in the electronic environment. Younger also addresses this question in her article. Ideas for writing in the area of new technology in libraries may arise in the course of one's daily work, if one is a practitioner, or by discussion at conferences, as well as by what is in the current literature.

Works Cited:

Anemaet, Jos. 1998. Merger, reorganization and technology meet technical services; Report of a workshop at the 1997 NASIG conference at Lehigh University. Serials Librarian 34, no. 3/4:379-84.

Childress, Eric, Eric Jul, and Eric Miller. 1998. Don't panic, it's a common disaster. Journal of Internet Cataloging 1, no. 3: 5-8.

Easton, Christa, 1997. New innovations in cataloging: The impact of technology on copy cataloging, part IV—A program of ALCTS Cataloging and Classification Section/, Copy Cataloging Discussion Group (Report from the 1996 ALA Conference) Library Acquisitions 21 (spring 1997):62-3.

Jeng, Ling-Hwey. 1997. Knowledge, technology, and research in cataloging. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 24, no. 1/2:113-27.

Reynolds, Regina R. 1995. Tools for a new age, an overview. Serials Librarian 25, no. 3/4: 223-33.

Roth, Alison C. 1997. From overdrive to cyberdrive: The impact of technology on technical services. Serials Review 23, no. 3:87-8.

Sauperl, Alenka. 1999. Pebbles for the mosaic of catalog expertise: What do problems in expert systems for cataloging reveal about cataloging expertise? Library Resources & Technical Services 43, no. 2:78-94.

Scheschy, Virginia M. 1998. Cataloging procedures on the Web: The greatest thing since MARC. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 26 (2):11-23

Steinhagen, Elizabeth N., and Sharon A. Moynahan. 1998. Catalogers must change! Surviving between a rock and a hard place. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 26, no. 3: 3-20.

Swan-Hill, Janet. 1996. The elephant in the catalog: Cataloging animals you can't see or touch. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 23, no. 1: 5-25.

Webber, Mary Beth. 1996. The changing face of cataloging: Tthe impact of technology on copy cataloging part II—A report of the ALCTS Cataloging and Classification Section Copy Cataloging Discussion Group meeting, ALA Annual Conference, June 1995. Technical Services Quarterly 13, no. 3/4:109-15.

Weiss, Paul. 1995. Getting the expert into the system: Expert systems and cataloging. Serials Librarian 25, no. 3/4:235-41.

Xu, Hong, 1996. The impact of automation on job requirements and qualifications for catalogers and reference librarians in academic libraries. Library Resources & Technical Services 40, no. 1:9-31.

Younger, Jennifer A. 1997. Resource description in the digital age. Library Trends 45, no. 3: 462-87.

Prepared by
Beth Jedlicka
Serials Cataloging
University of Georgia
bethj@libris.libs.uga.edu

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Outsourcing is not a new idea. It is used in inter library loan (ILL) and document delivery services, serials operations, acquisitions, approval plans, authority control, backlogs, collection development, music collections, pockets of special materials, retrospective conversion, and even reference services. But outsourcing also lends itself nicely to more routine and traditional operations in technical services. Years ago cards were typed manually and to expedite that process libraries ordered card sets from the Library of Congress. It was a change, but it was progress. When OCLC came along that was another change, but where would we be without it? Why in the world would we want to change? Could service be improved by outsourcing part of the operation? Outsourcing is not a bad word and does not need to have negative connotations. The decision to outsource should be viewed as a welcome change. It can be a positive way to increase productivity and an opportunity for both personal growth and job enhancement. Outsourcing, partnering, whatever the name, it is here to stay.

In Outsourcing Cataloging, Authority Work, and Physical Processing, outsourcing is defined as using the services of a contractor rather than in-house library staff to accomplish an activity. The following checklist of considerations is adapted from the book, edited by Marie Kascus and Dawn Hale.

1. What are the goals of a particular library?
   
   
2. Will staff with expertise and experience be needed in the future to provide access to information?
   
   
3. What are the implications of relinquishing some local control?
   
   
4. Can we insure quality in our bibliographic records and customize them as we wish if we do not directly control cataloging?
   
   
5. What is the status of current projects?
   
   
6. What are the real costs and what are the hidden costs?
   
   
7. What will be the user impact? What is the impact on Reference service if the database quality deteriorates?
   
   
8. What are the system implications?
   
   
9. What changes will have to be made in technical services work flow?
   
   
10. Is there an inventory of uncataloged items?
    
    
11. What will be the turnaround time?
    
    
12. Is it threatening to our profession to have vendors who are physically and psychologically removed from our institutional missions?
    
    
13. What in-house activities would a library retain if the library does decide to outsource some tasks?

Suggesting future research in outsourcing is hard to do, but the preceding list of questions, and the article summaries that follow, may suggest some areas for future researchers to explore.

The outsourcing decisions of Wright State University's Library are widely known. The School contracts with OCLCs TechPro service for all of its cataloging, original and copy, in all formats. Authority control is provided through a contract with Blackwell North America. The pre-outsourcing Wright State staff of thirteen has been replaced by 1.5 FTEs and a head of bibliographic control. The TechPro contract has quality as well as quantity specifications. By outsourcing its cataloging, the library at Wright State saved over $250,000 per year, funds retained by the library and invested in public services. University Librarian Arnold Hirshon and others, have consistently emphasized that Wright State's decision is not for all Libraries (Miller 1995).

A pilot project was conducted at the Ohio State Universities Libraries to contract out the cataloging of Slavic-language books.

