O C L C
N E W S L E T T E R
J A N U A R Y / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 0 1 I S S N : 0 1 6 3 - 8 9 8 X N O . 2 4 9
Helping libraries
and consortia thrive
C O N T E N T S January/ February 2001 No. 249
Editor in chief:
Nita Dean . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . nita_ dean@ oclc. org
Editor:
Bob Murphy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . bob_ murphy@ oclc. org
Assistant Editor:
George Promenschenkel . . . . . . . promensg@ oclc. org
Editorial Assistant:
Jennifer Hamilton . . . . . . . jennifer_ hamilton@ oclc. org
Cover Design: Linda Shepard
Art Production: Rick Limes/ Tammy Miller
Desktop Publishing: Lithokraft II
All photos taken by Rich Skopin or Lorna Williamson
unless otherwise noted.
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Contact Information:
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OCLC, a nonprofit membership organi-zation,
is engaged in computer library
service and research.
Correspondents:
Brenda Bailey
Rick Bennett
Robert C. Bolander
Debra Brown- Spruill
Paul Cappuzzello
Becky Dean
Ron Gardner
Rich Greene
Janet Hawk
Hisako Kotaka
Dawn Lawson
Nancy London
Marifay Makssour
Chris Mottayaw
Kimihiro Niimoto
Anita Ruiz
Tom Storey
Susan Walker
Alane Wilson
Membership News
OCLC Users Council discusses governance, strategic directions and the
library as a virtual place
Bucknell University creates 103 millionth OCLC Interlibrary Loan request
OCLC Statistics
Eastern Washington University enters 104 millionth request on OCLC
Interlibrary Loan system
OCLC issues 1999/ 2000 Annual Report
OCLC staff participates in Arabian Gulf Chapter of the Special Libraries
Association meeting
Colorado Virtual Library for Kids supports K– 12 education
OCLC acquires Canadian technical services operation
Jane Ryland elected to OCLC Board
OCLC, NELINET, Ohio State University Libraries and EarthWeb collaborate
on e- book solutions
OCLC RetroCon service converts records for more than books
El Colegio de México becomes OCLC member
Workshops and seminars in Japan focus on metadata issues
OCLC participates in London Online with exhibit, updates, meetings and
a reception
WebDewey in CORC used as a teaching tool in library schools
Glenn Patton named director, OCLC Metadata Standards and Quality
Betty Bengtson appointed special advisor to the president for academic
library services
Arlene Taylor appointed to Dewey Editorial Committee
Interview
The Future of OCLC Metadata Services
Research
Virginia Tech improves access, saves money and shelf space with
electronic theses and dissertations
Dublin Core Metadata Initiative progresses
OCLC Web Characterization Project names top 50 site references on
the web
U. S. Library Services
OCLC Library Services helps U. S. libraries and consortia thrive
Change is constant during 20 years with OCLC Library Services
West Region covers 21 states— and Guam
Midwest Region staff brings broad background to Library Services
East Region staff, networks take team approach to cover territory
Support team assists libraries before and after service implementation
Product News
OCLC catalogers can verify and correct URLs through CORC
CORC system enables users to link headings in resource records to Library
of Congress authority records
What users are saying about Electronic Collections Online
PAIS International database to be reloaded on FirstSearch
OCLC Multiscripts Z39.50 Client now available
OCLC News Briefs and Links
48 Project Muse to add 50 full- text titles to Electronic Collections Online
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A PROGRESS REPORT ON
OUR GLOBAL STRATEGY
F R O M J A Y J O R D A N
II n the coming months, you will be hearing
more about three exciting projects that
are part of our global strategy to extend
the WorldCat collaborative model and add
greater value for more libraries.
First, the Library of Congress and OCLC
have agreed to deliver a new reference
service based on the Collaborative Digital
Reference Service ( CDRS) pilot, begun last
year by the Library of Congress and
16 participating libraries. CDRS aims to
provide professional reference service
to researchers anytime, anywhere, through an
international digital network of libraries.
OCLC’s role in building this virtual reference
desk will be to create and maintain a database
of profiles of participating institutions that
will provide answers through CDRS and a
database of cataloged, searchable answers.
In collaboration with the Library of Congress,
we expect to develop a viable model for a
self- sustaining digital reference service.
Second, the Peninsula Library System
( PLS) in California and the North Suburban
Library System ( NSLS) in Illinois have agreed
to serve as test sites for enhancements to
the WorldCat database. The planned
enhancements include new content,
interface features and database functionality;
they represent the first phase of our strategy
to evolve WorldCat beyond bibliography.
And third, the Arabic Cataloging Pilot
project will soon move into production after
being tested by 25 libraries in France, Kuwait,
Oman, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and
the United States. Since last June, OCLC staff
in Dublin and in Birmingham, England at the
offices of OCLC Europe, the Middle East &
Africa have worked closely with Edutech
Middle East ( our distributor in the region) to
develop and test this new service and bring it
to the library community. I am pleased to
note that the OCLC Arabic Cataloging
software was designed and implemented as a
global service, with regional focus in the
context of “ think global, act local.”
“ Sooner or later,” wrote management
expert Peter Drucker,“ every plan deteriorates
into work.” Our global strategy has started to
turn into work. I will keep you posted on our
progress.
Jay Jordan
President and Chief Executive Officer
OCLC
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
4 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
OCLC Users Council delegates discussed findings
from a governance study, discussed global strategy
and focused on the meeting topic,“ Giving
Meaning to the Library as a Virtual Place,”
during the first of three 2000/ 01 meetings
held Oct. 22– 24 in Dublin, Ohio.
Featured speaker Betty Bengtson, retired
director of University Libraries, University of
Washington, spoke about “ Building the Virtual
Library.” Larry Alford, Users Council president
and deputy university librarian, Davis Library,
University of North Carolina– Chapel Hill, led
discussion of governance and direction and
facilitated the meeting.
In January 2000, the OCLC Board of Trustees
retained the consulting firm of Arthur D. Little to
conduct an independent study of OCLC’s
strategic directions and related issues of
governance, especially as OCLC functions more
and more in a global environment. The board also
appointed an advisory council of distinguished
librarians and other leaders in the information
professions and academe, chaired by Nancy
Eaton, OCLC Board of Trustees member and dean
of University Libraries, Penn State University, to
interact with the consultant and prepare
recommendations for the board to consider.
Preliminary recommendations from the
governance study have been presented to the
Users Council for consideration. Delegates
spent a great deal of time during the three- day
meeting discussing the study and possible
recommendations. Users Council will continue
its involvement in the OCLC governance study
through the 2000/ 01 meetings.
“ Any changes in governance require full
discussion within the Users Council, between the
Users Council and the Board of Trustees, and with
OCLC management,” said William J. Crowe, chair,
OCLC Board of Trustees, and Spencer Librarian,
Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of
Kansas.
Dr. Crowe reviewed the role of the board and
discussed the governance study as well as OCLC’s
global strategy and initiatives to improve OCLC’s
business systems and processes to serve libraries
more effectively.
“ This is an opportunity to discuss how OCLC
can best move forward,” said Dr. Crowe. “ It is a
chance to consider thoughtfully what directions
OCLC should take and what choices OCLC should
make about spending scarce resources. Ours is a
large and varied community: the directors of the
regional networks and service centers, the various
advisory committees and interest groups that
consult with OCLC and, of course, the librarians
who make the daily contributions to WorldCat.
It’s very important for all of us to listen to each
other.”
Mr. Alford, along with Betsy Wilson, newly
elected to the OCLC Board of Trustees by the
Users Council, and director of University
Libraries, University of Washington, led small
group discussions on OCLC governance that
centered on definitions of contribution and
representation, among other issues.
Ms. Bengtson drew on her experience in
libraries in her presentation,“ Building the Virtual
Library.” She traced her involvement, over the
course of her career, in the continuing evolution
of the virtual library.
Ms. Bengtson stressed the importance of
adopting a user- centered focus in libraries. She
said the University of Washington concentrates on
selection and organization of information,
including e- resources; integration of print and
e- information; access to global information;
preservation of digital information; digitization of
local collections; and working with faculty to
create new knowledge bases.
The University of Washington Libraries has
developed a sophisticated portal to a variety of
information resources. “ We still have a long way
to go,” said Ms. Bengtson. “ We���re going to be in a
mixed environment ( with print and electronic
resources) for quite some time. Whether we
reach the virtual library is a question, but we have
certainly started on that journey.”
OCLC Users Council
discusses governance,
strategic directions
and the library as a
virtual place
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 5
During the meeting, Jay Jordan, OCLC
president and chief executive officer, announced
that following her retirement from the University
of Washington at the end of the year, Ms.
Bengtson will serve as special advisor to the
president for academic library services at OCLC.
In his president’s report to Users Council, Mr.
Jordan presented an update on OCLC plans and
activities.
“ Our ( libraries and OCLC) goals are to advance
research and education, to organize and preserve
knowledge and pass it on to the next generation,”
said Mr. Jordan. “ In this process, OCLC must
extend its historic role as a trusted third party to
the new environment of digital information.”
OCLC senior management discussed with
Users Council “ Extending the OCLC Cooperative:
A Three- Year Strategy.”
“ Our plan is to integrate the evolving and
extended WorldCat with the efforts of libraries
and what libraries have accomplished in portal
management,” said Frank Hermes, vice president,
OCLC Marketing and Planning, who described the
plan framework. “ The goal of this plan is to help
position libraries as the place to go on the web
for information, and to position librarians as the
information authorities who add value to all types
of information.”
Gary Houk, vice president, OCLC Metadata and
Content Management Services, sketched a
timetable for the plan, identifying this first- year
focus on helping to weave libraries into the web,
extending WorldCat ( the OCLC Online Union
Catalog) in the second year, and focusing on
content management and preservation in the
third year.
“ Libraries will be able to use OCLC as an end-to-
end service provider for resource description
through content management, discovery,
navigation and fulfillment,” said Mr. Houk. “ At the
same time, WorldCat will have expanded
tremendously from a single database covering
eight formats to an international network of
metadata repositories connected with a myriad of
fulfillment options in a web environment.
“ Through WorldCat,” Mr. Houk continued,
“ libraries will be much more deeply integrated
into the web. We want to help web information
seekers find their way to the library.”
Phyllis Spies, vice president, OCLC Worldwide
Library Services, explained how OCLC’s strategic
plan would be implemented around the world.
“ We want to have production, marketing and
support operations in multiple countries, but we
want to coordinate and leverage them in an
integrated, global
way,” said Ms. Spies.
“ That’s where we
want to be as we
look at our new
product strategy,
our new
organizational
structures and our
governance.”
In other action,
the Users Council passed a resolution
recommending that OCLC develop a service to
provide an automated batch record process to
update the serials holdings for OCLC Union List
service participants.
George Needham, vice president, OCLC
Member Services, led a “ Members Forum”—
discussion and questions— to conclude the
meeting.
“ Users Council is undergoing some change,
partly because of the governance study and partly
because of changes in the world of information,”
said Mr. Alford. “ We will continue to find ways to
strengthen and enhance the roles of members in
the cooperative.”
Minutes from the October 2000 meeting are
available on the OCLC Users Council web site
< http:// www. oclc. org/ oclc/ uc/>. The next
regularly scheduled Users Council meeting is
Feb. 11– 13, 2001.
The Users Council supports OCLC’s mission by
serving as a key discussion forum and
communications link between member libraries,
regional networks and other partners, and OCLC
management. By providing a channel for
recommendations and questions from Users
Council delegates, approving changes in the Code
of Regulations and electing six members of the
Board of Trustees, Users Council helps shape the
future direction of OCLC.
• • •
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
6 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
Staff at the Bertrand Library of Bucknell University includes, left to right: Candice
Busch, borrowing coordinator; Jennifer Perdue, Interlibrary Loan supervisor; and
Kay Knapp, lending coordinator.
photo provided by Bucknell University
The Bertrand Library of Bucknell University in
Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, created the 103
millionth request on the OCLC Interlibrary Loan
( ILL) service Oct. 17.
The next day, King’s College Library ( OCLC
symbol: KOL) in Wilkes- Barre, Pennsylvania, filled
the request for the book, Contemporary Analytic
Philosophy.
