Finally, as promised, a discussion on re-classification!
We all know that classification schemes need to change on a fairly regular basis in order to keep up with our ever-expanding knowledge, and remain a relevant way of organising the world's knowledge. Whether or not your library wants to keep up with these changes is, of course, a decision for each individual library service. There are a number of strategies that can be used to make the decision whether or not to re-classify and there are lots of different ways of going about it. Some of these issues are discussed in this paper.
Monday, 28 February 2011
Wednesday, 23 February 2011
Cataloguer or systems librarian?
I started my professional career as a cataloguer in a public library, supervising a team of library assistants on a programme of retrospective conversion - converting card records to computerised records. After a relatively brief foray into the world of special librarianship (which included helping the IT staff to design and build an automated library system), I took up a position as lending services manager in a busy academic library.
This being the early days of automated circulation, and before the days of the OPAC, the lending librarian was the closest thing we had to a systems librarian, so I was responsible, amongst other things, for loading mag tapes onto the Data General mainframe computer on a daily basis to back-up the issue transactions. Then, an OPAC was introduced and I found myself sharing the responisbility for the mainframe with the Chief Cataloguer.
Eventually, a full-time systems librarian was appointed, with responsiblity for the new computer labs we were introducing as well as for the library management system. I went off on maternity leave and came back as the Chief Cataloguer.
I suppose the point I'm getting to is that although I am a cataloguer, I became one such when automation was just taking off, and my relationship with the computers that have changed our lives so much was cemented by being in a position to look after a mainframe. I may have been daunted at first, but I've never been afraid of technology. I also recognise that times change and I must move with them or be left behind.
The systems librarian eventually pinched one of the cataloguers to be an IT type person, who to this day has responsibility for the library website, as well as looking after the libraray management system and helping to develop the library's discovery systems.
Without my background experience, it would have been easy for me to fill a traditional cataloguing role, slavishly following rules, hiding away from the library users and being the butt of subject librarians' jokes. As a cataloguer it is all too easy to forget that actually you are a very valuable asset to your library, that actually you have well-honed problem-solving skills, and you could well be unwittingly limiting your options.
Time to look up from your AACR, your Dewey, and your LMS and see what is going on around you. If you leave it too long, you will miss those exciting opportunities that are there for the grabbing.
Prompted by a couple of blogs:
What's the point?
High visibility cataloguing
This being the early days of automated circulation, and before the days of the OPAC, the lending librarian was the closest thing we had to a systems librarian, so I was responsible, amongst other things, for loading mag tapes onto the Data General mainframe computer on a daily basis to back-up the issue transactions. Then, an OPAC was introduced and I found myself sharing the responisbility for the mainframe with the Chief Cataloguer.
Eventually, a full-time systems librarian was appointed, with responsiblity for the new computer labs we were introducing as well as for the library management system. I went off on maternity leave and came back as the Chief Cataloguer.
I suppose the point I'm getting to is that although I am a cataloguer, I became one such when automation was just taking off, and my relationship with the computers that have changed our lives so much was cemented by being in a position to look after a mainframe. I may have been daunted at first, but I've never been afraid of technology. I also recognise that times change and I must move with them or be left behind.
The systems librarian eventually pinched one of the cataloguers to be an IT type person, who to this day has responsibility for the library website, as well as looking after the libraray management system and helping to develop the library's discovery systems.
Without my background experience, it would have been easy for me to fill a traditional cataloguing role, slavishly following rules, hiding away from the library users and being the butt of subject librarians' jokes. As a cataloguer it is all too easy to forget that actually you are a very valuable asset to your library, that actually you have well-honed problem-solving skills, and you could well be unwittingly limiting your options.
Time to look up from your AACR, your Dewey, and your LMS and see what is going on around you. If you leave it too long, you will miss those exciting opportunities that are there for the grabbing.
Prompted by a couple of blogs:
What's the point?
High visibility cataloguing
Coming soon!
Been rather busy lately with things other than cataloguing, and on leave this week to boot!