"Contracting Cataloging is a viable means of obtaining catalog records for specific materials, in the case of this pilot project, Slavic language books. First, we found that the quality of cataloging was acceptable with the two exceptions, and these were specific cases in which we believe the quality can be brought up to an acceptable level through specific instruction to OCLC TechPro. And secondly it is clear from the cost analysis that OCLC TechPro costs less than hiring a Slavic original cataloger" (El-Sherbini 1995, 57-73).

"Catalog outsourcing has added another policy option to technical service operations by promising cheaper cataloging than accomplished by in-house cataloging staff... The cataloging manager handling the outsource contracting inevitably will end up looking at bids that offer pistachio, rocky road, and bubble gum when the library only wants vanilla. ... As catalog outsourcers become more sophisticated, outside contracting is likely to increase" (Holt 1995, 34).

"Outsourcing has engendered substantial controversy with critics who claim it affects the quality of bibliographic control in overt and subtle ways. First, critics charge that the cataloging done by contractors is inferior. The lower costs for contract cataloging are obtainable only through the use of inadequately trained personnel with the consequent sacrifice in quality. Specifically, they are concerned that contract catalogers bring an inadequate understanding of subject analysis and class of descriptive cataloging, with a resulting loss of precision and the introduction of inconsistencies in the OPACs. Taken to its logical conclusion, these deficiencies will mean false retrievals or missed searches or failure to provide catalog users with optimum search and retrieval conditions. Equally threatening is the loss to the organization of skills of catalogers in the library environment. Although contracting out is often a reaction against inefficiencies in cataloging departments and exasperation with the cost and length of time cataloging takes, frequently administrators overlook the many services performed by an in-house cataloging staff. In addition to cataloging, they contribute their organizational expertise to committees, studies, and other initiatives. In-house catalogers may be paid higher salaries than contractors. The overall value of the cataloger to the library must be taken into consideration when deciding to outsource and reduce technical staff. Not only the quality of the cataloging must be assessed but also the needs of the total library environment" (Thomas 1996, 491-505).

"The authors conducted a survey on outsourcing of cataloging in academic libraries to determine the extent of such projects and their overall success. The survey instrument included questions about what factors influence the decision to outsource, what reasons libraries had for outsourcing or not outsourcing, what was being outsourced, and how vendors were chosen. Libraries also were asked to evaluate the success of outsourcing projects. The results show that outsourcing of cataloging is not a strong trend in academic libraries but that libraries which outsourced were generally pleased with results. There also seems to be a correlation between size of collection and number of new titles cataloged annually, and the decision to outsource" (Libby and Caudle 1997, 550-60).

"Catalogers in academic libraries who belong to ALA's Technical Services Division were surveyed to determine if and how their job functions have changed over the past ten years. The 271 respondents indicated a change from print to electronic formats, involvement of nonprofessionals in higher levels of cataloging, a trend toward outsourcing (particularly, copy cataloging and foreign-language materials), and more cataloging of specialized items, audiovisual materials, and digital documents by professional librarians. The latter now use their expertise to edit problematic records, engage in Web page design, and use HTML. More and more catalogers are involved in activities formerly in the domain of systems librarians (selecting and implementing catalog products, database maintenance, etc.)." (Buttlar and Garcha 1998, 311-21).

Prepared by
Taras Ortynsky
Head, Technical Services
Villanova University
tortynsk@email.vill.edu

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The research trends in the topic of subjects were well summarized in the program titled "Crisis in Subject Cataloging and Retrieval," held at the 1995 ALA Annual Conference. In that program, Arlene Taylor pointed out the following signs of the crisis in subject cataloging: lack of administrative support, lack of sufficient education in the theory and practice of subject analysis, negative view of the Library of Congress Subject Headings, availability of keyword searching, insufficiency of subject analysis for handling different formats, and the expanding online environment. Thomas Mann, on the other hand, in his talk on "Cataloging and Reference Work," emphasized the continuing need for subject classification of books and the importance of specific entries in a controlled vocabulary. He suggested that part of the crisis is due to the lack of subject instruction for the library users in general. Michael Gorman, in his talk on the cost and value of organized subject access, made it clear that systematic subject access is the key to effective use of libraries and that effective retrieval is impossible without authority control. In sum, the research on subjects since 1995 has centered on examinations of effectiveness of the subject access and has urged improvement in specific environments for particular forms of materials.

Topics of the articles selected below fall into four areas: retrieval and usefulness of subject headings, subject authority control, keyword versus controlled language, and multilingual display of subject headings.

Practical concern about the issue of retrieval and usefulness of subject headings has been a popular topic for many authors. Down (1995) and DeZelar-Tiedman (1996) discussed the enhancement of subject access in four areas (form/ genre, characters, geographical setting, and topical headings) to individual works of fiction based on the observation of the OCLC/Libryar of Congress (LC) Fiction Project. Mowery (1995) surveyed the subject headings and classification numbers in catalog records for books on Chicano literature and pointed out that the subject cataloging of the works of Chicano authors is especially problematic. Miller (1996) focused on the ambiguities in the Library of Congress Subject Headings for form and genre access to moving image materials. Chan and Vizine-Goetz (1997) examined recurring patterns of invalid (either erroneous or obsolete) headings from a sample of 9,442 headings by the Library of Congress to bibliographic records. Although they found that the overall error rate is low, they suggested that an awareness and understanding of patterns of errors in subject heading strings could help improve the quality and efficiency in subject authority control. Based on a case study at Virginia Tech, Sapon-White and Hansbrough (1998) stated in their article that dissertations with subject headings in their bibliographical records are more likely to circulate, and circulate more often than those without subject headings. Wilbur, on the other hand, found only a small margin of difference in his comparison of group and individual performance of the document retrieval task (1998) between subject experts and untrained workers .

