Thursday, June 23, 2011

Revised KZ Classification for International criminal law and the International Criminal Court

In anticipation of the annual meeting of the American Library Association, the Library of Congress has issued a report on its recent activities. Of particular interest to law catalogers is the section on page seven, "KZ Classification for International criminal law and the International Criminal Court." The report documents the implementation of a new section of the KZ classification schedule, KZ7000-KZ7500, international criminal law. According to LC's report, "[t]he new classes in this schedule closely follow the principles and doctrines of international criminal law, which were worked out over the last decades by scholars, political scientists, and international organizations." Outdated ranges in KZ for International criminal courts and procedure, KZ6304-KZ6332, have been closed and new subject headings have been established, while existing subject headings have been revised. The numbers in class K for those subjects that are governed by international criminal law have been closed or revised, and references have been provided to direct users of the schedules to the new numbers in KZ. The affected K classes are: K5256 (Terrorism); K5258 (Human trafficking); K5277 (Piracy at sea); and K5301-5304.5 (Crimes against humanity. War crimes). More complete information is available in the report itself at: http://connect.ala.org/files/2515/2011_06_library_of_congress_report_pdf_13745.pdf.

Friday, June 17, 2011

ALCTS e-forum: Serials, Staffing, and Workflow Day 2 Summary

Here is the June 16 summary of the two-day forum from Jennifer Sippel:

Day 2 re-cap:

Knowledge bases + OPAC
* This topic generated more questions than answers
-- How can we more fully utilize the OPAC?
-- How can we get vendors to make the product meet our needs?
-- How can we reduce duplication of efforts and get all systems to jive with one another?
* Several mentioned how nice it would be if the ILS spoke nicely with the ERM.
* Georgie Donovan suggested, "Consolidating with one vendor seems to be one of the best ways y’all have mentioned to reduce the number of knowledge bases."
* Kristin Martin asks, "One of the things that I've thought about since we started experimenting with WorldCat Local and from examining other discovery tools, is what exactly should be in the OPAC? Should we be placing all of these records into our OPAC, with every library separately maintaining records for electronic objects that are in fact stored in a central place (after all, we all point to our Elsevier journals on the same platform), or should we be working on ways to search our physical holdings in our catalog with other content, as the discovery tools are doing?... We are sort stuck in an in between place right now, where we are still trying to figure out how best to leverage our resources."
* This topic led to a side discussion regarding the user’s confusion around what is going on when linking between OPAC & A-Z list managed by ERM systems. Screen shots and accompanying advice was shared.

Print journal usage stats
* One of the most popular topics of the day!
* Scanning barcodes during re-shelving (barcode binder method) was mentioned a few times
* Making tick marks when re-shelving
* Access database to keep track of ticks
* trend was to track titles, not individual volume/issue
* One mention of including routed titles in total usage stats
* Roger Davis mentioned his open source tracking system,http://serialcount.kent.edu/, which he’s happy to share.

Tracking communications/e-resource access issues
* Not a lot was said about this one; seems as if there is still some uncertainty about how to do this?
* Repeat mention of forming an e-resources team and coordinating communication between that team
* Several mentions of having a "report problem link" buttons on various interfaces that send messages to spreadsheets or documents
* One mention of SysAid to report/route problems

Documenting & assessing workflows
* Word documents & other types of manuals outlining tasks, including screen shots!
* have a back-up person trained in case main person is out (or leaves?)
* captivate videos for training
* be pro-active in order to anticipate potential problems
* Georgie Donovan shared e-resource workflow document and is coordinating an interest group around sharing of such documents/resources in some type of informal repository

ONE word of advice
* "Not claiming and then tracking the claim status!!!" --Saundra L. Ross
* "A modified (significantly reduced) print check-in processes, including ceased claiming."--Jennifer Sippel
* "Print serials have gotten easier because we have so few of them now, and we stopped claiming."--Julie Moore
* "About the only positive impact on staff is that if your staff were overqualified for print serials workflows, you now have something challenging to throw at them....I think the job prospects in this field are far better than for subject selectors and reference and instruction librarians."--Mark Hemhauser
* "You have to be willing to embrace an ever-changing environment and accept chaos (at least in the digital world)!"--Becky Torrey
* "I think the e-resources work has led to more interesting, more techy jobs in the “tech services” area of the library and gives a better impression of tech services work…." --Georgie Donovan