Check back soon for an article on re-classification!
Check back soon for an article on re-classification!
Monday, 31 January 2011
Cataloguing backlogs!
As promised, a discussion on cataloguing backlogs - and what cataloguing department can say they haven't got one, or they've never had one?!
And, what's in a name? What is a "backlog"? Does it change its spots if it's called a "throughput", or a "work in progress"?
What is definite is that if you have one you're sure to know about it, and if you don't acknowledge it, public services / reader services staff will be sure to let you know! The other certainty is that if you don't take positive action, your backlog will never diminsh! If you want some courage to grab the bull by the horns, give this true life story a read!
Hoping this helps you and your backlog!
And, what's in a name? What is a "backlog"? Does it change its spots if it's called a "throughput", or a "work in progress"?
What is definite is that if you have one you're sure to know about it, and if you don't acknowledge it, public services / reader services staff will be sure to let you know! The other certainty is that if you don't take positive action, your backlog will never diminsh! If you want some courage to grab the bull by the horns, give this true life story a read!
Hoping this helps you and your backlog!
Friday, 28 January 2011
Yes, we use coloured slips of paper!
Below is an explanation of our use of coloured slips!
Check back on Monday for discussion of "backlogs"!
In our cataloguing processes we are guilty of using coloured "progress" slips in each of our incoming new titles! Numerous reasons, but whether or not they're justified, I'm not sure!
Each month's incoming stock is allocated a different coloured slip. These are produced from a word processed template and literally take seconds to print out and guillotine (3 slips per A4 page). At the point of receipt, each title is given a slip. Each slip includes space for ISBN, date of receipt, date of cat/class, date of input, date of processing, date of tagging, and date of departure from the office.
Here's the main reasons for using slips:
Easy retrieval
- If there is a backlog, it is easier to find requested items if you know what coloured slip you are looking for, and can then pin down the item through its receipt date - which is always at the very top of the slip
- The exact stage in the process an item has reached can be easily identified
- Because the team is quite large, the receipt/cat/class/processing is split up into its component part. So, the cataloguer (who deals only with bib records and doesn't input local information into the LMS) uses the slip to list possible classification numbers and to record their final choice of number so the library assistants know what number and filing suffix to put into the libaray management system
- At the checking stage before the items are dispatched to the library a visual check of the slip can identify any processes that may have been missed
- Any problems identified in the last check are noted on the back of the slip and an analysis made, so that problems can be nipped in the bud before they become regular errors
Wednesday, 26 January 2011
Day in the life of a librarian - 6
Day in the life of a librarian – 6
Wednesday 26 January 2011
Car parking space got – not in main car park but better than the long walk!
Immediate discussions on processing of donations going into special collections. Emails checked and answered, but still awaiting some replies. Twitter checked – yet another new follower!
Just checking out some detail for a meeting in early Feb. Agenda now arrived so can book train tickets. Also reading up the notes for our discovery system so I can ask some sensible questions when the supplier comes to visit later today.
More discussions on staffing for vacancies and organising our special collections area.
Off to a meeting to discuss resource discovery – could be gone a while!
Very good meeting, lots of questions and surprisingly quite a few answers! Need to keep an eye on the staff and the workflow – can’t have people stressing out about stuff.
Off for a lunchtime walk.
Sad to read whilst out at lunchtime, about the closure of local museums
Final ADR signed off, and copied for the staff files. More leave cards signed! Staff development session for a member of the team agreed and signed. Highlighted a email from UKBIBS about ISNI to read later whilst on the enquiry desk. Of course, Murphy’s law says that I will be inundated with enquiries and there will be no time to catch up on reading!
Brief foray (well, 45 minutes – I don’t know of that’s brief or not really) into the library to do some safety sampling. Thrown up some interesting things to report back to our safety co-ordinator.
Just making a cup of tea before going upstairs to do 2 hours on the enquiry desk.
