The Two Worlds of FRBR And the Best of Both Worlds October 9, 2008

1. The Two Worlds of FRBR And the Best of Both Worlds October 9, 2008 Dr. Vinod Chachra, President & CEO VTLS Inc. Blacksburg, VA, USA

2. VTLS HQ in Blacksburg, VA, USA

3. About VTLS Inc. First spin-off corporation from Virginia Tech (VT) - Virginia’s largest University – home of System X - 3rd fastest Supercomputer in the world when built from 1100 PCs purchased off the web. Total cost under $5M. Vinod Chachra served as VP for Information Tech at VT. VTLS has offices in 7 countries; does business in 40. VTLS has three major product lines • Virtua – Alexandria Egypt; many National Libraries • VITAL – Fedora based Institutional Repository – developed in partnership with the Australian ARROW project. • VTRAX – RFID based tracking & security systems for libraries

4. VTLS is a Worldwide CompanyPartner or Office*Locations Australia* Brazil* Brunei Egypt France Greece India* Kuwait Malaysia* Philippines Russia Slovakia Spain – European HQ* Switzerland* Tunisia Taiwan Thailand UAE USA*

5. Select Customers: National Libraries • Europe: National Library of Switzerland • Europe: National Library of Wales • Europe: National Library of Ireland • Europe: Royal Library of Belgium • Europe: National Library of Slovakia • Europe: National Union catalog of Poland • Africa: Library of Alexandria (Egypt) • Africa: Notional Library of Morocco • Asia: National Library of India • Asia: National Library of Indonesia • Asia: National Library of Malaysia • Union Catalogs (regional) of Catalan and Switzerland

6. E W M E I M WE E M M I FRBR Link Types: Group 1 Work Work WW Expression Manifestation Item

7. Work Expression Manifestation Item Cr e a t ed b y R e a l i zed b y P r o d u c ed b y Owned b y FRBR Link Types: Group 2 Responsibility Relationships Person / Corporate Body

8. A little History – Back in June/July 2003.

9. VTLS shared 11 educational Power Points • All 11 Power Points produced in 2003 were provided freely on the VTLS web site as an educational tool • Several Library schools used these power points to teach students on the details of FRBR with concrete examples • The examples covered the following topics • A FRBR demonstration (FRBR1) • FRBR Cataloging (FRBR2) • FRBR OPAC (FRBR3) • FRBR Work to Work Links (FRBR4) • FRBR Multi Volume Sets (FRBR5) • FRBR series (FRBR6) • FRBR Collected and Selected Publications (FRBR7) • FRBR Music Analytics (FRBR8) • FRBR Journal Indexing (FRBR9) • FRBR Super Works (FRBR10) • FRBR Circulation Requests (FRBR11)

10. VTLS purchased LC Music Database • As a demonstration project, VTLS purchased the LC music database and FRBRized it to show the power and utility of FRBR. VTLS provided this free to the public for a period of time.

11. Present status of VTLS FRBR • In the last five years VTLS has sold only about 20 contracts for FRBR. • The view in the library community seems to be that FRBR is still an experimental idea (wrong!) with an unknown future (wrong again!). • Nevertheless, this is preventing rapid deployment of systems. Recent Important Additions • VTLS recently developed FRBR SaaS (Software as a Service) • VTLS extended FRBR concept to create an Archival System

12. Two World Views of FRBR There are two world views on FRBR • First View: The catalog should contain the “flat”records (as they are now) and these records should be FRBRized on the fly for display purposes. • Second View: The catalog should contain separate record of works, expressions, manifestations and items that are linked together by appropriate linking fields to form a “hierarchy” of linked records.

13. Strengths of First View First View: The catalog should contain the “flat”records (as they are now) and these records should be FRBRized on the fly for display purposes. • It is simple to implement – does not require any changes to present cataloging practices and therefore it is easier to sell. • Requires no change in ILS data base structures as the record is only collocated on display. • As FRBR display management algorithms improve, no change in data is required to improve the display

14. Weaknesses of First View • The hierarchical results are built on the fly. Display algorithms have to be perfect as there is no possibility of intellectual intervention by humans to improve the displayed result sets. No advantages are gained in cataloging • No possibility of making requests (Holds, ILLs) • At the work level (eg: user is willing to accept any expression of the work in any language) OR • At expression level (eg: user is will accept any edition of the work in the language of choice). At present Holds and ILLs are placed at the manifestation level. • Multiple calculations – each time a FRBR record is displayed it has to be re-assembled from flat records. • Reverse tree displays are not easily possible

15. Strengths of Second View Second View: The catalog should contain separate record of works, expressions, manifestations and items that are linked together by appropriate linking fields to form a “hierarchy” of linked records. • The record system matches the FRBR model • Substantial productivity improvements in cataloging • Fewer errors -- as data related to works and expressions are not repeated at lower levels • Since the data at each level can be manually changed if needed, improvements are possible by human intervention (eg: handling spelling and language variations) • Holds/ILLs can be placed at three levels instead of just one. • Reverse trees can be easily displayed. • Many other creative things are possible (The example of Archival Systems being used at National Library of Wales).

