Greenstone is a suite of software for building and distributing digital library collections. It is not a digital library but a tool for building digital libraries. It provides a new way of organizing information and publishing it on the Internet in the form of a fully-searchable, metadata-driven digital library. It has been developed and distributed in cooperation with UNESCO and the Human Info NGO in Belgium. It is open-source, multilingual software, issued under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
— http://www.greenstone.org/factsheet
Installing Greenstone is really rather simple, though the online tutorials can be somewhat confusing given the different configurations for servers, etc. These instructions are for a local, non-networked, installation on a computer running Ubuntu 10.04, though they will work for other recent Ubuntu versions as well.
- Download the most recent release for GNU/Linux at http://www.greenstone.org/download. For me, the most recent release is Greenstone-2.83-linux.
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Open a terminal and navigate to your downloads folder. If you are new to Linux, typing
pwdwill tell you your current directory.liwill tell you the contents of your current folder. For me, I entered the following to move from my home directory to the Downloads subdirectory:cd Downloads -
Next, double-check to ensure that your downloaded file is in this directory using the
licommand. Then, make that file executable with the following command (be sure to use the correct filename if you downloaded a different version):chmod a+x Greenstone-2.83-linux - Leave this terminal window open, but now open your desktop file browser and go to the Downloads folder. For me, that is "Places" then "Home Folder" then "Downloads". Then double-click on Greenstone-2.83-linux to launch the installer. Alternatively, you could launch it from within the terminal window if you are comfortable with that.
- Follow the installation instructions by clicking "Next" throughout the dialogue, but be sure NOT to install the "admin" pages when asked since we are only installing this for local, non-networked use.
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Once Greenstone is installed, these last two steps are what will be necessary for launching the program each time. Greenstone does not install into the Applications menu and must be started from the terminal in Linux. First, launch the Greenstone Server from the command line within the Greenstone directory.
Navigate to the Greenstone directory from the Downloads directory:
cd ..
cd GreenstoneLaunch the Greenstone Server:
./gs2-server.shGreenstone will then also try to open a web browser and take you to the default page. If this encounters an error, click "File" on the little server window, then "Settings" and change to one of the other options like "/localhost" or "127.0.0.1" until you find the right setting.
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Now open a new tab in the terminal window and launch the Greenstone Librarian Interface (also from within the Greenstone directory):
./gli/gli.sh
Popularity: 54% [?]
Okay, I’m shamelessly plugging my new (somewhat) remunerative endeavor.
I bind books. I rebind books. I make them from scratch, and I repair them. It’s what I enjoy, and though this enjoyment had until recently been shelved until I finished my library science degree (MSLS, at the University of Kentucky), I am now pleased to return to this pleasure.
And so I am announcing the re-launch of my bookbinding business, Readers Repair. I have some backlog to work through, but after that, bring me your injured bibles, your damaged books, your dissertations in need of fine binding. I am still putting products and services onto the website and I welcome your suggestions of what types of products and services you think might be worthwhile. There was at least some minor interest in custom-bound Greek and/or Hebrew texts a couple of years ago, but what else? Any ideas?

Popularity: 24% [?]
From a recent release:
As of April 1, 2010, the Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA) will be available free of charge on the Getty Web site at http://library.getty.edu/bha. Free Web access to BHA is an advantage not only to all traditional users of the database but also to such potential users as institutions in developing countries and independent scholars worldwide, who until now have been unable to afford access to the BHA.
…
BHA on the Getty Web site offers both basic and advanced search modules, and can be searched easily by subject, artist, author, article or journal title, and other elements. To search BHA, please visit, http://library.getty.edu/bha. Note that the database search includes both BHA (covering 1990-2007) and the International Bibliography of Art (IBA), covering the years 2008 and part of 2009. The Répertoire de la litterature de l’art (RILA), one of the predecessors of BHA, with records that cover 1975-1989, will be online by May 1.
Use the BHA at: http://library.getty.edu/bha
Popularity: 30% [?]