Seems fairly quiet up here. Yup, just one or two enquiries, nothing too taxing. Writing up the notes from the safety sampling. Taken 45 minutes (is that just a coincidence?) Oops, can’t save it, need my USB! A quick run downstairs for my pink heart-shaped USB. Document now saved and emailed to the safety co-ordinator – and to my boss just in case he wonders what I’ve been up to!
Tricky enquiry heading this way! Oh goody, evening desk person has just arrived, so he can have this one!
Off for tea now.
Refreshed and raring to go again! Lots more updating of the cataloguers’ wiki and email to boss about making use of stuff learned at the various mashlibs there have been!
Now contemplating the merger of two of our faculties. Hoping that hole left by our senior assistant librarian (acquisitions) will be filled quickly so I don’t have to think too much about fund codes and budget allocations!
Now wondering if you can add hyperlinks to words in an email message like you can with blogs and wikis – off to have a look!
Ah ha, it seems you can, although it’s not quite so simple. Anyway, that does mean I can now stop adding all these long blue lines, and make real text into hyperlinks instead! Odd why I never seem to receive any in this format …
Final thought for the day: Am I really a cataloguer since I seem to have done no cataloguing whatsoever so far this year!
Wednesday 26 January 2011
Car parking space got – not in main car park but better than the long walk!
Immediate discussions on processing of donations going into special collections. Emails checked and answered, but still awaiting some replies. Twitter checked – yet another new follower!
Just checking out some detail for a meeting in early Feb. Agenda now arrived so can book train tickets. Also reading up the notes for our discovery system so I can ask some sensible questions when the supplier comes to visit later today.
More discussions on staffing for vacancies and organising our special collections area.
Off to a meeting to discuss resource discovery – could be gone a while!
Very good meeting, lots of questions and surprisingly quite a few answers! Need to keep an eye on the staff and the workflow – can’t have people stressing out about stuff.
Off for a lunchtime walk.
Sad to read whilst out at lunchtime, about the closure of local museums
Final ADR signed off, and copied for the staff files. More leave cards signed! Staff development session for a member of the team agreed and signed. Highlighted a email from UKBIBS about ISNI to read later whilst on the enquiry desk. Of course, Murphy’s law says that I will be inundated with enquiries and there will be no time to catch up on reading!
Brief foray (well, 45 minutes – I don’t know of that’s brief or not really) into the library to do some safety sampling. Thrown up some interesting things to report back to our safety co-ordinator.
Just making a cup of tea before going upstairs to do 2 hours on the enquiry desk.
Seems fairly quiet up here. Yup, just one or two enquiries, nothing too taxing. Writing up the notes from the safety sampling. Taken 45 minutes (is that just a coincidence?) Oops, can’t save it, need my USB! A quick run downstairs for my pink heart-shaped USB. Document now saved and emailed to the safety co-ordinator – and to my boss just in case he wonders what I’ve been up to!
Tricky enquiry heading this way! Oh goody, evening desk person has just arrived, so he can have this one!
Off for tea now.
Refreshed and raring to go again! Lots more updating of the cataloguers’ wiki and email to boss about making use of stuff learned at the various mashlibs there have been!
Now contemplating the merger of two of our faculties. Hoping that hole left by our senior assistant librarian (acquisitions) will be filled quickly so I don’t have to think too much about fund codes and budget allocations!
Now wondering if you can add hyperlinks to words in an email message like you can with blogs and wikis – off to have a look!
Ah ha, it seems you can, although it’s not quite so simple. Anyway, that does mean I can now stop adding all these long blue lines, and make real text into hyperlinks instead! Odd why I never seem to receive any in this format …
Final thought for the day: Am I really a cataloguer since I seem to have done no cataloguing whatsoever so far this year!
Tuesday, 25 January 2011
Day in the life of a librarian - 6
Week in the life of a librarian – 6
Tuesday 25 January 2010
Didn’t bother trying to park in the uni car park, so went straight to the nearest street. Thrilled to get into work on time (9.30) – well actually, a few minutes early.
Am Duty Manager on a Tuesday morning so managed to pick up the pager early from the person who has it until I get here! Have a meeting 10.30-12 so hope it doesn’t go off!