The topic of subject authority files is not only closely connected to the improvement of bibliographic retrieval, but also indispensable to the international cooperation of subject indexing among libraries around the world. In their article on subject searching, Wilkes and Nelson (1995) attempted to compare the results of subject searching in two online catalog systems, one with authority control, and the other without. Williamson (1997) pointed out that standardization of subject access is an important factor in national and international networking, cooperation, and exchange of bibliographical data. In her article on authority control in Germany, Kelm (1996) stated that, on the basis of a multilingual subject authority file, libraries can cooperate in the field of subject indexing through all participating European countries and languages. Chan and Vizene-Goetz (1998) studied the feasibility of automatically creating a subject heading validation file by scanning the OCLC Online Union Catalog and concluded that an automatically generated subject heading file is indeed feasible. The validation file would be useful in verifying subject heading strings, updating subject headings in data maintenance, and validating subject headings for retrospective conversion.

In the ever-changing online environment, the choice of keyword versus controlled vocabulary searches has become a major point of discussion in the field of library and information sciences. Most studies (Curl 1995, McJunkin 1995, Hildreth 1997, Muddamalle 1998) have shown that the natural language/keyword search and controlled vocabulary search both yield very effective retrieval results with marginal limitations. However, users of the online catalog search more often by keyword than by any other type of search. The key finding is that in order to achieve optimal retrieval, a combination of natural language search and controlled vocabulary search should be adopted. In addition to this controversy, new terminology, such as “subject gateway”, has been created for network-based resource access. In “Cross-Searching Subject Gateways,” Kirriemuir and his co-authors (1998) defined subject gateways “as some facility that allows easier access to network-based resources in a defined subject area,” described the characteristics of some of the subject gateways currently accessible through theWeb, and looked at some of the issues facing subject gateway development in the near future.

In the online environment, subject access has become a major path to effectively retrieve materials in the ocean of knowledge. Previous surveys also showed that Library of Congress Subject Headings have been adopted in libraries around the world. In "Subject Cataloging in Pakistani Libraries," Mahmood (1997) pointed out that the subject headings lists available in English-speaking countries lack suitable headings for Asian subjects. He suggested the compilation of a comprehensive list of subject headings for Pakistani books written in Arabic script. Kelm (1996), in her article on subject authority files in Germany mentioned above, proposed international cooperation of multilingual subject authority file in the field of subject indexing by all participating European countries and languages.

Some potential topics for further research in the area of subjects follow:

• Recommendations for structural modification of Library of Congress Subject Headings for the changing formats
• More exploration of enhancements in current cataloging conventions and MARC record structure to allow enhanced subject and/or keyword access in bibliographic retrieval
• Recommendations for guidelines on subject searching in Web-based OPACs
• Evaluation of Web subject search, organization, and design
• Continued evaluation of the keyword search versus controlled language search in the Web-based online environment
• Analysis of vocabulary control in the Library of Congress Subject Headings
• International standardization of subject heading languages
• Discussion of multiple languages and character sets in the subject headings authority systems, nationally and internationally
• Case studies of multilingual thesaural links between the heading in the Library of Congress Subject Headings authority file and the authority files of other languages

Works Cited:

Chan, Mai Lois, and Diane Vizine-Goetz. 1997. Errors and obsolete elements in assigned Library of Congress Subject Headings: Implications for subject cataloging and subject authority control." Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 4 (Oct.): 295-322.

Chan, Mai Lois, and Diane Vizine-Goetz. 1998. Toward a computer-generated subject validation file: Feasibility and usefulness." Library Resources & Technical Services 42, no. 1 (Jan.): 45-60.

Curl, Margo Warner. 1995. Enhancing subject and keyword access to periodical abstracts and indexes: Possibilities and problems. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 4: 45-55.

DeZelar-Tiedman, Christine. 1996. Subject access to fiction: An application of the guidelines. Library Resources & Technical Services 40, no. 3 (July): 203-8.

Down, Nancy. 1995. Subject access to individual works of fiction: Participating in the OCLC/Library of Congress iction Project. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 2: 61-69.

Ferl, Terry Ellen, and Larry Millsap. 1996. The knuckle-cracker's dilemma: A transaction log study of OPAC subject searching. Information Technology and Libraries 15, no. 2 (Jun): 81-98.

Hildreth, Charles R. 1997. The use and understanding of keyword searching in a university online catalog. Information Technology and Libraries 16, no. 2 (June): 52-62.

Kelm, Barbara. 1996. The subject authority file in Germany. International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control 25, no. 3 (July/Sept.): 62-66.

Kirriemuir, John, et al. 1998. Cross-searching subject gateways: The query routing and forward knowledge approach. D-Lib Magazine (Jan.): Accessed Oct. 10, 2002 http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january98/01kirriemuir.html.

Mahmood, Khalid. 1997. Subject cataloging in Pakistani libraries. International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control 26, no. 3 (July/Sept.): 68-70.

McGarry, Dorothy. 1996.. Guidelines for subject authority and reference entries. International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control 25, no. 3 (July/ Sept.): 67-68.

McJunkin, Monica Cahill. 1995. Precision and recall in title keyword searches. Information Technology and Libraries 14, no. 3: 161-71.

Miller, David. 1995. Ambiguities in the use of certain Library of Congress Subject Headings for form and genre access to moving image materials. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 1: 83-104.