Candice Busch, borrowing coordinator at
Bertrand Library ( PBU), said she was happy to
make the millionth request, but added that she
felt a little guilty about reaching the milestone so
early in her library career.
“ I was just working away when I noticed the
number and pointed it out to my supervisor,” said
Ms. Busch. “ She told me that ILL staff around the
world try to hit these millionth requests. I have
been working in libraries just since January ( 2000),
so I felt a little guilty about falling into this one.”
Ms. Busch said it has been an education
working in the library. “ There is just so much
information out there it boggles the mind,” she
said. “ We might get a request for some obscure
journal from 1934 and not only can we find it, we
can actually get it for a student or professor.”
“ I focus on the lending side of the operation,
so hitting a millionth request just isn’t something
I think about,” said Kay Knapp, lending
coordinator at Bucknell. “ I think it’s great that as
a new person in interlibrary loan, Candice
achieved this milestone.”
Jennifer Perdue, Interlibrary Loan supervisor,
said interlibrary loan traffic has increased steadily
over the last 10 years. Last year, the library
borrowed 8,628 items, and lent 8,462.
Built in 1951, the Ellen Clarke Bertrand Library
is the center of information services on the
Bucknell University campus. Located in one of
the landmark buildings at Bucknell, the library is a
leader among peer institutions in providing
access to print and digital information. The
Information Commons on the first floor provides
students with one location for getting assistance.
“ A Place in History” is an exhibit that
introduces the library’s Information Services &
Resources’ new content web site, which includes
selected full- text local published histories and
newspapers, civil war letters and documents with
transcriptions, and a genealogist’s guide to
regional repositories.
Photographs, biographies, a Union County Civil
War Military History, bibliographic listings, and
the search engine for genealogical data enhance
research opportunities. The site provides
electronic access to materials in Bucknell’s
Special Collections/ University Archives.
Bucknell University and King’s College Library
are members of PALINET.
Florida State University in Tallahassee made the
102 millionth OCLC ILL request on Sept. 12.
• • •
Bucknell University creates
103 millionth OCLC Interlibrary Loan request
OCLC Statistics
( as of Jan. 1, 2001)
Current statistics are at
< http:// www. oclc. org/
oclc/ new/ stats. htm>.
Participating
libraries
38,601
New member libraries
( Nov. 1– Dec. 31, 2000)
26
Total OCLC Interlibrary Loan
( ILL) service requests
104,627,240
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 7
The 104 millionth request on the OCLC
Interlibrary Loan ( ILL) system was produced
Nov. 20 by Eastern Washington University
located in Cheney, Washington.
The request was for an article,“ Enhanced Early
Detection and Enumeration of Zebra Mussel
( Dreissena spp.) Veligers Using Cross- Polarized
Light Microscopy,” by L. Johnson, in the journal,
Hydrobiologia. The request was filled by
Allegheny College ( OCLC symbol: AVL) in
Meadville, Pennsylvania.
Judith L. Lee, a borrowing technician at the
John F. Kennedy Memorial Library ( WEA), entered
the millionth request. She works with Julie
Compton, another borrowing technician in the
department. Library staff members celebrated
reaching the milestone with a pizza party.
“ We work as a team,” said Troy Christenson,
Resource Sharing manager at the library. “ We
typically have a 24- to 48- hour turnaround on
lending. We do whatever we need to do to take
care of our patrons. I think we do a very good
job with our team concept here.”
Mr. Christenson said last year the library went
from being a net borrower to a net lender.
“ Our students and faculty have been able to
see information on the Internet that they can’t get
to immediately,” said Mr. Christenson. “ With
OCLC, we have been able to locate and deliver
many of the things our patrons find on the
Internet.”
The Eastern Washington University Libraries
consist of the John F. Kennedy Library, which is
the main university library on the Cheney
campus, and the Cooperative Academic Library
Service located in Spokane, Washington.
As an integral part of the academic programs
of the university and a support service for the
entire university, the libraries provide state- of- the-art
communications for global information
resources, maintain a fluid collection of books
( nearly 550,000 volumes) and periodical
subscriptions ( currently over 6,400 titles), and
serve as a selective U. S. government depository,
representing the largest collection of federal
documents in Spokane County ( currently over
877,000). The library provides access to a host of
on- site and remote electronic reference and full-text
resources.
• • •
Eastern Washington University enters
104 millionth request on OCLC Interlibrary Loan system
Interlibrary Loan staff at the John F. Kennedy Memorial Library, Eastern Washington
University, includes, left to right: Julie Compton, library assistant; Troy Christenson,
Resource Sharing manager; and Judith L. Lee, borrowing technician.
photo provided by Eastern Washington University
Highest OCLC
record number
45,638,416
Location listings
( holdings)
783,758,313
FirstSearch libraries
17,360
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
8 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
OCLC has issued its 33rd annual report.
In the report, Jay Jordan, OCLC president and
chief executive officer, wrote that libraries and
OCLC are using their expertise in information
technology and knowledge management to help
define the networked, digital environment of the
21st century. He also introduced OCLC’s emerging
global strategy, which calls for transforming
WorldCat ( the OCLC Online Union Catalog) from a
bibliographic database and online union catalog
into a globally networked information resource of
text, graphics, sound and motion.
“ As I continue to meet with librarians in many
venues around the world, I sense a growing
excitement in the profession,” wrote Mr. Jordan.
“ Libraries and OCLC are uniquely positioned to
grapple with the challenges of the web and seize
its opportunities. The last 30 years of online
cataloging, resource sharing and reference services
have been a prelude to greater things to come.
There is a rekindling of the spirit of cooperation
through which libraries and OCLC have done so
much in the past, and through which we are now
poised to do even more in the future.”
For the year ended June 30, 2000, OCLC’s
revenues were $ 153 million, up 5 percent from
the previous year as libraries continued to
increase their use of OCLC’s online cataloging,
resource sharing and reference services.
Contribution to equity was $ 4.9 million.
OCLC provided member libraries with
$ 9.2 million in
credits for
cataloging and
resource
sharing to
encourage the
growth and
quality of
WorldCat.
In addition,
OCLC
launched
two new
services—
the OCLC Cooperative
Online Resource Catalog ( CORC) service
and the OCLC WebExpress service.
Highlights of the 1999/ 2000 annual report,
which covers OCLC’s fiscal year ( July 1 to
June 30), include:
• The number of participating libraries increased
to 37,297 from 34,775.
• The OCLC online system for cataloging and
resource sharing handled nearly 1.1 billion
messages as libraries cataloged 55.2 million
items and arranged 8.6 million interlibrary
loans, a new high.
• 2.7 million new cataloging records were added
to WorldCat.
OCLC issues 1999/ 2000 Annual Report
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 9
• Location listings in WorldCat grew to 767
million from 720 million.
• More than 16,000 libraries around the world
used the OCLC FirstSearch service, performing
64.3 million searches, a 4 percent increase over
the previous year.
• The OCLC Institute conducted 46 educational
events for 1,429 people.
• OCLC completed mergers with PAIS and PICA.
To foster increased international participation,
OCLC formed the Global Sharing Program,
which makes it easier to process international
interlibrary loans, and launched a pilot project
to test cataloging of Arabic language materials
using Arabic vernacular characters.
• The OCLC Board of Trustees retained the
consulting firm Arthur D. Little to conduct a
study of OCLC’s strategic directions and
governance.
Printed copies of the report can be obtained
by writing to: OCLC Support Services, MC 437,
6565 Frantz Rd., Dublin, Ohio 43017- 3395, or
requested by e- mail < orders@ oclc. org> or fax
(+ 1- 614- 798- 5728). Please include the item
number— MAN8440— and the quantity needed in
the request. The annual report will be available
on the World Wide Web in January 2001
< http:// www. oclc. org/ oclc/ ar2000/ ar. htm>.
• • •
The Arabian Gulf Chapter of the Special
Libraries Association met Oct. 24– 26 in Abu
Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
The theme for this year’s meeting was
“ Challenges and Opportunities for Arabian Gulf
Libraries in the New Millennium.”
OCLC staff members attending the
meeting included: John Dowd, library
services consultant; Stuart Hunt, senior
product specialist; Nick Rawson, director,
Library Services, OCLC Europe, the Middle
East & Africa; David Whitehair, consulting
product support specialist; and Marty Withrow,
director, Metadata Services Division, OCLC.
• • •
OCLC staff participates in Arabian Gulf Chapter
of the Special Libraries Association meeting
David Whitehair, consulting product support specialist, OCLC
Product Management and Implementation Division, gives a
presentation on the OCLC Arabic Cataloging pilot during the
Arabian Gulf Chapter of the Special Libraries Association
conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
OCLC and regional service partner Edutech Middle East
participated in the pre- conference titled, “ The Use of the Internet
for Management and Delivery of Information Resources.”
Pictured, left to right: Marty Withrow, director, Metadata
Services Division; Mr. Whitehair; Prabu Desikan, sales manager,
Edutech Middle East; John Dowd, library services consultant,
OCLC Europe, the Middle East & Africa; Nick Rawson, director,
Library Services, OCLC Europe, the Middle East & Africa; Wael
Samir Mohammad, information specialist, Edutech Middle East;
and Stuart Hunt, senior product specialist, OCLC Europe, the
Middle East & Africa.
photos provided by OCLC staff
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
10 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
by Brenda Bailey
Colorado, like many other states, is concerned
about student achievement and improving K– 12
education. The Colorado Legislature created
educational Content Standards in 1994, and all
subsequent education reform efforts have been
designed to hold students and teachers accountable
through a series of standard- based assessments.
The Colorado State Library, as part of the
Department of Education, has a mandate to support
the efforts of education professionals in this area.
The challenges for State Library staff have been to
create a resource that is applicable to the standards,
and to make it easily comprehensible for children
yet compatible with the Colorado Virtual Library
( CVL) interface and content designed for adults.
We attacked the project in three phases:
content, data access points and
interface design. A committee
was already in place— the
Educational Standards
Committee, which had looked
at how the CVL could support
standards in the classroom.
Trying to identify content and
create metadata to accompany
these efforts was an
overwhelming challenge, so we
were delighted to discover the
KidsClick! project during our
initial design phase. This site
was created by a group of librarians at the
Ramapo Catskill Library System in New York who
identified sites that had content appropriate for
children. Metadata had already been created that
described the resources, and they were willing to
share this information with us. We loaded their
data for around 6,100 sites into OCLC SiteSearch
Database Builder software. Since we needed
more material specific to Colorado, another 200-
plus sites were identified that had biographical
information, geography, flora, fauna, etc., specific
to Colorado, and we created metadata for these
sites using a simple web- based entry tool.
Our staff then considered access points. Each
site was evaluated in relationship to the Colorado
Content Standards. Using the web- based editing
tool, we added references to the appropriate
standards and benchmarks in each metadata
record. A general grade level indicator was
provided as well.
Finally, an interface was designed and
implemented using the OCLC SiteSearch WebZ
software. The interface was designed to appeal to
a variety of age levels and search styles. Those
students who can spell and have terminology
readily at hand for searching can enter a keyword
search in a search box. Those who are not
confident spellers but who recognize words can
select from a list of topics arranged alphabetically.
And finally, a hierarchy of subjects with colorful
icons is provided that also includes subtopics for
narrowing a search. Users can click on these
topics down to the next level. With all of these
search methods, once they are presented with a
list of web sites, students can go directly to the
site within the search framework, mark records,
or print the results sets
and/ or e- mail the citations
to themselves.
The Colorado Virtual
Library for Kids offers a
teacher interface as well.
This is simply a different
search interface and display
of the same database.
Teachers can enter a
keyword topic, then select
specific educational
standards and/ or
educational benchmarks
from a drop- down box. They are then provided
the brief records for a list of web sites that they
can use as part of creating lesson plans in support
of a particular content standard. A Parents section
is under construction at this time.
To point users to the resources designed for
both students and teachers, we created a section
on the main CVL site called “ For Colorado Kids,
Parents, and Teachers.” This site can be
bookmarked within OCLC SiteSearch directly, or
it can be accessed from the main CVL page.
The site has been presented throughout the state
to groups of principals, superintendents, school
media specialists, charter school staff and groups
such as the PTA, with enthusiastic response from
all. We’ve received many anecdotes from parents
about how useful the site has been in assisting their
children with homework assignments.
