This month marks the one year anniversary of the twitter list of catalog and metadata librarians, yo_bj/magical-metadata-fairies (formerly Troublesome Catalogers). It’s been quite a ride… which calls for some naval gazing.

The list was started in October of 2009 when Twitter turned on the Lists function for my profile. I was keeping track of a small list of catalogers that I created on Tweetdeck, so I had something to work off of. A few #followalibrarian self promotion tweets later, the list gained popularity. There was even a blog posting! Even though I first started the list to keep track of catalogers, the list’s purpose has changed in the past year.

Throughout the year, I have a wide range of activity on the list. There have plenty of bitch sessions about bibliographic utility software, standards, rules, and the latest publication/post that reinforces the cataloger stereotype. That is to be expected, and one of the purposes of the list is to bring like-minded folks together, so, for many people, it’s good to rant about something very specific to an audience who gets what you’re ranting about. I have seen many more instances of catalogers helping each other out with cataloging questions and requests. I’ll admit that I smile every time I see a conversation thread resulting from a cataloging question; I’d like to see the list become a gathering place on Twitter for catalogers to ask questions, converse, and share resources. It’s already doing some of that now, but I know that there are more catalogers and metadata folks out there that haven’t been found or haven’t found the list yet.

When I search for potential list fodder, I find myself searching for the following terms through Twitter:

• Cataloging (and Cataloguing)
• Cataloger (and Cataloguer)
• Metadata
• AACR2 (RDA is less unique, therefore grabbing hits about dietary standards and gossip about a certain actor with the same initials)

“Cataloger” usually gets the most focused results, while the “metadata” results have a lot of noise from product/company/industry tweets. “Cataloging,” however, brings out the most interesting results. Not only I catch catalogers with this, I also catch non-catalogers (and not companies) tweeting about cataloging. I see a wave of cataloging tweets from library students every fall and spring, ranging from hate to love of the joys of cataloging. There are many other people tweeting about cataloging, but in a personal context. I’ve seen people catalog vinyl records, photographs, comic books, DVDs, CDs, yarn, action figures, clothes, jokes, pick up lines, friends, relationships, and life goals. The results show a glimpse of the need for humans to organize things, to give things their place in the person’s world.

But enough of the navel gazing – now for the fun facts about the list:

Followers (as of blog posting): 74
Following (as of blog posting): 155
Some of the countries represented:

• Australia
• Belgium
• Canada
• France
• Japan
• Netherlands
• Slovenia
• Switzerland
• Thailand
• United Kingdom
• United States (majority)

Who are these troublesome catalogers/magical metadata fairies?

• Artists
• Army spouses
• Burlesque performers
• Comic book geeks
• Conservatives
• Cooks (or is that Cookery?)
• Crafters
• Cyclists
• Dancers
• Gamers
• Hackers
• Knitters
• Liberals
• Musicians
• Parents
• Pet lovers
• Reporters
• Sports fanatics
• Students
• Teachers
• Writers

…. And those are just off the top of my head!

Happy anniversary, troublesome catalogers and magical metadata fairies. May you have many more years of wand-waving and Hell-raising.

Week of November 5th

Series statements are tricky little buggers. Earlier this year I attended the LC series authority training and saw firsthand that neither series statements nor their authority records like to behave. Part of that can be blamed on the publishers, but another part of the blame go towards catalogers who 1. Should have known better or 2. Had no clue whatsoever when it comes to series statements so they threw in whatever seemed appropriate to them and local institution. [1] Needless to say, I’ve run into my fair share of dodgy 490/830 fields during this practicum.
Thursday proved to be the day when the publisher gets more of the blame. A short biography of a famous type designer had the first edition date, but the OCLC record showed a 490/830 series statement which I could not find on the item. I ran the item pass Jamie, and he couldn’t find any series statement on the item either. His best guess was that soon after the first edition was published the publisher then decided to add something to the cover or dust jacket to indicate that it was part of an existing series. We ended up creating a new record due to the lack of series statement.

Week of November 12th

This week was the week of getting to the problem items that I had put off for a while. The first item I worked on was the disembodied Hamilton catalog with no front and back pages. This item proved easier to catalog than I previously thought. The running titles on the pages gave me a clue as to the title of the item. The running title would include the specific item being featured (like perpetual calendars) and then be followed by “manufactured by the Hamilton Mfg. Co.” So, add all these different items being featured, and you would get the title “Specimens of wood type, wood ornaments, indexes, dashes, silhouettes, corners, catchwords, perpetual calendars, borders, star rule and wood rule manufactured by the Hamilton Mfg. Co.” This title also happens to be the title of the catalog. I found two holdings for the item in OCLC which one copy was missing pages and the other copy was complete. By the description of the record I was sure that what I had was what the record was describing; however, I felt unsure about adding our holding to the OCLC record due to the missing front pages. I did not know if I had to create a new record with brackets around the title and page count since I did not have a complete copy with a title page. I went to Jamie with the question of adding our holding. Since Tracy mentioned that she is going to try to get replacement pages and that we both were pretty sure that this item is the same item being described in OCLC, Jamie suggested that I add our holding to the existing record with a 500 note saying that we are missing the front and back pages with reproductions pending.

The other set of items I cataloged were the set of local type specimen catalogs that Tracy could not get definite dates for. She had a couple of ideas regarding date ranges, but that seemed to be the closest that she could place the catalogs. Also, since these catalogs were small local companies, Annenberg would not have them listed. I had to find other means of dating them. I went through each catalog to see if I could dig up at least a calendar specimen or a year that was used in one of the specimens. Some I could not find any indicators, like Wisconsin Cuneo Press’s Type specimens, so they ended up with the date [19uu]. Others I was to get the date range down to a decade, like Impressions, Inc.’s catalog, due to finding a date in the catalog text.

Week of November 26th

This week was an interesting week to say the least. I’ve been trying to concentrate on items that I’ve been putting off for one reason or another and tried to get the issues resolved so I can catalog those items before I leave. In addition I have to change the cutter numbers for the American Type Foundry items that Jessie cataloged at his time. Throw the training manual on top of that, and you have one busy practicum student.