Impact of e-Books on serials workflow
* Christine Stachowicz did a nice job of summarizing for me: "We split the handling of e-books pretty much the same way – what acts like a monograph or is purchased like one goes through our Monographic Services Dept, while what acts like a serial (essentially, resources that involve ongoing payments) are handled by E-Resources & Serials Management."
* Susan Davis said, "I think the folks handling e-books have a greater appreciation for the struggles the e-serials folks have had all these years. In other words, "welcome to my nightmare" :-)"

And, because I couldn’t summarize it for him, Mark offered his own summary for Day 1 :)
* Mark Hemhauser’s response to claiming e-journals: "We get a report of all of our subscriptions that include an electronic component from our ILS. Then manually check each title (over a period of a few months) to see if the title has been cut off, and to find and resolve discrepancies between our holdings and our actual access. Similar to the SEESAU approach, but with less sophisticated programming and back-end configuration."

ALCTS e-forum: Serials, Staffing, and Workflow Day 1 Summary

ALCTS is hosting a free e-forum discussion on serials staffing and workflow. Here is the description:

While working with serials has always required a tolerance for change and ambiguity, the transition from print to electronic subscriptions has introduced workflow and staffing issues that demand flexibility. In this e-forum, we will explore how libraries of different sizes and varying Technical Services configurations have adapted their workflows and staffing in response to format changes, budget cuts and other pressures affecting the serials life cycle.

Below is a summary of discussions occured on June 15, compiled by Jennifer Sippel at the Minneapolis Community and Technical College:

"Here's a quick re-cap of Day 1:

Staffing: Training & Hiring
• Libraries are reorganizing staffing to accommodate demands of acquiring, processing and maintaining access to electronic resources. They do this in a variety of ways, including: re-training existing staff, using retirements as opportunities to write new job descriptions or create new positions, re-organizing departments, or a combination of all.
• There is still some confusion around who is doing what, and the silos are, for the most part, coming down with respect to managing serials in a mostly electronic frontier.
• Tina Kussey mentioned her e-resources team is responsible for communicating with each other via an internal listserv and collectively problem solving access issues together.
• I think Lori Snyder summed it up quite well when she said, “E-Resource management is definitely a web between several departments and we have found it difficult to draw clear cut lines about who should do which activity.”

Format: electronic vs. print
• Some libraries have created "electronic format preferred" policies; others are selecting electronic over print but have no formal policy; the main exception to this preference is popular reading magazines and/or periodicals with heavy graphics/images that do not translate well (or at all) online.
• While libraries may be purchasing more electronic resources, some are still devoting more staff time to print resources. But that is changing. Buddy Pennington notes, "we have far more staff devoted to print subscriptions than electronic. But that is changing even as I email this. This very morning, two staff persons in Technical Services were being trained on electronic resources support.”
• Jason C. Simon mentioned that weeding print is the current trend when access is available electronically, but there are issues with doing so associated with access vs. ownership (publishers changing access policies, pulling content from aggregated databases, perpetual access as afforded by license agreements, etc.) and suggested supporting Open Access initiatives.

Checking in & claiming (print & electronic)
• Many mentioned they are still checking in print; a few are not; and some are checking in selected print but not all, or are checking in on a limited basis.
• Many mentions of systematically claiming print, but on a more selective basis than in the past.
• With the exception of 1 or 2, most mentioned they are still trying to figure out how to claim e-journals.
• Okay, I’m not even sure how to summarize Mark Hemhauser’s response to this topic, so here is the full-text version of how he is claiming e-journals: “We get a report of all of our subscriptions that include an electronic component from our ILS (Aleph, yuck!), then look them up in SFX, compare what our SFX local threshold says to what is actually available. We are looking to see if the title has been cut off, and to resolve discrepancies between what we thought we had and what we are currently getting access to. Sometimes we also compare our orders to what Ebsco has for us and what they say is available online for us, to what we've got in SFX. Imperfect method but we mash all three datasets together by issn in MS Access and then compare the "holdings" or "thresholds" and the order type--online, print + online. This doesn't work when the issns do not match.” [Mark posted an even more detailed follow-up about how this works in a separate email]

