Bridge Consortium: Carleton College & St. Olaf College Libraries
Bridge Serials Working Group
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC
Report on an online survey
Nov 2005
To gain insight into how other libraries are dealing with the questions about how best to make e-journal
access clear and easy for their patrons to negotiate, SWG sent a survey to several discussion lists Oct
21-24, 2005. In particular, we were interested in the question of whether or not libraries that were using
an open-URL resolver and A-Z list were also cataloging e-journals for their OPAC.
We asked six questions (one with 3 parts). We posted our survey on innopacusers, obegroup, serialst
and autocat. By Nov 16, we had received 22 responses. Library types included 12 private colleges &
universities, 5 state colleges/universities, 4 science/health sciences libraries and 1 academic library
consortium.
The questions and responses from each library are compiled below. The text of the email survey we sent
follows the compiled responses to each question.
Responses.
1. Do you add MARC (or other) bib records for e-journals to your OPAC?
We catalog everything in our OPAC. As of June, 2005, we had 18,122 records for e-journals in our
OPAC. We are part of OhioLINK, which has an "Electronic Journal Center." TechPro provides OhioLINK
member libraries with cataloging records for the e-journals in the "Electronic Journal Center." Of the
18,122 records, 5,823 of them were records for EJC titles cataloged by TechPro. Also, 5,210 of the
18,122 records were provided by Lexis-Nexis. These records are not full-MARC. Finally, 6,238 of the
18,122 records were for EbscoHOST titles. These records are also not full-MARC. (Private college)
Yes, but not for everything (i.e. aggregator titles not in the primary scope of our collection or shortterm/ephemeral titles we do not create bib records for). All other types we have MARC for, but often the
bib records come out of the bib records we had for the print version of a journal. (health sciences library)
Yes we do and for several reasons right now. Our OPAC serves as a backup should our resolver go
down for some reason. Our OPAC also allows for more rich alternate and title abbreviation searches as
well as a subject search. (Health sciences library)
We have added MARC records for e-journals in JSTOR, Project MUSE and EJS, as they have been
deemed stable enough not to require constant changing. Even so, there are problems keeping the
holdings info in those records current, and JSTOR, in particular, has a fairly sizeable number of new titles
to be added each month. We do not add MARC records for any other aggregated databases. Their
holdings are much, much too volatile. The whole point of paying SerialsSolutions to track our full-text ejournal holdings is because we do not have the personnel to do so ourselves -- we pay them to do it -why should anyone replicate that huge amount of work, tracking the same data in two different places.
According to the usability testing we have done so far, our users do not look for e-journals in the OPAC
anyway, so you'd be looking at a huge amount of on-going work for a small staff of people, duplicating
work we pay someone else to do, for extremely little benefit. (Ithaca)
Yes (Auckland U of Tech)
Yes, we do add bib records for e-journals to our OPAC. However, there is an important caveat to our
adding bib records for e-journals to the OPAC. At this time, we add only those titles that meet two criteria:
1) We are paying for the subscription to the electronic title and 2) the electronic version provides us with
our archival access to that title. We do not add records for titles where the online is provided free with the
print, and we do not add records for titles that are in aggregated databases. We consider the fulltext
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC survey replies (Nov 2005)
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content in aggregated databases to be unstable. In a practical sense, this means that we catalog all
JSTOR titles and all individual electronic journal subscriptions where the electronic is the only version we
receive. For electronic journal packages from publishers, and our policy is to catalog those titles that we
consider reliable, stable, and substitutions for the print version. (Furman)
Yes, for full text titles. (Private college)
Yes--we receive MARC bib records from Serials Solutions. We prefer the CONSER format-neutral
records when available (HELIN)
We use Serials Solutions for our A-Z list and download the MARC records they provide to our OPAC.
(Private college)
The F&M Library does not use any open-URL resolver though we have considered the following products
- SFX and Serials Solutions. Presently, we are adding MARC bib records for e-journals to the OPAC.
(F&M)
We avoid spending the huge amount of time required for cataloging electronic journals by buying the
Serials Solutions' MARC records service, which we share among 9 colleges in our consortium catalog.