As always, this is an evolving site, and we hope
to add more links to resources. Students will
Colorado Virtual Library for Kids
supports K– 12 education
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 11
soon be able to do cross- database searching of
this file against the other resources available
through the CVL, including school and public
library catalogs and databases that point to
digitized objects. Future plans include offering an
easy link that allows them to search their school’s
library catalog directly or to link out to the web
sites from their school library databases.
To see the Colorado Virtual Library for Kids,
visit < http:// www. aclin. org>, and click on the
“ For Colorado Kids, Parents and Teachers” button.
For more information on the Colorado Virtual
Library for Kids, contact Brenda Bailey at:
bailey_ b@ cde. state. co. us, + 1- 303- 866- 6907.
For more information on KidsClick!, visit
< http:// www. kidsclick. org>.— Brenda Bailey is
director of Networking and Resource Sharing,
Colorado State Library.
• • •
Jane N. Ryland, membership consultant,
Internet2, and a higher education technology
consultant, was elected to the OCLC Board of
Trustees at its November meeting. She replaces
Edward E. David, president, EED, Inc., whom the
board elected in 1989 and whose term expired
in 2000.
Ms. Ryland was president of CAUSE, the
association for managing and using information
resources in higher education, from 1986 to 1998.
Prior to that she held posts in business and higher
education at several organizations, including
Reference Technology, Inc.; Storage Technology
Corporation; SHEEO/ NCES Communication
Network, State Higher Education Executive
Officers; Virginia Community College System;
Virginia Tech; and IBM Corporation.
Ms. Ryland is currently a member of the
COLLEGIS Board of Directors and the Eduprise
Advisory Board. She has served on the National
Association of College and University Business
Officers Board of Directors, the Association of
Higher Education Facilities Officers Board of
Directors and the American Association of
Community Colleges Commission on Learning
and Communications Technologies. In addition,
she has served on the Council of Higher
Education Management Associations, the Higher
Education Information Resources Alliances
Coordinating Council, the Coalition for
Networked Information Steering Committee and
the CAUSE Board of Directors.
Ms. Ryland holds a bachelor’s degree in English
from Westhampton College of the University of
Richmond, and she holds a master’s of public
administration in management systems from the
University of Colorado. She is the author of
numerous publications and conference
presentations.
There are 15 members of the OCLC Board of
Trustees. The OCLC Users Council elects six of
the trustees. In addition, the board includes Jay
Jordan, OCLC president and CEO, and eight
trustees elected by the board, five of whom come
from fields outside librarianship.
• • •
Jane Ryland elected to OCLC Board
OCLC acquires Canadian technical services operation
OCLC has acquired Library Technical Services, a
library cataloging service based in Winnipeg,
Manitoba, Canada. LTS provides original and copy
cataloging as well as physical processing of
materials to large and medium- sized academic
libraries in Canada.
LTS was established in 1994 as a business unit
of ISM Information Systems Management
Corporation, an IBM Company. LTS has 20 staff
members, including 17 catalogers.
“ Over the past six years, we have worked hard
to position LTS as Canada’s leading provider of
high- quality library technical services,” said Mary
Jane Gordon, manager, LTS. “ With the depth of
our cataloging expertise and our first- class
business processes, we are well positioned to
expand. Becoming part of OCLC will provide us
with the resources and opportunities to do so.”
“ Since the creation of the OCLC Canada office
in 1997, the number of libraries in Canada using
OCLC products and services has increased
steadily,” said Donald J. Muccino, OCLC executive
vice president and chief operating officer. “ Our
acquisition of Library Technical Services will
allow us to expand the scope of quality technical
services available locally from OCLC and better
serve libraries in Canada.”
• • •
Jane Ryland
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
12 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
by Susan Walker
Libraries everywhere are
struggling to provide access
for their users to the vast
amount of information
available in electronic form.
To help libraries gain
economical access to
electronic resources,
NELINET, an OCLC- affiliated
U. S. regional network, recently collaborated with
EarthWeb < http:// www. earthweb. com> to
develop a multiconsortial contract. This contract
established special pricing for EarthWeb’s
ITKnowledge, a reference and learning tool that
contains full- text books and other publications on
information technology topics. This special
pricing is also available through many other
regional networks. In addition, OCLC teamed
with the Ohio State University Libraries and
OhioLINK ( Ohio Library and Information
Network) to increase user access to ITKnowledge
by providing cataloging records through OCLC
WorldCat Collection Sets.
OCLC WorldCat Collection Sets began in 1984
to promote the shared cataloging of significant
microform sets. Collection Sets produces tapes
and electronic files containing cataloging records
representing various sets of items. In January
2000, enhancements were made to Collection
Sets to allow output of cataloging records for
electronic items and processing options for field
856 ( electronic location and access). Several new
electronic sets have been added to Collection Sets
in recent months.
Libraries volunteer to catalog sets of records in
WorldCat to be included in Collection Sets.
Cataloging volunteers are provided a special
symbol and authorization to use only for
cataloging the set. The set is pulled together by
collecting all records cataloged using this special
symbol. Searching is free of charge, and
cataloging volunteers receive credits for
enhancements and original records. Collection
Sets catalogers receive a free tape or EDX file of
the records upon completion of their set.
The Cataloging Department at Ohio State
University Libraries, in cooperation with
OhioLINK < http:// www. ohiolink. edu/>,
volunteered to catalog a set of electronic records
representing the ITKnowledge collection. Rather
than create separate records for these electronic
items, catalogers at Ohio State University Libraries
preferred to use the single record approach to
catalog this set, in which the bibliographic record
represents the printed version with reference to
the electronic resource.
EarthWeb supplied OCLC with a list containing
the International Standard Book Number ( ISBN),
title, author, publisher, date of publication and
pagination for each of the ITKnowledge e- books.
Robert Bremer, OCLC consulting database
specialist, used a customized macro and the ISBN
list to efficiently and accurately catalog over a
thousand records in WorldCat by adding the 530
( additional physical form available note) and 856
fields to the existing print version of the records.
The URL in the 856 field of the ITKnowledge
records contains the appropriate ISBN and
provides a direct link to the item. No matching
print version was found in WorldCat for several
ISBNs on the ITKnowledge list.
OCLC forwarded the remaining list of over 400
ISBNs to Magda El- Sherbini, head of the
Cataloging Department at Ohio State University
Libraries. Using the ISBN list and information
available on the ITKnowledge web site, catalogers
at Ohio State University Libraries created original
Encoding Level K records for the remaining
items.
Ms. El- Sherbini said the cataloging project was
completed in a timely manner due to the
commitment of each of the project participants.
“ In addition to providing bibliographic access to
these materials, this project demonstrates the
importance of cooperation among leading
institutions in Ohio,” said Ms. El- Sherbini. “ I
would like to thank OhioLINK and OCLC for
including Ohio State University Libraries in this
project, and I am looking forward to new and
exciting projects in the future.”
The Cataloging Department at Ohio State
University Libraries has expressed interest in
planning and developing other cooperative
cataloging projects that would provide access to
electronic materials.
OCLC, Ohio State University Libraries and
OhioLINK are continuing to work together to
catalog new titles as they are added to
ITKnowledge. Libraries that order this set may
OCLC, NELINET, Ohio State University Libraries and
EarthWeb collaborate on e- book solutions
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 13
place a standing order to receive additional
records, as the cataloging becomes available.
OCLC is interested in working with other
libraries in a similar manner to create sets of
cataloging records representing electronic
resources. Following completion of the set
cataloging, participating libraries are listed on
the OCLC web site. A list of sets available and
additional information about Collection Sets is
located at < http:// www. stats. oclc. org/ wcs_ list.
html>. Any institution interested in working with
OCLC should contact its OCLC- affiliated regional
network or service center in the United States, an
international distributor, or Susan Walker at OCLC
< susan_ walker@ oclc. org>.— Susan Walker is
product manager, OCLC WorldCat Collection Sets.
• • •
Glenis Longworth is converting catalog records
from Bach, Beethoven and the Bee Gees as part of
an OCLC RetroCon service project.
With 20 years experience in OCLC RetroCon
services, Ms. Longworth has seen more than her
fair share of catalog cards. Most of the records
she has converted from cards to machine- readable
form have been for books. But the Bach,
Beethoven and Bee Gees titles she is converting
these days are for a sound recordings collection
for San Jose State University.
“ It used to be that libraries would sometimes
add a few sound recording catalog records to their
books projects for retrospective conversion,” said
Ms. Longworth, OCLC RetroCon technical
specialist. “ But sound recording records were few
and far between. This project is a little unusual.”
It may be unusual, but the 10,000- title project
is necessary to bring the San Jose State University
Library records up to date, to put the records
online in electronic form, and to make the
materials stored on library shelves more visible
and accessible to students and faculty at the
university.
“ In the past, we have had a focus on
retrospective conversion of books,” said Celia
Bakke, head of Technical Services, San Jose State
University Library. “ But many formats are
important to our users. So it is essential for
us to provide full and accurate access to all
our materials.”
Other libraries are considering the
retrospective conversion of formats other
than book records.
“ Libraries have converted their catalogs for
books so that library users can find what they
need in the library’s electronic catalogs,” said
Jennifer Callahan, OCLC RetroCon service
supervisor. “ If a library has converted just book
records to machine- readable form, then non- book
catalog records that have not been converted will
not be accessible. It’s almost as if these items
don’t exist in the library.”
“ We have open stacks for browsing, but it’s
pretty difficult to browse for sound recordings,”
said Ms. Bakke. “ We have found that once these
records are converted, we provide better access
and the materials are used more.”
Ms. Longworth converts records in all formats.
She said she is enjoying her work on the sound
recordings project. She said that even after 20
years, the variety keeps her interested in
retrospective conversion.
“ It doesn’t get boring,” said Ms. Longworth.
“ I often run across something unusual and
interesting. For example, the Bee Gees record I
recently converted was in German. I just got a
kick out of that.”
• • •
OCLC RetroCon service converts
records for more than books
photo provided by OCLC RetroCon services
Glenis Longworth, OCLC RetroCon service technical specialist,
works at OCLC���s Washington Court House office.
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
14 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
The library of El Colegio de México, located in
Mexico City, has joined OCLC as a full cataloging
member and will add its 375,000 bibliographic
records to WorldCat. The Daniel Cosío Villegas
Library will also use the OCLC Interlibrary Loan
service and the CORC service with WebDewey.
“ La negociación con OCLC es un éxito para la
Biblioteca, puesto que se alcanzó un objetivo que
se había trazado desde mucho tiempo atrás y que
representa un logro importante para apoyar las
labores de El Colegio, que requieren una
biblioteca moderna y eficaz, al tanto de las
tendencias mundiales en el manejo de
información académica,” said Alvaro Quijano Solis,
director, Biblioteca Daniel Cosío Villegas. “ OCLC
nos presenta una gran oportunidad de integrarnos
a un importante grupo de bibliotecas a nivel
mundial, con las cuales tenemos mucho que
compartir y de las cuales esperamos aprender
para mejorarnos más cada día. Estamos contentos
del acuerdo logrado.” [ The negotiation with
OCLC is a success for the library— an objective
set a long time ago has finally been met, and it
provides important support for El Colegio’s
activities. The success of the El Colegio’s
research work requires a modern and efficient
library, familiar with the world’s trends in
academic information management. OCLC has
given us this great opportunity to be part of an
important worldwide library group. We have a lot
to share with the libraries in the group, and, at
the same time, we have much to learn from them.
We are very pleased with the agreement.]
“ The Biblioteca Daniel Cosío Villegas is noted
for its consistent leadership for the library and
academic programs it supports,” said Nicholas
Cop, director of OCLC Latin America and the
Caribbean.
“ The addition to WorldCat of the large number
of unique and useful Spanish language records
from a respected institution whose cataloging is
known to be of high quality is particularly
exciting,” said Mr. Cop. “ Access to the library’s
notable Mexican and Latin American collections
will benefit the entire OCLC membership.”
Founded in 1940, El Colegio de México is an
institution known for its academic excellence.
It concentrates its activities in the areas of high-quality
teaching, research and the provision of
information. The many contributions of El
Colegio de México to research and development
in the social sciences and the humanities in
Mexico have placed it among the most
outstanding institutions devoted to research and
teaching, and have earned it a well- established
international standing.
