Repair or Trade-In? Improving Catalogs with Fresh Bibliographic Records from OCLC

Transcription

1 Repair or Trade-In? Improving Catalogs with Fresh Bibliographic Records from OCLC John A. Whisler Eastern Illinois University April 30, 2009 Spring Forum presented by the CARLI I-Share Cataloging and Authority Control Team and the I-Share Acquisitions and Serials Team Today s presentation describes how Macro Express macros can significantly help with the batch correction of predictable types of errors in our catalog records. Most of the projects described focus on the identification and repair of a specific problem via a macro, and they do a very good job of it. However, there is another approach which may appeal to you. As with automobiles, sometimes it may be a better idea to trade in your old bib for a fresh copy from OCLC rather than fixing up your old one. And, while we are enjoying Group Services pricing, this can be done without additional OCLC costs, so it is economically favorable. In addition, some of the projects described today do not have a macro solution, so getting fresh bibs from OCLC to replace existing bibs may be the most efficient way to correct the data. As a participant in OCLC s Bibliographic Notification service, I receive fresh copies of bibs from OCLC automatically when the encoding level has been changed or a contents note has been added or changed. I ve frequently noticed that the fresh bib contains other benefits, such as additional and corrected headings, expanded description, correction of obsolete MARC coding, and identification of obsolete records. As I ve been working with CARLI staff to develop today s presentation, I ve noticed that many of the problems found in my catalog have already been fixed in OCLC through their many data cleanup efforts and now through all of our efforts during the Expert Community Experiment. The Negative Side Replacing records will undo any previous edits you made to the bibliographic record unless the same edit has also been done in OCLC as well. During the initial months of my participation in Bibliographic Notification, I observed a few instances where the new bib removed something of value that was present in my old one. My assessment was that overall I gained far more than I lost, and my decision was to accept these rare situations as a reasonable trade-off for the gains and efficiency of the program. Other libraries may reach different conclusions, or wish to do more review of replaced records than I have done. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 1

2 The Mechanics Below is an overview of the major steps involved in correcting problems by loading batches of new records from OCLC. Each step is described in more detail in the following section. 1. Identify a group of bibs with a problem using one of the I-Share Shared SQL queries. 2. Extract the OCLC control numbers from the query results and reformat them into OCLC search keys. 3. Load the search keys into Connexion Client and retrieve bibs from OCLC to your OCLC local save file. 4. Export bibs from OCLC local save file to Voyager import file. 5. Load bibs into Voyager either a) manually or b) as a batch load. 6. At least one day after processing the batch, re-run the original Access query to identify bibs that were not corrected. These will need to be corrected by another technique. The Details Step 1. Identify bibs by running Access query. Each of the data cleanup projects described in today s forum presentation begins with an MS Access query that identifies bibs with a particular problem. All of these queries have been posted to the I-Share Shared SQL webpage, available from the URL below: If you do not work with Access queries yourself, there is probably someone else at your institution who can do this for you and supply you with the results. CARLI staff can also do this for you if your I-Share Liaison submits a work request specifying the query you want. Step 2. Extract and format OCLC search keys. As part of the output of each query there is a column labeled NETWORK_NUMBER that usually contains the OCLC control number in the form (OCoLC)ocm or (OCoLC)ocn However, other types of numbers may also appear in this column that are not OCLC numbers, or the bibs may not contain a network number at all. To avoid these non-oclc numbers, you may add a criterion to John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 2

3 your Access query that restricts results to OCLC numbers as in the following example: Note the criterion Like (OCoLC)* that I have added in the far right column. Note also that you will want to remove this criterion for follow-up runs of the query in Step 6. When the query is run, you will receive results like the example below. If you right click on the NETWORK_NUMBER column header, the whole column will become highlighted, and the option to copy it will become available, either from a new John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 3

4 window or from the Edit command on the menu bar: Once this column is copied, paste it into a plain text file such as a Notepad document. I keep one named OCLC Search Keys on my desktop just for this purpose: You will now want to delete the first line that says NETWORK_NUMBER. From Notepad s Edit command, use the Replace All function to change all instances of (OCoLC)ocm to # and all cases of (OCoLC)ocn to # (if there are any). John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 4