There is one record per title, and an 856 for each college (e.g. "View available full text for RIC."). Each
856 links to one institution's A-Z list record for the desired title, so all sources are displayed at that point.
(Rhode Island College)
Occidental College does the same [as RIC] without being in consortia, and we are very happy with the
products from Serials Solutions. I highly recommend it. Even before Serials Solutions, we tried to
catalog electronic journals...Serials Solutions has made it possible to include them all, and they take care
of the changes in the aggregators. (Occidental)
No, we have a comprehensive a-z list (includes print collection, which is in the OPAC). (University of the
Sciences in Philadelphia).
No (Private college)
Yes, sometimes on separate records and sometimes as additions to the print record (if we own the print).
(State university)
yes (Academic library)
no (Goucher College Library)
Yes, MARC records (Auburn)
Yes (Health sciences library)
No (Maryville University)
Yes. (Duquesne University)
Only for stable resources like Muse, JSTOR, or ACS. (St. Cloud)
1a. Do you enhance these records for local use by adding access points for academic
departments or disciplines?
No, we don't. (Private college)
Generally no. (health sciences library)
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC survey replies (Nov 2005)
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Not a lot in our MARC records, but yes on our Weblist we have a subject listing that pretty much mimics
the departments and clinics. For our MARC records we do make sure that there is a least one MeSH
heading.(Health sciences library)
No. What records we do add, we add a "series" note for EJS (Collection), JSTOR (Collection) or Project
MUSE (Collection) -- subjects are usually already in the MARC records we download one-by-one from
OCLC. (Ithaca)
No (Auckland U of Tech)
Yes and no. We use the appropriate subject headings in the bib record, but we do not add additional
access points to the OPAC. However, on the library web site, we maintain web pages for each major /
academic discipline, listing the appropriate resources for that department. If feasible, we will provide links
to electronic journals on that subject on the subject web page. (Furman)
Not per se, but they do have subject headings. (Private college)
We do not enhance these records, except that I update the author and subject fields when they are out of
date. (HELIN)
No. I leave them just the way they are and the only time I change them is for authority control purposes.
(Private college)
n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
Yes, we use 690 to provide discipline-related information, mostly for our MyLibrary implementation.
(State university)
No, but do some authority record clean-up (Academic library)
N/A (Goucher College Library)
No (Auburn)
No (Health sciences library)
No, we enhance these records with an access text statement, etc. But we do not add other access points
for academic departs, etc. (Duquesne University)
Not in the OPAC, but we are in our A-Z list. (St. Cloud)
1b. Are these separate records for the electronic or an 856 link/s in the record for
print/microform?
Our e-journals are cataloged separate from the print. The only time that we include an 856 in the
print/microform record, rather than cataloging the electronic access separately, is when we receive
electronic access per our print subscription and do not pay extra for the electronic access. (Private
college)
It depends. We do both. If we have a print bib, we use it. If we do not (i.e. we never owned the item in
print), we then use a bib for electronic. (health sciences library)
We use the one record approach and just put 856 link fields on our print record. If we add the record new
for the electronic, then we will add the electronic version. (Health sciences library)
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Our former practice was to "piggyback" an electronic MFHD onto the print bib record, but it made the
OPAC display very confusing to our users and it made it very difficult for the Acquisitions people tracking
the billing. We now add separate bib records for electronic, and edit the bib-linking to work, where
appropriate, to print and MF. We have also begun the labor-intensive work of retrospectively finding all
the old "piggyback" records, finding new MARC records for the electronic versions, adding those and relinking the e-MFHDs to the new e-bibs, as well as setting up the bib-linking between. (Ithaca)
Separate records for e-titles received via aggregators or via individual sub. Link in print record to free
web versions of a resource such as govt. docs. (Auckland U of Tech)
We use a separate record for the electronic version of a journal. We place a 776 field in the print record
to point to the online version, and vice versa. (Furman)
E-only records, if we do not own the print, an 856 and notes if we do. We use an added entry for the epackage or publisher name which is extremely useful for the staff if not for users. (Private college)
They are separate. (HELIN)
We use separate records for the electronic journals rather than a link in the print record. (Private college)
n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
Both. (State university)
separate records (Academic library)
single records, multiple 856s (Auburn)
mostly single records; full e-records when no print (Health sciences library)
they are separate records, we do not include an 856 in the print/microform records (Duquesne University)
At this point they are separate. All formats are separate due to a long-standing cataloging decision which
we're now regretting. We're going to investigate all this and see if we can condense/combine. (St. Cloud)
1c. When you have the title from a variety of sources, do you have separate records for each
source? Or just separate 856 links in the record for print?