The Daniel Cosío Villegas Library provides
support for El Colegio de México’s activities. It
enjoys recognition both in Mexico and Latin
America as a leading library for the wealth of its
collections, the quality of its bibliographic
processes and for the information services that it
provides to the academic community.
• • •
El Colegio de México becomes OCLC member
Staff from the library of El Colegio de México
photo provided by El Colegio de México
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 15
by Kimihiro Niimoto
In the third quarter of 2000, librarians in Japan
met at three different venues to learn about the
OCLC Cooperative Online Resource Catalog
( CORC) and how this service continues OCLC’s
tradition of revolutionizing librarianship,
enhancing cooperation and furthering access to
the world’s information.
Keio University’s Mita Media Center and
Waseda University Library hosted a workshop,
“ Information Management and Metadata
Expectations,” on July 14 at Keio University’s
Mita campus. Nearly 100 guests from a wide
range of institutions attended the workshop,
including librarians from the Information
Technology Center, University of Tokyo; Tokyo
Institute of Technology; National Institute of
Informatics ( NII, formerly NACSIS); National Diet
Library; and Fuji Xerox.
Andrew H. Wang, executive director, OCLC
Asia Pacific, discussed OCLC’s strategy for
electronic information management. Taylor
Surface, CORC program director, OCLC, delivered
the keynote speech on OCLC CORC.
Discussion of metadata activities in Japan
included case examples that were delivered by
representatives of Tokyo Institute of Technology,
Keio University and Fuji Xerox.
Attendees commented that the workshop
afforded them the timely opportunity to discuss
the future of their libraries, and especially to
join the continuing discussion on metadata
standardization, which is a subject that offers
a broad range of issues with regard to the
Japanese language.
More information about the workshop is
available through the Waseda University Library
< http:// www. wul. waseda. ac. jp/ event/
sokeiwork/> and Keio University Library
< http:// www. mita. lib. keio. ac. jp/ main. html>
web sites.
Four days after the Tokyo workshop,
approximately 40 librarians from Aichishukutoku
University, Nanzan University, Chukyo University
and other institutions gathered in Nagoya to
attend a seminar that featured discussions on
OCLC’s direction toward providing libraries with
truly global tools such as the OCLC CORC service
and the OCLC FirstSearch service. In addition to
Mr. Wang’s and Mr. Surface’s lectures on OCLC’s
strategic direction and CORC, respectively,
Hiroshi Itsumura, assistant professor and associate
university librarian, Aichishukutoku University,
presented a case study on his institution’s use of
CORC. Aichishukutoku University is the only
institution in Japan that participated in the CORC
Founders Phase. Today his staff mainly focuses on
cataloging Japanese language web sites, and Mr.
Itsumura’s report focused on the various issues
his staff confront in cataloging multilingual sites.
The third OCLC seminar began July 19 in
Kyoto where 60 librarians from Ritsumeikan
University, Doshisha University, Kansai University
and other institutions gathered to discuss CORC
and FirstSearch. And, as was also the case at the
Nagoya meeting, Shu- En Tsai, OCLC Asia Pacific
senior library services executive, made a
presentation on OCLC FirstSearch service
features, such as easy access to online full text,
including online full text linked to database
citations from the OCLC FirstSearch Electronic
Collections Online service.
In May 2001, the Committee for International
Library Cooperation, which is under the Japan
Association of Private University Libraries, will
host an international symposium at Kwansei
Gakuin University focusing on “ Library
Consortiums in the Future.”— Kimihiro Niimoto
is manager, OCLC Center, Kinokuniya Company.
• • •
Workshops and seminars in Japan
focus on metadata issues
Keio University’s Mita Media Center and Waseda University Library hosted an
“ Information Management and Metadata Expectations” workshop at Keio University’s
Mita campus. Andrew H. Wang, executive director, OCLC Asia Pacific, discussed
OCLC’s strategy for electronic information management. Taylor Surface, OCLC CORC
program director, delivered the keynote speech on OCLC CORC and metadata activities.
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
16 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
Billed as the largest and most comprehensive
information industry event in the world,
Online Information 2000, held in London,
England, Dec. 5– 7, brought information
professionals from all over the world together.
OCLC’s activities, which were coordinated
by staff from OCLC Europe, the Middle East &
Africa and OCLC headquarters in Dublin, Ohio,
included a booth in the exhibit area, an update
session, meetings for OCLC Cooperative
Online Resource Catalog ( CORC) service users,
and a reception.
OCLC’s booth focused on demonstrations of
CORC, the OCLC FirstSearch service, the OCLC
WebExpress service, PICA’s PiCarta
International database, the Arabic Cataloging
Project, OCLC CJK software and WebDewey.
“ Online Information 2000 provides an
excellent opportunity for us to meet with our
users throughout Europe and beyond and to
introduce prospective OCLC members and
users to our products and services,” said Janet
Mitchell Lees, managing director, OCLC
Europe, the Middle East & Africa. “ The library
staff members we talked with were interested
in a wide range of products and services, with
FirstSearch, CORC and other cataloging
services, interlibrary loan and WebExpress
having the most activity.”
• • •
OCLC participates in London Online
with exhibit, updates, meetings and a reception
photos by Nita Dean
Jay Jordan, OCLC president and CEO, talks with
Graham Coult, editor of Managing Information, and
Kathy Fryer, manager of Marketing Communications,
OCLC Europe, the Middle East & Africa.
Stuart Hunt, senior product specialist, OCLC Europe, the Middle East
& Africa, makes a presentation to CORC users. Bill Carney, OCLC
consulting marketing analyst, also spoke during this meeting and is
seated at the front of the room.
OCLC users, distributors and staff attended the
reception at the London Olympia Hotel. Pictured,
standing, are Phyllis Spies, vice president, OCLC
Worldwide Library Services, with Martin Svoboda
( left), a library director from the Czech Republic, and
Peter Burnett, head of Technical Services, the Bodleian
Library, Oxford University.
The OCLC booth at the Online Information 2000 Exhibition
and Conference in London, England
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 17
Glenn Patton, manager of the OCLC Cataloging
Products Department since 1997, has been
promoted to director, OCLC Metadata Standards
and Quality, by Gary Houk, vice president, OCLC
Metadata and Content Management Services.
Mr. Patton joined OCLC Cataloging Services in
1980. In his 20 years with OCLC, he has been
involved in the redesign and implementation of the
OCLC Cataloging service. In his new position, he
will manage OCLC metadata activities in standards,
quality control and national programs. He will also
work with vendors that provide or use metadata.
Since 1982, Mr. Patton has served as OCLC’s
liaison to the ALA Association for Library
Collections and Technical Services Committee on
Cataloging: Description and Access. He is also a
member of the Program for Cooperative
Cataloging’s Standing Committee on Training and
the International Federation of Library
Associations and Institutions Standing Committee
on Cataloguing. He served on the ALA Machine
Readable Bibliographic Information committee
from 1986 to 1990.
Prior to joining OCLC, Mr. Patton spent 11
years as music and fine arts librarian at Illinois
Wesleyan University, Bloomington, Illinois.
Mr. Patton earned a bachelor’s degree in music
and a master of arts degree in musicology from the
University of Kansas. His master of science degree
in library service is from Columbia University.
• • •
Glenn Patton named director,
OCLC Metadata Standards and Quality
by Dawn Lawson
An increasing number of
graduate programs in library
and information science are
making use of the OCLC
Forest Press WebDewey in
CORC service, which was
released July 1. The service
provides web- based access
to the enhanced Dewey
Decimal Classification ( DDC) system database.
As of December, seven ALA- accredited library
schools in the United States and Canada were
using the WebDewey in CORC service.
Professor Arlene G. Taylor, Department of
Library and Information Science, School of
Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh,
was one of the first educators to incorporate use
of the service into her curriculum.
“ WebDewey makes it easier to teach the DDC
than ever before,” she said. “ The earlier electronic
versions of the classification were probably very
useful for technical services professionals, but
they weren’t entirely suitable for introducing
students to the DDC. The user- friendly interface
design and extensive use of hyperlinking
throughout make WebDewey nearly ideal for
teaching the DDC.”
Dr. Taylor, who is a new member of the
Decimal Classification Editorial Policy Committee,
has suggested enhancing the service with a hot-key-
type feature providing easy access to Tables 1
through 7 ( DDC’s seven auxiliary tables) from
anywhere in the program. This feature is
scheduled for implementation in February, the
date of WebDewey in CORC’s next quarterly
update. Each quarter the service is updated with
both new features such as this and changes to the
content of the DDC database. Updates to the
database content include editorial changes to the
classification as well as the addition of Library of
Congress Subject Headings ( LCSH) that have been
newly mapped to DDC numbers.
In the case of the print edition, users wait
seven years for the publication of a new edition
incorporating editorial changes. Dewey for
Windows, the CD- ROM version of the
classification, provides editorial changes and
LCSH mapping updates annually.
“ We are delighted that the web version allows
us to deliver the DDC in its most up- to- date form
to our users each quarter,” said Joan Mitchell,
executive director of OCLC Forest Press and
editor in chief of the DDC.— Dawn Lawson is
manager, Electronic Products, OCLC Forest Press.
• • •
WebDewey in CORC used
as a teaching tool in library schools
Glenn Patton
M E M B E R S H I P N E W S
18 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
Betty G. Bengtson, who retired effective Jan. 1 as
director of University Libraries at the University
of Washington in Seattle, has been named special
advisor to the president for academic library
services at OCLC. In this post, Ms. Bengtson will
represent OCLC in the library community, serving
as a liaison for ideas, projects, new products,
research agendas and areas of mutual concern.
“ Betty and the University of Washington
demonstrate what forward- looking institutions
are doing with portals,” said Jay Jordan, OCLC
president and CEO. “ She is a pre- eminent
librarian who will lend her expertise and ability
to think globally to OCLC in its important work
of helping libraries manage information in an
increasingly digital environment.”
“ I am pleased to be asked to assist OCLC in
planning future services to libraries,” said Ms.
Bengtson. “ I look forward to working with the
many talented individuals at OCLC and to a
continuing involvement with libraries and
librarians.”
Before joining the University of Washington in
1990, Ms. Bengtson was an associate director at
the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Library,
and earlier she was a librarian at Georgetown
University, the College of Notre Dame and
Macalester College. She is a graduate of Duke
University and received masters’ degrees from
Catholic University and the University of
Maryland. She is a past- president of the
Association of Research Libraries ( ARL), and
she recently completed service on the boards
of ARL and the Council on Library and
Information Resources.
• • •
Betty Bengtson appointed special advisor
to the president for academic library services
Arlene G. Taylor has been appointed to the
Decimal Classification Editorial Policy Committee
( EPC) through December 2005.
“ We are delighted that the American Library
Association nominated Arlene Taylor,” said Joan S.
Mitchell, editor in chief, Dewey Decimal
Classification, and executive director, OCLC
Forest Press. “ In her 30 years as an educator and
researcher, Dr. Taylor has taught students how to
use the Dewey Decimal Classification to classify
information resources ranging from printed books
through web sites. We are looking forward to her
advice on how to develop the DDC to meet
current and emerging knowledge- organization
challenges.”
Dr. Taylor is currently professor, Department of
Library and Information Science, School of
Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh.
Her teaching and research has focused on
organizing information, including cataloging,
authority control and subject access. She recently
completed the ninth edition of Wynar’s
Introduction to Cataloging and Classification,
and was awarded the 2000 ALA/ Highsmith Library
Literature Award for the Organization of
Information. Dr. Taylor was the 1996 recipient of
the Margaret Mann Citation, given by
ALA/ Association for Library Collections and
Technical Services. Dr. Taylor holds a doctorate in
library science from the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, an M. S. L. S. from the
University of Illinois at Urbana– Champaign, and a
bachelor’s degree in English from Oklahoma
Baptist University.
The Decimal Classification Editorial Policy
Committee is a 10- member international board
whose main function is to advise the editors and
OCLC Forest Press on matters relating to the
general development of the DDC. The EPC
represents the interests of Dewey users; its
members include public, special and academic
librarians, and library educators.