Alas, there is yet one more thing to throw onto the pile. It seems that there is a bigger issue that has to be resolved stemming from Jessie’s records. While searching for a specimen catalog in OCLC, I came across a couple of records for catalogs that we held. Half out of curiosity and the rest out of biding time before my shift ended, I opened the records only to see that the formatting was outdated and lacked subject headings. After scratching my head a couple times, I took the OCLC number from the record and searched Voyager, only to find that the Voyager record has been updated to AACR2r standards along with subject headings with Jessie’s name listed as the creator. I took note of the OCLC number and went back to my results list in OCLC to look at the other records. The same thing happened for two other records. This leaves me to suspect that Jessie updated the record in OCLC instead of replacing the record and then updating our holdings in OCLC. I suspect that because a similar thing happens with continuing resources in OCLC for UW-Madison. The university cannot replace records for continuing resources in OCLC, but we can edit and update the record. Even though it looks like the record is changed in OCLC and the exported record in Voyager has the changes, the original record in OCLC did not change. When you leave that record and come back to it later, the record will revert back to its original form.

I am left with the choice of either saying tough luck to the problem OCLC records and go on focusing on my specific projects, or tie up the loose ends I have now and focus on getting these records fixed. While I do have a couple issue items of my own that I need to spend more time on, it would probably be better if I fixed the OCLC records now instead of leaving them for the next person. I don’t know when the next student will take up this practicum so I don’t want the discrepancy of these records to stand for a long while. There is also the issue of accessing materials through OCLC. Due the specific nature of the type specimen catalogs, care is needed in both descriptive and subject cataloging. I have yet to see a record in OCLC for a type catalog that shows that type of care. I’ve run into records that only have the 110, 245, 260, and 300 fields, and even then the cataloging in those fields is not complete or in the correct format. By creating a fuller record this provides more access to the item through searches and browsing. If the fuller record was just left in Voyager, then only those who have access to MadCat would be able to take advantage of the better record. Finally, it wouldn’t be consistent of this project to fix most of the records in OCLC and then leave a few unchanged.

The next step, after deciding to fix the records, is to see if I can export records from Voyager to OCLC. I do not know the extent of the issue with Jessie’s items since I only have gone through around five items; however I am planning to find more records like the ones I found above, and I’d like to know if there is an option besides cutting and pasting from Voyager to OCLC. I asked Jamie and Debi and they both do not know if we are able to export into OCLC. Debi also asked Victor in the original cataloging department, and he said that he would look into it and get back to me next week. Considering that next week is the site visit and the end of my practicum, I hope that there will be an answer before Thursday afternoon.

Week of December 3^rd
The quote for this week is “so much to do, so little time to do it.” In the end, I was able to wrap up the loose ends. I went through Jessie’s records and found that the problem was not as widespread as I thought. There was around seven to eight records that needed updating in OCLC. Unfortunately I did not hear back from Victor about exporting records into OCLC, so I ended up cutting and pasting. Nonetheless, since there were only a handful of records that needed to be changed, I was fine with cutting and pasting. Tracy was a little concerned about spending the time I had left with fixing the records, but it needed to be done and I knew what to do to get it done.
I ended up with some time left for more cataloging after going through the records. Again, the collection proved to be an adventure to catalog. Yet again I ended up using the Alembic Press website to date items by their job cases. There was one catalog that sold their own type and selected job cases from Hamilton (good old Hamilton again…). While I did not get a definite date out of the web site, I was able to get the date range down to the decade, along with other cues from the content of the catalog. At the very end of my shift I cataloged two small booklets: Learn to Fish With Old Man Wachel and Catfishin Know How. Both were done by the same man who self published them in 1969 at Elkhorn, WI. Neither of them were in OCLC so new records were created. This was a nice way to end the practicum- two unique items that were interesting to both read and catalog.

Week of October 1^st

Thursday I had an early meeting with Jamie since he was going to be gone for the rest of the week. Because of the early meeting I was able to discuss with Jamie the issue of the dates. Jamie agreed that if I could find indicators on the internet about the date of the item, then I could use the date or date range for the MARC record (with brackets). One example of this dating came in with a binder from the Hamilton Manufacturing Company. One could tell right away that the material in the binder came from different catalogs. One obvious marker was the numbering of the pages. One half of the pages were numbered (erratically) while the other half did not have any numbers at all. Another marker was the holes in the pages. Some had only two holes (which match the binder) while other pages had four holes. Unfortunately, the two markers mentioned above did not match up: for example the numbered pages both had two and four holes. The only indicator for a date was one of the pages stating “Bulletin for Catalog No. 15.” Knowing that not all the pages came from the same catalog, I had to find out the dates of the other parts in that particular binder along with when catalog no. 15 was printed.

I’ve come to learn that the phrase “You can find anything on the Internet,” does have a kernel of truth to it. The search for “Catalog No. 15” from the Hamilton Manufacturing Company not only brought up a date (1922), but the search brought me to the website Alembic Press (http://members.aol.com/alembicprs/index.htm). This website, run by a small letterpress printer in Oxford, England, has a history of type cases.[1] Searching the site brought me to the specific page on a particular case called the California Job Case. In the narration following the diagram of the case, it lists catalogs 15 and 16 from Hamilton as catalogs where the case was listed. I then went back to the binder and did indeed find the California Job Case. That particular type case in the binder matched with the description of the case found in catalog 16 which was published in 1932. The 1920s-30s date range seems appropriate to the material found in the binder, and the binder was cataloged with [1922-1932?] with the date range in the fixed fields.

The dating issue has come up with other materials; nonetheless it seems that only materials that come from the local area are the only ones without dates. Tracy has offered to help me look for dates for the local catalogs. Some of the businesses from the catalogs have gone out of business but others are still printing so it will depend on if the companies still in business keep track of the publishing dates of old catalogs. Otherwise, the cataloging has been going relatively smoothly.