5 Your Notepad document should now look like this: Save and close the document. It is now a file of properly formatted OCLC search keys that Connexion Client can process. Step 3. Load search keys into Connexion Client and retrieve bibs to local save file Some preliminary setup of your Connexion Client may be necessary if you have never done batch downloading of records before. I am assuming you have configured your Connexion Client for your institutional login and have established export settings. If you have not, you can find good directions at: The document above includes settings for Connexion Web, which you can skip because batch processing isn t available via ConnexionWeb. You need to look at the Connexion Client portion of the document. From the Connexion Client opening screen, you will see a Tools choice on the menu bar. Open this, and you will see another set of choices, one of which is Options. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 5

6 Choosing Options will open a screen with a number of tabs, one of which is labeled Batch. My batch settings look like the screen below, but other settings may also work. Click OK once you have edited your Options. I believe this should be all of the preliminary steps, and you should be ready to proceed. From the Connexion Client opening screen, click on the Batch choice on the menu bar. This opens a menu where you can choose what type of batch action you want. We will choose the first one, Enter Bibliographic Search Keys. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 6

7 The following screen should appear: Note the Use default index value is set to None. This is my recommendation. If the value is set to a particular index, Connexion will prefix each search with the index key for the selected index. Notice there is a button in the middle right portion of the screen called Import. Click this button, and a search box appears to locate your file of OCLC search keys on your computer. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 7

8 Navigate to where you saved the file of Search keys in Step 2. Click Open and the search keys from your file will appear in the box, with a question on whether to delete your original file or not. I always say No, just in case I want to run them again if there is a failure of some kind. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 8

9 After responding to the delete question, Click the Save and the Close buttons at the bottom. Reopen Batch from the menu bar, and this time choose Process Batch from the dropdown choices. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 9

10 Click to check the box under Path to select where you want your bibs to go. Usually, the option for File Name DefaultBib.bib.db is the best choice. Then click the box under Process for Online searches. Click the OK button, and searching will begin, showing each OCLC control number as it is being processed. When searching is complete, a report of the retrieved bibs will display (if your settings are like mine). You can close this report, or print it if you want. Step 4. Export bibs from OCLC local save file to Voyager import file. You are now ready to retrieve the bibs from your OCLC local save file. From the Connexion Client main screen, go to Cataloging, then Search, then Local save file. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 10

11 A window labeled Search Local Bibliographic Save File will display. Click OK to continue. Right click anywhere in the list of records. An option to Select All should appear. Choose this to highlight them all. Click the little green Export icon (or press the F5 key) to export them all to your Voyager import file. When Exporting is complete, a C will appear in the Export column next to each title. You are now done with OCLC, and you can click the little red garbage can icon to delete all of these records from your OCLC local save file. They should now be in your Voyager import file. If you will import the bibs into Voyager using the cataloging client, follow the instructions in Step 5a. If you will ask CARLI staff to load the bibs into your database using Voyager bulk import functionality, follow the instructions in Step 5b. Step 5a. Load records into Voyager manually. Open your import file from the Voyager Cataloging Client. If you are not familiar with this functionality, see the instructions in Part II (Importing MARC Records into Voyager) from the document available at: John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 11

12 Save the records into your database as you normally would. Most will result in a Replace transaction, but a few might not. Be sure your cataloging client Options/Preferences/General/Bibliographic Import-Replace Profile is set to OCLCConditional for proper bibliographic duplicate detection functionality. The 019 Problem In their database maintenance efforts, OCLC frequently finds duplicate bibliographic records that represent the same entity, and they move all holdings to one record and delete the other(s). The OCLC number from the deleted bib(s) is placed in field 019 of the retained bib as a cross reference. Sometimes you will have the obsolete record in your database from years ago. Other libraries may have cataloged the item more recently and received the bib with the current OCLC number. These will exist in the I-Share Universal Catalog as two different bibs, and may result in user (and librarian) confusion and incomplete identification of available copies of items during Universal Borrowing transactions. For these reasons, and for general bibliographic neatness, I think it is good to replace bibs with obsolete control numbers with the current version. This should be done using the safe bibliographic replacement techniques as described in the John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 12