OCLC Forest Press, a division of OCLC since
1988, publishes the Dewey Decimal Classification
system, the world’s most widely used system for
the classification of library materials, and a variety
of related materials. More information about
OCLC Forest Press is available on the Dewey web
site at < http:// www. oclc. org/ fp/> or via
telephone at 1- 800- 848- 5878, extension 6237,
or + 1- 614- 764- 6237.
• • •
Arlene Taylor appointed to Dewey Editorial Committee
Betty Bengtson
Arlene Taylor
I N T E R V I E W
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 19
Discussing the OCLC CORC service and the
future of cataloging at OCLC is a lot of
ground to cover. Can you set the stage
for us?
Before we talk about some of the specifics of
CORC and what we’re planning for cataloging
services, let’s remember that OCLC is in a
transition period. In September, we gave the
OCLC Board of Trustees a document outlining
OCLC’s plan of action for the next three years.
The board gave its support for this new global
product strategy, which we called “ Extending the
OCLC Cooperative.” The ideas that form the basis
of the strategy came from the OCLC Users
Council, from our various advisory committees,
from our staff, from networks and service centers
and from the library community.
The future of OCLC cataloging services is one
aspect of OCLC’s larger strategic plan— and it’s
definitely a key aspect. One thing is clear: all of
our planned services depend on good quality
metadata.
Can you summarize what the change from
“ OCLC Cataloging Services” to “ OCLC
Metadata Services” means?
We want to transform OCLC’s traditional
cataloging services into a comprehensive
metadata creation and management service for
librarians, library users and OCLC partners as part
of the OCLC strategy to extend WorldCat into a
globally networked information resource, and to
provide a cooperative framework for organizing
the world’s knowledge.
WorldCat has grown to be the world’s
largest bibliographic database thanks to
the contributions of cataloging staff in
libraries worldwide. Why does OCLC
want to collaborate with other, non- library
organizations?
OCLC is based on the cooperative efforts of
libraries. This cooperative effort has been very
successful in building WorldCat. Going forward,
The Future of OCLC Metadata Services
Gary Houk, vice- president, OCLC Metadata and Content Management
Services, answers questions about the OCLC CORC service and the
direction of Metadata Services at OCLC.
OCLC’s newest cataloging service, the Cooperative Online Resource Catalog ( CORC), officially
went into production July 1, 2000 after 18 months of development. Library staff from almost
500 institutions helped OCLC staff design the first phase of what will form the basis of OCLC’s
platform for all cataloging services.
Gary R. Houk joined OCLC in 1974 as a programmer analyst on the
OCLC Cataloging system.
During the first 18 years of his career at OCLC, Mr. Houk had many
responsibilities, including management of the Cataloging Development
team, management of the Quality Assurance team, and management
of the Systems Development team for the PRISM project. In 1992,
Mr. Houk began his tenure as vice president of OCLC Services.
In October of 2000, Mr. Houk was named vice president of a business
unit responsible for the marketing and development of OCLC Metadata
and Content Management Services. This unit includes OCLC Forest
Press, which maintains and publishes the Dewey Decimal Classification,
a knowledge organization system used by 200,000 libraries worldwide.
Mr. Houk received a bachelor’s degree in computer science and a master’s degree in business
administration from Ohio State University.
I N T E R V I E W
20 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
the new services we plan to provide to libraries
and library users will continue to be based on
library cooperation, but they will also require
collaboration with other organizations.
To connect library users to content, we must
partner with commercial organizations to get
access to additional metadata, to discover where
resources reside and to deliver the content users
are seeking. Those same organizations want to
work with OCLC and libraries.
The growth of the web has created a demand
for metadata, for knowledge organization, for
access, for archiving— in short, for the expertise
of libraries and librarians. Archives, museums,
booksellers, publishers, professional societies and
governmental agencies all have a need to organize
information and a need to share that information
with their constituents or customers. We think
we can reduce the costs associated with the
production of quality metadata for them, just as
we have done for libraries, in a way that will
directly benefit libraries. Also, there is a need out
in web- land for information from trusted sources.
Libraries are a trusted source, as are archives and
museums, but we don’t really have a good way
for us all to cut down on the work of resource
description, share our metadata and make it
accessible to the world’s ‘ knowledge workers’ and
information users. So, all co- op members will
have access to a very large database of quality
records as well as linkages from those records to
additional resources such as reviews, biographies,
cover art and tables of contents. The ways and
extent of participation and cooperation will
change.
In July, CORC became the latest addition
to the OCLC family of cataloging services.
How does CORC fit into OCLC’s plan?
There are a number of reasons why we believe
that the CORC system is a good foundation for our
next generation cataloging system. CORC is a
graphical browser interface to OCLC’s cataloging
system, so users are not required to install or learn
to use proprietary software to access the system.
This also means that users can access the system
from non- Windows- based workstations or any
device that supports browser access. On the
other hand, CORC has functionality not available
in the current OCLC Cataloging system. CORC
supports unlimited record sizes, multiple metadata
formats, linked authorities and linked classification
numbers. These are capabilities that cannot be
added to the platform that supports our current
cataloging system.
CORC also offers better administrative support
for managing authorizations, for electronic
problem reporting and for access to
documentation. The transition will take time and,
given a few limitations in current browser editing
capabilities, we will be enhancing our Windows
clients such as CatME as part of the transition to
the next generation system. This isn’t change for
the sake of change. Telecommunications,
computers, workstations and database
technologies have changed considerably since
1971 [ the year WorldCat was introduced]. The
volume of activity has increased tremendously.
OCLC serves libraries in 76 countries speaking
many languages. MARC and AACR2 are not
universal standards. For OCLC to truly be a
global, distributed, multilingual cooperative we
have to make our systems more flexible, more
customizable and more open. The CORC system
is one of the key building blocks of the
foundation of our future services.
So what happens to MARC?
As long as the library community continues to
value AACR2 and MARC, OCLC will continue to
support them. But the basis for the data
structures themselves in an extended version of
WorldCat will have to be independent of any
particular metadata standard. We will have to
provide the flexibility in design necessary to
enable each community of metadata users to view
and export metadata in the form that fits that
community. So, in CORC right now, the basis of
the data is OCLC MARC, and we have enabled
Dublin Core as an additional data format. Three
years from now, OCLC MARC and Dublin Core will
be two of several data formats. The basic data
structure will have to accommodate them all. The
good news is that with the advent of CORC, OCLC
can support multiple data formats within the same
database, and users can select their preferred view
of that data regardless of how the data is stored.
Can anyone— even those without a library
degree or library training— create catalog
records using the CORC system?
CORC is an improved cataloging tool that makes
cataloging easier for the cataloger. CORC is the
first system in which I have personally created
records for several web resources because CORC
provided me with more assistance than other
systems. I cannot hope to create the kind of
catalog records that a professional cataloger can,
but my objective was to get a good brief record
into the database for an electronic resource that
would be of interest to others, and which could
I N T E R V I E W
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 21
be enhanced by a cataloger. I think the size of
the web, the growth rate of electronic resources,
and the fact that some automated metadata
creation is possible in that environment has
opened up the possibility that we will see new
contributors of metadata for some types of
resources.
I think any fear that CORC makes cataloging
too simple is a variation of the fear that
automated cataloging would do away with the
need for catalogers. We’ve had automated
cataloging since 1971 and there’s still a lot of
work for catalogers, more than there used to be
because the rest of the world has realized how
important structured metadata is in the discovery
process. CORC automates part of the original
cataloging process by harvesting data from a
resource, but I’m confident that this will allow
catalogers to be more efficient, catalog more and
so be more valued.
It’s also important to note that cataloging is a
particularly high level of resource description.
There’s a variety of resource description being
done in the world. We want to extend
standardized resource description to a broader
community, to be inclusive, not exclusive. And
we want to provide tools to people doing
minimal resource description as well as to those
doing very detailed resource description.
Many OCLC member libraries catalog a lot
of material. What assurances can you give
them about functionality in OCLC’s
cataloging services of the future?
OCLC members can be assured that OCLC will
not replace the features and functionality of our
current main cataloging service with anything
that offers less than is already available. OCLC
operates a very large production cataloging ‘ shop,’
and our own catalogers rely on the same features
that our members do. We have 41 cataloging staff
in our OCLC TechPro service, 20 in our new
Canadian LTS cataloging service, and over 150 in
our OCLC RetroCon service areas all using OCLC
Passport, CatME, CJK and Cataloging services.
The volume of materials cataloged in a year varies
slightly, but in the 1999 fiscal year, they cataloged
approximately 227,000 items and converted 4
million catalog cards to machine- readable form.
The transition period between older
technologies and newer ones requires careful
planning. We will continue to use our usability
lab and field testing to ensure that our services
maintain the high level of dependability and
performance users expect.
What are the benefits in extending the
OCLC cooperative?
A lot of the benefits are not new. What’s new is
the scope of the benefits. By extending the
OCLC cooperative, many more people will have
access to a very large database of quality
metadata. That database will be enriched by
unique content with links to relevant secondary
information about the items.
We want to reduce the costs associated with
the production of quality records by providing
interactive access to authority files, classification
schemes, thesauri and local catalogs. Accurate
and reliable metadata will be available in
compliance with international standards and in
many languages. Knowledge organization tools
will support people in the discovery and
navigation process.
In short, OCLC will help knowledge
repositories weave themselves into the web so
that the incredibly valuable work of metadata
creation benefits not only people who choose to
use a library as their portal of choice, but also
supports linking information seekers from
wherever they start, back to library services when
appropriate.
What is the best way for OCLC members to
plan for these changes and stay informed
about OCLC’s implementation of the global
product strategy?
Earlier, I mentioned our plan of action document,
“ Extending the OCLC Cooperative: a Three- Year
Strategy.” It outlines plans for libraries and OCLC
to transform WorldCat from a bibliographic
database and online union catalog to a globally
networked information resource. But, it’s more
than an OCLC strategic plan. It’s part of our
ongoing dialogue with libraries, U. S. regional
networks, international distributors and potential
partners. I hope library staff will read the
strategy, discuss it with colleagues and join in the
dialogue. The entire document and a feedback
form are available at http:// www. oclc. org/
strategy/ index. htm.
OCLC intends to provide leadership in shaping
an environment in which libraries thrive, but to
do this we need all those with a stake in the
changes we propose to participate and contribute
to realizing our vision.
• • •
R E S E A R C H
22 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
by Robert C. Bolander
Gail McMillan visited OCLC
in Dublin, Ohio, on Nov. 7
as part of the OCLC Office
of Research Distinguished
Seminar Series. Ms.
McMillan is associate
professor in the University
Libraries at Virginia
Polytechnic Institute
and State University ( Virginia Tech), Director
of Virginia Tech’s Digital Library and Archives
< http:// scholar. lib. vt. edu/>, and one of
three co- principal- investigators on the project
team that founded the Networked Digital
Library of Theses and Dissertations ( NDLTD)
< http:// www. ndltd. org>.
Ms. McMillan, a widely recognized expert on
digital libraries, scholarly communications, and
electronic theses and dissertations ( ETDs), is
working on a white paper on ETDs for the OCLC
Office of Research, as reported in the
September/ October 2000 issue of the OCLC
Newsletter ( pp. 20– 21).
Her presentation dealt with the implementation
of a university- wide requirement that all theses
and dissertations ( TDs) be submitted in electronic
format. She brings a librarian’s perspective to her
work with ETDs, yet her point of view is
informed by more than five years work with ETDs
at Virginia Tech and through the NDLTD.
Networked Digital Library
of Theses and Dissertations
Virginia Tech is one of 40 universities in the
United States and over 100 institutions worldwide
that belong to the NDLTD. ETDs have been
required at Virginia Tech since Jan. 1, 1997, and
they now are required at seven other universities
in the United States. Many more institutions
make them optional, while some require them in
certain departments but not the university as a
whole. Today nearly 3,000 ETDs have been
submitted and approved at Virginia Tech
< http:// scholar. lib. vt. edu/ theses/>, and there are
8,557 ETDs in the NDLTD, most of which are
searchable through a federated search engine
developed by students in Virginia Tech’s
computer science department.
In addition to sharing information through the
NDLTD, there has been an annual conference on
ETDs since 1996. At the 1999 conference in
Blacksburg, Virginia, over 60 participants came
from 30 institutions. In May in Florida,
200 people attended from 38 states and
13 countries. The next conference will convene
in March 2001 at the California Institute of
Technology, just after the Association of College
and Research Libraries conference in Denver.