Miller, David. 1997. Identical in appearance but not in actuality: Shared by a subject-access and a form/genre authority list. Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 3 (July): 190-204.

Mowery, Robert L. 1995. Subject cataloging of Chicano literature. Library Resources & Technical Services 39, no. 3: 229-37.

Muddamalle, Mauikya Rao. 1998. Natural language versus controlled vocabulary in information retrieval: A case study in soil mechanics. Journal of American Society for Information Science 49, no. 10 (Aug.): 881-87.

Olson, Tony, and Gary Strawn. 1997. Mapping the LCSH and MeSH systems. Information Technology and Libraries 16, no. 1 (Mar.): 5-19.

Plaunt, Christian, and Barbara A. Norgard. 1998. An association-based method for automatic indexing with a controlled vocabulary. Journal of American Society for Information Science 49, no. 10 (Aug.): 888-902.

Ressel, Maggie, and Vicki Toy Smith. 1998. A new approach to thesis subject analysis: A collaborative success. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 26, no. 3: 41-49.

Roe, Sandy. 1999. Online subject access. Journal of Internet Cataloging 2, no. 1: 69-78.

Sapon-White, Richard, and Mary Hansbrough. 1998. The impact of Subject Heading assignment on circulation of dissertations at Virginia Tech. Library Resources & Technical Services 42, no. 4 (Oct.): 282-91.

Steinhagen, Elizabeth N. 1996. Cataloging news: A program titled "Crisis in subject cataloging and retrieval." Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 22, no. 2.

Stone, Alva. 1996. Up-ending Cutter's pyramid: The case for making subject references to broader terms. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 23, no. 2: 5-16.

Taylor, Arlene G. 1995. On the subject of subjects. Journal of Academic Librarianship 21, no. 6: 484-91.

Tillotson, Joy. 1995. Is keyword searching the answer? College and Research Libraries 56, no. 3: 199-206.

Wan, Tian-Long, et al. 1997. Experiments with automatic indexing and a relational thesaurus in a Chinese information retrieval system." Journal of American Society for Information Science 48, no. 12 (Dec.): 1086-96.

Weimer, Katherine H. 1996. The nexus of subject analysis and bibliographic description: The case of multipart videos." Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 22, no. 2: 5-18.

Wilkes, Adeline W., and Antoinette Nelson. 1995. Subject searching in two online catalogs: Authority control vs non-authority control. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20, no. 4: 57-79.

Williamson, Nancy J. 1997. The importance of subject analysis in library and information science. Technical Services Quarterly 15, no. 1/ 2: 67-87.

Wilson, Mary Dabney. 1998. Specificity, syndetic structure, and subject access to works about individual corporate bodies. Library Resources & Technical Services 42, no. 4 (Oct.): 272-81.

Xu, Hong and F.W. Lancaster. 1998. Redundancy and uniqueness of subject access points in online catalogs. Library Resources & Technical Services 42, no. 4 (Oct.): 61-6.

Prepared by
Wen-ling Liu
East Asian Unit Supervisor, Technical Services Dept.
Indiana University
Wliu@indiana.edu

TOP

The major research event of the past three years, at least with regard to presence in the literature, was the study of librarian and end-user understanding of Library of Congress Subject Heading (LCSH) strings with subdivisions conducted by Drabenstott and colleagues. The study showed that librarians misunderstood a set of complicated Library of Congress (LC) headings at a rate of about 50%, while for end users it was nearer to 75%. Headings arranged according to the new standard subdivision order were slightly—but only slightly—more likely to be misunderstood. The study description and major findings were reported, with some variance in emphasis and detail, in articles in Library Resources & Technical Services, Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, Reference & User Services Quarterly, and Technicalities. Technicalities also published brief discussions by Drabenstott and Warner of what the study might mean for LCSH. The full report is available from the University of Michigan School of Information.

Hearn (2000), in his review of the possibilities for machine-assisted validation of LC headings, critiqued Drabenstott’s assumptions about the role of subdivided headings in information retrieval, maintaining that they exist to bring order to large files and facilitate browsing. Browsing also received welcome attention from information scientists such as Allen (1998), who drew a distinction between “conceptual and spatial representations of information” and argued that their usefulness depended on a user’s particular cognitive abilities, and Johnson, who presented a prototype system that draws on syndetic structures to illustrate subject relationships.

At the same time, the prospect of improving LCSH in some way inspired a variety of projects. Cochrane reviewed issues raised in her 1986 book about LCSH for signs of progress. Olson criticized LCSH (2000) and library classification schemes (2001) as culturally biased and reflective of prevailing prejudices rather than truly objective. An alternative subject vocabulary approach, facet analysis, sparked a flurry of interest as Ellis and Vasconcelos (1999) considered it as a Web organization tool while Spiteri (1999) found in an analysis of 14 faceted thesauri little consensus as to what constitutes a facet. Increasingly considered a prime candidate for facet treatment, form/genre access in LCSH was investigated by Miller (2000) and by O’Neill, Chan, and Childress (2001). Wilson, Spillane and Cook (2000), meanwhile studied the impact on circulation of subject headings for fiction.

Issues involving the multiplicity of subject languages continue to get attention. MacEwan (2000) discussed the need and potential for linking LCSH to vocabularies used in non-English-speaking countries. Chan, Lin, and Zeng (2000) developed a pilot project for multilingual subject access to the Web. Heiner-Freiling (2000) reported on a survey of subject-heading languages used in various national libraries (most use LCSH), and Martinez Arellano Yanez Garrido (2000) reported on a survey of classification schemes used in Latin American libraries. Hoerman and Furniss offered a comparative analysis of principles governing LCSH and the IFLA Principles Underlying Subject Heading Languages.