We follow current cataloging rules and have all electronic access on a single record for the online title.
For example, if we have access to current issues via OhioLINK's "Electronic Journal Center" and if we
have access to back issues via JSTOR, then we have appropriate notes for both on a single record for
the online title. Here is an example:
 506 Subscription and registration with JSTOR required for access to back issues
 506 OhioLINK membership required for access to current issues
 550 Back issues digitized and made available by: JSTOR
 550 Current issues available through agreement to OhioLINK
 856[4,0] |uhttp://rave.ohiolink.edu/ejournals/issn/00143820/|zConnect to current issues of
Evolution (Lancaster, Pa. : Online)
 856[4,0] |uhttp://www.jstor.org/journals/00143820.html|zConnect to back issues of Evolution
(Lancaster, Pa. : Online) (Private college)
Because we use an ERM we have separate MARC records for each source and these records include an
856 field in them. (health sciences library)
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC survey replies (Nov 2005)
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We have separate links in the one bibliographic record and we denote who the source is in a |3 and in |z
we add the years of coverage as we might have say 1997-2001 with one source and 2002-present from
another source. (Health sciences library)
We have placed our 856s in the MFHD, not the bib record. For a single title which we get from more than
one source, we put in additional 856s in the MFHD. The link text we use is the holdings info -- so, we'll
use link text of "v. 1 (1901) - v. 79 (1979) (JSTOR)" for one source and "v.80 (1980) - current (Project
MUSE)" for another, for example. (Ithaca)
Previously multiple urls in one record. Now a single link to a Serials Solutions live site, representing latest
holdings available via each source we have access to. (Auckland U of Tech)
Because we only link to the stable versions that we are directly paying for, I cannot think of any titles that
have more than one online version right now. Although, as we increasingly switch
titles from print to online, I think this is an issue we will begin to encounter and a policy that we will have
to develop. (I would be very interested to hear how other institutions are handling this, if you don't mind
sharing your results.) (Furman)
Separate 856 links and notes for multiple e-versions. Also separate holdings record. (Private college)
We catalog paper and microform together on the same bib records and one separate from for the
electronic version. (HELIN)
We have one record for the electronic journal which links to our Serials Solutions page. That page shows
the databases it is available in and the dates of coverage. (Private college)
There are no separate records for the electronic form as 856 links are added to the record for the print
form. Links are kept-up-to-date by the Acquisitions Assistant. (F&M)
n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
Separate 856 links originally, but more recently we have used the alpha list to provide for multiple source
links. E-Matrix (our internally-created ERMS) will soon be the repository for this info. (State university)
no, single electronic record with hosted 856 tag maintained by our vendor (Academic library)
Separate 856s on the same record (Auburn)
Separate 856s in one record (Health sciences library)
No, we have only one record in our OPAC per title. We use SFX as our link resolver, the records we get
from them take our patrons to an SFX menu where access options are presented (Duquesne University)
So far, every single one is separate. (St. Cloud)
2. If you do not add bib records for e-journals to your OPAC, then how do you provide
subject/discipline access to these titles - both LCSH and/or local?