St. Augustine famously argued that community is created as people with common affections for something mutually esteemed have opportunity to communicate about and celebrate those common affections. Oliver O’Donovan’s book “Common Objects of Love” was an exposition of this idea for modern culture. This have profoundly shaped my understanding of community, as a pastor and as a librarian. For the latter context, my approach to the library’s contribution to the the seminary where I serve has been transformed and is now driven by attempts to further our constituency’s opportunities to more deeply discover and communicate about those distinctives which drew the community together in the first place. Echoes of Augustine are hard for me to silence as I consider the use of oral history in the study of communities. It seems to me that if Augustine was right, and I believe he was, part of oral history is the attempt to discover what a community considers to be its distinctives and how that community communicates and celebrates those distinctives as a part of building their sense of true community.
This is my mental context when considering, for example, “popular memory as an object of study” (Perks and Thomson, 75ff). Setting aside for now the discussion of dominant memory and public representations of history, to which the implications of Augustine’s arguments are clear, do not Augustine’s precepts on community also bear directly on those more private narratives? One cannot exist totally in isolation from the other. Indeed, they inform and shape each other, mutually contributing to this thing called community. Oral history explores how this happens, prods the private memory for how it differs from and contributes to the public memory. It is in this way that we can avoid treating the object of history as ‘the past’ (Perks and Thomson, 84).
Ethical dilemmas can still be problematic, especially in regard to the interviewer’s relationship to the community whose constituency is being interviewed. The example of feminism is noted in the text, as is the correlation of this dilemma to the ongoing discussion between historians and anthropologists about methodologies. Perks and Thomson also point out that “oral historians have increasingly examined language ‘as the invisible force that . . . gives meaning to historical events.’” (Perks and Thomson, 94). I find this to be a helpful point of discussion. Of course, even the word ‘meaning’ has its own hermeneutical baggage: is meaning determined by the individual, thus allowing for a multiplicity of meanings, or by the community, or by some Other; but the point is still well taken. A community is shaped and developed (present tense) by events of the past by its interpretive communication of those events. An important point for oral histories to explore.
It is not without notice that I write these things on Good Friday, among the most important of days for my Community, and one for which disagreements in ‘meaning’ abound. Meaning is rooted in the author’s intention, and the intended meaning of historical events is determined by the One who sovereignly rules over it. In the case of Good Friday, thankfully, as also of Easter, the meaning is clearly set out for us in the clearest of ways — communicated by He who orchestrated it.
Romans 5:8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. 11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. (ESV)
Popularity: 29% [?]
Commonplaces.org has a new look, and as I put the finishing touches on it I welcome your initial impressions and suggestions.
Also, I am writing this on the WordPress app for the iPhone, and would like to hear your experiences with this app, if any.
Popularity: 18% [?]
A recent announcement from the Internet Archive:
The Internet Archive is pleased to announce an important manuscript, Homiliary on Gospels from Easter to first Sunday of Advent, as the 2,000,000th free digital text. Internet Archive has been scanning books and making them available for researchers, historians, scholars, people with disabilities, and the general public for free on archive.org since 2005.
“This 1,000 year old book which has only been seen by a select few people, can, with the technology of today, be shared with millions tomorrow,” said Robert Miller, Director of Books of the Internet Archive. “Selecting this title for the 2 millionth text is a fitting tribute to the team of scanners who have been carefully working for the past 5 years.”
…
“Handwritten in Latin by a number of scribes in a script inspired by the court of Charlemagne, this rare and beautiful treasure from the first millennium of Christianity, is one of the gems in the renowned collection of the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies. The Institute is dedicated to transmitting the inheritance of the Middle Ages to new generations; to deepening our understanding of the life and ideals of Western culture in the time of its first youth,” said Jonathan Bengtson, Director of Library and Archives, University of St. Michael’s College in the University of Toronto & Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.
View the Homiliary on Gospels from Easter to first Sunday of Advent for yourself.
Popularity: 19% [?]
Can [the] discussion of narrative and historical interpretation remain true to the community of discourse from which it emerges and to our professional vision of what the community should ask of its history? — Ronald J. Grele, “Useful Discoveries: Oral History, Public History, and the Dialectic of Narrative,” The Public Historian, Vol 13, No2 (Spring 1991), pp 61-84
This question is posed by as he ruminates on the implications of Carr’s “potentially democratic and diachronic view of narrative” and Glassie’s view of the “wholeness of a culture” on the possibility of a “theory of presentation” in oral history. I must confess, I am still not sure I understand all of what is being discussed in these ideas and am struggling to find a handle by which to grasp them and their imlications for oral history as a discipline.
