Re: [CODE4LIB] One Data Format Identifier (and Registry) to Rule Them All
I don't understand from your description how Topic Maps solve the identifying multiple versions of a standard problem. Which was the original question, right? Or have I gotten confused? I didn't think the original question was even about topic vocabularies, but about how to best provide an identifier for (eg) Marc 2.1 and another for Marc 2.2, while still allowing machines to ignore versions if they like and just request and/or identify generic marc. And you said that Topic Maps had a solution to this? I am genuinely curious -- not neccesarily because I'm ever going to use Topic Maps (sorry!), but because if they have a well thought out tested solution to this, it could serve as a model in other contexts. Jonathan Alexander Johannesen wrote: On Wed, May 6, 2009 at 18:44, Mike Taylor m...@indexdata.com wrote: Can't you just tell us? Sorry, but surely you must be tired of me banging on this gong by now? It's not that I don't want to seem helpful, but I've been writing a bit on this here already and don't want to be marked as spam for Topic Maps. In the Topic Maps world our global identificators are called PSI, for Published Subject Indicators. There's a few subtleties within this, but they are not so different from any other identificator you'll find elsewhere (RDF, library world, etc.) except of course they are *always* URIs. Now, the thing here is that they should *always* be published somewhere, whether as a part of a list or somewhere. The next thing is that they always should resolve to something (although the standard don't require this, however I'd say you're doing it wrong if you couldn't do this, even if it sometimes is an evil necessity). This last part is really the important bit, where any PSI will act as 1) a global identificator, and 2) resolve to a human text explaining what it represents. Systems can just use it while at the same time people can choose the right ones for their uses. And, yes, the identificators can be done any way you slice them. Some might think that ie. a PSI set for all dates is crazy as you need to produce identificators for all dates (or times), and that would be just way too much to deal with, but again, that's not an identifcation problem, that's a resolver problem. If I can browse to a PSI and get the text that this is 3rd of June, 19971, using the whatsnot calendar style, then that's safe for me to use for my birthday. Let's pretend the PSI is http://iso.org/datetime/03061971. By releasing an URI template computers can work with this automatically, no frills. Now a bit more technical; any topic (which is a Topic Map representation of any subject, where subject is defined as anything you can ever hope to think of) can have more than one PSI, because I might use the PSI http://someother.org/time/date/3/6/1971 for my date. If my application only understand this former set of PSIs, I can't merge and find similar cross-semantics (which really is the core of the problem this thread has been talking about). But simply attach the second PSI to the same Topic, and you do. In fact, both parties will understand perfectly what you're talking about. More complex is that the definitions of PSI sets doesn't have to happen on the subject level, ie. the Topic called Alex to which I tried to attach my birthday. It can be moved to a meta model level, where you say the Topic for Time and dates have the PSI for both organsiations, and all Topics just use one or the other; we're shifting the explicity of identification up a notch. Having multiple PSIs might seem a bit unordered, but it's based on the notion of organic growth, just like the web. People will gravitate towards using PSIs from the most trusted sources (or most accurate or most whatever), shifting identification schemes around. This is a good thing (organic growth) at the price of multiple identifiers, but if the library world started creating PSIs, I betcha humanity and the library world both could be saved in one fell swoop! (That's another gong I like to bang) I'm kinda anticipating Jonathan saying this is all so complex now. :) But it's not really; your application only has to have complexity in the small meta model you set up, *not* for every single Topic you've got in your map. And they're mergable and shareable, and as such can be merged and fixed (or cleaned or sobered or made less complex) for all your various needs also. Anyway, that's the basics. Let me know if you want me to bang on. :) For me, the problem the library face isn't really the mechanisms of this (because this is solvable, and I guess you just have to trust that the Topic Maps community have been doing this for the last 10 years or so already :), however, but how you're going to fit existing resources into FRBR and RDA, but that's a separate discussion. Regards, Alex
[CODE4LIB] Curious about Cell Phone Barcode Scanning Apps
I'm interested in some advice on building an app to pickup barcode data through a cell phone camera and return OPAC/Library Thing/WorldCat etc. results to a mobile interface. I know that Android has a UPC barcode reader linked to a shopping app, and I'm wondering if this can be used or repurposed, or if there's a better place to begin. Thanks!
