Cataloging Committee December 5, 2016
Recorder, Laurie O’Connor
Attending: Dea Nowell—Chairperson (Umatilla Co. SLD); Laurie O’Connor—Recorder (Harney Co. Library); Joyce McCurdy, Darlyne Johnson, Valeria Gardner (Ontario ); Carmern Wickam (Baker); Barbara Telfer (The Dalles-Wasco Co. LD); Catherine Wick (Pendleton PL); Abbey Phelps (Sherman Co. School District); Ann Zuehlke (Hood River Schools); Jenny Simpson (Nyssa PL); Lisa Hauner (Oregon Trail LD); Leeann Baldwin (Hermiston PL); Tracy Hayes (Lake Co.); Molly Hamlin (Planetree); Beth Longwell (Sage); Brent Mills (Sage); Caller 1, Caller 2, Caller 3 (?)
The Cataloging Committee meeting minutes from October 3, 2016 were presented. Motion to accept them as written was made by Laurie O’Connor; second by Carmen Wickam; none opposed.
Z39.50 server targets – update Brent Mills
Brent addressed this issue in depth in his December 3 Systems Update. In summary, problems catalogers may experience when importing records with special characters are related to “mixed character sets” found in some of the z39.50 targets and inherent in most Windows programs. Catalogers should be aware of mixed characters, and either avoid importing malformed records or know how to fix if you must import (Prospector and MaineCat are common culprits.) To locate the special character map in Evergreen, use “CTRL + S” when in non-flat text edit, and then correct your imports as needed.
Beth wondered if the new servers give us adequate coverage, perhaps we could eliminate some of our problem sources. Dea felt the new sources may not adequately cover all types of materials. Brent sees problem records coming in every day, sometimes they get fixed, other times not. Catherine and Carmen both asked that Brent not remove any of the z39.50 sites as default search options, as two of the potential “problem” sites are often their best sources for bibs, especially for movies and audio titles. Laurie asked if Brent could run a weekly report for a few weeks to locate problems, and then let mentors reach out to catalogers as needed to train. Dea thinks this is a good idea. She also wanted to point out that all catalogers should watch for the incorrect “p” in 264’s related to books; it should always be “c”.
Duplicate bib records –what to do when found & how to prevent them
Dea reminded catalogers to make sure they are searching “Sage” before importing records, and if using z39.50 searches, make sure you do not have “local catalog” selected. Laurie said she will monitor new records for potential duplicates in the next few months, and will report back to catalogers about the frequency of duplicates and possible reasons they are being entered on Sage. Catalogers, please remember to do multiple searches, make sure you are searching all of “Sage”, not individual libraries, before you import a new record. Abbey Phelps says she is seeing more duplicates lately, new and older records. She will share some of her examples with Laurie as they come up.
Cover images on OPAC (and/or lack thereof)
What fields generate the OPAC cover images, and why do some bibs not display images? What should catalogers check on bib records to make sure images do display? Sage contracts with “Content Café” from Baker and Taylor to generate cover images on the OPAC. Beth said images are generated through the 020 and 024 fields. If an 024 field is present, the 1st indicator must be a “1” to tell the system to display the image. When there are only 020 fields, the images probably generate off of the “main” ISBN, and it should be the first 020 listed. If no image is generated on the OPAC, you could attempt a “remove/add and test” ISBN approach. If you get an incorrect image, the service is “seeing” an incorrect ISBN first, so you may switch the order. A quick ISBN search on Amazon may help you identify the related image that you want to display.
Laurie suggested catalogers not include additional information in the 020 without properly separating with correct delimiters and subfields.
If you are doing a record for a kit, you can contact Brent or Beth to manually enter proper field to generate an image.
Dea has found that some unusual publications, for example, independent publications or self-published items, may not have an image available.
Series authorities updates — Beth Longwell
Dea explained Sage has been waiting to update some of our authority records until the most recent Evergreen upgrade. Series authorities are included in the name authorities that Beth gets from LTI. She said there are 36,000 name authorities that must be loaded into our system, and because there are some duplicates in our records, she is cleaning these up as she adds them. It is a lengthy process, but she is making progress, and hopes to send an email out later this week with a progress report.
Evergreen upgrade January 15 Brent mentioned there will be an EVG update in January, and he will start sharing potential changes and new functions catalogers may see with the new edition.
Updates from Cataloging Mentors
Cataloging mentors have started meeting monthly in order to work through some of the details and tasks that would normally bog down the Cataloging Committee meetings, and will keep catalogers informed of projects and progress. Dea asked that any catalogers wanting to address concerns or improvements to please contact her or one of the other mentors. Examples of the mentors’ attention this fall include the corrupt character imports thru some of the z39.50 server targets; updating the Standards Manual; CAT1 level training requirements and process; duplicate issues; mentoring new catalogers; series authority issues.
Laurie said she is monitoring duplicates for the next few months in order to discover possible reasons catalogers sometimes create unnecessary duplicates. In the new records created in October, she only found 12 true new duplicates. As patterns develop, she will report to the full committee.
The mentors are working to identify CAT1 skills and how we will train, mentor, and monitor those catalogers wishing to advance. Laurie is drafting an outline for this process, and hopes the mentors have a system for the Cataloging Committee to discuss and approve at the February meeting.
Dea will be doing series authorities work, once Beth has the authorities loaded.
Other Items:
Sarah Samuels has asked the mentors to consider an alternate approach for searchability of authors where what is presented on title page does not match the authorized form.
Tracy Hayes asked what catalogers should do when they find records with both the 260 and 264 fields in them. She presented TCN# 16531774 as an example. Do both fields display when two are present? Should we delete the obsolete 260 field when the record appears to be a full RDA with the 264 field entered? Dea wondered if EVG was properly displaying 264 fields at this time, and if possibly the new EVG 2.11 might improve this issue. Beth and Brent will check to see how our system is displaying these fields, what EVG is “looking at”. Beth said the 264 does display. Laurie asked that we add this issue to the January mentors’ meeting.
Catherine Wick asked Brent if there was any progress stabilizing the z39.50 search fields. Brent said there is a known bug throughout all of Evergreen that appeared sometime after EVG 2.91, and it has not yet been fixed. Others are waiting for the fix, as well, but it has not yet been solved. Meanwhile, every time catalogers log into z39.50 to search, be aware your search fields appear in random order. If there is a fix, Brent will notify us.
Barb Telfer was wondering if she could send a list of changes she makes to z39.50 records to the mentors to make sure she is producing good results. Any catalogers can send the mentors questions or suggestions.
Dea hopes to create an organized reference area on the Sage web page to display important discussions and updates from mentors and committee meetings.
Next Cataloging Committee meeting will be 11 a.m. February 6, 2017 via GoToMeeting. Mentors meet on 1st Thursdays of every month.
Meeting adjourned at 11:55.
Video recording: https://youtu.be/PLI5q9jIFEk