We do add bibs. (health sciences library)
Not applicable as we do add them. (Health sciences library)
We are using PirateSource software from East Carolina University, customized locally, to provide both an
alphabetical listing of databases AND a dynamically-created subject list of both electronic and print/other
format items by subject. We contract with SerialsSolutions for their E-Journal Portal -- which is their A-Z
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC survey replies (Nov 2005)
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list, hosted on their servers and maintained/updated constantly by SerialsSolutions. The E-Journal Portal
(which we call "Journal List" on our webpage) is searchable by individual e-journal title. It's the main
access point for anyone looking for a given journal title -- print or electronic, as we send our print (and
MF) journal info to SerialsSolutions as well. (Ithaca)
In addition to catalogue records, we have a Serials Solution supplied A_Z list, and we also compile lists
by subject. (Auckland U of Tech)
All of our electronic titles, whether they are added to the OPAC or not, are added to our link resolver. We
use our link resolver to generate our e-journal list, which has the ability to be sorted by subject. The
subject categories are provided by our link resolver vendor and are imperfect at best. The subject
categories do not always align very well with the majors / fields of study offered at Furman, but they are
better than nothing. Down the road, we may create our own subject categories and assign each journal
to the categories we feel are appropriate. However, this would be very time consuming, and we are still
in debate about how to best go about it. (Furman)
N/A (HELIN)
N/A (Private college)
Only a very small number of our users approach journals by subject. When they do, it's likely to be for
broader categories than our cataloging allows: what psychology journals does the library have? A
keyword search in our A-Z list can provide this information. (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
N/A (State university)
N/a (Academic library)
We use SerialsSolutions and rely on the subject listing available as part of their A-Z list and search
interface. (Goucher College Library)
N/A (Auburn)
N/A (Health sciences library)
We don't. You can title-keyword search our "A-Z list" (which isn't really a list but a manual-entry point into
our openurl resolver), but we don't intend anyone to use it that way. (Maryville University)
NA (Duquesne University)
A-Z list. (St. Cloud)
3. Are you removing bib records for e-journals from the OPAC in favor of the A-Z list, or are you
retaining them? What are your reasons for this?
We are retaining our bib records and are adding them. We are actually moving away from using an A-Z
list and focusing more on catalog-only access as this helps provide us with "one-stop shopping"
regardless of format (print or electronic) and gives us better searching tools. We also have a journals
scope within our catalog (http://catalogs.health sciences library.edu/search~S5/). We are making these
choices primarily due to workload issues - our choice is to use the catalog and an A-Z list or just the
catalog and maintaining this information in two places is just too much work for us. (health sciences
library)
Currently we are still maintaining both along with a link resolver! So, yes we are doing triplicate work as
each serves a slightly different function and can be backups for the other. Again, our journal access is
premium so we want to have several ways to get to them and provide the best service we possibly can.
(Health sciences library)
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Never even added most of them. (Ithaca)
Retaining them - management preference for catalogue to represent all of the Library's resources
(Auckland U of Tech)
No. We have not removed any records from the OPAC in favor of the e-journal list. (Furman)
Have not removed bibs from the OPAC. (Private college)
We want the bib. records in the catalog so that users may retrieve e-journals in addition to other
resources that their search may retrieve. (HELIN)
We are definitely retaining the records. We want patrons to be able to find them through the OPAC or the
A-Z list and not have to know where they should be searching. (Private college)
n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
The OPAC is the ultimate source for the data in the alpha list, as it is for E-Matrix, so obviously we do not
remove e-journals from the OPAC once they get into the alpha list. We need these records for an audit
trail anyway, since this is where we order, claim and check-in serials! (State university)
no, have bib records and A-Z list (Academic library)
We retain bib records for titles for which we have paper holdings; we add 856 links to the entry in the
SerialsSolutions A-Z list so that updates occur automatically (in terms of databases in which they're
included). (Goucher College Library)
We retain the bib records. Our A-Z list is rebuilt nightly with a perl script that uses info in the catalog - it's
built from the catalog (Auburn)
Retaining. Library staff don't use the A-Z list. A-Z list does not provide subject access and doesn't include
print titles so OPAC is a good choice in some situations. (Health sciences library)
We only have a couple of e-journals in the OPAC - a few scholarly titles that are online-only. We keep a
minimal amount of info in the OPAC, basically more for acquisitions record keeping than for the public.