Brief discussion with boss about invoice payments. Double-checked that I really had completed all my ADRs – which I have, so I can stop worrying about it. Rather nice, reassuring email arrived from on high to say I was not on their hit-list for being tardy with ADRs.
Email in-box checked for overnight messages – mostly from peanut butter to say the librarian’s day 6 wiki had changed! There were one or two real ones that required action though.
Just checking Twitter now, before meeting at 10.30. Ah, Laurel Tarulli has just reminded me about Yammer; although I found it rather useful when it first came out, I find I rarely use it these days. Made one or two unrelated to #libday6 tweets, now thinking about imminent meeting to discuss resource discovery. Looked at this again last night before I went home. Throws up some interesting questions.
Gosh, 11.50 already! Meeting done and dusted, morphed into discussion on staffing levels etc.. Tea time now.
Sent out a few emails and replied to some others. Interested to see that CILIP is targeting me for a moving on in MARC course; if I get a chance to do any cataloguing these days it’s a miracle – either that or our backlog has returned!
Being indecisive about what to tackle next! Looking at Yahoo Pipes (been meaning to since the very first mashlib ages ago) but it looks a bit beyond me at the moment. Just investigating netvibes (yes, I know I’m behind the times!) Seems to be rather similar to iGoogle which I confess I’ve been using for many years! Do I want to create yet another place for me to look for things of interest, considering I’m already overwhelmed?!
Someone’s brought in some lovely homemade cakes for their birthday. Usually we have a lethal bread knife lying around on the processing table for the day, but today the cakes have already been sliced, so I can stop worrying about health and safety! Oh, well, actually, that’s reminded me, as safety manager for most of the lower ground floor I am supposed to start safety sampling this month. Now, where’s the checklist? Hmmmm. Check shelves are safe; check staff are lifting correctly; check fire escapes are clear of inspections; are there any trailing cables; and the list goes on … Can’t really do it now as still have the duty manager pager, and the list is so long I don’t think it’ll get done today as I finish at 2pm. One for tomorrow then, otherwise it’ll be Feb and the next one will be due!
A thought just popped into my head – gosh, it must have been lonely! I should go on a typing course; I wonder how many words I actually spell wrongly (mostly because my fingers don’t work in the right order) and my computer automatically puts them right?
Oh, my 6 book reading challenge diary has just come through the internal post! Can I read 6 books in the 5 months that have been allocated? I’m not a great reader, and certainly not a reader of the great authors, but last year’s reading average was about 3 books a month, so I should achieve this. Will have to fit it in around the big cross stitching project I have on the go for Mother’s 70th birthday, and the course I’m doing for work (although I’ve paid for that myself and am doing it in my own time)!
Another discussion, this time about the progress of the cataloguing, classification and processing of a large collection of donated material going into our newly formed special collections area. Balance between getting these done and accessible to users, and maintaining the flow of new stock coming in, as well as ensuring that colleagues who are carrying vacancies are also being helped out. What with new services to develop as well, things are quite busy here!
Oh, I just got some thoughts on http://highvisibilitycataloguing.wordpress.com/ Pity I didn’t manage to get my referencing right though! Librarian? Not A-Z? what was I thinking? Well, it was the run up to Christmas and I have to say I was absolutely shattered – too many children’s Christmas concerts, illnesses, work stresses etc.. Still, no excuse really. Humble apologies to all.
Humble apologies accompanied by rumbling tummies – off to get my lunch.
Yesterday’s stats were gratefully received by our facilities officer. We have a big move around coming in the summer, including the assimilation of a collection from a site which is closing, so figures on which class number areas are growing the most quickly could be handy to know.
Tomorrow looks like being a busy day – meeting with resource discovery supplier, enquiry desk session and loads of links to add to the cataloguers’ wiki! See you then!
Tuesday 25 January 2010
Didn’t bother trying to park in the uni car park, so went straight to the nearest street. Thrilled to get into work on time (9.30) – well actually, a few minutes early.
