Ad Hoc Serials Group

Notes of Meetings: February 16//March 9// March 23

March 23, 2007 Notes

Recap of the initial concern:

Serials holding displays in the OPAC are confusing for all levels of library users because item records for volumes have been inconsistently added to the bibliographic record. There are several sources for these unintended item records.

• Item records added on-the-fly when volumes are checked out by faculty, but not suppressed from public view or deleted upon return.
• Item records added for volumes sent to Iron Mountain storage, but not suppressed.
• Other

First priority is to find a way of suppressing existing unintended item records from public view, ensuring that no more unintended item records are added to the database, and generally “cleaning up” the records.

Beyond this immediate concern, the group, representing the broad spectrum of library services, wants to provide library users with the best and most useful serials holdings display possible.

Since David Snyder had a prior commitment, Gretchen Walsh reported that he had queried the Innovative Users Group about methods of globally suppressing the unwanted item records, but to no avail. Doreen reported on the work she and her staff (i.e., Julie) have been doing. They have been able to streamline the process somewhat, but it is still slow going.

Mimi Tang outlined the Circulation Department procedures for on-the-fly journal and monograph records, indicating that there is no ongoing problem with failure to suppress item records for journal volumes circulated. She appreciates the new template that automatically suppressed the item record. Although the template also suppresses item records for on-the-fly monographs, these represent a very small number of items circulated. When such a monograph is returned, it is sent to the Catalog Department to be formally cataloged and entered into the OPAC.

Since we have explored all means of streamlining the process of suppressing unwanted item records, and procedures are in place to ensure that no more item records are added to the system, we agreed that the Catalog Maintenance unit will simply proceed with the list that had been created earlier. Public service staff can refer any journal that should have priority handling (e.g., a heavily used journal) to Doreen for immediate action. Additionally, any journal that does not have the dummy item records necessary to display properly should be referred to Doreen.

Having wrapped up that first concern, we turned our attention to discussion of what constitutes an ideal serials display.

Brian had prepared several sample records to demonstrate how records would appear if we have separate check-in records for Storage and Stacks, and what sorts of problems could arise.

Law and Society Review is an example of a fairly straightforward journal display. Everyone like the clarity of the two check-in records.

With Educational and Psychological Measurement, the information to be displayed was made more complicated by the addition of microform holdings. It still was admirably clear. A change of order of the records – so that the Storage record directly followed the Mugar record – was suggested.

Statesman’s Year Book had more locations, and thus was more complicated. Again, changing the order of the records seemed to provide greater clarity:

• Mugar Reference (when a title is Reference)
• Mugar Stacks
• Storage
• [UNLESS another library has the primary holdings, e.g., a title mainly held in SEL, but with some holdings in Mugar. In that case, the primary library (reference, then stacks, then storage) will go first.]
• Other libraries
• Microforms

There was considerable discussion about what elements of information (in particular if an item is circulating or library use only) should go where. This was not fully resolved and needs more thought.

Commentary provided the knottiest example of the batch. The holdings are spotty (this was a gift), and the record for storage was correspondingly complex. Discussion of how best to alert library users of such gaps were discussed in detail. Exact holdings – and the format of holdings statements – are also issues for interlibrary loan, particularly with the use of Rapid. The Rapid system looks for years, not volume numbers. There may be changes in requirements for holdings statement format with some BLC initiatives.

It was decided that we would begin the conversion to separate check-in records (and therefore holdings statements) for journals in storage, as well as other location, e.g., Mugar, Pardee, etc. For reference items with some years in Ref, earlier in stacks, there will also be a separate check-in record for reference.

Brian will start the process by adding these records for journals that come to him in the regular course of events, and will work out the most effective procedures. As with suppressing the unwanted item records, all the work essentially will funnel to one person, who also has other duties. As the project proceeds, other alternatives of staffing and workflow will be explored. Public service and other staff who notice particularly troublesome journal records can refer them to Brian for review. SEL had opted in the past for a different display of storage status, but Heidi felt that SEL staff would prefer the new option.

Ideas for changes in the format of the “Library has” statement that would make it stand out more for users will be referred to the reconstituted WebPAC committee. The particulars of these suggestions still need thought and discussion.

Tom will convene a meeting for all public service staff to present the new plan and ask for input. The Ad Hoc Serials Display group will meet again on April 27 for an update on the item record display suppression and addition of storage check-in records. At that time additional issues of serials display, such as the addition of public display of item records for complete holdings, will be explored.

March 9, 2007 Notes

Reports on Action Items from Feb. 16 Meeting:

1. Expedited suppression of unintended item records:

Doreen and David reported that they had attempted numerous ways of constructing parameters for a list that could be globally updated without causing unpredictable negative results. Although the rest of the group had little experience with constructing algorithms for lists, they suggested some possibilities. One that may have some merit is to pull out smaller batches from the large list that David had created earlier. They will continue thinking about the problem. Since these rogue item records are now understood to be higher priority than had earlier been the case, Catalog Maintenance staff (mainly Julie) will devote more time to the project. There is no quick fix that doesn’t threaten more harm than benefit.

