Report on Knowledge Access Management Institute
--prepared by Marlene Vikor, UM Libraries, Cataloging Dept.
OCLC Institute
Knowledge Access Management: Tools and Concepts for Next-Generation Catalogers
Hosted by the Chesapeake Information and Research Library Alliance ( CIRLA)
July 14-16, 1999
at University of Maryland Libraries, College Park
Faculty: - Erik Jul, OCLC
- Ann Sandberg-Fox, principal editor of International Standard Bibliographic Description for Electronic Resources (ISBD(ER))
Participants: - University of Maryland Libraries & CIRLA colleagues from
- Smithsonian Institution Libraries
- Howard University
- National Agricultural Library
- George Washington University
- Georgetown University
- University of Delaware
UM participants:
- Lulu Barnachea, CIRLA & TSD
- Wilma Bass, Catalog Management
- Beth Guay, Cataloging
- Young Kim, ITD
- Alice LaSota, Cataloging
- Donna McCurley, Cataloging
- John Schalow, Cataloging
- Lily Wee, ITD
- Marlene Vikor, Cataloging
The two and one-half day institute was a concentrated theoretical and practical consideration of metadata and its use in knowledge management of internet resources. The definition of "knowledge management" given to participants -- "A discipline that promotes an integrated approach to identifying, capturing, evaluating, retrieving and sharing all of an enterprise's information assets."
Format for the institute included lecture, facilitated discussion, hands-on lab work, and team presentations. Participants are to pursue a distance learning project related to internet resource description within the month following the institute.
The case was made for the exponential growth of the World Wide Web or "Web-olution" and the need for effective response from knowledge managers. Lecture and discussion dwelt on comparisons of conventional descriptive practices based on AACR2/MARC vs. SGML applications, such as TEI, EAD, Dublin Core. Participants also explored emerging technology applications-- PURLs, Metadata editors, and XML--and considered cataloging's future--reconciliation of AACR2/MARC with ISBD(ER), and simplifications to these rules/standards in response to alternative descriptive practices for electronic resources. In the institute lab sessions, participants created PURLs (Persistent Uniform Resource Locators), applied file designations drawn from the ISBD(ER) expanded list of file designations to Web resources in the INTERCAT database, searched and created records in the CORC database, and generated Dublin Core metadata for comparison to the MARC/AACR2 descriptions of some electronic resources.
Important concepts from the institute and links to relevant documents:
- Foundation of modern cataloging being recast:
- Web Resource Description
Mark up systems define structural properties of "documents" for later processing, ex.,
SGML --Standardized General Markup Language --controls document formatting for publication
http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/
Applications of SGML, each defined by a DTD-- Document Type Definition --
description of the structure and content of different types of electronic documents :
- RDF-- Resource Description Framework --provides conventions to support interoperability among applications that exchange metadata , is expressed in XML & supports independently developed and maintained metadata element sets, e.g., MARC, DC, TEI, EAD ...
http://www.w3.org/TR/PR-rdf-schema/
RDF Model = Resource----Property Type---->Value
examples: www.page.html------Creator---->John Smith
www.page.html-------Title----->John's Home Page
- MARC DTD http://lcweb.loc.gov/marc/marcsgml.html
- Metadata/Cataloging Tools
- PURLs provide URL redirection to combat relocated Web files
http://purl.org/
benefits:
- 1:1 correspondence between PURL and URL
- PURL is persistent, URL is changeable
- Single change-point
- All instances of PURL remain valid
- Maintenance effort leveraged
- URL checking distributed
- Software also downloadable for local use http://www.oclc.org/purl/docs/download.html
- Metadata Editors:
- Automated Classification:
POST INSTITUTE
UM participants met on July 8 to discuss the institute, and prepare recommendations for next steps by UM Libraries. Participants expressed belief that
- they had received a good introduction to internet resource description issues and metadata cataloging tools,
- that there is a pressing need to assess conventional library descriptive practices (AACR2/USMARC) in comparison with other external metadata schemes, especially Dublin Core,
- that there would be value in institutional participation in CORC for experimentation and learning,
- that the learning should also continue via a UM Libraries Digital Libraries or Metadata Interest Group,
- that Dublin Core guidelines should be shared/promoted to the Libraries Web Spinner authors, and to other campus Web page authors,
- that the Libraries should pursue adoption of PURLs for its Web site,
- that LEC should be approached with report of the Institute and a proposal for CORC participation by an inter-divisional UM Libraries team.
- Post institute contact among the CIRLA participants by reflector or meeting would also be valuable.
A follow-up meeting of participants will occur on July 15th to make final preparations for a presentation to LEC by Schalow & Wee, scheduled for July 27th.
@ ALA Annual:
- CC:DA Task Force on Metadata meeting 6/27/99
< minutes at : http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~ulcjh/metamarda699.htm >
- Outlined 2-day ALA annual 2000 pre-conference which will describe options for providing access to electronic resources and the pros and cons of the various options
- Presented responses to four of the five charges of the Task Force
- Analyzing resource-description needs of libraries, seeking input from interested librarians and discussion via the metamarda-l reflector --see FRBR http://www.ifla.org/VII/s13/frbr/frbr.pdf
and Lagoze's article on defining who our users are http://www.dlib.org/dlib/june97/06lagoze.html
- Building a conceptual map (or maps) of the resource-description terrain/landscape and developing models for accessing/using metadata both within and outside the library community http://128.253.121.110/metamarda/ResourceMap.html
- Devising a definition of "metadata" and investigating the interoperability of newly emerging metadata schemes with the cataloging rules (AACR2) and the USMARC format.
- Recommending ways in which libraries may best incorporate the use of metadata schemes into the current library methods of resource description and resource discovery. Prototypes, which will be evaluated over the next year, include:
- Hosted presentation on XML & RDF and their importance to the library world made by Eric Miller of OCLC Office of Research and Diane Hillmann of Cornell titled, "Web standards for describing data: portions of the landscape"
- CORC Panel Discussion June 26, 1999
80 member institutions now, aiming for 200
200K records in CORC database & adding 100/day
Experiment gives practical experience with Dublin Core vs. USMARC via CORC automated cataloging tools, allows participants to assess effectiveness of alternative description methods for internet resources, provides for easy creation of digital pathfinders ("Webliographies")
Panelists included:
- Karen Calhoun- Head, CTS Mediation Services, Cornell University
- Daniel Foley - Metadata Librarian, Energy & Environmental
Information Resource Center, USGS
- Duncan Irvine - Head, Bibliographic Control, University of
Strathclyde, Glasgow, Great Britain
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© 1999 University of Maryland Libraries
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