Voorbij (1998) compared the subject retrieval potential of title keywords and subject descriptors, finding that the latter enhanced retrieval for about half the records studied. Martinez Arellano (1999) analyzed records in a catalog with large amounts of both Spanish and English material and found a controlled vocabulary particularly advantageous in that setting. Sclafani (1999) also assessed the relative value of keyword and subject heading searching. The advantages of using classification markers to organize retrieval sets in automated information systems were investigated by Kwasnik (1999), Jörgenson (1999), and Vizine-Goetz (1998). Gordon (2001) showed how everyday activities could be used to identify links between terms in a thesaurus to support subject browsing for a collection of photographs. Gottlieb and Dilevko (2001) studied decision making in individuals’ classification of their Web bookmarks.

The principal focus of research activity now is automated subject indexing. This must be said even though the people carrying out this research are for the most part not librarians. Hardly an issue of the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, the Journal of Documentation, or Information Processing and Management is published now without at least one or two reports of new research projects (e.g., Moens and Dumortier 2000; Mostafa and Lam 2000; Mostafa, Quiroga, and Palakal 1998; Roberts and Souter 2000; Wu, Fuller, and Wilkinson 2001). Theoretical works abound as well, including a major assessment by Anderson and Pérez-Carballo (2001) of the appropriate roles of human and machine indexing as technology continues to advance. Mai’s analysis of the intellectual process of subject indexing asserts that the indexer herself creates the subject matter of the document being indexed and that much depends on the indexer’s social and cultural context (2001). Finally, Fugmann’s essay questions the assumptions behind the quest for totally automated subject access, including the fallacy of user-friendliness based on convenience alone and the inverse relationship between precision and recall (2000). Insisting that “interpretation is a requisite for any text understanding and, hence, for any sensible text processing” (39-40), he issues a call for “research and development in what may be called an information philosophy” (40) as distinct from information technology.

Works Cited

Allen, Bryce L. 1998. Visualization and cognitive abilities. In Visualizing subject access for 21st century information resources, edited by Pauline Atherton Cochrane and Eric H. Johnson. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.

Anderson, James D., and José Pérez-Carballo. 2001. The nature of indexing: how humans and machines analyze messages and texts for retrieval. Information Processing & Management 37: 231-77. [Appears consecutively in two parts: I, Research, and the nature of human indexing; II, Machine indexing, and the allocation of human versus machine effort.]

Chan, Lois Mai, Xia Lin, and Marcia Lei Zeng. 2000. Structural and multilingual approaches to subject access on the Web. IFLA Journal 26: 187-97.

Cochrane, Pauline Atherton. 2000. Improving LCSH for use in online catalogs revisited—what progress has been made? what issues still remain? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 73-89.

Drabenstott, Karen M. 1999. Interpreting the findings of “A study of library users and their understanding of subject headings”. Technicalities 19, no. 4: 1, 13-15.

Drabenstott, Karen M., Bonnie A. Roeber Dede, and Melanie Leavitt. 1999. The changes of meaning in subdivided subject headings. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 28, no. 3: 19-43.

Drabenstott, Karen M., Schelle Simcox, and Eileen G. Fenton. 1998. Understanding subject headings in library catalogs. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan School of Information.

———. 1999a. Do patrons understand Library of Congress subject headings? Technicalities 19, no. 1: 1, 6-10, 16.

———. 1999b. End-user understanding of subject headings in library catalogs. Library Resources & Technical Services 43: 140-60.

Drabenstott, Karen M., Schelle Simcox, and Marie Williams. 1999. Do librarians understand the subject headings in library catalogs? Reference & User Services Quarterly 38: 369-87.

Ellis, David, and Ana Vasconcelos. 1999. Ranganathan and the Net: using facet analysis to search and organise the World Wide Web. Aslib Proceedings 51: 3-10.

Fugmann, Robert. 2000. Obstacles to progress in mechanized subject access and the necessity of a paradigm change. In Saving the time of the library user through subject access innovation: papers in honor of Pauline Atherton Cochrane, edited by William J. Wheeler. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.

Gordon, Andrew S. 2001. Browsing image collections with representations of common-sense activities. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 52: 925-29.

Gottlieb, Lisa, and Juris Dilevko. 2001. User preferences in the classification of electronic bookmarks: Implications for a shared system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 52: 517-35.

Hearn, Stephen. 2000. Machine-assisted validation of LC subject headings: implications for authority file structure. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 107-15.

Heiner-Freiling, Magda. 2000. Survey on subject heading languages used in national libraries and bibliographies. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 189-98.

Hoerman, Heidi Lee, and Kevin A. Furniss. 2000. Turning practice into principles: a comparison of the IFLA Principles underlying subject heading languages (SHLs) and the principles underlying the Library of Congress Subject Headings system. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 31-52.

Johnson, Eric H. 1998. Using IODyne: illustrations and examples. In Visualizing subject access for 21st century information resources, edited by Pauline Atherton Cochrane and Eric H. Johnson. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.

Jörgenson, Corinne. 1999. Image indexing: An analysis of selected classification systems in relation to image attributes named by naïve users. Annual Review of OCLC Research. Accessed Jan. 14, 2001, www.oclc.org/research/publications/arr.

Kwasnik, Barbara H. 1999. The role of classification in knowledge representation and discovery. Library Trends 48, no. 1: 22-47.