Why Electronic Theses and
Dissertations?
According to Ms. McMillan, there are several
reasons why moving to digital submission is
important. Paper TDs are underutilized, and
online documents get much more use. Scanned
documents are large, and therefore more costly to
store, and they are less effective than original
online documents. Furthermore, students know
more when they complete masters or doctorates
at institutions that require electronic submission
of TDs. They become information literate, use
information technology in more sophisticated
ways than they would otherwise and gain
experience with electronic publishing. ETDs also
offer an opportunity to enhance the creative
expression of student research, as well as to have
it communicated more effectively and shared
more widely among scholars, regardless of their
ability to pay.
Having said that, Ms. McMillan reported that
format creativity is one thing they had hoped to
achieve with ETDs that has not yet materialized.
Virginia Tech abolished all document- formatting
guidelines, but most of their ETDs look just like
traditional TDs. However, they can contain
thumbnail pages and links to help the reader
navigate through the document. They can have a
unique layout, contain simulations, video clips
and sound. Examples can be viewed online
< http:// www. theses. org/ notable. htm>.
At the same time, those involved with
implementing and administering the ETD program
were concerned about getting an out- of- control
range of formats, Ms. McMillan said. However,
Virginia Tech improves access, saves money and shelf
space with electronic theses and dissertations
R E S E A R C H
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 23
she went on to report that the reality is that
students are using the same tools everyone else
uses, at least within their departments and
university colleges. Almost all are submitted as PDF
files. Some institutions in the NDLTD have
requirements or guidelines in hopes of being better
able to manage new technologies as they emerge.
Ms. McMillan said that ETDs are used much
more frequently than paper TDs. For theses
submitted at Virginia Tech between 1990 and
1994, the combined average circulation per copy
is 2.24 per year, while for dissertations submitted
during the same period, it is 3.2 per year. In
1999, Virginia Tech received over 670,000
requests for their fewer than 3,000 ETDs.
ETDs: The Library’s Role
Ms. McMillan said the library had several goals for
ETDs, including improving library services, better
turn- around time on processing TDs, making TD
content available at all times, serving more users
without more staff, cataloging from e- text,
eliminating handling of TDs during processing,
and saving space.
The library wrote programs and scripts that
handle ETDs ( including automatic e- mails to the
author and committee chair when the ETD is
approved and one to inform UMI < http:// www.
umi. com/> that another Virginia Tech ETD is
available for downloading and processing) and
maintains web sites. The library implemented
tracking systems that allow ETDs to be accessed as
students and/ or chairs indicate. Authors submit
directly to the file’s permanent home server in the
library’s Digital Library and Archives. The library
also has provided support to students about
creating their ETDs, as well as accessing them.
The ETD/ Library server provides storage and
access to ETDs, and the library provides system
maintenance, backup and archive support. Staff
are careful with security, making routine network
backups and using various servers inside and
outside the library.
In addition to improving the number of
accesses, Ms. McMillan said Virginia Tech’s ETDs
are available much more quickly than their paper
predecessors— by months. She acknowledged
that this is good for the user community, but
pointed out that there are also definite advantages
to the library. For example, 166 feet of shelf
space is gained annually in the general stacks and
the University Archives from the nearly 2,000
paper documents replaced by ETDs.
How ETDs are Managed at
Virginia Tech
Ms. McMillan described the TD workflow at
Virginia Tech before electronic submissions.
Documents were submitted to the graduate school
in triplicate. After they were approved they
stacked up in a closet until it was full and then
they were shipped to the library. Copies were
reviewed at the library to make sure all pages
were there. Two copies were sent to the bindery
and one to UMI for microfilming. Materials were
at the bindery for a minimum of three weeks, and
it could be a couple of months before they
returned to the library. Once back, they had to be
cataloged, assigned a call number, marked and
shelved. One bound copy was sent to University
Archives. Months would have passed since the
dissertation had been approved and submitted to
the graduate school. Today they are available as
soon as they are approved at the graduate school.
Now, ETDs at Virginia Tech are produced using
standard word- processing tools, delivered as
Portable Document Format ( PDF) files, managed
by the library, reviewed and approved by the
graduate school and downloaded by UMI for
microfilming.
Virginia Tech considered emulating paper-format
workflow, but then considered just having
students submit the ETDs directly where they
were going to be maintained. Only the graduate
school has access to them until approval, at which
time the document is moved to whatever
directory corresponds to the level of access or
availability the student has authorized.
Several things happen automatically upon
approval: transfer of an ETD’s file or files to the
server space appropriate for their access
authorization, e- mail notification to the student
author and committee chair; e- mail notification to
UMI that includes the author, title and URL. They
download the ETD themselves for storage and
processing.
Ms. McMillan reported that it does not take
much to start up an ETD server. Many institutions
can do it with resources already on hand. Staffing
needs are minimal, too. Virginia Tech did it with
one full- time librarian plus a part- time
programmer from the library systems department,
although this gradually became a full- time
position, too. “ It’s really easy to start up, since
you’re already doing similar things with library
systems; ETDs are easy to add,” she said.
All scripts and programs created by NDLTD
members are freely available to anyone, whether
Gail McMillan
R E S E A R C H
24 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
or not they are NDLTD members. Using them is
simple, according to Ms. McMillan.
What is the Role of the
Graduate School?
Ms. McMillan said the Virginia Tech graduate
school shepherded ETDs through the university
governance structure and processes. It also has
facilitated training workshops for students and, of
course, it reviews and approves all ETDs, just as it
did their paper predecessors. The graduate
school also works with individual students as
specific needs arise.
Faculty Concerns
The faculty expressed several concerns prior to
implementing Virginia Tech’s ETD requirement,
according to Ms. McMillan. These included a
desire that ETDs be accepted on a voluntary
basis for a year before the requirement went
into effect. A university- level oversight committee
was established to monitor the success of, and
any problems associated with, the implementation
of the requirement. Faculty asked that the
requirement be publicized widely, and that there
be sufficient software, hardware and training
available that the requirement would not become
a burden on departments. Ms. McMillan reported
that computer labs and classrooms across
campus, including the library provide support,
and both the graduate school and the library help
with training. The faculty also was concerned
about technical issues, such as whether the
library had enough server space, and if network
response time might be too slow.
The hardest issue to address, however, was the
feeling among many faculty members that ETDs
would be harmful to graduate students who were
planning to become future scholars and members
of the academy.
“ While several publishers assured us in writing
that they didn’t have a problem with ETDs being
available on the web with unlimited access, other
publishers assured us that they felt exactly the
opposite,” said Ms. McMillan. At least one of
these initially said they would approve ETDs
online only if access was limited to the university
community, like a book on the shelf. She believes
that the recent development of additional
preprint servers should also encourage faculty
and students to release access to ETDs.
Access Restrictions
At their discretion, Virginia Tech graduate students
may impose a one- to three- year restriction on
their ETD, after which it will be made public
unless the student contacts the graduate school to
request otherwise. Ms. McMillan reported that, in
reality, the university will attempt to contact
authors before lifting restrictions on their ETDs,
but this way the work becomes available
eventually if the author disappears. Works can be
limited to on- campus access or no access at all.
Another option is for some combination of access
levels. In this situation, the dissertation is
submitted as multiple files, with each file or set of
files having different access levels.
Ms. McMillan reported that Virginia Tech
faculty members outnumber publishers in telling
graduate students not to provide web access to
their ETDs, and raised the question of whether
this advice is well founded. She reported
attending a conference where two prominent
publishers told the audience that their journal
editors realized that the chapter from an ETD, for
example, must be drastically rewritten to appeal
to a different audience and had to survive the
critical peer- review process to get published. The
article was considered to be a synthesis of the
chapter rather than a mere republication of it.
She and her colleagues also found a survey of
publishers in science and technology fields that
supported this perspective.
Ninety- six percent of Virginia Tech alumni
surveyed said that they were satisfied that their
works were more widely known and appreciated
because they were on the web. Eighty- three
percent reported that it expanded their network
of research colleagues. Ms. McMillan said that
their comments indicated they were pleased with
their ability to share their research via the web,
especially when copies were requested.
Availability of Virginia Tech ETDs
Ms. McMillan reported that 15 to 20 percent of
Virginia Tech’s ETDs have been completely
inaccessible at any one time since 1997. An
additional 23 percent are restricted to on- campus
access only. She also indicated that access
restrictions have remained fairly constant over
time at Virginia Tech. This is considered a
disappointingly high rate of restriction. However,
whenever they have received a request for access
to a restricted ETD, Ms. McMillan has contacted
R E S E A R C H
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 25
the author and committee chair, and permission
almost always has been granted.
Cataloging Issues
In 1996 when they started adding ETDs to the
library’s collection at Virginia Tech, they did not
have a lot of experience cataloging electronic
materials of any kind, according to Ms. McMillan.
They had a few e- journals, but not very many
databases, etc. Traditional TDs had been cataloged
by undergraduate students who worked with
cataloging templates.
Professional cataloging librarians took over
with the implementation of the ETD requirement
to learn what was involved and how to apply
solutions to other situations that might arise.
They used typical catalogers’ workstations; the
library did not add anything to support ETDs. Ms.
McMillan reported that their ETD cataloger, who
initially had no experience with electronic files,
now estimates that it takes about five minutes to
catalog a typical ETD.
Virginia Tech’s ETDs are available on the web
as soon as they are approved by the graduate
school, then go through the normal cataloging
process. Thus, cataloging and availability become
separate activities. All words in the title page and
abstract are exposed for searching via InfoSeek’s
ULTRASEEK engine, according to Ms. McMillan,
and she again emphasized how libraries can start
very small and inexpensively. Virginia Tech began
with a small search engine that was available for
free on the Internet ( OpenText).
Ms. McMillan worked with the design of the
ETD submission form and wanted it to have
everything a cataloger would need to create a
catalog record, if the author would supply it— and
the catalogers would accept it. The goal was to
develop a form that someone could catalog from,
and now they will be able to derive metadata
from them for evolving catalog- record standards.
They have not yet determined how to map
from the electronic submission form into
Machine Readable Catalog Record ( MARC)
format, then up to OCLC and down to the
online public access catalog, so they’re copying
and pasting. ( Remember, they did not add any
programming staff!) Ms. McMillan reports that
they do, however, include all abstracts in the
bibliographic record, which previously would
have been too much keying.
Library Savings
Ms. McMillan indicated that the library realized a
73.3 percent savings immediately upon
implementing the ETD requirement. Their future
goal is to have no cataloging costs related to
ETDs. They want to be able to generate a MARC
record automatically from the submission form,
by using tagged elements within the online form
to generate the bibliographic record.
In addition to library materials processing
costs, the graduate school saves in processing and
storage costs, and the library saves shelf space.
Ms. McMillan said the library’s start- up costs for
staff, hardware and software, calculated from a
zero- based approach, are estimated to be about
$ 65,000. More information about this estimate is
available at < http:// scholar. lib. vt. edu/
theses/ data/ setup. html>.
Lessons Learned from ETDs
Ms. McMillan shared several things that those
associated with ETDs at Virginia Tech have
learned over the past several years:
• When it comes to ETDs, if you build it, it will
get used. Access has greatly exceeded
expectations, producing a remarkable increase
in exposure to graduate student research done
at the institution.
• It is good strategy to have as many policies and
procedures as possible in place prior to
implementation, at least in suggested form.
Once committed, committees may be very
reluctant to make even minor revisions for a
while after embarking on such a major new
initiative. Thus, it is useful to write policies the
way you want them to be, because the
committee is likely to revise them.
• The faculty members do not seem to be
accessing ETDs as much as they could. It
would appear that many still are reading TDs in
paper form, rather than online. Ms. McMillan
knows that some faculty members are
concerned about the authenticity of the online
work.
R E S E A R C H
26 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
She also reported learning through this process
that some graduate students are writing TD
chapters as articles for publication, rather than as
thesis or dissertation chapters to be revised for
later publication. In doing this, authors often also
sign away their rights to the chapter, and must
request it back from the publisher. Some
dissertations even contain chapters with one page
and a citation directing the reader to a particular
journal article, which constitutes the chapter.
Such experiences have made the library more of
an advocate for faculty and students in terms of
informing them about copyright issues and their
potential impact on authors and their work.
