Abstract
MARC.pm and Prebulk are powerful tools for batch editing large files of bibliographic records in MARC format. This tutorial shows how they were used to preprocess netLibrary records prior to importing into Voyager.
The example is specific, but the methods can be applied to other projects. An interesting wrinkle is how UTA accommodated proxy-savvy URLs.
Background
NetLibrary books are eBooks, that is books available in electronic format via the web or other means. They are generally acquired by academic libraries as collections, often through consortial agreements. Files containing the corresponding bibliographic records are available to libraries wishing to add those records to their online catalogs (OPACs).
UTA was looking at an initial netLibrary load of over 5000 bibliographic records, the first of multiple loads to come.
The good news was that our library didn't have to create the records and we had a utility for batch loading.
However, each record needed to be edited -- ouch!
The Challenge
Each netLibrary bib record has an 856u subfield containing a URL link to that particular eBook. Once the records are loaded into the catalog, URL links allow an OPAC user to click and go directly to that item.
Access to netLibrary items is restricted to the University community. In order to make the links usable to off-campus users, we must pass them through the campus proxy server for authentication.
We wanted to create a holdings (MFHD) record for each item that had, in addition to the location and call number in the 852 tag, an 856u tag containing the URL to the eBook. As stated above, the netLibrary URL needed to be appended to our EZproxy URL.
We also wanted to customize the public note in the 856z subfield.
Additional minor changes included stripping some unwanted stuff out of the bib, adding a local call number to a 099 field, and tweaking the MFHD 008.
The prospect of manually editing this many records in Voyager was understandably daunting, so we wanted to make them right prior to doing a Bulk Import.
We knew that other libraries were preprocessing bibliographic records, so we began combing through Voyager manuals, VUGM session handouts, and the voyager-l listserv to find out how to do it.
The paucity of voyager-l traffic on the topic1 seemed to suggest that preprocessing bibs is not universally done (or that it is so intuitive that people don't have questions about it). Those libraries that had already paved the way were generally using MARC.pm,2 an open source Perl module, and/or Prebulk, a Voyager batch program.
Since we already had some experience with Perl, we decided that those tools would also work for us and (after a few fits and starts) developed a process for massaging netLibrary records.
Acronyms
1 Note that this tutorial was originally written in the summer of 2001.
2 Many libraries are also using the PC-based MarcEdit program to preprocess bib files.