On Friday I met with Susan from Special Collections to discuss cataloging and material storage issues that I have come across. The supplement storage issue from last week came first in the discussion. Susan suggested that the supplement should be stored in a separate envelope and marked as “Shelve with [Call#].” She also recommended that we create a pullout (consisting of a piece of paper folded in half, longer that the height of the item) so the item is less likely to be damaged if people pulled on the folded piece of paper to get to the item instead on pulling on the item itself.

Another issue that came up was how to treat materials that are located in a book but are not an original part of the book themselves. Many materials that I find in books are things that were probably just stuck in there by a previous owner. Susan agreed on making a local note for the items (which I have been doing). However, she said that the items in the books should be kept in envelopes instead of being left in the books due to increased chance of loss if left loose. Again, the envelope would be shelved next to the item the materials were found in.

The topic of miscellaneous items found in books then turned to the issue of a part of the collection which consists solely of ephemera and advertisements from American Type Foundry. Tracy and I have talked about how to proceed to enter the collection in the system, but we did not come to a conclusion to do one way or another. I felt that that part of the collection may be more in the archival realm than the special collection realm like the rest of the collection. I had contacted Ciaran Trace to schedule a meeting where we could discuss that part of the collection since she is the archives professor on the faculty. But, since I already was meeting with Susan, I asked her opinion on what should be done with the collection. She suggested that the collection should be cataloged on a collection level record with a particular 500 field to list what is in the collection.

At the end of the meeting, I told Susan about the dating issues that I have run across with the local business catalogs. Susan wondered if the business library would have a collection or information that specializes in local businesses. I will have to check this out next week for the businesses that have gone out of business.

Week of October 8^th

This week I managed to get a hold of Trace to talk about what to do with the ephemera collection. Unfortunately I did not have the samples I wanted to show her, but I did my best to describe the collection. Ciaran was not very sure if the collection should be treated as an archival collection due to the possibility of growth in the collection. The collection, to my knowledge, is not completed and probably will be growing as more materials are collected. If the collection was treated like an archival collection then the addition of new material will mean that the finding aid and records in the system will have to be restructured. After this brief conversation I am leaning towards Susan’s suggestion, but I will have to find out more detail about the collection itself before I make a recommendation to Tracy.

The weekly meeting with Tracy brought up the issue of the physical processing of materials. I reported back my conversation with Susan with her, and for some of the suggestions (like placing the supplements in the envelopes) Tracy agreed with. However, Tracy was not sure about placing the miscellaneous items in their own envelopes. One of her concerns was how would using envelopes would affect the processing and storage of the physical collection. We decided to work on a possible processing process for our next meeting.

Jamie was not able to come at our usual meeting time, so I went on working on the collection and saving drafts of edited/created records. I got to the part of the collection that is made up of trade paperbacks and other more common publications. I ended up going through many books because the records in OCLC were already updated to AACR2r standards and did not have any holes in their records that needed to be filled. I went through about 20 items before the end of the day on Friday, including one CD set of the Gutenberg Bible.

Friday I also started working on workflow documentation and a statistics spreadsheet. Tracy expressed that some sort of work instructions be made for the next person to work on the project. I created a very basic flowchart of the cataloging process along with more detailed instructions with adding and editing records in Voyager. I also added a “troubleshooting” section to address the major issues that I had come across during my time doing the project. The guide will be edited and added to as the semester progresses.

Week of October 15^th

Monday Jamie was able to come down to start looking at the records I edited or created. However, since most of the books I looked through were trades, Jamie decided to give me the permission to change the records on my own. This made sense because most of the records only needed minor edits. I was able to work the backlog down on Monday and the beginning part of Tuesday. I left the books that I had questions about on the side for Jamie, but otherwise I ended up processing over 30 items during this week.

I guess I’m in the “medium” part of the medium rare collection with the trade publications. It is interesting to do an original record for a type catalog and double-check an existing record for a widely distributed item right next to each other. While I have been mostly following AACR2r and local practices for most of the items, I have delved into the DCRB manual at Cataloger’s Desktop on occasion. Nonetheless, I find myself using standards that their main audience is common items. This led me to question how many “general” catalogers catalog special collections. Beth M. Russell surveyed 114 ARL libraries to see how special collections cataloging were handled. The results showed that many libraries do not have a full time special collections cataloger; instead certain catalogers were assigned to special collections along with other duties.[2]

The results of the study do not surprise me. Smaller libraries cannot afford full time staff for some areas and instead use the available staff that they have now. What I wonder about those who are hired as general catalogers and then are assigned to special collections is if they adjusted from general cataloging to special collections cataloging fairly well. As I said above, the two are similar, but there are more unique issues with special collections. For example, if I was a general subject cataloger who was assigned to the SBP collection, how would I know to solve the missing date issue if I did not know about Annenberg? How can I assign the most appropriate subject headings if I do not know the terminology or have an expert in the field in-house? Sure, I can catalog the items, but that quality of cataloging will suffer from the lack of specialized knowledge and resources.

Speaking of resources, I stumbled upon the chart “Major Differences & Changes: When to Create a New Record” in one of the books on the new book display at SLIS. The chart goes through all the descriptive cataloging areas (like title, edition, etc.) and determines what differences would call for a new record. According to the chart, almost every difference calls for a new record.[3] If that was the case, OCLC would have double the records in their system! I ran into many records in which there were differences or omissions in areas like other title information. Since I deal with rare items, the record has a greater chance of suffering from bad cataloging and not being checked for quality by others. Do I assume that the record is a sloppy record or does my item needs a new record because they did not include a 246 spine title?

Week of October 22^nd

Tracy and I had the meeting about the physical processing of materials. We talked about how we could possibly catch up with the backlog of cataloged material while working out a “physical processing-in process” workflow that would fit in with the cataloging work flow that I have in place now. After the records have been exported into Voyager and updated to local standards, I write the call number on the first page after the title page, and then I would transfer the following information in a word template:

• Call number
• Author
• Title
• Publication location
• Year of publication/copyright

I then print off the call number flags for SBP to cut and add to the item while they glue book plates to the item. Once we get to the point in the collection where there is no backlog the process should go smoothly. For now, I have to go through the 80+ items already cataloged and print out flags. It’s going to take a while, so I’ll probably split my time between cataloging and flagging so I can keep up with my cataloging while not letting the collection backlog get any bigger.