Our patrons are totally steered to the web-based openurl resolver search for ANY queries about journal
holdings, print or electronic. (Maryville University)
We provide access via both points, the OPAC and the A-Z list (Duquesne University)
We are retaining them in the catalog because some people may look them up that way. (St. Cloud)
4. If you add/maintain bib records in your OPAC for e-journals, why did you decide to do this? Are
you happy with the results for your library? What are the pluses & minuses of this approach?
As you know, this is a very complicated issue! For now, our OPAC is the most powerful index that we
have. We also catalog our electronic databases in our OPAC; however, at the same time we're looking
into creating a database of databases. We also maintain an open-URL resolver; however, the resolver
defaults to "Search the catalog" when no results are found. Then, "Search the OhioLINK catalog" is also
an option. Our reference staff are glad that our OPAC is accurate when it comes to e-journals, and they
teach patrons to rely on the OPAC. That said, I personally am always interested in hearing about
alternatives! (Private college)
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See answer to question 3. Also, we are only just now getting ready to decommission our A-Z list, so we
do not yet know the full impact of this decision. The minuses of only going through the catalog are that the
interface is not as clean as an A-Z system and we do not have a way to browse by discipline without
doing a lot of extra work. (health sciences library)
We initially decided to do this as soon as we began having the ability to do so (circa 1995) and at that
time we did not have an A-Z list and there were no resolvers. As we developed our web pages more and
began creating lists of resources, we did develop a very simple A-Z title list. Currently our web list is A-Z,
has topics, and allows a simple search. Maintenance is always a challenge, but we are committed to
providing the best service and so are motivated to do that. Again the pluses are additional access points,
backup, and not always knowing what preference our patrons will have. The minuses are that we are
doing triplicate effort and so when there is a system or product that will allow us to do all of what we want
then we will consider moving in that direction. Presently our resolver has some limited alternate title
abilities and does not allow us to create specialized subject lists or to search by subject...you can search
by keyword, but that is it, for right now. (Health sciences library)
No answer given. (Ithaca)
Users have a one-stop-shop option in the catalogue, as well as being able to choose only e-resources if
preferred. This is working well for us. (Auckland U of Tech)
The decision to add records to the OPAC for stable electronic journals only was made before I arrived at
Furman, but it is a decision that I agree with. Adding electronic journals to our OPAC increases their use
and visibility, but it is more difficult and time consuming to maintain the OPAC than the link resolver / a-z
list. Including titles that are in aggregator databases or other unstable collections in the OPAC would take
too much of our time for a relatively small return. Most of our students prefer the e-journal list over the
OPAC when searching for journal articles, because it delivers full text to their desktop. The major
disadvantage of our approach is that there is no one place where all of our resources (print electronic,
monographic, serial, multimedia, etc.) can be searched at once. (Furman)
Although we believe most know item searches are done in the A-Z list, we still want to maintain the
integrity of the catalog for "full text," print or electronic. Obviously this is more labor intensive than only
providing an A-Z list. What is most likely to happen in the near future is that we will add print holdings to
our SerialsSolution list. (Private college)
We are mostly happy with our decision to turn this over to Serials Solutions. No one in the consortium
was able to keep up with adding all the e-journals to which we have access. Most of us added records for
Project Muse, JSTOR, etc. but no one was able to add and maintain larger packages. SerSol sends us
updates (adds/deletes/changes) every month to load into the catalog. This means that we don't have to
track what titles are being added, etc., to all our different packages.
THE URLs in the bibliographic records take the user to the SerSol A-Z page so they can choose which
resource to connect to, based on the holdings available to them. In many cases, a library may have
access to the same journal in 3 or more different places.
The only minus for us is that we can't add holdings records to these bib. This means that the user can't
see what volumes they actually have access to until they get to the A-Z page. I haven't heard many
complaints about this. (HELIN)
I don't think that patrons should have to look in two places for the information they are trying to find. Our
OPAC is a record of our holdings, including e-journals. Our patrons would be confused if we told them if
it's a print journal they need to look in the OPAC but if it's electronic, look in the A-Z list. They just want to
know if we own it. We are happy with the results. It is clear at a glance in our catalog what titles we own.
