Re: Editing Scope of this report

>>
>> Note that I am very much tempted to give more concrete example (and cite ISBN!) for "analogously to the library world's identifiers for authority control". I.e., put "analogously to the library world's identifiers for books (ISBN) or authority control (classification numbers)". But I feel this is slightly more than copy-editing, and, especially, a personal move, so I'll abstain for now :-)
>
> And, of course, that could lead down a rabbit hole -- to begin with, the only library world "identifiers" are things like OCLC number and LCCN, and those identify the metadata not the resource. ISBN belongs to the publishers and doesn't cover all of the library holdings (having been implemented only in 1968 and by commercial publishers only). Classification numbers don't work as identifiers because libraries modify them for local purposes.
>
> In fact, it is only now with VIAF that we are treating the authority record numbers as identifiers, a huge step forward that is somewhat hidden because those identifiers are not yet being used in the library records. (I think VIAF could be the turning point for library data when we look back ten years from now. Or perhaps I simply HOPE it will be.)


I was thinking very much of LCCNs. But you're right, there are many devils in the details here. To take one, I'm not sure that libraries changing classification numbers locally would make my point invalid (it is as if you were changing a URI locally...). But I now remember that (fake example warning!) 23.45 in UDC could have a different meaning today from the one it had in 1982.
So I'll refrain from adding anything :-)

Antoine

Received on Monday, 5 September 2011 18:07:02 UTC