One issue that Tracy and I spent most of our meeting discussing is the enveloping of supplemental material and flimsy stand-alone items. Tracy stressed that the envelopes must be similar to the size of the main item that it accompanies. We do have a selection of sizes so matching the sizes should not be too much of a problem. Another concern came up about the storage of the envelopes in the physical collection and the chance of envelopes or their contents being misplaced. Flags will not be printed for the envelopes, but the information will be written on a designated part of the envelope along with the inventory of the contents. Hopefully the envelopes do not end up being misplaced, but, like any other item, there is always the chance.

While cataloging I came across a book that has already been processed, but there was no flag to indicate that the item was processed. I took the item to Tracy and found out that the item was part of an exhibit. They took out the flag when they put up the display, and when they took down the display the flag was accidentally placed into an item that had the same title/author but was a different publication year and format. This mix-up does call attention to the issue of items that are the same work but different manifestation (book v. unbound plates). The information on the flag was sufficient enough for one to know which item it goes to, but sometimes the human factor comes into play and mix-ups happen. One recommendation that I could make to minimize the chance of mix-ups is to make sure that the flags stay with the items all the time, or at lease pay extra attention when replacing loose flags into items.

Later during the day on Thursday I noticed that I could not set a location limit to SBP. This confused me since I had a printout that had all the cataloged items from the collection from the last practicum. I told Tracy this and Tracy was surprised about this as well because of the printout. Tracy ended up contacting Irene Zimmerman from CTS and found out that SBP never had a location listing in the Set Limits options. However, there is a way to search for a specific library’s holdings through the guided search:

1. Go to the “Guided” Search tab at the MadCat home page.
2. Type “m,sbp” in the first field.
3. Select “as a phrase” in the first drop down menu next to the text field.
4. Select “Holdings Keyword” in the “Search by” drop down menu.
5. Click “Search.”

I really do not like this way of searching for a library’s holdings because the general user would not know the holdings code for the library. It’s hidden and does the special collection a disservice for browsability. Nonetheless, it’s better than not having the option at all. I gave the instructions to Tracy and she will give out the instructions to people who expressed interest in searching the collection.

Week of October 29th

Going through the backlog of materials did not take as much time from cataloging than what I thought. I managed to get through most of the material that needed flags and envelopes by Friday afternoon. This was a good time to review the records that I have completed or created thus far to check for consistency. While the majority of records were fine, I did have some issues with the cutter numbers for the type specimen catalogs from American Type Foundry (ATF). It turned out that Jesse and I used different cutter numbers for the company: A44 and A544. To add to the mix, LC had its own cutter number of A517. I knew that the LC is outdated because the 17 now indicates a Russian translation of the work. The problem with Jesse’s number lies within the classification range of type specimen catalogs A5-Z. Since A1-A4 has been assigned to different topics, they cannot be used for the catalogs. That leaves me with A544. I decided to combine the A5 with the cutter extensions 44 because adding 2 cutter numbers to the A5 allows for growth in the collection. If there is another type specimen catalog from a company with a name that begins with A-An, I can differentiate that company from ATF’s run in the Z250 classification. However, there will be a problem if there is another company that begins with American. The 44 cutter number are the extension numbers for “American” so following the procedure of adding the extension cutter numbers will not work for this situation. Possible solutions include cuttering the company’s initials or subsequent words after “American.” Nonetheless I am inclined to let the next person in this practicum to make this decision due to the fact that I have not run into any type catalogs with that problem.

Tracy has given me an interesting item to work on. The item in question is a wood type specimen catalog from Hamilton (the same company that I ran across in my 10/1 entry). Because of its condition, the catalog was taken apart, pages inserted into individual mylar pockets, and rebound in a cloth binder. While the binding might present a small issue with filling out the MARC records, the bigger issue is that the catalog is missing all its front matter and some of the back matter. This leaves me without a title, date, city of publication, accurate page count, and a few other miscellaneous pieces of information to correctly catalog the item. Tracy has done some preliminary research and has found a possible title and page count, but that still isn’t enough for a solid basic record. It looks like I get to go on yet another adventure on the Internet courtesy of Hamilton.

Speaking of dates, Tracy did manage to meet with the Webcrafters people, but was not able to get any dates for the catalogs from their earlier incarnation as Democrat Printing. Argh!

[2] Russell, Beth M. “Special Collections Cataloging at a Crossroads: A Survey of ARL Libraries.” Journal of Academic Librarianship 30: 4 (July 2004): p. 294-303.

[3] Task Force on an Appendix of Major and Minor Changes, Committee on Cataloging–Description and Access, Cataloging and Classification Section of the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services. Differences Between, Changes Within: Guidelines on When to Create a New Record. Chicago, IL: Association for Library Collections & Technical Services, 2007.

Here is part 1 of the diary.

Week of September 4^th

This week I spent talking to Jamie, from Memorial CTS, about the general logistics of the project. Jamie set up meetings with both Debi (CTS) for this week and Tracy (Silver Buckle Press) for next week. I met with Debi to go over Voyager Cataloging and OCLC at the computer I will be using for most of the project which is located in the graphics office right next to Silver Buckle. Since I already have experience with Voyager, the training with Voyager was short. One part of the training that I was pleasantly surprised to see is the use of macros through Macro Express. I had previous experience with both Macro Express and its earlier version, Keyboard Express, from my Medicare claims processing job. The use of macros was extensive at my old job, so I should have little trouble adapting to the use of macros here.

Training in OCLC wasn’t as bad as I expected it to be. It turns out that the web version that the cataloging class played around with is not too different from the desktop interface that I will be using. Debi explained about the fee system in place with searches and exports from OCLC which surprised me a little that OCLC does charge a fee per search like you would see in Dialog. Searching in OCLC came back to me from cataloging class after the first search, so again, not too much trouble.