I agree with Carr that an awareness of history and the impulse to express it are indeed fundamental aspects of the human experience, and that our interpretation of these things occurs through the lens of past experience, and in doing so I suppose I reveal myself to be “deeply historicist,” though I struggle to see this as Kantian to the same extent as Grele. I recognize in myself some measure of apparent elitism if indeed a recognition of variance in narrative ability is elitist. These are probably the byproducts of my training as an historian.
Grele’s explanation of Glassie’s more “populist” view of history in which folk ideology trumps scholarly analysis is an argument that remains elusive for me. Grele portrays Glassie’s view as one in which scholarly criticism is an ethical and intellectual destruction of the narrative. At this point I am left in the dust and cannot follow the argument. This lack of ability for me renders my judgment on Grele’s discussion of the implications of a sythesis of these two approaches on the theory of oral history a moot point. Communication is indeed framed by human experience. I get that, and I can see — to some extent — how both views have bearing on this. The leap from this to the question at hand, however, is a leap to great for my synthetic abilities.
I think the question is attempting to address how historians and their respective presuppositions about the critical interaction with the objective content of history can successfully communicate with communities, as objects of study, who themselves communicate their history differently and with vastly different presuppositions, experiences, and communicatory abilities. If so, my answer remains a steadfast, “I don’t know.” It is impossible to set aside one’s presuppositions, in my opinion. The best one can do is seek to understand the principles of thought behind perspectives elicited from those with differing presuppositional frameworks, and this is as far as I have come in my thinking on the matter. Hopefully my mind will stretch a bit and understand more clearly the ideas behind the question Grele poses.
Popularity: 13% [?]
Benjamin Myers, a professor of Systematic Theology at Charles Sturt University’s School of Theology in Sydney, recently compiled twelve theses on libraries and librarians on his blog, Faith and Theology. I recommend his blog, a self-described forum for conversations about theology, books and culture.
Take a look at the theses (only 83 more are needed for an even 95); I especially like theses 2 and 10.
Popularity: 12% [?]
Abstract
This essay seeks to provide a via media in the discourse of social indexing versus professional manual indexing by arguing that the use of social indexing can indeed be useful, and perhaps even the most practical option for imminent use, but should be employed in the service of the eventual application of a formalized methodology. The perspective here set forth argues that professional manual indexing is always the final and theoretical best, but recognizes that temporal circumstances can often render social indexing as the temporary and practical best – yet only insofar as it enables a subsequent and properly thorough treatment. The argument is supported by brief examples from three categories of research fields: established fields, emergent fields, and entry fields.
Concept and Contention
Daniel Webster is credited with having said that a politician”s blind conviction that “something must be done” is “the parent of many bad measures.”1 This tyranny of the urgent to which Webster was referring has a way of tempting even the most judicious of politicians to very injudicious decisions when circumstances are such that they feel “something must be done.” Before too many stones are cast at such politicians, let the reader admit they this tendency is universal enough to include even those in the most judicious of all professions – library and information science.
The question must be asked, albeit somewhat tongue-in-cheek, if this tyranny of the urgent has affected the judgment of the discipline in regard to the continuing debate on the utility and viability of social indexing over against the established and proven manual indexing of information professionals. The lines have been drawn, sides have been chosen, and judgements have been passed. The debate, however, seems all too often to be between the one and the other, with little nuance or admission of mutual utility. The purpose of this essay is to propose a via media, a middle way, through the polarizing debate by arguing that there is a very real, useful, and helpful place for both approaches when applied purposefully.
It should be recognized that temporal circumstances do often construct a legitimate sense of urgency. When this urgency occurs in disciplines which are slow to react, the most sensical course of action is not to quickly and impatiently implement final decisions but rather to implement intervening measures which can provide some helpful, but temporary, structure and organization. Intervening measures need not be as robust, as comprehensive, or even as intuitive as the eventual final solution, but they are extremely important for many reasons. Intervening measures bring at least some structure and organization to the situation. They have incredible potential for shaping the debate as the situation unfolds. Most importantly, however, they enable more thorough subsequent treatments by “buying time” until a patient implementation of a more proper long-term solution is applied.
