[Koha] LC Name Authorities - Bulk upload LC database file into Koha Authorities module?

James Weinheimer weinheimer.jim.l at gmail.com
Sat Jan 30 04:11:17 NZDT 2016


On 1/27/2016 11:19 PM, Craig Butosi wrote:
> I've been curious for a while now if anyone has successfully bulk-uploaded into Koha (3.20 or newer) one of the free LC Name authority database files available through the Library of Congress:http://id.loc.gov/download/
>
> I wonder if it's even possible given the file formats in which these files are available (n-triples, rdf/xml, Turtle, etc). It looks like some sort of conversion would be required before uploading into the Koha authorities module. It would be lovely to bulk upload a Name authority file direct from LC rather than Z39.50'ing individual authorities.

This would be very positive. One of the problems is that the downloads 
available are not MARC, but are either MADS or SKOS. It seems as if 
converting these records to MARC would lose information, but I am not sure.

To see what this means, look at the record "United 
States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Bibliography" 
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2007100437.html. If you select 
RDF/XML (MADS and SKOS) 
(http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2007100437.rdf) this is what 
would need to be translated into MARC.

The guidelines for mapping MARC to MADS are at 
http://www.loc.gov/standards/mads/mads-mapping.html, and it says "This 
mapping gives equivalencies between the MARC 21 Authority Format and 
MADS, but is not intended to be a crosswalk that allows for 
bi-directional conversions without some loss of data. Where there is no 
equivalent MARC 21 element, this mapping says "no MARC 21 equivalent". 
Therefore, I assume there are some problems.

I don't know if anybody has experience with this, but I don't think the 
problems would be trivial.

James Weinheimer weinheimer.jim.l at gmail.com
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