The drawbacks are that the Serials Solutions records are pricey and we have to maintain them monthly
(although that doesn't really take very long). (Private college)
The decision to add the MARC bib records to the OPAC was made in response to requests from patrons,
i.e. mainly professors. The A - Z list is maintained by the Acquisitions Assistant. (F&M)
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n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
As noted above, the OPAC is the source for the data that feeds our ERMS tool and finding aids (alpha
list, MyLibrary, etc.). Currently, the OPAC is the only finding aid for serials that includes both ceased and
current titles, so we think it important to maintain e-journals there as well. The
pluses include coverage of all titles in one source; better subject, publisher, ISSN and other access;
serendipity searching for those not necessarily looking for a serial. The minuses are synching the files,
maintenance of data (esp. URLs) in multiple locations, and confusion from
the public on why the catalog has e-journals if they are already in the alpha list. (State university)
We thought that the resources would see more use with additional access provided through the catalog
(Academic library)
We're paying for them, might as well provide as much access as possible. Yes, we are happy with the
results. The minuses of this approach is that there is a lot of work involved. (Auburn)
OPAC should be a one-stop shop for all library resources. It provides much better search capabilities than
our A-Z list. Downside is that it's more work - have to maintain the A-Z list, the catalog, and the link
resolver, amongst other places. (Health sciences library)
In order to help make the OPAC a one-stop-shop, and to provide additional access for our online users,
we are happy with our approach. Pluses for us are increased traffic in our OPAC, additional ways to
gather use stats, ease of use for our patrons (Duquesne University)
We are somewhat happy with it. We like the access, but the multiple records make searching a pain. We
run our A-Z list from a home-grown database with our print holdings, while the e-journal holdings come
from SFX. We'd rather use the A-Z list for everything, but it is not OpenURL compliant so we still have to
send SFX to the OPAC. (St. Cloud)
5. If you don't add/maintain bib records in your OPAC for e-journals, why did you make this
decision? Are you happy with the results for your library? What are the pluses & minuses of this
approach?
We do add bib records. (health sciences library)
Not applicable because we do add them. (Health sciences library)
See my above outburst [for question 1.] . ;-) (Ithaca)
N/A (Auckland U of Tech)
As I have stated, we do not add bib records for all titles. This is primarily because of the time and
manpower involved in cataloging every title available in full text in all of our resources. In particular
cataloging the content aggregated databases, where the content is not stable, is just not feasible.
(Furman)
See response in #4. (Private college)
N/A (HELIN)
N/A (Private college)
We have never regretted not spending the huge amount of time required for cataloging electronic
journals. Even before e-journals very few users went to the catalog, on cards or online, to locate journals.
(For those of you newer to the profession than me, libraries used to produce printed
Cataloging E-Journals in OPAC survey replies (Nov 2005)
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alphabetical lists of journals.)
And only a very small number of our users approach journals by subject. When they do, it's likely to be for
broader categories than our cataloging allows: what psychology journals does the library have? A
keyword search in our A-Z list can provide this information.
The only drawback is that a few tools, like ILLiad, check against OPAC records. I was happy to see that
OCLC's ILLiad is looking at the problem. But even so, losing the ability to have ILLiad check against our
ejournals does not require the amount of labor needed to catalog, and maintain, all the ejournals we get
from aggregators. (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
The additional cost and work have not seemed worth it to this point. We may re-assess at some future
point. At this stage, we have our hands full just keeping our a-to-z list and link resolver up-to-date, and
both of those are higher priorities than bib records in the opac (from the point of view of their respective
utility to patrons). (Private college)
N/A (State university)
N/a (Academic library)
Costs and staffing -- we went from about 900 print subscriptions to over 20,000 e-journals available. We
can't afford to add this many bib records to our catalog or try to keep up with the changes (MARC records
from SerialsSolutions would cost about $10,000 per year .... plus paying for the added Innovative records,
and the staff time to upload each month etc.). Also, with ArticleLinker, most students approach our
holdings from within an electronic resource. We do include our print holdings (uploaded only once, with
few changes occurring ....) in the A-Z list. (Goucher College Library)
n/a (Health sciences library)
We are very happy. Back before openurl technology, in 2000-2001, we were loading mini-bib records
(title, issn, 856 - no subject headings) for e-journals from aggregate databases into the OPAC. But in
2001, we merged our catalog into a big consortium and decided it was too complicated trying to manage
our maintenance workflow in the consortial cataloging environment and moved the whole functionality to
a web server. We even have the link on our opac screen for "Journal title" search jump the patron out of
the catalog and over to our openurl resolver. The big minus is the one your survey points out - we have
no real "subject" searching capability. But we don't need that much with an openurl resolver - we teach
patrons to subject-search for articles in the article databases and then just follow the links to our holdings.