2. Revised Template for Circulation on-the-flies

David has modified the circulation template for on-the-fly records so that item records added to an existing bib record are automatically suppressed. This should prevent unwanted item records entering the public display. This has affected monograph on-the-flies as well. A number of questions were raised about the entire workflow – policies, procedures and training at every point. We will need to meet with Circulation staff to get a better understanding of this process.

3. Adding barcode and suppressed item record for serial volumes handled for any reason.

Tom had suggested this measure to prepare for future consideration of having full display of item records for every volume of a serial. Brian is looking into the mechanics of following through on this suggestion.

We discussed what the ideal serials display should look like. Suggestions included:

• A more prominent “library has” statement – using bold font or other style changes.
• A separate check-in record for volumes in storage at Iron Mountain.
• Consistent and clear “status” statements. “Available” and “Library use only” don’t seem to be consistently applied, causing confusion.
• Holdings statements in Mugar’s catalog are not in MARC format. There are various opinions about this. Rhoda pointed out that RAPID (the ILL system in use by BLC) looks for holdings in MARC format, but that the display is not as clear as the holdings notes we use. Gretchen lamented the somewhat chaotic “lacks” notes for some titles [many of which are in the African studies collection].

With an approximate vision of the “ideal display”, we turned out attention to the work involved and who would do it. As with so many things, a straightforward-sounding idea in reality involves a lot of steps – for a large number of records – with few on the staff able to do it reliably.

With this in mind, we set the following action items:

1. Confer with Circulation staff about workflow
2. Continue to work on suppressing unwanted item records, and to look for ways of doing them with rapid update
3. Brian will make a demonstration file of serials records with separate check-in records for storage (Iron Mountain) locations. We will see if the display delivers the clarity we seek, and how onerous the work will be.
4. We will look for other library catalog displays that we consider good examples. (These should be Innovative sites)

Next meeting will be Friday, March 23. 10 a.m. Library Admin. Conference Room. All interested parties are welcome. Gretchen will ask Circ. staff to attend.

Friday, February 16, 2007, 10am

Thanks for a lively and very productive meeting!

Serials Display and other issues
(Strategic Plan Strategy #25: Select processes and operations to improve)

Friday February 16, 2007 an ad hoc group met to come to grips with the multiple issues involved in the display of journals in the WebPAC, in particular the misleading, confusing, and largely inaccurate item records visible in the public display. See, for example, Historical Archaeology, E11 .S625. The group included: Rhoda Bilansky, Tom Casserly, Brian diScenza, Archie Elliott, Tim Lewontin, Heidi Lyons, Holly Mockovak, Doreen Paci, Loumona Petroff, Linda Plunket, John Sitkin, Gretchen Walsh.

We needed to first come to an agreement on where we wanted to get, and then to determine how we could get there. There was general agreement that the current display of many journal titles was confusing. There was disagreement as to whether it would be better to have a clear "Library Has" statement that was made more striking (at present, the researcher's eye tends to be drawn to the table of item records), or if ALL volumes of serials holdings should be represented by publicly displayed item records. After some discussion (at times loud and raucous, but always civil) it was decided that there was merit in displaying all volumes with item records, but that the work involved was too great to be accomplished in a timely manner. We concentrated on ways to improve the workflow in dealing with the list of 10,000 journal titles that needed editing to suppress all item records except for the one "dummy record" needed for researchers to be able to limit by location and search by call number. We also needed to deal with the problem that some publicly displayed item records are still being created when journal volumes circulate.

Journal volumes in storage also need item records, and the public display of location information needs to be examined carefully. A recent change in procedure will improve the display for serials where the entire run is in storage, eliminating ambiguity. Other important issues were tabled for future discussion and action.

The meeting concluded with three immediate action items:

1. David Snyder will modify the circulation template so that item records created for circulated volumes will automatically be suppressed. This will help eliminate the problem if the correct template is selected by the Circulation staff member checking out the volume.

2. Doreen will work with her staff to expedite suppression of item records. Julie has already done 1500 of the original list of 10,000 titles. It may be faster to work in batches using rapid updating to suppress all item records, then go in and unsuppress the necessary dummy item record. Doreen will also review the 1500 titles already done to add a dummy item record for volumes in storage.

3.At Tom's suggestion, all journal volumes handled for any reason (review, binding, etc.) will be given a bar code and suppressed item record. This will simplify any future changes in display options. Procedures for accomplishing this still need to be developed.

We left several important issues for discussion and action at a future meeting:

1. Inclusion of Circulation staff in the discussion, particularly in terms of procedures for choosing templates for circulation of journal volumes, but also for their view on all the issues.

2. Review of all the issues surrounding the display of Storage location, in particular the special problem of those with call numbers in the "A" range. We hope that once the more general item record display problems are solved that we can see more clearly how to make storage location easier for students and other users to understand.

3. Discussion and implementation of the "request from storage" function provided by Innovative.

[G. Walsh's after-the-meeting addition: we have to have a serious discussion at many levels of what we - and the University - should expect students to be able to do, including reading and understanding a "Library Has" statement if we make it clear.]

Next meeting: Friday, March 9. 10 a.m. in the Lib. Admin. Conference room.

notes prepared by Gretchen Walsh

Suggestion from Linda Plunket:

One slight correction-- in the longest paragraph in the summary I would suggest changing:
"for the one "dummy record" needed for researchers to be" to:
"for the one or more "dummy records" needed for researchers to be"