Author: zemkat

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RDA Tip of the Week: Misleading page numbers

When recording pagination of a “typical” book (sequential page numbers on both sides of pages), record the last numbered page of each page sequence, followed by the term “pages”: (RDA 3.4.5.2)

  • xi, 213 pages
  • 210, 29 pages

If you know that those numbers don’t exactly describe the number of pages, for example:

  • a few pages are unnumbered (common in front matter!)
  • a few page numbers are skipped
  • a few page numbers are repeated

that is fine. As long as the numbers you record give a rough idea of the extent of the book (and no content is actually missing!) such abnormalities do not need to be recorded in the extent, or even noted in the record.

If, however, the number is very misleading, for example:

  • the number on the last page is a typo (such as 119 for 191)
  • pages are printed on both sides but sequentially numbered on one side

this strangeness should be recorded in the extent, for example:

  • 119, that is, 191 pages
  • 101 leaves, that is, 202 pages

(RDA 3.4.5.5)

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ארצינו : ספר מקרא על פי הנושא המרכזי לשנת הלמוד השניה או השלישית / מאת צבי שפרשטיין :ציר בידי אשר פורסט (OCLC #649829978)

When reaching the last mile of a big messy project, I recommend addressing any problem titles while the material is still fresh in your head, rather than letting them cook on the shelf for a while. In the meantime, you might forget not only how to type in that alphabet, but even how to copy and paste it.

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A showcase of the Italian research in magmatic, metamorphic and applied petrology / under the patronage of the Gruppo Nazionale di Petrografia (GNP) and with the support of the 32nd International Geological Congress organizing committee. (OCLC #868312242)

It’s a book with a CD-ROM in the back.  Wait no; it’s a CD-ROM with an accompanying booklet! Also, a special issue of a journal. Actually, three special issues bound (burned) into a mega-special-issue! The 33Xs and 740s are many.

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The common place book of William Turner, M.D. : an exiled reformer under K. Henry VIII, and Dean of Wells in the reign of K. Edward VI, the father of natural history in England … (OCLC #52094229)

Ooh, a commonplace book, just like the Baudelaires kept! What exciting things lurk in here? I’m not exactly sure… The handwriting is crowded, and much of it is in Latin and Greek.

Having just given a talk this morning about searching for copy in OCLC, I feel a bit silly for finding the record sooner: I had only searched for “commonplace”, not “common place”. 246 now added.

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Analysis of traffic growth rates / by Monica L. Barrett, R. Clark Graves, David L. Allen, Jerry G. Pigman, Ghassan Abu-Lebdeh, Lisa Aultman-Hall, Sarah T. Bowling. (OCLC #868084240)

We are cataloging this series of digitized documents in our institutional repository UKnowledge. Fortunately, most titles have print copy in OCLC with good subject cataloging and even some URLs for other electronic copies identified, so that helps us to derive our original records.

One difficulty is that there can be up to three different title-page-ish pages to choose from: a cover, an actual title page, and a report documentation page with fields organized into boxes. Not all of these may be present in a given report, but sometimes when they are, they contain slightly different information.

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AccessMedicine / from McGraw-Hill Medical.  (various records)

Platform change!  Fortunately the old URLs redirect properly (hooray!) but surely the content is slightly different.  The title-list format is definitely different.

To avoid re-cataloging the whole platform, and to help reliably spot the differences, I re-formatted the old title/edition list (using vim) to match the new format, and compared the two side-by-side (with vimdiff, shown).

Blue on the right means a new title has been added; blue on the left means a title has disappeared. Pink just means a difference, sometimes a new edition to be cataloged, but sometimes just a variant in punctuation, spelling or title choice.

The title list documents were pretty different, but it looks like relatively little new cataloging is needed!  Next month will be simpler: I’ll download the current title list again, and compare with what I have now.

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Still running : the autobiography of Nate Northington, the first African American football player in the Southeastern Conference / Nathaniel Northington ; with La Monte McNeese. (OCLC #851416833)

Individual biographies in football are classed under GV939.A2-Z. The Classification Web description looks pretty normal, so it is tempting to cutter by the author’s name. Doing so would hide his autobiography under N, between biographies of him written by others. Why not put his first?

Though ClassWeb doesn’t mention it, “Individual Biography” numbers have a specific meaning for A2-A5, which (unless specified) is detailed in the Biography Table; this particular title should have second cutter A3 for Autobiographies, diaries, etc. putting it close to the front, where it belongs.

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RDA Tip of the Week: The Initial Tip

When transcribing initials into descriptive fields, do not leave any space between them. (RDA 1.7.6) Examples:

Title:

  • Meet J.K. Rowling
  • Mosby’s PDQ for LPN

Statement of responsibility:

  • by J.R.R. Tolkien
  • poems by T.S. Eliot

Publisher:

  • A.P.H. Publishing Corporation
  • CNN Politics

When recording the name of a person or family as an authorized access point, there SHOULD be space between initials. (RDA 8.5.6.1) Examples:

  • Milne, A. A. (Alan Alexander), 1882-1956
  • Skinner, B. F. (Burrhus Frederic), 1904-1990

However, if the authorized access point is a corporate body, those initials (even if they are part of a name!) should have no spaces. (RDA 8.5.6.2) Examples:

  • A.W. Calhoun Medical Library
  • ABC Multimedia
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Young Lakota / a co-production of Cine Qua Non, Inc. and the Independent Television Service ; produced and directed by Marion Lipschutz & Rose Rosenblatt ; executive producer: Heather Rae. (OCLC #867875362, OCLC #859210773)

These two discs appear identical except for the running time; they even have the same DVD menu and credits as far as I can tell. From the invoice, I determined that one was the Film Festival version and the other was the Broadcast version, but I had to do some digging to figure out which was which, and make a new record for the one that was not in OCLC. (As one is an abridgement of the other, I’d consider them at least different expressions!)

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У истоков мира : Русские этиологические сказки и легенды / составление и комментарии О.В. Беловой, Г.И. Кабаковой = At the origins of the world : Russian etiological tales and legends / compiled and commented by O.V. Belova, G.I. Kabakova. (OCLC 867778645)

This book had a full parallel title page, which was helpful, but meant that I had to also consult the ISBD standard.

RDA only specifies content: which elements to record, and in this case, the order of all instances of a specific element; for example, RDA 2.4.3.3 talks about all parallel statements of responsibility. We are doing our description in ISBD (display), so must check that standard for rules on ordering and punctuating the full paragraph.