Tracy from SBP gave me a list of records that the previous student, Jessie, was able to complete at his time doing the project. The list doesn’t have many titles, which sort of suggests that this project may be a very slow process. I only had time to glance at a couple of records on the list and there are some subject headings with terminology that I didn’t recognize. Nonetheless, based on the assumption that the books already cataloged in the system are similar in subject to the rest of the collection, I’m sure that a small core of vocabulary will only be needed to be known for the subject headings.

Week of September 10^th

On Monday, I went through the list of the items already cataloged in MadCat from the previous student. Out of 40+ records, I focused on around five to six for closer study. From these records, I retrieved the MARC records from the MARC option on MadCat and I searched WorldCat for the selected items to see how many other libraries hold the same item. The WorldCat search turned up records for every item and the number of libraries holding the items varied, but never beyond a low number (around 70-80 max.). I learned later on that the SBP collection is considered “medium rare”- meaning that most items in the collection may already have records from a handful of libraries that have the items. On the other side of the item records, the MARC records showed some similarities with fields and subject headings. I used the Understanding MARC website to obtain more information about fields that I was not familiar with (ex. 510) while clearing up confusion on other fields (50 v. 90).

Thursday I met with Tracy to talk about the collection and the project. She showed me the collection and what Jessie was able to finish when he did the project (around two shelves worth of books). She picked through the collection and showed me examples of what was in the collection. Most of the collection is made up of type specimen catalogs from various printing and type foundries. Other parts of the collection include books on famous printers and journals about different aspects of the printing industry. Our meeting ended with Tracy giving me a copy of Jessie’s practicum journal so I can get more of a sense what were the issues that will likely pop up while doing this project. I read the journal during the hour break before the next meeting with Tracy and Jamie. Overall, it looked like Jessie struggled through the project with the cataloging process and all the quirks and problems that he came across with the collection. He training with the CTS catalogers lasted around five weeks and I wondered if it will take that long with me as well.

The next meeting on Thursday was with both Tracy and Jamie. Jamie came down with a help sheet with subject headings. Since most of the collection is about the same in form and subject, this sheet will help immensely during cataloging. I asked Jamie about a few aspects of the project, focusing on how much original cataloging was done in the last project and the extent of cleaning up existing records. Jamie said that while most items will have a record on WorldCat, almost all the records need extensive cleanup before importing the record into Voyager. In addition to that, most of the items in the SBP collection have unique features to them. For example, one of the sample items Tracy pulled out had a bookplate on the inner cover page stating that the book was loaned to a certain printery from the branch office of the type company and had a letter from the type company to the local printery. Because of unique features like the ones described above, each record needs to have notes pertaining to that individual copy in Voyager (or in WorldCat if it can be safely assumed that each copy would have that feature). While it looks like most of the records will be found in WorldCat, the cleanup and updating required before exporting to Voyager will be extensive.

After answering my questions, Jamie and I went to the computer in the Graphics office (right next to SBP) where I will be doing most of my cataloging, and started going through the first book in the pile. A record was found in WorldCat, but it needed updating since the entries were probably copied from the LC card from the card catalog. We also ended up making an authority record in WorldCat for the type foundry since there were no records found in the authority records. We ran out of time before we were able to import the file into Voyager, so we finished the process on Friday. However, when we came back on Friday, my computer refused to input the file into Voyager. We ended up in Jamie’s office on his computer to complete the process. In all we went through five items- four monographs and one journal. While the monographs were found in WorldCat, the journal was not, prompting my first original cataloging experience. Needless to say, I did not break OCLC while creating the record. At the end of the meeting, I asked Jamie when I could start updating/creating records on my own. He said that I could do so, but the records must go through him before I replace them on OCLC and import them into Voyager. After the meeting, I went through three books on my own. Two of the books were facsimiles so I put them aside for Jamie to go through and the other book I edited the record and saved it in a temporary folder for Jamie’s check next week.

Week of September 17^th

During the regular meeting with Tracy on Thursday, we debated on what should be done with the serials in the collection. There was one journal that Jamie and I came across the week before that we were not sure how Tracy wanted me to treat serials. Tracy wanted to combine both the serials and monographs collections and shelve them as one collection. When I threw out the suggestion of possibly having each collection shelved separately, Tracy expressed concern that the journals would be less used by users if set apart from the monograph collection. She also mentioned that most of the serials in the collection only have one or a few issues in each run and are not very likely to grow fast if at all. We did not come to a decision at the end of the meeting.

Right after the meeting, Jamie came down to check my first attempt of cataloging on my own. The book, a collection of letterheads, did have a record in WorldCat; however, the record was not an exact match. The publishing date was recorded as [1953?] even though the title page listed the date of “November Forty-One”. I took this as the publication date and changed the date in the existing record. However, Jamie was not very sure that I should change the existing record for a couple reasons:

1. Even though the record did not have an edition listed, the item may have another edition from 1953.
2. The “November Forty-One” date placed the book right before WWII. Jamie stated that the publication of the book may have been interrupted due to the war effort, and, therefore, a later edition may have been published after the war.

Because of the uncertainty of the date and lack of knowledge about the edition from the existing record, Jamie decided that creating a new record would be the best thing to do. Using most of the information from the existing record, I created a new record. This time, after exporting from OCLC, I was able to import into Voyager and create the records there as well.

Jamie and I then went to the two facsimile books. I found the records for them earlier on; however, I did not know how to indicate on the records that these books were copies of the originals and not the originals themselves. I only knew that new records needed to be created. The answer to my question was very simple- change one of the fixed fields to indicate the item is a facsimile. Here I thought I would have to spend hours in Cataloger’s Desktop searching for an obscure rule in the AACR2r, but I guess not. Another issue we ran into was that one of the facsimiles was not a complete copy of the original. The record that I found earlier on came in handy to see how many pages were in the original. Beyond those issues, the cataloging went smoothly.

With Jamie’s blessing, I came in on Friday to start cataloging on my own. I ended up looking at around five to seven books before Jamie came down to check my work. All the books I looked at had existing records in WorldCat and a couple in Voyager. I ended up cleaning up the subject headings for most of the records as well as making the 510 note for the catalogs that are mentioned in the Annenberg book American Type Foundries and Their Catalogs. I also took note on which books needed local notes or created a 500 note if appropriate. I did not struggle too much with the cataloging, but I did have some questions for Jamie about things I could not find instructions for in Desktop.

