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Third Millennium Cataloging
XML for Catalogers and Metadata Librarians
How are today's librarians to manage and describe the ever-expanding volumes of resources, in both digital and print formats? The use of XML in cataloging and metadata workflows can improve metadata quality, the consistency of cataloging workflows, and adherence to standards. This book is intended to enable current and future catalogers and metadata librarians to progress beyond a bare surface-level acquaintance with XML, thereby enabling them to integrate XML technologies more fully into their cataloging workflows.
Building on the wealth of work on library descriptive practices, cataloging, and metadata, XML for Catalogers and Metadata Librarians explores the use of XML to serialize, process, share, and manage library catalog and metadata records. The authors' expert treatment of the topic is written to be accessible to those with little or no prior practical knowledge of or experience with how XML is used. Readers will gain an educated appreciation of the nuances of XML and grasp the benefit of more advanced and complex XML techniques as applied to applications relevant to catalogers and metadata librarians.
Building on the wealth of work on library descriptive practices, cataloging, and metadata, XML for Catalogers and Metadata Librarians explores the use of XML to serialize, process, share, and manage library catalog and metadata records. The authors' expert treatment of the topic is written to be accessible to those with little or no prior practical knowledge of or experience with how XML is used. Readers will gain an educated appreciation of the nuances of XML and grasp the benefit of more advanced and complex XML techniques as applied to applications relevant to catalogers and metadata librarians.
404 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2013
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About the author
Timothy W. Cole
5 booksTimothy W Cole is Professor of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
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April 5, 2014
Over the last several years I have read a variety of books on XML, but this book by Cole and Han is the one I believe is essential for every digital librarian (about all of us now) to own: they have taken a complex standard and elegantly show how it can be applied. Timothy W. Cole is Mathematics and Digital Content Access Librarian at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Myung-Ja K. Han is Metadata Librarian at the same institution.
The book is divided neatly into four major parts: I. Introduction and overview; II. Structured metadata in XML; III. Authoring and validating XML; IV. Metadata crosswalks, XML transformations, and RDF XML. Several chapters and sections of the book are truly outstanding – in particular Chapter 2, entitled “XML: Why It Is Important to Catalogers and Metadata Librarians,” is invaluable. In institutions where XML has never been utilized, it can be hard to plead the case for XML-based projects to managers who may not know what it is. Cole and Han succinctly explain why it is relevant to libraries and support their case throughout the book by presenting case studies in each chapter. Indeed, the case studies were superlative and, I found, that in instances where some chapter text confused me the case studies often made patently clear what they were talking about in the chapter (e.g., Case Study 5.2 Hypatia A MODS Record Creation and Ingestion Tool).
General readers may be put off by the book’s textbook format with topical questions and exercises at the end of every chapter. I found them to be useful, though, in terms of letting me know what I should have gotten out of the chapter. In addition, the book is very heavy in computer jargon, but Cole and Han go to great lengths to define the terms within the text and there is a glossary at the back of the book. A minor annoyance is the smallness of the illustrations, but they are legible enough and their copiousness is very welcome. Finally - although the authors make this point quite clear in Chapter 3: XML Core Syntax and Grammar - the reader will not come away from this book knowing how to code XML in any sophisticated manner. (The authors list some great online tutorials, but I suggest reading Beginning XML . Wiley Publishing)
Cole and Han’s book on XML will become a vade-mecum for many librarians who have been introduced to XML, but who have not been shown how it can and has been applied in the past. This book truly shows the power of XML in action and I cannot imagine starting an XML project without referring to it numerous times. The wealth of information, the breadth of coverage (from ONIX to MODS and to RELAX NG), and the clarity of the prose make this book a must-have for any librarian who considers themselves digitally literate, or for any information science student looking to achieve such literacy.
The book is divided neatly into four major parts: I. Introduction and overview; II. Structured metadata in XML; III. Authoring and validating XML; IV. Metadata crosswalks, XML transformations, and RDF XML. Several chapters and sections of the book are truly outstanding – in particular Chapter 2, entitled “XML: Why It Is Important to Catalogers and Metadata Librarians,” is invaluable. In institutions where XML has never been utilized, it can be hard to plead the case for XML-based projects to managers who may not know what it is. Cole and Han succinctly explain why it is relevant to libraries and support their case throughout the book by presenting case studies in each chapter. Indeed, the case studies were superlative and, I found, that in instances where some chapter text confused me the case studies often made patently clear what they were talking about in the chapter (e.g., Case Study 5.2 Hypatia A MODS Record Creation and Ingestion Tool).
General readers may be put off by the book’s textbook format with topical questions and exercises at the end of every chapter. I found them to be useful, though, in terms of letting me know what I should have gotten out of the chapter. In addition, the book is very heavy in computer jargon, but Cole and Han go to great lengths to define the terms within the text and there is a glossary at the back of the book. A minor annoyance is the smallness of the illustrations, but they are legible enough and their copiousness is very welcome. Finally - although the authors make this point quite clear in Chapter 3: XML Core Syntax and Grammar - the reader will not come away from this book knowing how to code XML in any sophisticated manner. (The authors list some great online tutorials, but I suggest reading Beginning XML . Wiley Publishing)
Cole and Han’s book on XML will become a vade-mecum for many librarians who have been introduced to XML, but who have not been shown how it can and has been applied in the past. This book truly shows the power of XML in action and I cannot imagine starting an XML project without referring to it numerous times. The wealth of information, the breadth of coverage (from ONIX to MODS and to RELAX NG), and the clarity of the prose make this book a must-have for any librarian who considers themselves digitally literate, or for any information science student looking to achieve such literacy.
Displaying 1 of 1 review