How to Start an ETD Initiative
Nearly 70 institutions currently accept theses or
dissertations in electronic format, but the
decision to do so did not happen overnight at any
of them. Ms. McMillan reported that Virginia Tech
talked about it for over 10 years. It takes library
and graduate school involvement, as well as the
information technology ( IT) department. At
Virginia Tech, the graduate school ultimately led
the way.
Ms. McMillan said it was good to have a
planning/ implementation team with broad
representation from various university sub-communities,
e. g., graduate students, the graduate
school, the faculty, the library and the IT
Department.
They also brought together everyone in the
library who was involved in traditional TD
processing, to make sure they were covering all
the bases when they went online. They sought to
determine what things had to be done in the new
environment as well as what could be enhanced
or eliminated. They looked at traditional and
online workflows and access, from the
perspective of the catalogers and reference
librarians and programmers, as well as the
bindery and the person who paid the UMI bills in
business services.
Ms. McMillan reported that it is not so difficult
to develop interest in ETDs, but consensus is a
different story. She said that having a prototype
for faculty and students to look at is a good idea,
and that it is important to start slowly and build
awareness and interest throughout the institution.
Ms. McMillan recommends starting with a trial
period of optional electronic submission, if
possible.
Help is Available
Ms. McMillan wrapped up her presentation by
saying that Virginia Tech and the NDLTD have
web sites with the necessary information on how
to get started, as well as a free automated
submission system, student guidelines, training
materials, FAQs, public relations information and
multimedia educational materials. She mentioned
that it is possible to arrange an on- site visit from
the Virginia Tech ETD team, and there are
international conferences and workshops
annually.
Ms. McMillan encourages anyone considering
implementation of an ETD program, whether
required or voluntary, departmental or university-wide,
to join the NDLTD, or to at least browse
their site. She encouraged audience members to
share their ideas, questions, concerns or
experiences by contacting her via e- mail at
< gailmac@ vt. edu>.— Robert C. Bolander is
manager, Communications and Programs, OCLC
Office of Research.
• • •
R E S E A R C H
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 27
by Stuart L. Weibel
Important progress during
the year 2000 brings the
Dublin Core Metadata
Initiative ( DCMI) to a
significant plateau, signaling
the maturity of the core
foundation ( the Dublin Core
metadata element set
< http:// purl. org/ dc/ documents/ rec- dces-
19990702. htm> and the associated qualifiers
< http:// purl. org/ dc/ documents/ rec/ dcmes-qualifiers-
20000711. htm>). While it is clear that
there is important work to be done to promote
stability and deployment of the Dublin Core, the
time has come to look beyond the core elements
toward a broader metadata agenda.
The Mission of the Dublin Core
Metadata Initiative
The Dublin Core workshop series was organized
around the goal of specifying metadata to support
cross- domain resource discovery on the Internet.
While this remains a major focus of the initiative,
metadata elements inevitably serve multiple
purposes, and applications often support more
than just discovery. Similarly, metadata
requirements within a given domain generally
demand additional semantics beyond what are
provided in the Dublin Core. As the Dublin Core
and qualifiers have matured, there is increasing
demand to meet these additional needs within a
single metadata architecture. The new mission
statement of the DCMI, approved unanimously by
the DC Advisory Committee at the eighth
international Dublin Core Metadata Initiative
Workshop ( DC- 8), acknowledges these needs.
The mission of the DCMI is to make it easier to
find resources using the Internet through the
following activities:
• Developing metadata standards for discovery
across domains
• Defining frameworks for the interoperation of
metadata sets
• Facilitating the development of community or
discipline- specific metadata sets that work
within the frameworks of cross- domain
discovery and metadata interoperability
The scope of DCMI activities that fall within
this mission include:
Documentation and communication
• Maintaining the Dublin Core web site
< http:// purl. oclc. org/ dc/> as the authoritative
source of DCMI standards, supporting
documents, related resources and news
concerning working group activities
• Promoting and supporting the development of
tutorial materials and events that help to
disseminate information about DCMI standards
and deployment
• Supporting liaison activities with other
metadata communities to promote
convergence of standards where practical and
to support crosswalks where appropriate
Standards development and maintenance
��� Organizing international workshops and
working group meetings directed toward
maintaining existing DCMI recommendations
and developing additional domain- specific
elements and qualifiers
• Participating in international standards
activities to promote the formal adoption of
DCMI recommendations as global standards
Tools and services
• Developing software infrastructure ( such as
the DCMI metadata registry) that supports the
management and maintenance of DCMI
metadata in multiple languages
• Providing reliable access to metadata schemas
for implementers, applications and users
• Consulting with designers of metadata systems
to promote consistent deployment of DCMI
metadata
The increasing global uptake of DC metadata
places high demands on an organization that is
essentially driven by voluntary contributions of
its constituents. The pressure of these demands
has made clear the necessity for DCMI to evolve
as an organization. This mission statement and
scope of activities provide the direction and
outline for that evolution. Substantial effort is
under way to further develop the processes,
management and fiscal stability of DCMI that
are necessary to attract further adoption.
Dublin Core Metadata Initiative progresses
R E S E A R C H
28 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
Milestones of the Year 2000 Workplan
Standardization
Two major steps took place on the DCMI
standardization front in the year 2000.
The first is the formal recognition by CEN, the
European standardization body, of DC 1.1 as part
of a CEN/ ISS Workshop Agreement ( CWA 13874)
< http:// www. cenorm. be/ isss/ Workshop/ metada
ta- observatory/ Home% 20Page. htm>. The intent
of this agreement is to provide guidelines for
industry to assist the adoption of Dublin Core
in Europe.
In parallel with the CEN activity, the National
Information Standards Organization ( NISO) has
balloted a version of Dublin Core as Z39.85
< http:// www. niso. org/ Z3985. html>. The fast-track
balloting for Z39.85 concluded successfully
in August and at this writing, formal responses to
comments are being prepared to support
final approval of the standard by the
American National Standards Institute
( ANSI).
Dublin Core qualifiers
The Dublin Core community
emerged from the DC- 7 workshop
in Frankfurt with the objective of
approving a set of qualifiers
intended to sharpen the semantics of the
original 15 elements. In determining the
makeup of these qualifiers, preference was
given to vocabularies, notations and terms already
maintained by established agencies. It is
expected that additional qualifiers will be added
as the standard matures, and that applications
may incorporate locally important elements and
qualifiers as well.
The DCMI currently recognizes two broad classes
of qualifiers:
• Element Refinements. These qualifiers make
the meaning of an element narrower or more
specific. A refined element shares the meaning
of the unqualified element but with a more
restricted scope.
• Encoding Schemes. These qualifiers identify
schemes that aid in the interpretation of an
element value. These schemes include
controlled vocabularies and formal notations or
parsing rules.
DC- 8: National Library
of Canada, Ottawa
DC- 8 < http:// www. ifla. org/ udt/ dc8/> was
hosted by the National Library of Canada and the
IFLA UDT Program in Ottawa. More than 150
people from 18 countries attended the meeting,
representing a broad spectrum of librarians,
researchers, museum specialists, publishers,
commercial content providers and others. A
number of emerging ideas helped to bring
participants together around some important
themes in the Dublin Core work.
A grammar of Dublin Core
Tom Baker’s notions of linguistic aspects of
metadata systems have developed over some
years and are well worth reading for anyone
trying to orient themselves in the topic of
metadata. The following quote from his article in
D- Lib Magazine, October 2000, is illustrative:
“ Dublin Core is a language. More precisely, it
is a small language for making a particular class
of statements about resources. Like natural
languages, it has a vocabulary of word- like terms,
the two classes of which— elements and
qualifiers— function within statements like nouns
and adjectives; and it has a syntax for arranging
elements and qualifiers into statements according
to a simple pattern < http:// www. dlib. org/ dlib/
october00/ baker/ 10baker. html>.”
Anyone who remembers diagramming
sentences from grade school will find this article
a comfortable introduction to metadata.
Application profiles
Part of the task of managing metadata complexity
is to develop formal means for the description and
documentation of the use of elements from several
metadata schemas in a single application. A given
application may use local metadata or elements
from another element set entirely, mixing and
matching according to the functional requirements
of the application. The work of Rachel Heery and
Manjula Patel < http:// www. riadne. ac. uk/
issue25/ app- profiles/> describes an approach to
combining elements from one or more formal
metadata schemas to form an application profile
that defines how the application will use a given
collection of metadata elements to meet the
functional requirements of the application.
R E S E A R C H
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 29
The essential elements for achieving this sort
of modular extensibility include:
• Metadata schemas expressed in a common
schema language ( for example, RDF schema
language < http:// www. w3. org/ TR/
rdf- schema/>)
• A software registry where such schemas are
recorded and accessible
• Operational policies to define how elements
are to be used
• Documentation to support the deployment of
the technology and operational policies.
This promise of metadata modularity is only
now, after five years of web metadata
development, coming into focus. There are still
many operational details to be resolved, but the
combination of social collaboration, advances in
metadata registry work and maturation of the
semantic standards themselves brings these
opportunities within reach.
Metadata registries
Metadata registries are intended to support a
variety of purposes, both within a given metadata
community, and as a part of the broader
metadata environment in the web. Within a
given metadata activity, a registry captures the
official definitions of the various defined terms
that comprise a given metadata standard. A
registry may also include policies or recommended
practice for use of the defined terms.
As DCMI metadata evolves, changes and
additions will be managed through this registry
as well, making it a central management tool for
the Dublin Core and associated elements or
qualifiers.
Metadata registries will also help to manage
relationships among various metadata
communities. To the extent that different
communities can agree on standard
representations of schemas, the problem of
mapping among elements can be made easier.
The DC- Registry Working Group met during
DC- 8 under the leadership of Rachel Heery of
UKOLN. The group is chartered to establish
functional requirements and design considerations
to support a DCMI metadata registry.
The DCMI Open Metadata Registry is a
prototype for the DCMI registry. This registry is
built from the EOR Extensible Open RDF Toolkit
< http:// eor. dublincore. org/>, an open source
toolkit designed to facilitate the design and
implementation of applications based on the
W3C’s RDF and XML standards.
Working group activities at DC- 8
The following are brief summaries of DCMI
working groups that met at DC- 8. More
information is on the working group pages
on the Dublin Core web site < http:// purl. org/
DC/ groups/ index. htm>.
DC- Education: The DC- Education Working
Group is the first example of a domain- specific
working group in the Dublin Core architecture.
As such, the DCMI is using this activity to help
formalize this important expansion of the scope
of DCMI activities.
The DC- Education Group has brought forth a
proposal for a small number of additional
elements and qualifiers to support the functional
requirements of this domain.
DC- Agents: Dublin Core elements describe
information resources, but inevitably the value of
some of the elements is associated with objects
or resources themselves. This is particularly
important with respect to Agent elements:
Creators, Contributors and Publishers. People
and organizations themselves have potentially
complex descriptions, and extensive discussions
of these elements suggest that they may merit
an element set of their own. This is ( not
surprisingly) similar to the situation that obtains
in conventional cataloging. A creator is generally
named within a cataloging record, but the
definitive, richer description of the person or
organization is retained in an authority record
that is maintained independently.
The DC- Agents Group has been chartered to
address issues of qualification of these three DC
elements as well as the development of a core set
of elements to support the description of agents.
DC- Guides: The User Guide Working Group
met at DC- 8 and reviewed the progress of work
since DC- 7, particularly the latest draft of
“ Using Dublin Core,” now on the DC web site
< http:// purl. org/ DC/ documents/ wd/ usageguide
- 20000716. htm>.
DC- Government: The DC- Government
Group was chartered to promote conventions
necessary to support description of government
information on the Internet. Governments in
Australia, Denmark and Finland have each
endorsed the use of DC metadata to describe
R E S E A R C H
30 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
government information resources on the web,
and there is discussion of similar action in a
number of other countries.
DC- Architecture: The DC- Architecture
Working Group deals with practical deployment
of DC metadata using mainstream web
technologies. Among the tasks of the group is
the specification of consistent methods for
linking to structured data that will support tasks
such as authority record linking ( and linking to
other structured values). This working group also
has responsibility for syntax specifications for
HTML, XML and RDF.