MacEwan, Andrew. 2000. Crossing language barriers in Europe: Linking LCSH to other subject heading languages. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 199-207.

Mai, Jens-Erik. 2001. Semiotics and indexing: an analysis of the subject indexing process. Journal of Documentation 57: 591-622.

Martinez Arellano, Filiberto Felipe. 1999. Subject searching in online catalogs including Spanish and English material. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 28, no. 2: 45-56.

Martinez Arellano, Filiberto Felipe, and Orlanda Angelica Yanez Garrido. 2000. Classification systems used in Latin American libraries. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 30, no. 1: 123-36.

Miller, David P. 2000. Out from under: Form/genre access in LCSH. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 169-88.

Moens, Marie-Francine, and Jos Dumortier. 2000. Text categorization: The assignment of subject descriptors to magazine articles. Information Processing & Management 36: 841-61.

Mostafa, Javed, and Wai Lam. 2000. Automatic classification using supervised learning in a medical document filtering application. Information Processing & Management 36: 415-44.

Mostafa, Javed, Luz M. Quiroga, and M. Palakal. 1998. Filtering medical documents using automated and human classification methods. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 49: 1304-18.

Olson, Hope A. 2000. Difference, culture, and change: The untapped potential of LCSH. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 29, no. 1/2: 53-71.

———. 2001. Sameness and difference: A cultural foundation of classification. Library Resources & Technical Services 45: 115-22.

O’Neill, Edward T., Lois Mai Chan, and Eric Childress. 2001. Form subdivisions: Ttheir identification and use in LCSH. Library Resources & Technical Services 45: 187-97.

Roberts, David, and Clive Souter. 2000. The automation of controlled vocabulary subject indexing of medical journal articles. Aslib Proceedings 52: 384-401.

Sclafani, Fredrick. 1999. Guest essay: Controlled subject heading searching versus keyword searching. Technicalities 19, no. 9: 7, 13-15.

Spiteri, Louise F. 1999. The essential elements of faceted thesauri. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 28, no. 4: 31-52.

Vizine-Goetz, Diane. 1998. OCLC investigates using classification tools to organize Internet data. In Visualizing subject access for 21st century information resources, edited by Pauline Atherton Cochrane and Eric H. Johnson. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.

Voorbij, Henk J. 1998. Title keywords and subject descriptors: A comparison of subject search entries of books in the humanities and social sciences. Journal of Documentation 54: 466-76.

Warner, Amy J. 1999. A reaction to “A study of library users and their understanding of subject headings”. Technicalities 19 (4): 4-5.

Wilson, Mary Dabney, Jodi Lynn Spillane, and Colleen Cook. 2000. The relationship between subject headings for works of fiction and circulation in an academic library. Library Collections, Acquisitions, and Technical Services 24: 459-65.

Wu, Mingfang, Michael Fuller, and Ross Wilkinson. 2001. Using clustering and classification practices in interactive retrieval. Information Processing & Management 37: 459-84.

Prepared by
Gregory J. Wool
Monographs Science and Technology Cataloger
Iowa State University
gwool@iastate.edu

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There are many potential topics for research in this area. In addition to directions for research found in articles, many considerations were raised by papers presented at the 1997 International Conference on the Principles and Future of AACR in Toronto.

In their introduction to the special Journal of the American Society of Information Science issue devoted to current research in OPACs (July 1996), Beaulieu and Borgman say that it is time to reassess research in online public access systems in light of new developments in graphical user interfaces, client/server environments, network services, and digital libraries. The nature of the catalog is changing. The catalog is no longer a self-contained entity. It has records for and can provide links to sources not necessarily held within the library. What are the implications of this? What role should the catalog play?

More research is needed to determine the optimal interface for OPACS. What are the pros and cons of different interfaces? How can existing interfaces be improved? What is the state of the art in Web catalogs? Comparative studies, such as Wool’s 1996 study of bibliographic displays, are needed for Web catalogs, taking into account both design and effectiveness. In addition to comparative studies between Web catalogs, it might be worthwhile to compare the merits of non-Web and Web catalogs. Are we losing anything, especially in terms or searching, by moving to Web catalogs?

There has been much discussion about bibliographic relationships. How can these best be represented in the catalog? Is MARC still the optimal way and if not, what is? Green says, "the relationality inherent in bibliographic data needs better and more widespread treatment than it now receives. Investigation into bibliographic database design should continue with special attention being given to the possible development of object-oriented bibliographic databases (1996)."

People are thinking about new ways to present bibliographic information to users. In his Toronto Conference paper on AACR2 and catalog production technology Fattahi (1997) says there is a need for a formulation of relevant principles for bibliographic display. One new idea for bibliographic display is presented by Carlyle (1997). She presents a summary display which combines filing rules with bibliographic relationships. This merits further explorations, as well as discussion of how the idea could be implemented, which she only touches on.

Another aspect of presenting information to users is the question of multiple versions, on which little has been written of late. In providing access to electronic serials, catalogers now have the option of mentioning the existence of an electronic serial on the record for its print counterpart rather than creating or using a separate record for the electronic serial. The implications of this for users could be studied, perhaps lending more insight into the benefits or drawbacks of one record or several for different formats of a work.

Use

Though user studies continue to be undertaken and written about, the literature about OPACs still calls for studies in user and searching behavior and in the human/computer interaction. How do people ask questions? Why does a user employ a particular search strategy? What types of relationships are important to them? Which is the best type of user study to get this information? In her paper on bibliographic relationships, presented at the Toronto conference, Vellucci (1997) identifies some problems with user studies, prompting the reader to think about how an effective study could be developed.