Checking access to E-journals
• Some mention of having individuals systematically checking to determine if access to electronic resources is working.
• I am aware there are products that can be purchased for checking broken links, but that doesn’t actually ensure access to content, so...Unless I missed it, there was no magic solution to this problem mentioned.
ERMs, etc.
• Sounds like some of serials workflow is dependent upon the technologies employed (ILS, Link Resolvers, ERMs, etc.), so there was some brief discussion about who is using what. Some mentions of specific issues related to certain products.
Randomly selected tip of the day
• from Jan Cox: "We have replaced our web page alphabetic journal title list with EBSCO’s A-to-Z product and added the A-to-Z link to our ILS bib record. These actions have minimized/eliminated the need to update URL information when there is a platform change, etc. (time saver)"



If you are interested in signing up for the ALCTS e-forum, here is information on ALA's webpage:

An ALCTS e-forum provides an opportunity for librarians to discuss matters of interest, led by a moderator, through the e-forum discussion list. The e-forum discussion list works like an email listserv: register your email address with the list, and then you will receive messages and communicate with other participants through an email discussion. Most e-forums last two days. Registration is necessary to participate, but it's free. See a list of upcoming e-forums at: http://bit.ly/upcomingeforum.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

WorldCat Local adds access to more databases, collections and publishers

WorldCat Local, the OCLC discovery service that offers users integrated access to more than 800 million items in libraries around the world, has added more databases and collections from leading publishers and other information providers to make content more accessible to library users through the Web.

WorldCat Local offers access to books, journals and databases from a variety of international publishers and information providers; the digital collections of groups like HathiTrust, OAIster and Google Books; open access materials; and the collective resources of libraries worldwide through WorldCat.

This month, OCLC added databases and collections to the WorldCat Local central index, including LexisNexis Collection 2, LexisNexis Collection 3 and LexisNexis Collection 4, from Cassidy Cataloguing.
OCLC also added remote access to databases and collections to WorldCat Local from LegalTrac, a comprehensive http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifcollection of major legal publications from Gale. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

With these latest additions, libraries using WorldCat Local can now offer users access to 1,400 databases and collections, and more than 500 million articles. OCLC continues to negotiate access to critical library content on behalf of the cooperative to ensure access to libraries’ most popular resources. To view a full list of 1,400 databases and collections available through WorldCat Local, visit the website at http://www.oclc.org/worldcatlocal/overview/content/dblist/default.htm

For more information, visit this OCLC press release: http://www.oclc.org/news/releases/2011/201127.htm

EBSCO Publishing and The H.W. Wilson Company merger

EBSCO Publishing (EBSCO) and The H.W. Wilson Company (Wilson) have merged in what is being viewed by the companies as an ideal match. This combination of organizations will allow the strengths of each to benefit existing and forthcoming products and services. Libraries using products from either company will benefit as improvements are made to the respective resources. Wilson database products are known for their quality indexing. The Wilson controlled vocabularies will be integrated into EBSCO's controlled vocabularies, resulting in improved subject indexing for EBSCO databases. The EBSCOhost platform will be enhanced to take advantage of this indexing in its search and relevancy ranking algorithms.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

All Wilson indexing, abstracts and full text will be fully searchable via EBSCO Discovery Service for subscribers of Wilson databases. The addition of Wilson's abstract/index records and unique full text will strengthen EBSCO Discovery Service. Wilson databases will be loaded onto EBSCOhost over the coming months. EBSCO will continue to maintain WilsonWeb until such time that all Wilson databases are available on EBSCOhost and customers have been transitioned to EBSCOhost.

For more information, check out the EBSCO press release at http://www.prweb.com/releases/EBSCOHWWilson/Merger/prweb8516676.htm

Friday, June 3, 2011

LC to implement law genre/form terms

From PCClist

In November 2010 the Policy and Standards Division (PSD) approved approximately 80 genre/form terms for law.  This marked the culmination of a successful partnership between PSD and the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL), whose members developed a thesaurus of law genre/form terms and presented it to PSD for inclusion in Library of Congress Genre/Form Terms for Library and Archival Materials (LCGFT).

On June 15, 2011 the Library of Congress will begin to apply law genre/form terms to new cataloging, chiefly for English-language works.  LCGFT terms for law that appear on copy cataloging will be retained and/or revised as necessary, in accordance with LC’s standard copy cataloging procedures.

Questions or comments may be sent to Janis L. Young, LC’s genre/form coordinator, at jayo AT loc.gov.



