URSUS CATALOGING STANDARDS COMMITTEE

Minutes

May 1, 2009

   Present: Sheila Bearor, Chair (LEG), Mary Saunders (MSL), Peggi Loveless (AUG), Sharon Fitzgerald (ORO), Gretchen Brissette (PI), Bryce Cundick (FAR), Jonathan Williams (SYS), Nelson Eubanks (SYS), Lanny Lumbert (USM), Elizabeth Phipps (USM), Lynn Wilcox (LAW), Kathryn Donahue (FK) via teleconferencing.

   Sheila called the meeting to order at 10:00 AM and asked members to introduce themselves.  Mary was secretary for this meeting. Elizabeth made a motion to accept the February minutes as printed.  So voted. 

   Jonathan reported on Infonet for James Jackson-Sanborn.  He introduced Nelson Eubanks, who has taken the position formerly held by Jon Forrest.  Nelson and Jonathan will do much the same work, but Nelson will concentrate on MINERVA and SOLAR, while Jonathan will concentrate on URSUS.  We have the go ahead to fill Deb Hensler's position, and when that is done, INFONET will be fully staffed for the first time.  We will be getting bib records from Overdrive for downloadable audiobooks.  Jonathan will run the records by us.  We can add OCLC numbers to these records.

   There was no report from the Indexes and Databases Subcommittee.

   We discussed the need for standards for cataloging digitized items.  Some downloaded bibs, like those forSpringer ebooks, may be good, others not.  Plus, we ourselves will be creating bibs for locally digitized items (the State Library plans to digitize part of its map collection), which may wind up in other institutions' catalogs.  Jonathan suggested a subcommittee of people who have already created such records.  Sharon, Lynn, and Lanny will study the issues and report back. In addition to workflow issues, Jonathan said that he may have to reconfigure the system. We also discussed the need -- or not -- for call numbers for digitized materials.  A DOI -- Digital Object Identifier -- may serve instead.

   Springer ebook records will be loaded through MARCEDIT.  Jonathan will run a file through the program to add OCLC numbers before the Springer bibs are loaded into URSUS.

   Sharon distributed information on the new "Quick Start" version of OCLC WorldCat.  It is OCLC's entry into ILS.  Jonathan regards this as a "test" period: a way to provide our libraries with these enhanced services without paying for them, and a way to get patron feedback to see if the services may be worth paying for in the future.

   Lynn demonstrated the Beta Federated Search Project sponsored by NELLCO (New England Law Library Consortium), a real-time search across multiple databases.  Right now, it is only in the evaluation and testing stage.  The hope is to produce a useful end product.

   We briefly discussed the upcoming merger of NELINET with Lyrasis.  All existing NELINET services are supposed to stay the same for one year, but after OCLC begins to handle its own technical support, will we want to continue to be NELINET/Lyrasis members?

   Due to teleconferencing difficulties at Bangor PL, we need a new meeting venue.  There doesn't seem to be any space on the Orono campus where we can both eat and have videoconferencing/Polycom.  Jonathan thinks we can get a room at the University College, where we used to meet several years ago.

   Our next meeting will be September 25, 2009.