Date:         Sat, 30 Oct 2004 08:38:14 -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: High Quality XSLT Stylesheets
Comments: To: Metadata Object Description Schema List <[log in to unmask]>
In-Reply-To:  <[log in to unmask]>
Content-Type: text/plain

On Fri, 2004-10-29 at 19:03, Bruce D'Arcus wrote:


> If you have any specific thoughts Karen, let me know.

Well, I know that it would be a great deal of work, but I really think
we need a "citation" format -- something that is loose enough to carry
the data from the wide variety of citation styles (and non-styles ;-).
Depending on your need, you could use multiple fields for multiple
authors
  <creator> Jones </creator>
  <creator> Smith </creator>
  <creator> Doe </creator>

Or you could have an author statement like those seen in many citations:
  <creatorList>Jones; Smith; Doe; et al</creatorList>

At least in this way you know what you have, and you don't have to parse
the field into separate names if you don't have that need. (Because
parsing always adds a risk of error or loss, i.e. what do you do with
that "et al" in MODS? yet it carries information.)

And a citation format would have similar ways to encode the volume,
number and other designations for serials -- separately, if that's
available, or as a general statement, if that's all that the citation
provides. Again, the point is that you want your data elements to be
"true" to the data in them -- you want to know if the "volume number" is
just the number or if it has the caption ("v.3"). You want to know if
you have just the first page number (which is all many indexing services
give you), if you have the first and last, or if you have the number of
pages (which is included in some services).

I always get nervous about shoe-horning one set of metadata into another
because the meaning of the data elements and what's in them gets fuzzy,
and that makes it hard to do elegant programming. You lose information
about what your data looks like and what it represents. I don't feel
that data has to be perfect; I do want the data and the data elements to
be in sync.
--
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Karen Coyle
Digital Library Specialist
http://www.kcoyle.net
Ph: 510-540-7596 Fax: 510-848-3913
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