13 following document: I seldom know if my bib s OCLC control number is obsolete unless I am processing batches as described here. One of two things happens when I am loading a replacement bib with a current OCLC number that was retrieved from an obsolete number in my database: 1) duplicate detection fails, and the bib is added as new, or 2) duplicate detection identifies a duplicate at a value less than 100 because matching is detected on data other than the OCLC control number. In both cases, I allow the incoming record to be added as new in my database. I resolve the problem the following day by running an Access query that finds bibs with no holdings. I then examine these bibs, and for those with 019 fields, I search my database for 035A using the 019 field number from the new bib. I can then delete the newly imported bib with no holdings and initiate the safe replacement routine for my obsolete bib. Here is the SQL for the query to find bibs without holdings: SELECT DISTINCT BIB_TEXT.BIB_ID, BIB_TEXT.NETWORK_NUMBER, BIB_MASTER.CREATE_DATE, BIB_TEXT.BIB_FORMAT, BIB_HISTORY.OPERATOR_ID FROM ((BIB_TEXT INNER JOIN BIB_MASTER ON BIB_TEXT.BIB_ID = BIB_MASTER.BIB_ID) LEFT JOIN BIB_MFHD ON BIB_MASTER.BIB_ID = BIB_MFHD.BIB_ID) INNER JOIN BIB_HISTORY ON BIB_TEXT.BIB_ID = BIB_HISTORY.BIB_ID WHERE (((BIB_MFHD.MFHD_ID) Is Null)) ORDER BY BIB_MASTER.CREATE_DATE; The query shows the operator ID as part of its results. If you use a special operator ID for bib replacement projects, it is easier to find cases like these. Step 5b. Load records into Voyager in batch mode. You will want to begin by studying the following document. I would also strongly advise consulting with CARLI before your first batch load project to make sure all bases are covered. You will need to add appropriate coding to each bib record s 049 field based on the Mode you choose. You will probably want to follow the instructions in the above document for No Holdings Replace mode. Back in Step 3, when you had your bibs in your OCLC local save file, you can apply this coding very easily by creating a constant data form with just the 049 field constructed exactly as you want it. With all the records highlighted in the title display, apply the constant data, and all will be edited at once. John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 13

14 You will also need to have the appropriate Bulk Import Rule established in your System Administration module, as documented in the link above. After you have exported your file of edited bibs from OCLC s local save file to your Voyager import file (Step 4 above), you can upload the file to your library s ftp directory on the reports/files server. If you don t normally get or put files to this server, you will need to work with someone from your library who is familiar with this process, because access to this server is password protected. The file should be given a distinctive name. Your I-Share Liaison can now file a Work Request Online to have the file loaded into your database. A test run of the first ten records is usually done to determine that all processes are correct. When you approve the test, the rest will be processed. When duplicate detection fails to identify a duplicate to replace, the incoming record will be added as a new record in the database. This means that the same issues concerning obsolete records and the 019 field discussed above will pertain here as well. Step 6. After at least one day, re-run your original Access query to see what problems remain. If you applied the criterion limiting retrieval results to records containing OCLC numbers only, as described in Step 2, you will want to remove this criterion for follow-up query runs, so that any bibs that do not contain OCLC numbers will be included in the results. Any bibs that are retrieved after you ve replaced them did not have their problem solved in OCLC. You will need to investigate and determine the feasibility of correcting these problems yourself in OCLC during the Expert Community Experiment, or correct them directly in Voyager using shared macros or manual editing. Getting Help For questions in this document related to I-Share Shared SQL queries or I-Share Shared Macros or Voyager-specific functionality, contact the CARLI Office (support@carli.illinois.edu) For questions in this document related to OCLC Connexion Client functionality, contact the ILLINET/OCLC Office (oclc1@ilsos.net). For questions in this document related to the workflow used at EIU, contact John Whisler (jawhisler@eiu.edu) John A. Whisler, EIU April 30, 2009 Page 14