Registry of Archival Masters of Digital
Monographs and Serials
Functional Requirements
Dale Flecker
December, 2001
Introduction
This document offers a functional specification for a registry
that records information about archival masters of monographs and
serials published in digital format (note this is a companion to
a parallel specification for digitally reformatted monographs and
serials PROVIDE POINTER). It has been produced as part of the
DLF's work in the archiving and preservation of e-journals.
Data registered
The Registry must have the ability to record (or, in some
instances, to link to) the following information:
Bibliographic Description. Masters should be described
following bibliographic conventions used in contemporary
cataloging "utilities" and integrated library systems. Given that
e-journals and e-monographs are very likely already cataloged in
traditional library format, this should be an easy and
inexpensive process based on copying existing data.
Precise Holdings. For multi-volume and "continuing"
works such as journals, a description should be recorded in
standard holdings notation of the precise issues and volumes
being archived. When archiving is an on-going process, an "open"
holdings statement is used. This statement should be "closed"
(indicate last issue archived) if the archiving institution stops
adding data toits collection. If forms of "compressed" holding
statements are used, they MUST be understood to imply that every
volume and issue of the encompassed run has been digitized. If a
"compressed" holding is used for an incomplete run, an
unambiguous indication of incompleteness must be included.
Information About Archival Master Copy. The following
information should be recorded about the archival master
copy:
Information from Multiple Sources
There will be many cases in which more than one institution
will need to register Archival Master copies of the same
bibliographic item. There may be instances in which two
institutions archive the same item in different formats or to
different standards. The Registry should provide a unified and
coherent view of all digital versions registered
Access
Records of registered materials must be interactively
searchable through standard information retrieval queries based
on normal MARC bibliographic elements. This search facility is
primarily intended for use by trained staff looking to see if a
known item has been archived If registered materials are
integrated into a larger bibliographic file, searching must
provide the ability to limit results to registered digital
copies. Because searching is only intended to support library
staff, a naïve general user interface is not required.
Easy accessibility should be provided to the entire
international library community as well as to other institutions
and companies (both commercial and non-commercial) engaged in
digital archiving efforts.
Visibility as entity
It is important that the Registry be visible and have a
recognized name to encourage contribution and use. While it is
highly desirable that registered data be accessible as part of a
larger bibliographic file, some means of identifying the Registry
(including, but not limited to, the ability to access only
registered materials in searching and harvesting as discussed
above) and making its utility visible should be provided.
Input and Maintenance
Data input and maintenance should be available through both
interactive on-line transactions for individual records, and in
batch mode for groups of records. A "derive" function, allowing
the majority of the bibliographic description of materials to be
copied from existing records, is highly desirable. It is expected
that the original registering institution will need to be able to
update information in the Registry after initial input, to record
such things as additional volumes archived, and changes in the
format of master copies. The ability to contribute and maintain
data should be easily and readily available to the entire library
community and to other institutions and companies (both
commercial and non-commercial) engaged in digital publishing and
archiving.
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