Janis L. Young
Policy and Standards Division
Library of Congress

MARC 21 Update 12 now available for printing

In 2008, updates of both the full and concise MARC 21 Formats were made available online and the principle was established that the online is the version of record for the formats and the print a byproduct that is produced after the online version. Taking this into consideration, along with the decreasing demand for print, the Network Development and MARC Standards Office has decided to no longer print and sell updates to the full versions of the MARC 21 Bibliographic, Authority, Holdings, Classification, and Community Information Formats. Instead, NDMSO has developed a stylesheet that removes characteristics of an online page when it is printed -- such as breadcrumbs, extraneous links and text -- so that it resembles the print version formerly sold by CDS. -- Catalogablog

Links to all MARC 21 Update 12 for all formats for viewing and printing, to keep your versions of MARC 21 current, available at the ever helpful Catalogablog

ALCTS e-Forum: Serials, Staffing, and Workflow

ALCTS has announced a free e-forum discussion. Information below.

Serials, Staffing, and Workflow
June 15-16, 2011
Hosted by Jennifer Sippel and Christine Stachowicz
Please join us for an e-forum discussion. It’s free and open to everyone!
Registration information is at the end of the message.
Each day, sessions begin and end at:
Pacific: 6am – 2pm
Mountain: 7am – 3pm
Central: 8am – 4pm
Eastern: 9am – 5pm
Description
While working with serials has always required a tolerance for change and ambiguity, the transition from print to electronic subscriptions has introduced workflow and staffing issues that demand flexibility.  In this e-forum, we will explore how libraries of different sizes and varying Technical Services configurations have adapted their workflows and staffing in response to format changes, budget cuts and other pressures affecting the serials life cycle. 
We will address topics such as:
  • Changes in staffing needs as subscriptions shift from print to electronic
  • Modifications to print subscription workflows and the development of workflows for electronic subscriptions, including the process by which those workflows are being assessed and documented
  • How serials cataloging workflows have been impacted, particularly given the availability of vendor records for e-journals
  • Whether off-site storage of journals has impacted binding or other Technical Services workflows
  • The challenges of managing electronic subscriptions, including tracking correspondence related to license negotiation and access issues
  • Training and realigning staff to new responsibilities across the serials spectrum
Jennifer Sippel has been a faculty Librarian and Instructor at Minneapolis Community & Technical College (MCTC) Library since 2007, and has overseen the library’s serials collection since 2009. In addition to teaching the Information Studies department’s two-credit Information Literacy course (INFS 1000) and the introductory course (LIBT 1100) in the fully online Library Information Technology program, she is currently working in collaboration with her colleagues on implementing an open source Electronic Resources Management system, PALSconnect: http://www.mnpals.org/content/efficient-e-resource-management-0. This summer, she is teaching a course on Serials Management for the recently ALA-accredited MLIS program at the University of St. Catherine (her alma mater), and is presenting a poster session on the topic of “Print Periodicals Processing” at her first NASIG conference in St. Louis.  A graduate of the 2009 MLA Institute for Leadership Excellence (MILE: http://mnlibraryassociation.org/mile-2009/), she has been an active member of the MILE 2011 planning committee and regularly presents regionally on topics ranging from Assessment to Zines.
Christine Stachowicz is Head of E-Resources & Serials Management (ESM) at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  ESM is one of three departments established in conjunction with the June 2008 reorganization of the Acquisitions Department and the Catalog Department, in which Christine had previously served as Serials Access Librarian and Catalog Management Librarian.  ESM is responsible for acquiring, cataloging and managing access to electronic resources and serials in all formats.  The department continues to evolve in response to subscription cancellations and format shifts, changes in binding policies, and growth in the acquisition of e-resources and vendor MARC records.  Between earning her MSLS degree at UNC-Chapel Hill’s School of Information and Library Science and returning to work at the University Library, Christine served as Reference Librarian/Head of Collection Access at Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, VA.
*What is an e-forum?*
An ALCTS e-forum provides an opportunity for librarians to discuss matters of interest, led by a moderator, through the e-forum discussion list. The e-forum discussion list works like an email listserv: register your email address with the list, and then you will receive messages and communicate with other participants through an email discussion. Most e-forums last two days. Registration is necessary to participate, but it's free. See a list of upcoming e-forums at: http://bit.ly/upcomingeforum.
*To register:*
Instructions for registration are available at: http://bit.ly/eforuminfo. Once you have registered for one e-forum, you do not need to register again, unless you choose to leave the email list. Participation is free and open to anyone.