Re: [CODE4LIB] Curious about Cell Phone Barcode Scanning Apps
I started to do a just bit of web research in this. Open source barcode photo recognition software looks like it's _just_ starting to become realistically available. This was the product that looked most promissing in my web research (not sure if it's what the Android app is using): http://code.google.com/p/zxing/ My Umlaut software would be an _ideal_ end-point of barcode recognition, is why I started to look into it. Umlaut is designed specifically to meet the goal of taking a known item citation (such as an ISBN, sure), and returning a range of library availability and services for that item. http://wiki.code4lib.org/index.php/Umlaut The next step, which I haven't figured out yet, is how to get your software to participate in MMS/SMS architecture -- in particular to receive MMS/SMS messages in a way that's affordable to you and convenient to your users. (It looks like some but not all cell phones can send MMS messages to email, but not necessarily as conveniently as sending MMS to a cell number; but I'm not sure if there's a cheap way to have software receive MMS messages at a cell number. The Android app of course performs all it's processing on the Android itself, which you can do on a device-by-device basis for devices powerful enough for that; but I too am attracted to the idea of an MMS solution that would work on any MMS capable device, with no need to customize per device). I also haven't actually looked at the zxing code yet. But I'd love to have Umlaut able to receive an MMS message, and give the user back a concise list of library services/links. So many interesting projects, not enough time. Jonathan Matt Amory wrote: I'm interested in some advice on building an app to pickup barcode data through a cell phone camera and return OPAC/Library Thing/WorldCat etc. results to a mobile interface. I know that Android has a UPC barcode reader linked to a shopping app, and I'm wondering if this can be used or repurposed, or if there's a better place to begin. Thanks!
Re: [CODE4LIB] One Data Format Identifier (and Registry) to Rule Them All
On Sat, May 9, 2009 at 00:32, Jonathan Rochkind rochk...@jhu.edu wrote: I don't understand from your description how Topic Maps solve the identifying multiple versions of a standard problem. It's the mechanism of having multiple identifiers for Topics, so, in pseudo ; Topic MARC21 psi info:ofi/fmt:xml:xsd:MARC21 psi http://loc.org/stuff/marc21; property #mime-type whatever for the binary Topic MARC 1.1 is_a MARC psi info:srw/schema/1/marcxml-v1.1 psi http://loc.org/stuff/marcxml-v1.1; property #mime-type whatever 1.1 Topic MARC 1.2 is_a MARC psi info:srw/schema/1/marcxml-v1.2 psi http://bingo.com/psi/marcxml; property #mime-type whatever 1.2 Or, if if MARC 1.2 is backwards compatible with 1.1 ; Topic MARC 1.2 is_a MARC 1.1 psi info:srw/schema/1/marcxml-v1.2 Or, if I make my own unofficial version ; Topic MARC 2.0 is_a MARC 1.2 psi http://alex.com/psi/marc-2.0; This is enough to hobble together what is and isn't compatible in types of formats, so if your application is Topic Maps aware, this should be trivial (including what format to ignore or react to). The point is that you don't need *one* identifier for things; Topics are proxies for knowledge, and part of the notion of knowledge is what identifies that knowledge. Multiple PSIs help us leverage both rigid and fuzzy systems. As to the identifiers themselves (as in, the formatting), is that important? Anyway, I'm suspecting I don't see what the problem seems to be. To create the best identifier for things seems a bit of a strange notion to me, but is this based on that there is only (or rather, that you're trying to create) one identifier for any one thing? Alex -- --- Project Wrangler, SOA, Information Alchemist, UX, RESTafarian, Topic Maps -- http://shelter.nu/blog/
Re: [CODE4LIB] Curious about Cell Phone Barcode Scanning Apps
On May 8, 2009, at 10:39 AM, Matt Amory wrote: I'm interested in some advice on building an app to pickup barcode data through a cell phone camera and return OPAC/Library Thing/WorldCat etc. results to a mobile interface. I know that Android has a UPC barcode reader linked to a shopping app, and I'm wondering if this can be used or repurposed, or if there's a better place to begin. Consider Semapedia, funny looking barcodes to map the physical world objects to the Webbed world: http://en.semapedia.org/ -- Eric Lease Morgan
Re: [CODE4LIB] Curious about Cell Phone Barcode Scanning Apps
Google provided the barcode-recognition line-interpolation software as open source for Android developers to build on. That explains why I have about 4 barcode-scanning apps on the G1. Note that most common cellphone camera's haven't advanced enough to get reliable resolution for barcodes, in particular the up-close macro-like distances you would use a scanner at. My old nokia, despite the 3 MP camera, couldn't get focus up close. In a year or two that should be different for the currently available models. --Joe On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 10:39 AM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: I'm interested in some advice on building an app to pickup barcode data through a cell phone camera and return OPAC/Library Thing/WorldCat etc. results to a mobile interface. I know that Android has a UPC barcode reader linked to a shopping app, and I'm wondering if this can be used or repurposed, or if there's a better place to begin. Thanks!