There are many new things to study from a user’s perspective. Accessing OPACs remotely, the value of having bibliographic records for electronic resources in the catalog, and more research on the occurrence and nature of multiple search sessions are just a few possibilities. In their literature review, Lundgren and Simpson (1997) discovered that little work into the user input regarding elements of the cataloging record has been done. In addition to new possibilities for user studies, several authors mention that within technical services, cataloging has very little replication research.

The IFLA Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) model raises questions. What would be the effects on users of adopting it? Is it hopelessly complex or does it help people become aware of and make choices? Does it reflect the complexity of bibliographic searching (i.e., people working at different levels)?

Another question is how can the results of these user studies best be put to use? A large amount of valuable information has been gathered, but it is not being used by system designers. Borgman (1996) says that OPAC design does not incorporate sufficient understanding of searching behavior. Perhaps more could be written on the implications of these studies on system design.

Works Cited

Beaulieu, Micheline, and Christine L. Borgman. 1996. A new era for OPAC research: Introduction to special topic issue on current research in online public access systems. Journal of the American Society of Information Science 47, no. 7 (July): 491-492.

Borgman, Christine L. 1996. Why are online catalogs still hard to use? Journal of the American Society of Information Science 47, no. 7 (July): 493-503.

Carlyle, Allyson. Fulfilling the Second Objective in the Online Catalog: Schemes for Organizing Author and Work Records into Usable Displays. Library Resources & Technical Services 41, no. 2 (Apr.): 79-100.

Fattahi, Rahmatollah. 1997. AACR2 and catalogue production technology. Paper presented at the International Conference on the Principles and Future Development of AACR, Toronto, Oct. 1997. http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/jsc/confpap.htm

Green, Rebecca. 1996. Design of a relational database for large-scale bibliographic retrieval. Information Technology and Libraries 15, no. 4 (Dec.): 207-221.

Lundgren, Jimmy and Betsy Simpson. 1997. Cataloging needs survey for faculty at the University of Florida. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 23, no. 3/4: 47-63.

Vellucci, Sherry L. 1997.Bibliographic relationships. Paper presented at the International Conference on the Principles and Future Development of AACR, Toronto, Oct. 1997. http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/jsc/confpap.htm

Wool, Gregory. 1996. The many faces of a catalog record: A snapshot of bibliographic display practices for monographs in online catalogs. Information Technology and Libraries 15, no. 3 (Sept.):173-95.

Prepared by
Beth Jedlicka
Serials Cataloger
University of Georgia
Bethj@libris.uga.edu

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The published literature during the period 1998 to 2001 addressed three main themes:

• Incorporating electronic resources into the OPAC
  
  
• Effectiveness of Web-based OPACs
  
  
• Decline of the OPAC

Incorporating Electronic Resources in the OPAC

The late 1990s brought to libraries Web-based OPACs. Commonly referred to as "Webpacs," these second generation online catalogs were the topic of many papers written during this period. How to include records for online resources in Webpacs was an especially popular topic. Porter and Bayard (1999) describe Notre Dame's Web site selection and cataloging process and offers sound guidelines that other libraries can adopt. More recently, Beam and Copeland (2001) provide a very detailed overview of the Prospector system, the union catalog of the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries. Their paper addresses the challenges inherent in maintaining URLs in OPACs when consortia share a catalog. Hughes (2001) takes a slightly different approach in her work, discussing some of the value-added features of Web-OPACs. These include book jacket images and author biographies—features made possible through the advent and employ of the MARC 856 linking field. Hughes demonstrates the importance users place on the OPAC and how libraries must exert effort to keep the OPAC a viable tool in the Internet age.

Effectiveness of Web-based OPACS

An area receiving much attention during this period was effectiveness of Webpacs. A number of well-documented studies were published, particularly Feldman (1999) and Thomas (2001). Feldman, president of a usability testing company, documents a prescription for such testing. She notes that often usability is an after-thought in the design process. She stresses the importance of iterative testing, looking at issues such as user-friendliness, navigation, responsiveness of the system, use of standards, and effectiveness of help screens. Also of note is her advice that the product’s developers not be involved in the testing. Thomas looks specifically at usability of OPACs. He conducts a study with first-year students to determine how well bibliographic records organize information. He discovers that users consider only a few fields important. He argues that OPACs are not just information storage and retrieval systems, but presentation systems, and as such, significant attention should be given to their layouts. Babu and O'Brien (2000) offer an overview of six Web-OPACs. They compare the Web interfaces of Talis, INNOPAC, WebCat, Voyager, GeoWeb, and Aleph. They develop a checklist of features and compare the tested Webpacs against it. They recommend that Web-OPACs offer sophisticated and effective searching capabilities, along with the compulsory ability to link to internal and external resources. In similar fashion, Cherry (1998) reviews ten Web-OPACs, looking specifically at full bibliographic displays. She ranks the systems’ use of field labels, help screens, and screen layout. Findings reveal a number of weaknesses, including lack of online help, options not listed at both the top and bottom of screens, and failure to provide links from authors and subjects. Chisman, Diller, and Walbridge (1999) describe usability tests at the Washington State University Libraries. Their study reveals how little users understand or care about serials, limiting features, and cross-references. Ortiz-Repiso and Moscoso (1999) contend that the perpetuation of traditional practices and structures inhibits Web OPACs from being truly innovative tools. They base their argument on the persistence of cataloging terminology such as main entry and added author in online catalogs, and the time it takes to make changes to the MARC format.