Jamie came down and checked my work from the morning. The biggest issues we ran into with my cataloging were deciding when to create a new record when another record already exists and AACR2r formatting, particularly with punctuation. There were also a couple times when notes were either needed or not needed, but that was not as big of an issue as knowing when to start from scratch when dealing with existing records. That type of decision-making is going to take me a while to learn. It seems like experience plays a big part when deciding to update or create another record, and experience is one thing that I lack. I do not know how long it will take me to start to get the gist of when to update or create, but I hope it is soon.

Week of September 24^th

Thursday’s meeting with Tracy was short because I didn’t have any questions or issues that needed to be addressed at that time. We mainly discussed schedules for the month of October. Jamie came down after the meeting to look at the items that I had edited/created records for during the morning. There was one item in particular that presented some issues. The item, a supplement to a catalog, had at least seven to eight records in WorldCat: over half of the records had the wrong title in the 245 field (the cover title was used instead of the title page title). The other records had variations of the title on the title page. The layout of the page went as follows (rough outline):

Supplement statement

Typefaces …

Produced by this company … who has produced catalogs since 1912…

Company name

Some records started with the supplement statement while others started with the Typefaces statement. The b subfield was even more varied, with some going from Typefaces down to the “produced” section and then back up to the supplement statement or not including the supplement statement at all. I ended up with the following 245 field:

245 10 |a New type faces, borders, ornaments, brass rule : |b supplementary catalogue, produced by this company since the publication of the American specimen book of type styles, 1912 / |c American Type Founders Company.

The reason why I put the supplement statement first in the b subfield was that the fact that the item was a supplement was very important, but due to the layout of the page I couldn’t go right out and put the supplement statement in the a subfield. It was most appropriate, then, to include the supplement statement first in the b subfield and then follow the flow of the page, excluding Typefaces.

When I came across the records for the item, I thought that since all the records were incorrect in some shape and form that it would be best to create a new record. Jamie, however, thought otherwise. Creating a new record when multiple records already exist only add to the confusion created by said records. Also, there would be a greater chance that OCLC might delete the record when cleaning up the system for obsolete and duplicate records. In this case, I would have picked the record that either had the most holdings attached to it or the oldest (seniority over other records). Since the oldest record from the bunch had the greatest holdings, we edited the record with the information from my draft record and updated it.

The above item was the only item which I miscalculated when I should either update or create a record. All the other items I worked on only had minor corrections done by Jamie. Another item did present a question as to what to do with price guides to catalogs that are already in our collection. Jamie suggested that I go to Tracy to see if she wanted to catalog them separately from the catalog or keep them together and add the guide as a note. Tracy said that she wanted to keep the two together, but since the price guide is too thick to insert into the catalog itself without damaging the binding, she suggested going to Special Collections to find out options on how to keep the two items together.

Friday proved to be a challenging day for cataloging. I kept coming across items that did not have dates published in them. The items without dates included a linotype catalog, American Type Foundry catalog booklet, and type catalogs from local foundries. While a couple catalogs could be dated using Annenberg, most of them could not. After going through item after item that did not have a date I went to Tracy to discuss how to find the dates. Tracy mentioned that the dates were a major problem during Jesse’s time. A couple of options came around, like looking at the type specimens or searching printing history collections/collectors websites to see if we can date it that way; nonetheless the lack of a printed date will prove tricky for cataloging in the 300 and 500 fields.

The original one:

If you don’t know, as of today, Facebook will automatically index all your info on Google, which allows everyone to view it. To change this option, go to Settings –> Privacy Settings –> Search –> then UN-CLICK the box that says ‘Allow indexing’. Facebook kept this one quiet. Copy and paste onto your status for all your friends ASAP

The alternatives:

New website! We finally got to move away from the university template (which didn’t allow room for much of anything) and this is the product that was years in the making. The site was build with drupal and right in the middle of the front page is MULtifacet, our home-grown next-gen OPAC. We just finished a two-phased usability study on MULtifacet and its former incarnation, Solrpac. Still in the analysis stage, but once the report is finished, I’ll let you all know.

New orientation video! While a vodcast isn’t anything new to MU, producing a vodcast in Mandarin Chinese is. This is part of the Libraries’ plan to accommodate the near 500% increase in international students coming to MU in the last five years, with the majority coming from China. We have plans to create other videos in other native languages of our international and ESL students.

New, shiny things are good! Especially before the students come back…

Friday

7:15 am – bike to work, clean up, boot computer, start making jasmine tea

7:30 am – launched tweetdeck, Pandora, read gmail, feeds, and other things.  Minions either on vacation or at work

7:35 am – the computer is very slow today

7:40 am – started tea consumption. Minion letting me know that there’s another 250 or so books coming our way for receipt cataloging

7:48 am – checked and backed up wiki

7:54 am – checked work email and calendar

8:08 am – time to start on the monthly report

8:27 am – finished monthly report. Time for blueberry muffins

8:43 am – successfully invaded Information Services department and acquired blueberry muffins. Also had the chance to look over the second edition of Who’s Who in Hell. Back to emails

9:09 am – Worked on OhioLINK errors report

9:13 am – EGL-IUG proposal due today. Need to start refining program proposal

9:23 am – the interwebz are slow today. Checked to see if there are any system outages or problems that the dept should know about

9:37 am – looks like IT is updating Windows stuff. Probably why things are slow right now. Sent proposal to EGL –IUG. Look over weekly stats…

9:41 am – Need to figure out a way to rework stats SQL queries. Previous databases are not updating and current databases are not displaying the correct information. Crack open Filezilla, phpMyAdmin and notepad++

9:54 am – w00t! I have one major SQL query pulling the right information. Now to work on the other 15 or so

10:00 am – banana and 15 min mandatory break

10:15 am – back from break. Checked feeds and then back to SQL hacking

10:15 am – printer refused to print. Smacked printer, now works

11:44 am – have the first php stats page fixed. Cleaning up records that have missing CAT DATE dates

12:00 pm – lunch!