Patrons who try to search by subject for entire journals are almost always doing the suboptimal thing for
the wrong reason (they don't understand that they should be using an article database). Faculty needing
subject lists for accreditation reports etc. can come to the staff and we'll do special projects internally to
give them such lists. We do also have the EBSCOHost Serials Directory database, with links to our
openurl resolver for holdings, for anyone who really wants to find journals by subject, as that database
has LC subject headings in it. (Maryville University)
NA (Duquesne University)
6. If you maintain both the OPAC and an A-Z list, which do you refer patrons to? How do you
explain the differences of each to your patrons?
We looked into a SerialsSolutions A-Z list, but our public services staff decided that they prefer the
OPAC. We did subscribe to the SerialsSolutions A-Z list for a year, but only to have a spreadsheet
created that we used for our open-URL resolver. (Private college)
We actually do have an A-Z list for free journals only (http://atoz.ebsco.com/home.asp?Id=sfohs, linked
from our journal scope at http://catalogs.health sciences library.edu/search~S5) . It is easy to
communicate this (i.e. "It is free journals only here") to patrons. (health sciences library)
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The OPAC is good to search for by title when you are not exactly sure of the title and/or need to do a
subject search. The A-Z list is good for the departmental groupings and only contains our current journals.
So journals for which we only have archival access, we have in the OPAC but not on the A-Z list. Also the
A-Z list only lists e-journals and not the print. So the OPAC is more comprehensive. Our resolver, has a
link to search the OPAC when there is no hit for the ejournal title. (Health sciences library)
The E-Journal Portal (aka A-Z List, aka "Journal List") is the first point to look for a specific journal title.
Since it has the info on electronic, print and microfilm, it's the best place to go. Since we are still adding
our EJS titles to SerialsSolutions, some few titles may slip through the cracks, so if it is very critical, a
person can try again in the OPAC, but we are working on that project and I hope to do another print
update to SerialsSolutions within the next couple weeks. (Ithaca)
Primarily we refer them to the catalogue, where they can collocate all resources on a subject, or limit by
format. We use the databases subject list when it is useful to indicate broader categories more closely
aligned to academic departments/divisions. For aggregator e-resources, this would link to database level
rather than to journal title level. (Auckland U of Tech)
We refer patrons to both the OPAC and the a-z list. Essentially, we tell them that the a-z list is where to
go to find full text, and the a-z list links out to the OPAC as a second choice if the full text is not available.
The link to the OPAC is pre-populated by the link resolver. (Furman)
Depends on the circumstances. We saw a huge increase in unmediated usage from A&I sources when
we implemented LinkFinderPlus. For mediated use, if the user has a citation in hand, they're usually
referred to the A-Z list. The weakness of our approach is the distinction between full text journals which
are in the OPAC and titles that appear only at the article level in aggregators which aren't. That distinction
is largely irrelevant to the user. We may pursue adding brief records to the OPAC for aggregator titles.
(Private college)
The catalog record refers the patron to the A-Z list. If a patron wants to find out where a library has
electronic access to a specific journal title, I would direct them to the A-Z list. If they don't specifically ask
for electronic access, then the catalog is the better place to start. (HELIN)
It depends on what kind of search they are doing. If they are looking for a particular title I send them to
the A-Z list because it is quicker and they can use Article Linker to do a citation search. If they are doing a
more general search for journals on a particular subject I send them to the OPAC. I find the A-Z list great
for specific citation/title questions but not for general questions. (Private college)
We like to refer patrons to the A-Z list because it lists the complete holdings. The OPAC reflects the most
recent acquisition. Several years ago we migrated from DRA to Sirsi. In that process serial holdings in
bib records were lost. (F&M)
[In response to Univ of Sciences in Phila reply to Question 5.] We have a completely different experience
with our users. Many of them do go to the catalog to locate journals, and our database use is well
distributed across many different databases in the humanities and social sciences, as well as science.