[CODE4LIB] exploiting z39.50
How might I go about exploiting Z39.50 to extract specific MARC records from a library catalog? More precisely, I am trying to download sets of MARC records from remote library catalogs destined for a sort of union catalog. I see each of these records being identified with a specific string in a local note or local subject field. This string might be CRRA, and my question is three-fold: 1. What MARC field/subfield might I put this string? 2. How would I go about getting the string indexed? 3. How might I go about querying the server for records with this string? For example, I might put CRRA in 599 $a. I would cross my fingers hoping this field gets indexes, and I might be able to search for it like this [1]: @attr 1=63 2=3 3=3 4=2 5=100 6=1 CRRA Am I on the right track? [1] http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/bath/tp-bath2.23-e.htm#b -- Eric Morgan
Re: [CODE4LIB] exploiting z39.50
From: Eric Lease Morgan emor...@nd.edu 1. What MARC field/subfield might I put this string? 2. How would I go about getting the string indexed? 3. How might I go about querying the server for records with this string? I can at least talk about the third question. There was work on a marc attribute set, though not completed. If you look at the oid register at http://www.loc.gov/z3950/agency/defns/oids.html you'll see that the latest work on it (second draft) was in 2000, http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/iso/z3950/MARC_attribute_set_2.doc. So if someone actually wanted to put it to use it would have to be completed. For SRU there is a complete marc context set, http://www.loc.gov/standards/sru/resources/marc-context-set.html. --Ray
Re: [CODE4LIB] exploiting z39.50
I wonder how xID handles superceded OCLCnums, if it'll still succesfully find the right matches for you? Ray Denenberg, Library of Congress wrote: From: Eric Lease Morgan emor...@nd.edu 1. What MARC field/subfield might I put this string? 2. How would I go about getting the string indexed? 3. How might I go about querying the server for records with this string? I can at least talk about the third question. There was work on a marc attribute set, though not completed. If you look at the oid register at http://www.loc.gov/z3950/agency/defns/oids.html you'll see that the latest work on it (second draft) was in 2000, http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/iso/z3950/MARC_attribute_set_2.doc. So if someone actually wanted to put it to use it would have to be completed. For SRU there is a complete marc context set, http://www.loc.gov/standards/sru/resources/marc-context-set.html. --Ray
Re: [CODE4LIB] exploiting z39.50
On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 3:08 PM, Jonathan Rochkind rochk...@jhu.edu wrote: I wonder how xID handles superceded OCLCnums, if it'll still succesfully find the right matches for you? This is documented in http://xisbn.worldcat.org/xisbnadmin/xoclcnum/api.htm#deleted Worldcat uses OCLC Control Number Cross-Reference to track deleted OCLC numbers. When an OCLC number is deleted, it's still search-able from this service. In the response, we use presentOclcnum to specify present OCLC number. For example 2416076 was merged into 24991049, a request of the deleted number 2416076 will return: rsp xmlns=http://worldcat.org/xid/xoclcnum/; stat=ok oclcnum lccn=34025476 presentOclcnum=249910492416076/oclcnum /rsp The presentOclcnum field is omitted when an OCLC number is active, so request to current OCLC number 24991049 returns: rsp xmlns=http://worldcat.org/xid/xoclcnum/; stat=ok oclcnum lccn=34025476 24991049/oclcnum /rsp Xiaoming Ray Denenberg, Library of Congress wrote: From: Eric Lease Morgan emor...@nd.edu 1. What MARC field/subfield might I put this string? 2. How would I go about getting the string indexed? 3. How might I go about querying the server for records with this string? I can at least talk about the third question. There was work on a marc attribute set, though not completed. If you look at the oid register at http://www.loc.gov/z3950/agency/defns/oids.html you'll see that the latest work on it (second draft) was in 2000, http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/iso/z3950/MARC_attribute_set_2.doc. So if someone actually wanted to put it to use it would have to be completed. For SRU there is a complete marc context set, http://www.loc.gov/standards/sru/resources/marc-context-set.html. --Ray