12:57 pm – back early from lunch. Futzing with re-tooled stats and SQL

2:23 pm – almost done with the futzing. Switched Pandora to “Tek-no” radio

2:30 pm – employee has mysterious pop-up asking for her password. Trying to figure out what’s going on…

2:49 pm – login to another database is broken. Fun times on a Friday afternoon…

3:05 pm – fixed stats problem the best I could. 15 min mandatory break

3:17 pm – back from break. Checked feeds and email

3:43 pm – last challenge for the day – broken logins. Switch Pandora to Power Metal station

3:56 pm – requested access to former co-worker’s server space. The file that is causing the login problem lives there, and I need access to it. Going back to emails to clean out the inbox before I go home for the weekend

4:25 pm – Oh look a book… going through professional lit books piled high on my shelf…

4:50 pm –get items around for next week

5:00 pm – out to dinner with some library peeps :c)

~fin~

Thursday

7:15 am – bike to work, clean up, boot computer, start making genmai-cha

7:25 am – launched tweetdeck, Pandora, read gmail, feeds, and other things

7:30 am – Minions come back to work

7:42 am – planet toc updated. Going through the various toc feeds

7:48 am – checked wiki and wiki calendar

7:53 am – checked work email and calendar

7:54 am – email from minion suggesting workflow change in receiving dups from circulation and stacks maintenance. Signed off on my end, waiting for others to do the same

7:57 am – worked on duplicates report… which turned out to be a repeat from yesterday’s report

8:02 am – checked work calendar again. Meeting at 10, otherwise free for the rest of the day….

8:03 am – spoke too soon. Receipt cataloging procedure needs changing on the wiki.

8:10 am – started going through inbox, cleaning, rearranging, and catch any possible backburner issues

8:16 am – read department meeting notes from earlier this week

8:19 am – one email away from Inbox 0. Last email dealing with Butler County’s adoption of Nixle, a community information service. Signing up to receive notices

8:25 am – signed up for Nixle notices. Dept. head signed off on workflow change. Inbox 0

8:26 am – went to MARC proposals page to look at 542 and 260 proposals

8:38 am – emailed dept. head and catalog librarian about 542 field

8:43 am – now to look at the 260 proposal more closely… if I can find it first

8:57 am – failed horribly to find anything relating to the 260 change… Ohhhh, it’s a 2001 proposal. That’s an old one. Why has it taken this long to implement the change, OCLC?

9:09 am – secretly feeling sorry for our future ER/S librarian who has to deal with the OCLC-MARC changes while they are in full swing

9:18 am – enough with 260 changes. Started work on evaluation forms for new faculty orientation next month

9:30 am –sent email asking for titles of breakout session at orientation. Started preparation for training employee in AutoIt. Selecting Macro Express script to convert during the first training session. Baby steps, Becky, baby steps

9:40 am – checked in with new faculty orientation head about getting those evaluation forms online. Topic has been placed on agenda for next meeting

10:00 am – AutoIt training session

11:22 am – Back from training session #1. Lots of emails to catch up with

11:33 am – inbox 0 did not last for long. Reading DMS agenda for Monday, testing out survey tools before sending them off to the IRB process

12:00 pm – lunch!

1:00 pm – back from lunch. (yet again spent at the computer). Emailed news about Elsevier selling off LJ, SLJ, and PW to other librarians. Waiting for riot to ensue

1:10 pm – W00t! Free afternoon. Now what is on my to-do list…

1:20 pm – switched Pandora to “I miss the 80s” station. Started work on super secret project (well, super secret to you folks)

2:15 pm – Sent some reading material to employee learning AutoIt. Safari_books_online++

3:00 pm – mandatory 15 min break

3:15 pm – back from break. Time to schedule meetings, lucky me…

3:25 pm – call for help from employee learning AutoIt. Going to her rescue

3:50 pm – back from call of help. Employee built her first AutoIt script! W00t!

4:19 pm – impromptu meeting with dept. head

4:24 – look more emails to respond to. Joy

4:40 – Prepare stuff to work on tomorrow

5:00 – bike home, dodging rain showers on the way

Wednesday

7:15 am – bike to work, clean up, start making jasmine tea, boot up computer

7:30 am – minions invade department

7:33 am – launched Pandora client on new age radio, open and check tweetdeck, check gmail, feeds, other things, start tea consumption

7:44 am – the tea isn’t working. Moving slower than usual today

7:49 am – checked work email and calendar

7:51 am – received feedback from Dean about epic email part 2. Will have to converse with dept. head about feedback and next steps

8:02 am – check wiki and wiki calendar

8:03 am – wiki is still intact. That is a good sign

8:09 am – meeting with dept. head

8:26 am – end meeting with dept. head.

8:27 am – ACK! Forgot to put seat cover on bike! Run outside before it’s too late

8:31 am – bike seat covered. Composing email to update members of a library working group

8:34 am – email sent to working group. Responding to questions about the beta planet toc feed email sent yesterday. (We are just experimenting with this, we don’t have the staff time to devote to the level of routing that we used to do, do you really want to receive C&RL News five months after the publication date?)

9:03 am – feedback email sent. Still very groggy. Off now to the copier to copy several documents and mail them to the lucky people who get to read them

9:22 am – commented on one of my minion’s sudden quietness. Shared stories about small children being too quiet in the next room…

9:25 am – started revising section on video podcasting in the international student outreach article. Office too bright, shut window blinds to convert office into cave. I’m happier with this arrangement

9:30 am – writer’s block. Switched to duplicate records report

9:35 am – sent out email to catalogers notifying them about the upcoming OCLC-MARC changes. Back to duplicates

9:42 am – sent gov pub duplicate to gov pub cataloger. Received holy quest from dept. head to construct report on how OCLC-MARC changes would significantly mess with workflow and local procedures. Also realized that I have a meeting at 10, and should probably get back to work on the article

9:55 am – email flood. Need to take care of them before meeting

10:00 am – meeting #1

10:35 am – meeting #1 done. Lots of email to respond to

10:42 am – check RSS feeds

10:51 am – time to start the report on OCLC-MARC changes

11:03 am – does anyone have any aspirin? Change Pandora station to symphonic radio

11:22 am – trying to stay focused on OCLC-MARC changes report

11:58 am – made OCLC-MARC changes report pretty, sent off to Catalog Librarian to add her changes.

