LibraryThing Catalog

Reading this post from the Cataloguing Librarian has gotten me thinking again about how the Friends library can use LibraryThing for their library. I had lunch with Mary a few weeks ago, and she told me she was still adding new books to their LibraryThing account. We were just exploring the options when I got my new job and couldn’t go the Meeting House on a regular basis anymore. They do use Surpass to catalog, but they’re not interested in spending the money for an OPAC based on that catalog at this point. (We both agreed, however, that it was important to have the quality full cataloging somewhere, even if it wasn’t being overtly used at this point.) Most of the patrons are in the Meeting House every week for Meeting for Worship, so they can browse the catalog locally on a laptop in the library. LibraryThing might encourage more people to take a look at the collection, though, and would also let members know when new books are added. I guess I’m just not sure whether they need to incorporate LibraryThing into a website, like Palmerston North City Library, or just promote their LibraryThing account more. I would venture to say the latter, since, as I said, they are fortunate in having a membership that is in physical proximity to the library every week.

Friendly Things

More Quaker libraries on LibraryThing:

• Henry J. Cadbury Library of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
• Newtown (PA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Milwaukee Friends Library
• Frankford (PA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Perry City (NY) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• North Seattle Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Part of Northwest Yearly Meeting)
• Strawberry Creek (CA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• New Market (TN) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (part of Wilmington Yearly Meeting)
• Twin Cities Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Harrisburg (PA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Moorestown (NJ) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Williamsburg (VA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• Richland (PA) Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
• (Not sure who this is yet: the name is “LR_Friends”)
• Lancaster Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends

10 July 2008 (on site): 1:30pm-3:30pm
10 July 2008 (on site): 6:00pm-9:00pm (Library Committee meeting)

The Thing

So, yes, it turns out that we do not have our own dedicated, accessible server, and so the solution to providing online access to the catalog will be through Library Thing. I’ve set us up, and some of the catalog is here:
www.librarything.com/catalog/PittsburghFriendsMtg.

If they were going to pay for a web-based OPAC from the Surpass company, then I hope they will decide to pay for an upgraded LT account. I’ve found some other Quaker libraries on there, too, like… the West Australia Regional Meeting of … (Quakers). Okay, that’s the only one so far that I can tell is actually a meeting library.

More soon.

03 July 2008 (on site): 1:30pm-4:30pm

Business as Usual

This week was fairly uneventful. Mostly I downloaded records from OCLC for books that the volunteers were unable to find using the copy cataloging software. I didn’t get a chance to do subject assigning, but I spoke with Pat about the whole collocation-via-subject headings that correspond with the shelving categories; she advised me to stick with the rule of assigning a subject heading as narrowly/specifically as possible. And that is what I will do.

I’ve also been reading Faith & Practice (leant by Jenny) as well as The Church Librarian’s Handbook.

07 February 2008 (on site): 10:45-3:15 | various (research): 3 hours total

Fits & Starts

Last week was a bit crazy and cut short (I forgot I had a doctor’s appointment), but I did speak with Mary about using the Quaker subject headings (QSH), and she’s all for it. I spent most of my time working on cataloging some books that the volunteers were unable to copy-catalog; I found records in OCLC, so it wasn’t difficult–they just didn’t show up on the usual searches.

I started using QSH; I think I assigned one to only one book, but this week I’ll work on that more. I’m generally going by Haverford’s rules, here:
http://www.haverford.edu/library/technical/Cataloging/quaker.htm

This is what they have to say:

• For “non-Quaker” subjects, the heading must be in proper LC form.
• For “Quaker” subjects, check if it is a legitimate LC heading or not and tag accordingly (650 or 690).
• (Note that if any part of the subject string — e.g., |a, |b, |v, |x, |y, |z — is not based on LC practice, then the field is tagged 690. For example, although “Society of Friends” used alone and “Slavery” used alone are valid LCSH headings, tagged 650 _0, “Society of Friends |x Slavery” is not a valid LC heading and must be tagged 690 __.) Be sure the Quaker heading is on the established list and if not discuss with the Quaker bibliographer.

I also started browsing the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting list of subjects here: http://www.pym.org/pm/library_col.php, although they are catagories, not really SH.

Thursday, 24 Jan: 12:00-12:45, 2:00-5:00 (on site) || Tuesday, 28 Jan: 9:00-10:00 (research)

Subjective

I met with Mary to discuss using the Quaker Subject Headings list; developed jointly by Haverford College, the Swarthmore College Peace Collection, and the American Friends Service Committee. The list is based on LCSH: Headings that are allowed in LC are listed as 150s; when more specification (i.e., free-floating subdivisions) or different headings altogether are requred that are not allowed by LC, the heading is listed as a 190. The format of the list is kind of unwieldy; I said I would put the information into a spreadsheet and see what I could do about making it more readable for us.

Also! It looks like they’ll be going with the Surpass Online Backup. This means that, not only will all the files be safe, they’ll be able to access the collection from any computer on which the Surpass software is installed.

Thursday, 17 Jan: 10:30-2:30 (onsite)

Changing the Subject

Okay! Found some links to resources to start creating a local thesaurus for the library:

http://www.swarthmore.edu/x7873.xml
http://www.quaker.ca/Publications/qbs/2008-09-QBS-booklist.pdf / http://www.quaker.ca/Publications/qbs/qbs.html
http://www.haverford.edu/library/technical/Cataloging/quaker.htm

Also! It turns out our software (Surpass CL) offers an Online Backup Service; I’m going to talk to Mary tomorrow and see about setting that up for the library.

Things are looking even better!

Wednesday, 16 Jan: 8:30-9:30 (research)