Am Duty Manager on a Tuesday morning so managed to pick up the pager early from the person who has it until I get here! Have a meeting 10.30-12 so hope it doesn’t go off!
Brief discussion with boss about invoice payments. Double-checked that I really had completed all my ADRs – which I have, so I can stop worrying about it. Rather nice, reassuring email arrived from on high to say I was not on their hit-list for being tardy with ADRs.
Email in-box checked for overnight messages – mostly from peanut butter to say the librarian’s day 6 wiki had changed! There were one or two real ones that required action though.
Just checking Twitter now, before meeting at 10.30. Ah, Laurel Tarulli has just reminded me about Yammer; although I found it rather useful when it first came out, I find I rarely use it these days. Made one or two unrelated to #libday6 tweets, now thinking about imminent meeting to discuss resource discovery. Looked at this again last night before I went home. Throws up some interesting questions.
Gosh, 11.50 already! Meeting done and dusted, morphed into discussion on staffing levels etc.. Tea time now.
Sent out a few emails and replied to some others. Interested to see that CILIP is targeting me for a moving on in MARC course; if I get a chance to do any cataloguing these days it’s a miracle – either that or our backlog has returned!
Being indecisive about what to tackle next! Looking at Yahoo Pipes (been meaning to since the very first mashlib ages ago) but it looks a bit beyond me at the moment. Just investigating netvibes (yes, I know I’m behind the times!) Seems to be rather similar to iGoogle which I confess I’ve been using for many years! Do I want to create yet another place for me to look for things of interest, considering I’m already overwhelmed?!
Someone’s brought in some lovely homemade cakes for their birthday. Usually we have a lethal bread knife lying around on the processing table for the day, but today the cakes have already been sliced, so I can stop worrying about health and safety! Oh, well, actually, that’s reminded me, as safety manager for most of the lower ground floor I am supposed to start safety sampling this month. Now, where’s the checklist? Hmmmm. Check shelves are safe; check staff are lifting correctly; check fire escapes are clear of inspections; are there any trailing cables; and the list goes on … Can’t really do it now as still have the duty manager pager, and the list is so long I don’t think it’ll get done today as I finish at 2pm. One for tomorrow then, otherwise it’ll be Feb and the next one will be due!
A thought just popped into my head – gosh, it must have been lonely! I should go on a typing course; I wonder how many words I actually spell wrongly (mostly because my fingers don’t work in the right order) and my computer automatically puts them right?
Oh, my 6 book reading challenge diary has just come through the internal post! Can I read 6 books in the 5 months that have been allocated? I’m not a great reader, and certainly not a reader of the great authors, but last year’s reading average was about 3 books a month, so I should achieve this. Will have to fit it in around the big cross stitching project I have on the go for Mother’s 70th birthday, and the course I’m doing for work (although I’ve paid for that myself and am doing it in my own time)!
Another discussion, this time about the progress of the cataloguing, classification and processing of a large collection of donated material going into our newly formed special collections area. Balance between getting these done and accessible to users, and maintaining the flow of new stock coming in, as well as ensuring that colleagues who are carrying vacancies are also being helped out. What with new services to develop as well, things are quite busy here!
Oh, I just got some thoughts on http://highvisibilitycataloguing.wordpress.com/ Pity I didn’t manage to get my referencing right though! Librarian? Not A-Z? what was I thinking? Well, it was the run up to Christmas and I have to say I was absolutely shattered – too many children’s Christmas concerts, illnesses, work stresses etc.. Still, no excuse really. Humble apologies to all.
Humble apologies accompanied by rumbling tummies – off to get my lunch.
Yesterday’s stats were gratefully received by our facilities officer. We have a big move around coming in the summer, including the assimilation of a collection from a site which is closing, so figures on which class number areas are growing the most quickly could be handy to know.
Tomorrow looks like being a busy day – meeting with resource discovery supplier, enquiry desk session and loads of links to add to the cataloguers’ wiki! See you then!
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