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RDA Toolkit Blog

Report from Midwinter

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 - 6:58 pm e — jhennelly

ALA's Midwinter Meeting in Dallas has included plenty of news for RDA Toolkit users. Today's RDA Update Forum was a particular stampede of useful information. Most significantly, Beacher Wiggins, Director for Acquisitions & Bibliographic Access at the Library of Congress and a member of the U.S. RDA Test Coordinating Committee, reported that significant progress has been been made on all the tasks put forth in the committee's June 2011 report.

ALA and De Gruyter partner on German RDA

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 - 3:24 pm e — jhennelly

Today, Berlin-based publisher De Gruyter announced the collaboration between themselves and ALA Publishing (on behalf of the RDA Co-Publishers) on the publication and distribution of a German language version of RDA: Resource Description and Access. Read the entire De Gruyter press release.

Tester Interview -- Douglas County Libraries

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 - 10:19 am e — jhennelly

Douglas County Libraries (DCL) is a public library system that serves the citizens of Douglas County in central Colorado. The DCL does both original and copy cataloging, and it is a NACO library. They use SirsiDynix's Horizon ILS. The cataloging staff consists of one senior cataloger and four catalog librarians, who primarily do copy cataloging. Two staff members participated in the RDA test. DCL continues to use RDA for the original cataloging of books and other select formats. Nancy Kall, Senior Cataloger, Special Collections at DCL, answered our questions.

RDA at ALA's Midwinter Meeting

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 - 4:29 pm e — jhennelly

The full program for ALA's 2012 Midwinter Meeting is now online through ALA Connect Conference Scheduler. The Conference Scheduler makes it easy to track down events focused on your interests, and to create and manage a personal schedule for your time at the meeting.

Tester Interview -- State Library of Pennsylvania

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 - 11:03 am e — jhennelly

The State Library of Pennsylvania can trace its origins to a 1745 action by the legislature of the colony of Pennsylvania. The cataloging of three professionals and one paraprofessional does both original and copy cataloging and creates authority records. The three staff professionals participated in the test. The staff uses the Voyager ILS from Ex Libris. The State Library has continued to catalog in RDA, though they have relied on AACR2 for copy cataloging. Thomas Duszak, head of collections/cataloging, answered our questions.

Tips in Threes -- Do Nothing Edition

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 - 11:57 am e — jhennelly

This month's tips have two things in common. First, they all address recommendations that arose from last year's U.S. RDA Test. Second and, depending on your perspective, more importantly, none of the tips really require you to do anything. They are just there for you to chose. Certainly one could argue that pointing out something that does really require any thoughtful action does not constitute a "tip." But these are all new features to RDA Toolkit, ones that users specifically requested.

Tester Interview -- North Carolina State University

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 - 9:09 am e — jhennelly

North Carolina State University is a land grant university, and its libraries serve a population of more than 34,000 students and 8,000 faculty and staff. The cataloging staff does both original and copy cataloging. They do not create authority records. All of their 18-member staff participated in the U.S. RDA Test. NCSU uses SirsiDynix's Unicorn ILS. Christee Pascale, Assistant Head of Metadata and Cataloging, answered our questions for NCSU.

Chris Oliver Chosen to Copy Edit RDA

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 - 12:30 pm e — jhennelly

ALA Publishing, acting on behalf of the Co-Publishers of RDA: Resource Description and Access and under the direction of the Committee of Principals, is pleased to announce the selection of Chris Oliver as Copy Editor for improving the readability of RDA.

Tester Interview -- Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 - 10:26 am e — jhennelly

Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh was established in 1895 and serves the citizens of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County. This public library does both original and copy cataloging as well as authority work. The cataloging staff consists of 4 full-time and 1 half-time professional catalogers. All the full-time staffers participated in the RDA test. Carnegie Library uses the Millennium ILS from Innovative Interfaces. Charles Herrold supplied the responses to our questions.

Reports from the JSC Conference last week.

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 - 9:55 am e — jhennelly

Last Week the Joint Steering Committee for the development of RDA: Resource Description and Access (JSC) met in Glasgow, Scotland with a long list of issues to cover. You can review the agenda here, and you can get a quick update on JSC rulings and decisions from John Attig's blog. Mr. Attig, the Authority Control Librarian at Pennsylvania State University, serves as the ALA representative to the JSC.