12:00 pm – lunch!

1:00 pm – back from lunch. Check slideshare and linkedin accounts for any updates. Switch Pandora to “I miss the 80s” radio

1:05 pm – dismayed to hear that one of my librarian friends in WI is walking away from the profession. Tweet-ranted for a bit, clearly need to read things over before hitting send

1:19 pm – email time

1:29 pm – email dealt with. Now for morbid curiosity time: How much are we spending on the print version of the journals that I have on the beta planet toc service?

2:09 pm – done collecting prices from our catalog. I forgot how expensive Haworth titles are.

2:15 pm – sent price list to dept. head. Also sent OCLC-MARC changes report to dept. head, after the Catalog Librarian gave her ok

2:19 pm – started email to interested AUTOCAT folks who want to help with organizing the information in the listserv in an easily accessible format.

2:38 pm – email sent. Sent another email to employee asking her availability to get together for AutoIt training

2:44 pm – scheduled first AutoIt training session with employee for tomorrow

2:45 pm – double-checked with Catalog Librarian about OCLC-MARC changes report before we make the report final.

2:49 pm – finalized draft, sent to dept. head. Also posted to wiki.

2:57 pm – still trying to wrap head around new 542 field. Tweeted for help. Responded to emails from AUTOCAT wiki folks

3:00 pm – 15 min mandatory break

3:15 pm – back to work. Emails yet again

3:23 pm – I have officially crashed. Read tweets and feeds

3:34 pm – researched requirements for presentation proposal. Let’s see if I wake up enough to write something

4:00 pm – it’s slow going, but I have something in the works

4:27 pm – sent draft presentation for proofreading. Trying to decide if the presentation should be geared towards newbies or ppl with some programming experience. Checked feeds… yeah, I’m pretty much going to catch up on feeds and tweets for the rest of the day

4:40 pm – prepare items to work on tomorrow

5:00 pm – (hopefully) bike home

Tuesday

7:15 am – bike to work, clean up, start making genmai-cha, boot up computer

7:25 am – launch Pandora client on new age radio, open and check tweetdeck, check gmail, feeds, other things

7:30 am – minions come in wide awake

7:40 am – check work email and calendar, start tea consumption

7:43 am – check wiki

7:47 am – fix entries on the wiki calendar

7:53 am – start email to dept head with the news that III is going to compete with OCLC’s cataloging bib utility. In addition, ask head for help with epic email part 2.

8:00 am – minion update

8:02 am – back to poking dept. head with news and email composition

8:06 am – answer from yesterday regarding mystery duplicate code. Deleted dup code (yay easy fix)

8:14 am – back to poking dept. head with news and email composition

8:20 am – Employee lost password for wiki. Reset password. Back yet again to epic email part 2

8:56 am – minion interruption: gave the supply order form a new home on the wiki

9:05 am – half way done with epic email part 2. Yes, a very long, detailed email requires lots of research

9:39 am – sent off draft of epic email part 2 to dept. head. Couple of minutes to recover, and then check email

9:46 am – respond back to a statewide working group regarding training in a new ILS module

9:47 am – panic call from employee who can’t get into dept Google calendar. Resolved problem

9:59 am – bad email address for one of the working group folks. Grrr

10:04 am – bad email address solved, also resolved another panic call from employee about Google calendar. Banana and 15 min mandatory break

10:15 am – break done. Received feedback on draft of epic email part 2. Revising and sending another draft

10:20 am – draft #2 sent. Prepare for meeting #1 and reading OLE Project Final Report

10:30 am – meeting #1

11:30 am – meeting #1 done. Lots and lots of email to check

11:35 am – add HR contact information on wiki per meeting #1

11:38 am – respond back to statewide working group with more questions about ILS training

11:42 am – checked in with the Google doc copy of an article I am collaborating on about outreach to international students. Note to self – touch up section about tech specs on video podcasting

11:55 am – checked RSS feeds, sneaked in a lolcat or two

12:00 pm – lunch!

1:00 pm – officially back to work (even though I’ve been reading emails and tweets for a while).  Make the routing list all pretty like to give to dept. head to get the okay to send out planet toc beta feed to librarians list

1:09 pm – got the revised draft back. Sent epic email part 2 to Dean. Crossing fingers

1:30 pm – meeting #2

2:05 pm – meeting #2 done. Continued work on routing list and email. Fished some information about hidden routed journals.

2:14 pm – Why are we paying for something that we can get free online? Researching more and building argument to drop subscription

2:30 pm – training session for receipt cataloging for employee

2:57 pm – training session done. Mandatory 15 min break

3:13 pm – back from “break.” Gave a “sure, go ahead” to co-worker looking at newer PURL service

3:15 pm – back to researching more and building argument to drop subscription

3:37 pm – yeah, we really don’t need to subscribe to that anymore. Sent email with evidence to dept. head

3:48 pm – sent off routing list and email to dept. head for distribution to other librarians. W00t! Trying to find to-do list for next thing to do

3:52 pm – deal with an issue that has been set on the back burner for a while. The XML file used to help catalog ETDs is broken in several ways. Time to go and try to fix as much as possible

4:03 pm – XML problem one sent off to OhioLINK. Now to deal with problem two, which deals with file sizes

4:07 pm – XML problem one solved!

4:08 pm – got the go ahead from dept. head to send out planet toc beta feed and routing list to librarians. Send yet another email…

4:14 pm – started dealing with XML problem two

4:28 pm – turned out that XML problem two was fixed before I got to it. It is fixed, but that doesn’t tell me much about how to fix it in the future. Minion who catalogs ETD is now happy again

4:30 pm – began playing around with III URL Checker to see if we can get better use out of it than we do now

4:45 pm – wind down for the day, set up things to work on tomorrow

5:00 pm – bike home