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USEMARCON

USEMARCON. E-EndUser 2003 5.9.2003 in Helsinki Arne Hedman / Helsinki University Library Thomas Roos / CSC. Agenda. What is USEMARCON? Versions available What must be defined before use of USEMARCON ? Where to get help? Our conversion of 30 million records Two cases.

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USEMARCON

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  1. USEMARCON E-EndUser 2003 5.9.2003 in Helsinki Arne Hedman / Helsinki University Library Thomas Roos / CSC

  2. Agenda • What is USEMARCON? • Versions available • What must be defined before use of USEMARCON? • Where to get help? • Our conversion of 30 million records • Two cases

  3. What is USEMARCON • MARC-converter for any MARC data in exchange format (ISO 2709) • user control • free of charge • USEMARCON is developed in late 1990’s by partners of the consortium from Holland, UK, Germany and France, supported by EU’s Telematics Applications Programme

  4. Versions available • Original Windows-version by Jouve S.I • MS Win 3.1x, MS Win 95 and Solaris 2.4 • Requires XVT C++ toolkit to compile • GUI only • Memory leaks • ftp://ftp.bl.uk/pub/nbs/ec/usemarcon cont…

  5. Versions available • Usemarcon Plus by Crossnet Systems Ltd • Separate MS Win and Linux/Unix versions • API calls possible • Tested by us on Win 2000, Solaris8 and Debian Linux • Builds with VC++ or GCC 2.8, but not GCC 3.X • Used by EISI as a platform for on-the-fly conversions http://www.bl.uk/services/bibliographic/usemarcon.html cont…

  6. Versions available • Usemarcon Plus by ATP Library Systems (ere@atp.fi) • Merged Windows and Linux versions • Elimination of all known memory leaks • Command line enhancements • code restructuring for better readability • build tested with • MS Visual C++ 6 on Windows XP • GCC 3.2 on Red Hat Linux 8.0 • GCC 3.3 on Debian unstable • Will be available from BL shortly

  7. What must be defined before use of USEMARCON? • All files and tables are text files  very easy to handle • Initialization File (.ini) • names of tables and input/output files • Look up tables (.tbl) • codes to be converted • Format checking tables (.chk) • List of fields and subfields allowed and their occurences cont…

  8. What must be defined before use of USEMARCON? • one table for input data and one for output data • Character Set Translation Table (.trs) • only non-standard characters to be defined • conventional ASCII characters specified in a • default character set table • Configuration file (.cnf) • a list of fields without indicators (001-009)

  9. What must be defined before use of USEMARCON? • Rule file (.rul) • conversion rule for all the tags • a tag without a rule will be dropped out

  10. Where to get help? • Guide to USEMARCON in web • http://www.bl.uk/services/bibliographic/guidetousemarcon.pdf • British library email:usemarcon@bl.uk

  11. Our conversion of 30 million records • Elements in records can be handled in many ways: • maintain • change • delete • add

  12. Tools for change are numerous: • Boolean instructions(OR, AND, NOT) • Conditional instructions (if… then) • Loop instructions • Memory instructions • String functions • Number functions

  13. Some experiences • Editing text files technically easy • Quick testing possible, because changing rules in text files with the help of error files is fast • In tricky conversions the manual does not help you very much.There has been bugs in manual, too cont…

  14. Some experiences • Repeatable tags with different subfield structure are problematic • Changing fixed fields can cause problems,if many conditional instructions exist • Do not convert too big files. It’s better to link the files to be converted.

  15. Weaknesses in USEMARCON • Not handy in changing the contents (tag/subfield code/constant/data) in one tag • Character set conversion without other definitions is not possible • No tool to choose and pick certain material from a file for conversion cont…

  16. Weaknesses in USEMARCON • Not possible to merge two files • If USEMARCON goes down becauseof an unqualified record, the corruptedrecord is not easy to find

  17. To make conversions effectively, some tools are needed • A program to browse input and output data for comparison • A hexeditor to remove bad records

  18. Case 1VTLS to Voyager • Conversion of cyrillic data from VTLS (FINMARC) to Voyager (MARC21-Fin) • extracted 2 versions of the databases to ISO2709 • cyrillic and translitterated cont…

  19. Case 1 VTLS to Voyager

  20. Case 1 VTLS to Voyager • 10 conversions later • 7 custom-made programs and 3 usemarcon conversions

  21. Case 1 VTLS to Voyager

  22. Case 2Usemarcon in Voyager • Use of USEMARCON in Voyager • Convert during import • with Pbulkimport • Convert during export • with Pmarcexport • Convert on-the-fly with the z39.50-server • /m1/voyager/lindadb/ini/z3950svr.ini • Finmarc=/m1/voyager/usemarcon/mafi2fi.ini

  23. Comments?

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