[Koha] Export MARC from Koha

[Steven F. Baljkas]

Thursday, April 22, 2004    15:25 CDT

Salut Philippe,

A quick response to the first question from your list:

> 1- I am not a specialist about MARC21 but i thought that UNIMARC was
> intended for use as an exchange format ?

Actually, the *original* MARC format was USMARC. Without everyone going
jingoistic, that's just a fact. By the 1990s, there were a variety of
nationalised-MARC systems in the world (USMARC, CANMARC, Australian MARC,
UKMARC, etc., etc., as we have had proof of even on this listserv when at
various times people have written in asking if Danish MARC or Chinese MARC,
etc. would be compatible with/represented in Koha).

UNIMARC made great claims to being an international standard but was and is
essentially Eurocentric, all apologies to IFLA. When you look at the MASSIVE
amount of support documentation generated by the Library of Congress and the
mind-boggling amount of work done by various governmental and private
companies around MARC21 standards, you come to realise pretty quickly that
there is a reason it is becoming the de facto global standard.

All that aside, yes, UNIMARC was and is intended as an information exchange
format (as is MARC21), and it is comprehended by Koha. From what Paul has
written before, you need to *decide the MARC variety you are going to use.*

> 2- I confirm that all datas from the biblio and bibliotitem tables are
> not exported (in test with my personal datas at least) . As i said in my
> previous message, datas like additional authors, subject, subtitle,
> date, etc. are not.

Could you tell us which version of Koha you are using? That usually helps
the developpers identify where glitches are coming from and how they can be
fixed. And MJR has asked for a list of what is not being exported.

In terms of the MARC coding, I may be able to help. Could you send me a test
sample of the MARC records you are able to export off the listserv? I can
examine them and see if something is happening to the MARC record's
registry, inadvertent damage to which can cause lost data.

> 3- Answer to Rachel (see below) : First thing should be to export the
> entire catalogue but additional datas from the borowers would certainly
> be nice.

While there have been problems for others in exporting data from Koha and
importing data into Koha, overall Koha seems to work for most people.
Someone will be able to figure out what is glitching. Soyez patient. MJR has
already asked that you send a list of what is missing so they can test and
report it properly as a glitch. And Rachel is one of the big-picture people
involved with Koha, so it is understandable that she took your question on
exporting patron data to that level. Take that as a compliment.

Amitiés,
Steven F. Baljkas
library tech at large -- bibliotechnicien
Koha neophyte
Winnipeg (Manitoba) Canada

> > On 2004-04-21 12:37:09 +0100 Philippe Revault <ph.revault at free.fr>
wrote:
> >
> >> 1- Is the export format in MARC or in UNIMARC ?
> >
> >
> > More likely to be MARC21, as far as I understand the code, but I could
> > be wrong.
> >
> >> 2 - Which datas are exported ?
> >
> >
> > It should be possible to export all. If you are sure things are
> > missing, let us know, I'll test and make sure it gets recorded.
> >
> Rachel Hamilton-Williams a e'crit :
>
> If you're exporting data I assume that the MARC export only does the
catalogue
> records - so it doesn't do
> - Borrowers/patron records
> - Finacial records?
> - Reserves
>
> Do you think it would be a good idea to have a method for exporting this
data
> as well?


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