The absence of interoperability : its impact on an operational service John Gilby & Fraser Nicolaides M25 Systems Team, London School of Economics 7 th July 2003

2 InforM25: origins From pilot project to consortium service eLib Phase III Clumps projects The application of Z39.50 M25 Link Project 1998 … …to live InforM25 service December 2001 The M25 Consortium of Academic Libraries 43 academic and research institutions… and growing Geographically covers London and nearby counties 130+ libraries, 30m visits, 22m volumes 35 catalogues searchable on InforM25

3 InforM25: origins Systems Team Remit One third of time on supporting M25 services/web maintenance at Z-client end assistance at Z-server end Project work related to Z39.50 and Bath Profile Key roles user focus – offer best performance system blueprints Bath guideline documents Z39.50? Well, its crap, isnt it!

4 Consistency of performance I InforM25 Index Data Yaz client Interoperates with seven system types: Aleph (Ex Libris); Dynix; Horizon (Dynix); Innopac (Innovative); Talis; Unicorn (Sirsi); Voyager (Endeavor). Variable implementations of Z39.50 Support for Bib-1 attributes [ example ] example Default behaviours. The treatment of: unspecified attributes; and specified attribute sets.

5 Consistency of performance II Multiple system-type implementations Various operational versions of the Z- server software Institution-specific performance factors: The availability of indexes The derivation of indexes from MARC fields The MODELS Library Interoperability Profile Family - a specified association of Use attributes and MARC tags [ example ]. example

6 Holdings and location information Augmenting the bibliographic record The particular importance of serials Enumeration and chronology information The Z39.50 Holdings Schema Functional Area B: Bibliographic Holdings Retrieval and Search

7 Use and usability What do users want? They simply want good results Investigations of end-user requirements CC-interop JISC funded project. Contexts: the Information Environment; and the RSLGs concept of a national catalogue. Forthcoming analysis of the usability of clumps and COPAC services. End-user search behaviour.

8 Conclusions The future of library-management systems is in interoperability. Senior director of an M25 Consortium library service The Information Environment community Joined-up services Portals, virtual learning environments, etc. Cross-institution; cross-domain. Standards Developmental and implementable Z39.50 plug and play?

9 Contact M25 Systems Team Rm. R302, Library London School of Economics 10 Portugal Street London WC2A 2HD Tel.:

10 Example Bib-1 configuration: Title System Type Bib-1 Attribute Types UseRelationPositionStructureTruncation Completeness A & BTitle----- C --Phrase-- DTitle-Any-None- ETitleEqual-Phrase-- F & GTitleEqualFirstPhraseRightIncomplete back

11 MODELS Profile: extract back UseValueDefinitionUSMARC Tag(s)UKMARC Tag(s) Title4A word, phrase, character or group of characters, normally appearing in an item, that names the item or the work contained in it. 130, 21X-24X, 440, 490, 730, 740, 830, 840, subfield $t in the following: 400, 410, 600, 610, 611, 700, 710, 711, 800, 810, , 243, 245, 740, 745, 440, 490, subfield $t in the following: 600, 610, 611, 700, 710, 711, 800, 810, 811 Title- series 5Collective title applying to, a group of separate, but related, items. 440, 490, 830, 840, subfield $t in the following: 400, 410, 411, 800, 810, , 490, subfield $t in the following: 800, 810, 811