DC- Citation: Journal articles are important
document types to most domains, and it is
essential that common conventions be approved
for citing such objects in DC metadata. A
considerable amount of effort at DC- 8 was
invested in discussing the existing proposal from
the DC- Citation Working Group. The working
group will soon submit a revised proposal to the
DC Advisory Committee for further
consideration.
DC- Type: During its meetings at DC- 8, the
DC- Type Working Group opted for creating a new
DC sub- type list alongside the very high- level list
called DCT1 < http:// purl. org/ dc/ documents/
wd- typelist. htm> adopted as DC qualifiers. The
current proposal of such a sub- type list
< http:// lcweb. loc. gov/ marc/ dc/ subtypes-
20000928. html> needs to be cleansed of
synonyms and overlaps and to be made consistent
and coherent. It is probably not possible to
develop a really complete list covering the needs
of most DC using communities. The goal of this
effort is, however, to create a much broader basis
for interoperability by agreeing on unique naming
of frequently used common document types. It is
expected that various communities will use their
own type lists in addition to this. While a
proliferation of type lists will hamper cross-domain
interoperability to some degree, this may
be an unavoidable consequence of balancing
domain- specific requirements and cross- domain
discovery.
DC- Library: The DC- Library Working Group
was established at the 7th Dublin Core workshop
to consider library specific issues in relation to
the Dublin Core. The Dublin Core is often
portrayed as a library standard, and though it has
been strongly influenced by librarians, the
intended scope has always been broader. Thus,
the DC- Library Working Group was chartered to
explore how DCMI metadata might effectively be
used within libraries to connect libraries more
closely to other information spaces on the web.
Possible roles for DC include:
• International interchange format between
various systems
• Vehicle for harvested metadata from databases
within and outside of library systems
• Creation of simple library catalog records for
web resources within local integrated library
systems or within the OCLC CORC service
• Increase exposure of MARC data to other
communities ( through a conversion to DC)
• Enhance acquisition of data from non- library
content providers using DC
While these goals are worthwhile, there are
important impediments to the use of DC in
libraries, including the inability of most local
library systems to import DC data and the as- yet-unresolved
issue of linking to authority files.
While there are no reasons why such linking
cannot be supported, it is important to establish
consistent conventions for doing so, so that data
interchange will be facilitated.
The discussion of Application Profiles at DC- 8
raised the question of what a library application
profile might look like.
Additional elements to the 15 Dublin Core
elements and qualifiers might include:
• Audience
• Holdings
• Access and use constraints
• A list of library- specific relation qualifiers
Future work items for the DC- Library Working
Group may include developing a library
application profile in consultation with the IFLA
Working Group on Metadata and investigation of
how best to accomplish consistent linking of
authority file data to DC records.
DC- Collections: The article on Collection
Description in the September 2000 issue of D- Lib
Magazine < http:// www. dlib. org/ dlib/
september00/ powell/ 09powell. html> illustrates
the substantial interest in the description of
materials at the collection level. The creation of
collection descriptions allows the owners or
curators of collections to disclose information
about their existence and availability to interested
parties. The DC- Collections Working Group has
been chartered to address these collection- level
description ( CLD) issues.
DC- Admin: Metadata is just descriptive data
structured and managed for a specific purpose.
Managing collections of metadata requires the
R E S E A R C H
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 31
ability to identify its source and its production
and change history. The DC- Admin Working
Group is chartered to explore the issues and
implications of metadata- about- metadata and
bring forward recommendations that may be
adopted widely by the DC community. This work
builds upon a previous proposal on an
administrative core ( A- Core) by Renato Iannella
< http:// metadata. net/ ac/ draft- iannella- admin-
01. txt>. Working group objectives include a
proposal for an administrative element set by the
first half of 2001.
Conclusions
Metadata is a keystone component for a broad
spectrum of applications that are emerging in
the web to help stitch together content and
services and make them more visible to users.
The Dublin Core Metadata Initiative cannot
meet the needs of every community, every
application and every user. But this international
community has, over a period of six years and
eight workshops, brought forth a core standard
that enhances cross- disciplinary discovery and
has been translated into 25 languages to date,
and a conceptual framework that supports the
modular development of auxiliary metadata
components.
The coming year should witness improvements
in DCMI processes, the solidification of standards
activities, better documentation, and clarification
of key architectural issues that are of particular
importance to libraries, including authority
linking.
Planning has begun for DC- 9 < http://
dublincore. org/ workshops/ dc9/>, the
2001 workshop. DC- 9 will be hosted by the
National Institute for Informatics in Tokyo,
Japan < http:// www. nii. ac. jp/>. Scheduled
for Oct. 22– 26, 2001, next year’s event will be
a three- track conference:
• Working Group Track, to address problems and
support evolution of DCMI standards
• Tutorial Track, to provide formal instruction to
Dublin Core newcomers
• Conference Track, to provide an opportunity
for project demonstrations, peer- reviewed
papers, poster sessions and panel discussions
The Dublin Core has become the de facto
standard for cross- domain resource discovery
metadata on the web. As the initiative matures,
the scope and usefulness of DCMI metadata
solutions promise to serve the needs of additional
domains around the world and continue to
promote the cross- domain, international discovery
function that initially motivated the Dublin
Core.— Stuart Weibel is director, Dublin Core
Metadata Initiative, OCLC Office of Research.
• • •
R E S E A R C H
32 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
by Rick Bennett
Portals, search engines and
technology sites top the sites
most frequently referred to
on the World Wide Web,
according to the OCLC Web
Characterization Project.
The project, conducted
by the OCLC Office of
Research, found that
Microsoft was the most frequently referenced site
on the web— referenced from roughly 1 percent
of all public sites. Microsoft is referenced 10
times more often than the 50th entry on the list.
The list clearly shows the high volatility
of the web. Ten of the top 50 site links are
automatically transferred to another site,
showing a new corporate affiliation ( shown in
parentheses). Two of the links are no longer
active at all.
Most of the sites listed are some variation of an
Internet portal or search engine site. Many others
are corporate sites for computer or software
providers. The highest ranked educational site is
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology at
number 28. No government sites and only two
non- English sites made the list.
Amazon. com made the top 10 and news sites
CNN. com and USATODAY. com were included in
the top 25.
There is not much separating those near the
bottom of the list from those below number 50,
and the ranking list could change quickly.
— Rick Bennett is consulting systems analyst,
OCLC Office of Research.
• • ���
OCLC Web Characterization Project names
top 50 site references on the web
50 Most Frequently Referenced Web Sites
1) www. microsoft. com
2) www. netscape. com
3) www. geocities. com
( geocities. yahoo. com/ home/)
4) members. aol. com
5) www. yahoo. com
6) www. adobe. com
7) www. amazon. com
8) www. altavista. com
9) members. tripod. com
( www. tripod. lycos. com/)
10) www. macromedia. com
11) www. angelfire. com
12) www. cnn. com
13) www. excite. com
14) www. real. com
15) www. lycos. com
16) members. xoom. com
( www. nbci. com/)
17) www. linkexchange. com
( www. bcentral. com/ ledefault. asp)
18) home. earthlink. net
19) ourworld. compuserve. com
20) www. apple. com
21) www. webcrawler. com
22) www. webring. org
( dir. webring. yahoo. com/ rw)
23) www. TheCounter. com
24) www. usatoday. com
25) www. infoseek. com
26) www. zdnet. com
27) service. bfast. com *
28) web. mit. edu
29) www. hp. com
30) www. hotbot. com
31) www. w3. org
32) www. ibm. com
33) www. mapquest. com
34) www. sun. com
35) www. intel. com
36) www. weather. com
37) leader. linkexchange. com *
38) www. nytimes. com
39) www. webcom. com
40) member. linkexchange. com
( member. bcentral. com/)
41) www. xs4all. nl
42) maps. yahoo. com
43) www. pathfinder. com
( www. time. com)
44) www. primenet. com
( www. frontiernet. net/)
45) www. mindspring. com
( www. earthlink. net/)
46) www. pbs. org
47) home. t- online. de
48) sunsite. unc. edu ( www. ibiblio. org/)
49) www. OzEmail. com. au
50) www. Teleport. com
* Link is no longer active
• • •
U . S . L I B R A R Y S E R V I C E S
OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001 33
by Nancy London
U. S. Libraries in the
Digital Arena
Libraries are playing key
roles in the digital age, and
U. S. libraries are often
recognized as being on the
cutting edge of technology.
Many U. S. libraries and
consortia have moved beyond providing access to
electronic resources to creating those electronic
resources. Our work with each library or
consortia is unique and is focused on helping all
libraries integrate digital resources.
Today, libraries are quickly implementing
projects that allow users to take full advantage of
digital resources. One approach is with web
interfaces that: integrate all electronic resources;
help the user to find information quickly through
easy- to- use, familiar interfaces; permit cross-database
searching rather than single- resource
searching; and provide library- customized tools
such as end- user borrowing.
OCLC has two solutions that facilitate this type
of integration: OCLC SiteSearch WebZ software
and the WebExpress service.
Another approach is in the creation of content.
U. S. libraries are expanding their resources and
using their expertise to create context for the vast
array of digitized resources that generate new
types of collections. In the U. S., libraries are in
the middle of the digital resource explosion.
Smaller Libraries Joining the OCLC Family
Even in traditional services, OCLC continues to
see growth across the United States with services
like cataloging, resource sharing and electronic
reference services. Much of this growth stems
from the evolving multi- type statewide efforts as
they expand to promote library access to quality
services for all types and sizes of libraries.
There has been a rapid growth in use of OCLC
solutions among smaller libraries. The OCLC
CatExpress service has brought quality cataloging
to small and medium- sized libraries, allowing
them an opportunity to benefit directly from
WorldCat. As OCLC moves toward the creation of
new products and services, smaller libraries also
will be able to take advantage of resource
creation, archiving, sharing and more. These
smaller libraries are beginning to play a part in
the fast- changing digital arena.
The number of libraries using OCLC services
continues to increase. U. S. membership now
stands at 7,500 and has grown by 11 percent over
the last three years. The total number of U. S.
libraries using at least one OCLC service is over
27,000. Worldwide there are 17,000 libraries and
over 111 consortia using the OCLC FirstSearch
service; 98 percent of these are in the United
States.
OCLC Library Services, U. S. Division
To serve the wide variety of libraries and
consortia across the country, OCLC established
the U. S. division of Library Services in the late
1980s. Since that time, OCLC Library Services
staff have been working with regional affiliated
networks to help match OCLC services to the
needs of libraries and consortia. Our focus on
library relationship management means the
Library Services consultant or specialist provides
the network or library with a single point of
contact for the purchase of OCLC services.
As Library Services and network staff work
with libraries, we focus on discovering the issues
libraries face, understanding their current focus
and future directions, and meeting their service
needs in a timely and affordable fashion.
OCLC Library Services helps U. S. libraries
and consortia thrive
OCLC Library Services, U. S. administrative staff, back row, left to
right: Michelle Phipps, Tess Mawhinney, Angela Hermes; front
row, Terri Dawson and Sandy Burns.
U . S . L I B R A R Y S E R V I C E S
34 OCLC Newsletter January/ February 2001
Our main objective is to create the group of
services that is most appropriate. Today, this
means doing more with less, so we seek to help
libraries gain the maximum benefit from OCLC
services by helping them integrate the services to
leverage previous investments.
To facilitate effective relationship management,
the U. S. division recently moved from a two-region
( East and West) structure to a three- region
( East, Midwest and West) structure. This change
provided two benefits. First, it facilitated the
integration of Conversion Services ( Retrospective
Conversion, Retrospective Conversion Batch,
MARS Authority Control Service, TechPro and
AsiaLink) into Library Services, giving staff more
options to help libraries with a total solutions
package. Second, it results in fewer libraries
being assigned to a single person and hence
permits the individual to visit more libraries
within a network territory and contact more areas
of each library. This three- region structure is
aligned along network territories, making it
possible for OCLC and networks to further their
partnerships and enrich the relationships and
service satisfaction of U. S. libraries and consortia.
The focus is a team approach allowing us to
maximize resources and facilitate visiting as many
libraries and consortia as possible to ensure they
have the latest information regarding our services.
In addition to the regional groups, our Library
Services Support for the Americas section
provides support for the three U. S. regions. A key
empha
