An Inquiry and Analysis of Metadata Utilization A Case Study of MARC

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An Inquiry and Analysis of Metadata Utilization
A Case Study of MARC
2005 ASIST Annual Meeting, November 1, 2005,
Charlotte, North Carolina

• William E. Moenltwemoen_at_unt.edugtSchool of
  Library and Information SciencesTexas Center for
  Digital KnowledgeUniversity of North
  TexasDenton, TX 72603

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Two quality criteria

• Fullness/completeness
• Usefulness

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Context for the initial analysis

• Z39.50 Interoperability Testbed project
• A Institute of Museum and Library Services
  National Leadership Grant
• Goal Improve Z39.50 semantic interoperability
  among libraries for information access and
  resource sharing
• Interoperability across library online catalogs
• Indexing of MARC records to support searching
• Richness of MARC content designation available
• Inform indexing guidelines and policies

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Indexing MARC

• Indexing Guidelines to Support Z39.50 Profile
  Searches (available on Z-Interop website)
• Identified all MARC 21 fields/subfields that can
  contain author, title, or subject data
• Author-related fields/subfields 119
• AuthorTitle-related fields/subfields 21
• Title-related fields/subfields 253
• Subject-related fields/subfields 144

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Z-Interop test dataset

• Approximately 1 sample of MARC records from
  OCLCs WorldCat database
• Weighted sampling based on number of libraries
  holding the object represented by the record
• 419,657 total MARC records
• 89 of records full level cataloging
• Formats represented in test dataset

• Books 91
• Cartographic Materials lt 1
• Electronic resources lt 1
• Archival/Mixed Materials lt1

• Sound recordings 4
• Visual Materials 1
• Serials 3

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MARC 21 content designation
MARC 21 Field Groups Currently Defined Obsolete Total MARC 1972 (Books Format Only)
00x 6 1 7 3
0xx 238 7 245 28
1xx 66 1 67 40
2xx 137 32 169 15
3xx 109 32 141 4
4xx 69 0 69 37
5xx 323 38 361 8
6xx 184 5 189 66
7xx 452 47 499 41
8xx 141 20 161 36
TOTAL 1725 183 1908 278
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Content designation in dataset
MARC 21 Field Groups Currently Defined Obsolete Unlikely Used Total
00x 6 0 0 6
0xx 96 1 33 130
1xx 49 0 2 51
2xx 81 0 19 100
3xx 23 6 0 29
4xx 10 0 30 40
5xx 128 1 3 132
6xx 104 1 7 112
7xx 205 0 5 210
8xx 105 3 8 116
TOTAL 807 12 107 926
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Summary frequency results
Total number of fields/subfields occurring in
dataset 13,849,499
Frequency of Fields/Subfields of All Occurrences
gt 600,000 1 4.4
500,000 gt 599,999 0 0
400,000 gt 499,999 13 39.9
300,000 gt 399,999 6 14.3
200,000 gt 299,999 6 10.6
100,000 gt 199,999 10 10.3
TOTAL 36 79.5
Only 4 of all fields/subfields account for 80
of all occurrences or 96 of all fields/subfields
account for 20 of all occurrences
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Characteristics of top 36

• Most frequently occurring 650 a Subject data
• 2nd most frequently occurring 040 d Cataloging
  source
• 3rd 4th most frequently occurring 260 a b
  Publication information
• 5th most frequently occurring 245 a Title
• Contain data useful to end users 28
• Contain control numbers, etc. 5
• Contain data useful to catalogers 3
• Top 36 fields/subfields

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Implications for indexing

• 537 fields/subfields contain author, title,
  subject data
• 381 of these actually occur in Z-Interop dataset
• Total occurrences of the 381 4,397,712
• 19 of the 381 (5) account for 80 of all
  occurrences
• 9 of 19 are subject-related
• 5 of 19 are author-related
• 5 of 19 are title-related
• Preliminary testing using only 19 indexed fields
• 95 - 100 of correct records retrieved!

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The MCDU Project

• The MARC Content Designation Utilization Project
• What is the extent of catalogers use of content
  designation available in MARC 21?
• Develop and implement systematic methods,
  procedures, and software tools to produce
  reliable and valid analysis of MARC 21 content
  designation use
• MARC record as artifact of cataloging enterprise

FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT THE PROJECT WEBSITE
http//www.mcdu.unt.edu/
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The MCDU dataset analysis

• 56 million MARC records all WorldCat bib
  records
• Parsed and stored in MySQL
• 20 databases
• LC and Non-LC created records
• 10 databases each based on type of record/format
• Frequency counts of all fields/subfields
• Non-LC Book Format field occurrence results

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Making sense of the numbers

• The numbers dont stand on their own
  contextualizing, qualifying, exploring,
  understanding
• Metadata quality Fullness/completeness
• Identify core elements of bibliographic records
  based on the analysis of format-specific samples
  and compare with existing recommendations for
  core records
• Metadata quality Usefulness
• Comparing the FRBR conceptual frameworks user
  tasks, MARC content designation supporting those
  tasks, and utilization of that content
  designation in the records

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References

• MARC Content Designation Utilization Project
• http//www.mcdu.unt.edu
• Z39.50 Interoperability Testbed
• http//www.unt.edu/zinterop/