Consequently, we consider our link resolver (Serials Solutions' Article Linker) indispensable, and we
upload a spreadsheet of our print collection holdings to our A-Z list regularly, so that folks find our
holdings through the link resolver regardless of format. Because of the link resolver, most students start in
the databases and find holdings without rekeying titles, but for journal title searches, we generally
recommend the catalog, rather than the A-Z list because of the added title entries. That way they find Peiching chou pao even if they key Beijing Review. Our search statistics for the last 6 months show that
8,904 journal holdings searches came from the catalog, and 17,172 came form the A-Z list, however most
searches came through the link resolver -- 38,937 during the same period. (Rhode Island College)
n/a (University of the Sciences in Philadelphia).
n/a (Private college)
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Reference staff refer most patrons to the alpha list, not the catalog, for e-journal subscription info. This
has primarily to do with the currency of URLs and holdings data, plus the fact that e-journals found in fulltext databases do not appear in the catalog, but only in the alpha list. (State university)
We view our OPAC as the primary (and most expensive database) portal to our resources, with the link
resolver as a subset with serials only included in it (Academic library)
Generally to the opac (Auburn)
We explain [the differences] that one is an alphabetial listing without much more info, the other is a more
complete source. Mostly it’s our faculty/researchers who use the A-Z list--they know which journal they
want, by title. (Auburn)
We refer patrons to both. I think the reference staff probably refer people mainly to the OPAC because
that's what they personally use. As I and my assistant personally use the A-Z list, we're probably more
likely to refer people to that. We point out that the A-Z list is just a title list of e-journals. If patrons want
print titles, subject access etc, they really need to use the OPAC. (Health sciences library)
I generally refer other staff members to the OPAC, not sure how the ref staff direct traffic (Duquesne
University)
We generally refer to the A-Z list as being both more complete and easier to use - each title is generally
listed only once with all formats on one record. (St. Cloud)
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Email sent to lists Oct 21-24, 2005 (innopacusers, obegroup, serialst, autocat)
Subject: E-Journals Cataloged in OPAC??
****Apologies for multiple postings***
How are libraries that are using open-URL resolvers handling the question of whether or not to include
cataloging records for these titles in their OPAC? We are well aware that this topic has been discussed
before, but as tools become more robust and varied, some of the answers seem to be changing and we
are interested in where libraries are in their thinking now.
If you have a fully-deployed open-URL resolver and a comprehensive A-Z list (for all formats), we would
like to hear from you on any or all of the following points.
1. Do you add MARC (or other) bib records for e-journals to your OPAC?
1a. Do you enhance these records for local use by adding access points for academic departments or
disciplines?
1b. Are these separate records for the electronic or an 856 link/s in the record for print/microform?
1c. When you have the title from a variety of sources, do you have separate records for each source? Or
just separate 856 links in the record for print?
2. If you do not add bib records for e-journals to your OPAC, then how do you provide subject/discipline
access to these titles - both LCSH and/or local?
3. Are you removing bib records for e-journals from the OPAC in favor of the A-Z list, or are you retaining
them? What are your reasons for this?
4. If you add/maintain bib records in your OPAC for e-journals, why did you decide to do this? Are you
happy with the results for your library? What are the pluses & minuses of this approach?
5. If you don't add/maintain bib records in your OPAC for e-journals, why did you make this decision? Are
you happy with the results for your library? What are the pluses & minuses of this approach?
6. If you maintain both the OPAC and an A-Z list, which do you refer patrons to? How do you explain the
differences of each to your patrons?
Thank you in advance for your responses. If we receive enough responses, we will summarize for the
list.
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