Decline of the OPAC

Much recent literature announces the death of the catalog. It is argued that the Internet and users' desire for full-text resources make the catalog a little-used, cumbersome resource -- —no longer the chief resource for information discovery. Since users are going first, and perhaps only, to the Web to satisfy their research needs, Antelman (1999) wonders why we should "attempt to accommodate the[se] new resources in the old gateway?" She argues convincingly that the universe of materials libraries are now faced with is much larger and more fluid than ever before. Although MARC accommodates book descriptions well, it is not an ideal format for capturing details about Web objects. She concludes by contending that a "good enough" culture is emerging, fueled by "instant information gratification." Antelman's contentions are convincing. Her article gave birth to an entire issue of Library Computing devoted to the utility and future of the online catalog. A couple of pieces from this special issue, edited by Antelman, compare the usability of Web lists versus the OPAC. Anderson (1999) discusses the practice of maintaining dual systems to expose e-journals to patrons. She comments how it is not unlike the separate lists librarians created to advertise videos and compact discs when these formats first appeared. She describes Virginia Commonwealth University's utilization of e-journal lists to create MARC records for their catalog. Chrzastowski (1999) also comments on the efforts needed to maintain Web lists and bibliographic records for e-journals. She details the pros and cons of each approach. One advantage the OPAC has is familiarity. Users have experience with it. Web lists, on the other hand, require less effort to use. Patrons can browse and click, a less time-consuming task than searching an OPAC one record at a time. It is this "principle of least effort," she contends, that will continue to guide practices in this area. Seys (1999) offers an appropriate metaphor, that of the OPAC as hammer. She argues that not every resource, especially Web resources, is a nail. Moreover, she contends that current cataloging rules, despite efforts to the contrary, still do not adequately accommodate online resources. This contention results from cataloging being based on an assumption of permanence, a quality practically non-existent on the Web. Finally, Baruth (2000) questions whether search engines will make quality services like OCLC's Cooperative Online Resource Catalog obsolete. She maintains that federated search systems hold the greatest promise for the future.

Works Cited

Anderson, Barbara. 1999. Web lists or OPACs: can we have our cake and eat it too?Library Computing18, no.4: 312-316.

Antelman, Kristin. 1999. Web lists and the decline of the library catalog. Library Computing 18, no.3: 189-195.

Babu, R. Ramesh & Ann O'Brien. Web OPAC interfaces: an overview. The Electronic Library 18, no.5: 316-327.

Baruth, Barbara. 2000. Is your catalog big enough to handle the Web? American Libraries 31, no.7: 56-60.

Beam, Joan T. and Nora S. Copeland. 2001. Electronic resources in union catalogs: URLs and accessibility issues. Serials Review 27, no.3-4: 33-47.

Bolin, Mary K. 2000. Catalog design, catalog maintenance, catalog governance. Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 24, no.1: 53-63.

Cherry, Joan M. 1998. Bibliographic displays in OPACs and Web catalogs: How well do they comply with display guidelines? Information Technology and Libraries 17, no.3 (Sept.):124-37.

Chisman, Janet K., Karen R. Diller, andSharon L. Walbridge. 1999. Usability testing: A case study. College & Research Libraries 60, no. 6 (Nov.):552-69.

Chrzastowski, Tina E. 1999. E-journal access: The online catalog (856 field), Web lists, and the “principle of least effort.” Library Computing 18, no.4: 317-22.

Davidson, Lloyd A. 1999. Libraries and their OPACs lose out to the competition. Library Computing 18, no.4: 279-88.

Feldman, Susan. 1999. The key to online catalogs that work? Testing one, two, three. Computers in Libraries 19, no.5: 16-18.

Green, Elisabeth, and Alison J. Head. 1998. Web-based catalogs: Iis their design language anything to talk about? Online 22, no.4: 98-100.

Hughes, Jane E. 2001. Access, access, access! The new OPAC mantra. American Libraries 32, no.5:62-64.

Kopak, Richard W., and Joan M. Cherry. 1998. Bibliographic displays and Web catalogues: User evaluations of three prototype displays. Electronic Library 16, no. 5 (Oct.):309-23.

Matthews, Joe. 2000. The value of information in library catalogs. Information Outlook 4, no.7: 18-24.

Morgan, Eric Lease. 1999. Catalogs of the future. Computers in Libraries 19, no.9: 38-39.

Ortiz-Repiso, Virginia andPurificacion Moscoso. 1999. Web-based OPACs: Between tradition and innovation. Information Technology and Libraries 18, no.2: 68.

Porter, G. Margaret, and Laura Bayard. 1999. Including Web sites in the online catalog: Iimplications for cataloging, collection development, and access. Journal of Academic Librarianship 25, no. 5 (Sept.): 390-94.

Potter, William Gray. 1998. The online catalogue in academic libraries. In Technical Services Today and Tomorrow. 2nd ed. Libraries Unlimited: 141-155.

Seys, Debora. 1999. The red queen and the library catalog. Library Computing 18, no.4: 275-8.

Thomas, David H. 2001. The effect of interface design on item selection in an online catalog. Library Resources & Technical Services 5, no. 1 (Jan.): 20-46.

Yachnes, Paul. 2000. XMLCat: an XML-encoded online library catalog. Library Computing 19, no.1-2: 59-67.

Prepared by
Norm Medeiros
Coordinator, Bibliographic and Digital Services
Haverford College
nmedeiro@haverford.edu

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Last updated 2002-07-09 by Norm Medeiros (nmedeiro@haverford.edu)

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