Tuesday, September 9, 2003 01:15 CDT Hi, Ed, I don't think anyone could claim Koha is doing something non-standard with its usage of MARC. The decision to use the 090 in the way that it has, however, was ill-advised given (as I just told Greg) the 090 was actually used by LC itself for the call number in the past and several systems out there in the market make use of it, causing potential migration problems that then get dumped squarely on poor Koha. # From what Chris C. and others have said since I've been on the list-serv, I gather that the H* (I won't even try to attempt the spelling at this late hour) Trust didn't care about MARC and that consequently, the developpers might not have appreciated fully how MARC-reliant much of the library world is and that there is a whole complicated history behind that. Anyway, I like your suggestion, Ed, about moving the item type to a 9xx field. The developpers could designate one of the tags for it and then that would become a Koha feature. # From the cataloguing side of things, this could still get screwed up in the future if one of the 9xx tags did get taken over eventually (that is not supposed to happen but ...). I think Koha was brilliant for wanting to include more meaningful item (format) types. Kudos to whoever thought of that. There may be a more permanent and pleasing solution to the problem of moving that info to a 9xx. Hence the following modest proposal: Perhaps for those of you who qualify as real librarians (unlike yours truly), one might humbly suggest something some my paraprofessional colleagues and I have discussed over the years, *** a prescribed localised tag for more meaningful format types (and/or possibly other information) *** than are prescribed by the beloved AACR2R. Any suggestion/s would have to be submitted to CPSO but perhaps there would be interest enough to have a tag added. I realise that one could do this through a note and that, yes, it is technically coded in the 007 and 008, but it would be nice to have a simpler (if sometimes redundant) and recognisable statement of the item's format for patrons (and for us, too). As with 6xx fields, an indicator could be used to denote whether the term used was from a standardised thesaurus (something that might happen one day), or purely of local use. Just a thought, anyway. Steven F. Baljkas library tech at large Koha neophyte Winnipeg, MB CANADA ----- Original Message ----- From: COURYHOUSE@aol.com To: shedges@skemotah.com Cc: lambert@amigos.org ; koha@lists.katipo.co.nz Sent: Monday, September 08, 2003 10:29 PM Subject: Re: [Koha] 090 Fields I guess what we have to analyze ... "is Koha doing something non standard that impacts the integrity of the MARC record? " if so perhaps the non standard information needs to be at the end of the record past where the MARC data is kept? if there is no area present perhaps one needs to be created as a 'stash' Just a thought.... Ed Sharpe archivist for SMECC Subj:Re: [Koha] 090 Fields Date:9/8/2003 5:24:04 PM US Mountain Standard Time From:shedges@skemotah.com To:lambert@amigos.org CC:koha@lists.katipo.co.nz Sent from the Internet Greg Lambert/Amigos said: > As I was reviewing the bulkmarcimport I noticed that the 090 MARC field is > used by Koha as the ITEMTYPE fields. > > In the MARC data I am importing, the 090 "a" and "b" subfields are > assigned > local LC call numbers. > > Since Koha assigns "a" as Koha Itemtype (NR) > "b" as Koha Dewey Subclass (NR) > "c" as Koha biblionumber (NR) > "d" as Koha biblioitemnumber (NR) > > What will happen to my original 090a and 090b fields? Will they still be > in the database? If so, will this cause item "issues"? > > My limited cataloging knowledge tells me that the 001 field is used for > the > item number information (at least in the colleges I've worked). Is that > not the case with MARC21? > > > Thanks! > -Greg Hmmm. Do you mean your existing MARC records use an 090 field? Koha has to store some important non-MARC information, primarily the biblionumber, biblioitemnumber and the itemtype, in the MARC record in order to interface with the "old" Koha databases. The 090 tag was chosen because neither MARC21 nor Unimarc define any use for this tag, so it was considered to be "safe." If you have existing MARC records that have data in an 090 tag, then you have a problem. You could move the data to a new tag using MARC::Record. -- Stephen Hedges Skemotah Solutions, USA www.skemotah.com -- shedges@skemotah.com _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha Thanks Ed Sharpe, Archivist for SMECC See the Museum's Web Site at www.smecc.org We are always looking for items to add to the museum's display and ref. library please advise if you have anything we can use. mail: Coury House / SMECC 5802 W. Palmaire Ave. Glendale Az 85301 USA 623-435-1522 CONFIDENZIALE: Questo messaggio e gli eventuali allegati sono confidenziali e riservati. Se vi è stato recapitato per errore e non siete fra i destinatari elencati, siete pregati di darne immediatamente avviso al mittente. Le informazioni contenute non devono essere mostrate ad altri, né utilizzate, memorizzate o copiate in qualsiasi forma. 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