16. Weaknesses of Second View • Requires change in record structure to support linked records • Harder for initial implementation (see new ideas on this) • Requires catalogers to be retrained • Task can be reduced by better software • See VTLS cataloging work-forms for each level • See VTLS validation routines for each level • Requires “inertia” of existing implementations to be overcome

17. Views expressed by LOC and others • A recent report published by the Library of Congress called “On the record” states: LC and the library community need to find ways of “releasing the value” of their rich historic investment in semantic data onto the Web. • Tomothy Dickey (OCLC) in the article “FRBRization of a Library Catalog” states: “VTLS, on the other hand, has since 2004 offered a complete product that has the potential of modifying existing MARC records – via local linking tags in 001 and 004 fields – to create FRBR relationships… The VTLS solution of adding local linking tags seems most appropriate…The Virtua module from VTLS offers a very tempting solution, but may require a change of vendors”. Not really … see VTLS FRBR SAAS.

18. The Best of Both Worlds (Short Term) FRBR SAAS (Software as a Service) • Allows library to keep their catalogs as they are • Allows users to see FRBR record from any traditional record • Allows clean and complete navigation between the traditional and FRBR record • Simple, no hassle solution

19. Recommended Implementation Options • Best Solution -- Implement a full FRBR solution • See what UCL has done (next presentation) • See other FRBR examples • Second Best Solution – Use FRBR SAAS • Simple implementation • Quick results • Over time move to first solution • Bad Solution – Ignore the whole issue

20. FRBR Cataloging Implementation

21. VTLS FRBR Features • Single database can have FRBR and non-FRBR records • Display of FRBR records are in tree structure • System is “aware” of record type and changes displays as needed • Local level fields have values of W, E, and M to indicate type of FRBR record • 001 and 004 used as linking tags

22. FRBR Cataloging • Creating an Original Record • Use FRBR work forms • VTLS provides three default work forms • Frbrwork.wfm • Frbrexpr.wfm • Frbrmanifest.wfm • Users can create their own work forms • In traditional cataloging the focus is on cataloging the manifestation as material on hand is the manifestation • VTLS is studying the cataloging practices to see if this remains true for FRBR

23. Load Options Method • Bring record into editor • Change profile to “split record” • Save record • Virtua automatically creates three records – W, E and M records from the one original record • The next example (Rowling) shows the process

24. Duplicate Control When creating FRBR records from traditional bibliographic records, you need duplicate control and merge functions for Works and Expressions

25. Duplicate Control The FRBRization of the French record resulted in adding an expression (for the French) to the already existing Work record.

26. Adding Expressions or Manifestations • Bring up Work record (or Expression record) • Right Click • Select “Create Expression Record” (or select “Create Manifestation Record”) • Example follows

27. Rules Based Validation • Procedure for MARC “content designation” validation of Work, Expression, and Manifestation records is same as validating non-FRBR records • Three new validation files for FRBR with new rules” • Rules can be modified by users by editing text file • Examples follow

28. A FRBR SaaS Implementation http://poseidon.vtls.com:8000/cgi-bin/gw_xyz/chameleon

29. FRBR SaaS Example [1 of 10 Search]

30. FRBR SaaS Example [2 of 10 Display]

31. FRBR SaaS Example [3 of 10 Select]

32. FRBR SaaS Catalog [4 of 10 Tree]

33. FRBR SaaS [5 of 10 Expand Tree]

34. FRBR SaaS Example [6 of 10 Navigate]

35. A FRBR Reverse Tree

36. FRBR Reverse Tree Example

37. Reverse Tree (M to E to W)

38. Advanced Navigation

39. From tree to tree

40. From tree to tree to tree

41. … to tree to tree (Monkey Business)

42. A FRBR Archival System

43. Archives Management - Background • Archival management functionality in Virtua was a result of functional enhancement to Virtua for the National Library of Wales (NLW). • It was designed to allow NLW to preserve the content and arrangement of their existing archival collection materials and to maintain these collections in Virtua. • The functionality was first implemented in release 48 of Virtua and carried over to Release 49. In includes changes to Virtua server, client and iPortal.

44. Archives Management - Background • Archival cataloguing differs from bibliographic cataloguing because archives, unlike most printed material, cannot be described in isolation. • An archive is, therefore, only fully understood only when there is knowledge of both its content, and also, its context. Content is generally understood through description, but context can only be reflected through arrangement. • Archival arrangement therefore involves the ordering of material to reflect its context. • Archival arrangement is reflected in the cataloguing through the use of a multilevel description system.

45. Archives Management - Background • Rules for multilevel description are laid down in • “ISAD(G) General International Standard Archival Description”. It has 7 core levels: • Fonds • Sub-fonds • Sub-sub-fond • Series • Sub-series • Files • Items • Not all seven levels exist at all times.

46. Archives Management - Background

47. Archives Management - Background • Although the general rules describe 7 levels at present, VTLS was interested in providing a more general solution. • The system takes into account the possibility that more levels could be described in the future, so the implementation had to be flexible to handle this possibility. • The features were also designed in such a flexible manner so that other customers, who may wish to use the functionality, but who did not wish to conform to the seven level architecture could do so.

48. Cataloging Archival Material • Core foundation of cataloguing archival material is the ability to link bibliographic records together in the system:

49. Cataloging Archival Material • Core foundation of cataloguing archival material is the ability to link bibliographic records together in the system:

50. Cataloging Archival Material • Core foundation of cataloguing archival material is the ability to link bibliographic records together in the system: