Date:         Mon, 15 Sep 2003 13:17:10 -0700
Reply-To:     Metadata Object Description Schema List <[log in to unmask]>
Sender:       Metadata Object Description Schema List <[log in to unmask]>
From:         Karen Coyle <[log in to unmask]>
Subject:      Re: location, location, location
Comments: To: Metadata Object Description Schema List <[log in to unmask]>
In-Reply-To:  <[log in to unmask]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 03:33 PM 9/15/2003 -0400, you wrote:
>A URL is a special-case URI. You can, by inspection,  determine if a
>string is a URI (it either conforms to the URI syntax or it doesn't) but
>you can't, by inspection, determine if a given URI is a URL. So if you put
>it in the <identifer> element that should be an assertion that it is an
>identifier, and the consumer of the record upon finding a URI in the
><identifier> element should not infer that it is or is not a URL.  If he
>wants to know how to "locate" the resource, he should look in <location>
>(where he might find the identical string, and then can infer that that
>string is also a URL; or might find that the URL is different).

Ray,

I can go for this if we have BOTH (as you suggested earlier), and if our
intention is to translate the 856 $u (and its related $3 and $q) to the
location area of MODS. Since there are no identifiers in MARC (today) that
begin http:// then in fact there will not be identifiers that are URLs when
MARC is translated to MODS. (That's right, isn't it? Is anyone putting
URL-formatted URI's in the 0XX area?) For those creating MODS records that
aren't from a MARC crosswalk, they can have both identifiers and locations
that are formatted as URLs.

If we agree on this, then we have to answer the question: if I have a URL
that is both an identifier and a location, do I have to put it in both
places in MODS? My answer would be yes -- if you only put it in one of
those areas in MODS, there is no way to know that the URL can be used for
both.

Now we get down to the actual URL that stirred this up: a URL in a citation
for a web resource, as required by various citation rules. My reading of
the citation rules is that those URLs are locations, even though the
location can sometimes help define the item. If someone wishes to also call
it an identifier, then I have no problem with that, but if the URL is not
placed in the location area then you have not indicated that this should be
a "clickable link". It then has the same status as the identifier
<http://www.loc.gov/mods/>http://www.loc.gov/mods/, which identifies but
doesn't take you to the location of the item via http.

So I guess I'm arguing that the 856 $q $u $3 should be locations, not
identifiers, in MODS. And the way I read the identifier area, there is no
reason why you cannot input an arbitrary URI, so that's already covered.

kc

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Karen Coyle                    [log in to unmask]
       http://www.kcoyle.net

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