RDA : Resource Description and
Access
Deirdre Kiorgaard
Australian Committee on Cataloguing Representative
to the Joint Steering Committee for the Development of RDA
AACR to RDA
AACR and descriptive cataloguing
AACR is a robust standard, but …
– ‘Class of materials’ approach is no longer valid
• Need for principles-based instructions
• Need for extensibility
– Designed for the card catalogue not digital world
• Data needs to be usable in the web environment
RDA offers better coverage
– Visual, Archival & Online resources
Brave new world?
The power of the search engine
Next generation catalogues
tagging
reviews
synonym control
links
full text
table of contents
“The OPAC has tended to favour an increase in the number of access points over
the effective presentation of the relationships between resources. … It has been
the failure to exploit the navigational potential of this rich metadata that has given
the OPAC such a bad name.” Danskin, 2006.
Navigation and relationships
Controlled forms of name
 Preferred names for works
Carefully crafted subject vocabularies
RDA and relationships
 Preferred titles for works and expressions
 Links & relationships between works,
expressions, manifestations and items
 Relationships between works etc, and their
creators, etc
 Relationships between persons, families and
corporate bodies
RDA and FRBR/FRAD/FRSAR
 The value of conceptual models
– Identify & define the things that are important - entities
– Identify & define the attributes that characterise the entities
– Identify & define significant relationships between entities
 FRBR/FRAD/FRSAR
– Identify & define bibliographic entities, attributes and
relationships
 FRBR – user tasks
“ a structured framework for relating the data recorded in
bibliographic (and authority) records to the needs of the users
of those records.”
FRBR in practice
 Used in databases
Red Light Green, Fiction Finder, xISBN,
Austlit, Music Australia, Trove
 Used in library systems and catalogues
VTLS – Virtua
 FRBR Bibliography
http://www.ifla.org/VII/s13/wgfrbr/bibliography.htm
FRBR in practice – Fiction finder (1)
FRBR in practice – Fiction finder (2)
Work
FRBR in practice - Trove
Work
FRBR in practice - VTLS
Work
Expression
Manifestations
FRBR in practice – Austlit (1)
Work
Related works
FRBR in practice Austlit (2)
Expression
Manifestations
Benefits of FRBR
A new way of providing access
– Improved navigation of the catalogue for users
– Improved catalogue displays
• For researchers – a more organised display
• For the general public – a less cluttered display
Improved efficiency of data creation &
maintenance
The (not so)
secret life of catalogue data (1)
“metadata increasingly appears farther and
farther away from its original context”
Shreeves, Riley and Milewicz (2006).
Shared library databases
Digitisation projects
Institutional repositories
The (not so)
secret life of catalogue data (2)
 The GLAM sector
Galleries, libraries, archives
and museums
 The Internet
Catalogue records have jumped the fence
 Leading to:
Services based on data aggregations
Sharing of library data with other sectors
Exposure of library data to the internet
Whose standards?
“Standards are like toothbrushes; everyone
agrees they are a good idea, but nobody
wants to use anyone else’s.” Baca (2008)
Library standards
Digital library standards
Cultural institutions
Publishing
“Seeing Standards:
A Visualization of the Metadata Universe”
http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/~jenlrile/metadatamap/
Achieving commonality
When choosing the standards to use within the library sector:
– use existing standards where they exist
– influence the development of existing standards to cover
any perceived gaps or to address any issues
When working with other communities:
– use elements from existing standards where needed,
rather than re-inventing the wheel
– use and/or develop common vocabularies wherever
possible
– use or build upon common models and principles
– make our element sets available on the web
RDA and achieving commonality
Uses external vocabularies
Jointly develops new vocabularies
Draws on standards in related
communities
Is built on common models and principles
Includes mappings to other
standards/schema
RDA in the digital world
 Clearly defined element set
– better granularity, improved mapping to other schema,
e.g. Dublin Core, ISBD, MODS/MADS, MARC21
 Greater emphasis on relationships
– Better navigation and displays
 Better interoperability - common vocabularies
– Content type, carrier type, media type; Relationship
designators; Encoding formats, etc.
– Making vocabularies accessible
 RDA and the semantic web
Sample – RDA instructions
RDA as a cataloguing tool
Interactive and online
Integration with policies and processes
Draft implementation timeline
March/April 2010
ACOC survey on RDA training in
Australia
June 2010
RDA released
31 August 2010
RDA Toolkit open access period ends
July 2010-March 2011 US libraries test RDA
November 2010
Train-the trainer courses begin
Early 2011
Implementation of MARC changes on
Libraries Australia
Mid 2011
Implementation of RDA in Australian
and overseas libraries
Further information
Australian implementation
http://www.nla.gov.au/lis/stndrds/grps/acoc/rda.html
Enquiries: nlarda@nla.gov.au
Subscription options and Australian pricing
http://www.rdatoolkit.org/
MARC changes to support RDA
http://www.loc.gov/marc/RDAinMARC29.html
US testing
http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/rda/index.html
Forthcoming publications
 Practical Cataloguing: AACR, RDA and MARC21 / Anne
Welsh and Sue Batley
ISBN: 978-1-85604-695-4
 Introduction to Resource Description and Access :
Cataloguing and classification in the digital era / Shawne
D Miksa
ISBN: 978-1-85604-683-1
 Introducing RDA: A Guide to the Basics / Chris Oliver
ISBN 978-0-8389-3594-1
Thanks …. Questions?