As Laura Kane McElfresh points out, changes to controlled vocabularies such as the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are “constrained by the machineries of the bureaucracies that create the classiffication system.”2 In other words, the controlled approaches which have created such a careful, intricate, and thorough approach to the organization of information in the discipline of library science are not the most efficiently responsive of approaches. But they worked, and they worked well. Indeed, they continue to do so. They are, however, ill equipped for fast, relevant, and agile responses to emerging topics. The contemporary information landscape includes many emerging topics that are glaringly absent from the controlled vocabularies most frequently employed -– at least not in terminology relevant to the information searcher. What is to be done? Are users to expect that until the bureaucracy addresses their needs, there is to be no helpful approach to the identification and retrieval of relevant information? It is here that the utility of social indexing can be helpfully employed: relatively short-term and purposeful use of social tagging can help to bridge the gap between the immediate need for information access to fields not readily reflected in formalized and controlled vocabularies.
Contextualized Examples
The most responsive social approaches to indexing are most useful in emerging fields. Established fields of research, on the other hand, are best approached through existing controlled vocabularies that have been formalized through years of application and use. Emerging fields of research do not yet have this luxury and social indexing can be a helpful intervening measure. From a third perspective, neither social nor manual indexing have clear advantages when it comes to their use by novices in what shall be termed entry fields. Each of these shall now be addressed in turn.
1. Established Fields of Research
Controlled vocabularies employed by professional indexers here have a clear advantage for all the reasons explicated by the many basic texts in library science and even in those of research methodology. 3 The study of historical movements is example enough. Research in Reformation Studies is, to many people, a rather specific and narrow topic. For those engaged in research in this Sixteenth Century movement (movements, plural, some would argue) the field of “Reformation Studies” is unhelpfully broad given all its inherent internal, geographic and topical differentiations. For a researcher desiring to find information on Bohemian correspondence related to the Reformation in the Czech Republic, for example, the most effective and efficient option is clearly to to utilize a system such as LCSH where there is already a relevant subject heading.4
Think of the plethora of ways in which users would tag resources relevant to this particular topic. Or, perhaps more to the point, is this topic not too esoteric for a significant enough number of users to contribute enough tags to produce a helpful outcome? In Tom Steele’s defense of the superiority of folksonomies, he argues that “experiments have shown recall is fastest at the basic level. When shown pictures of dogs and birds, people were more likely to use the term ‘dog’ or ‘bird’ instead of ‘beagle’ or ‘robin.’” He concludes, “With tagging, the users can relate to their own basic level, whether it is ‘beagle’ or ‘dog.’ A controlled vocabulary uses a hierarchy instead, which may or may not match the users’ basic level.”5 Unfortunately for Steele, he just proved the wrong point by admitting that users will tend to tag resources with broad topical tags -– an approach clearly unhelpful when searching for detailed, specialized, esoteric information. To alleviate this problem, Steele later asserts that “a thesaurus like the LCSH can assist users creating tags in many ways.”6 Doubtful they will, but his point is taken. If they do, it only serves to further the viability of tagging as an intervening measure until controlled vocabularies can more adequately reflect the field.
Established fields of research are therefore best served through professional manual indexing. Indeed, all fields of research are theoretically best served by this means, but the exponential growth of information now available to searchers is obviously much greater that the capacity of any corpus of professional indexers. It is at this point that this theoretical best must yield to the practical best as a “tide-me-over” in order to temporarily alleviate the urgency.
2. Emergent Fields of Research
A sagacious use of social indexing can help relieve the tyranny of the urgent, and here the very topic of social indexing is its own example. Social indexing is a process identified by multiple monikers – folksonomies, social bookmarking, social tagging, collaborative tagging, distributed tagging, and more. A single term has yet to emerge as the preferred term in the field. In other words, a multiplicity of terminologies are used for the study of social indexing. The LCSH, on the other hand, does not yet have any readily identifiable relevant authority terms. A researcher seeking information on the emerging field of social indexing should not be expected to wait until the LCSH bureaucracy responds. Social indexing can be the very tool that is needed needed to solve the problem.
There are those who have argued that user tagging would enhance libraries’ websites and catalogs.7 It could be argued that most of the literature on emerging fields is published serially, but there is much discussion of how social indexing would also help in identifying monographic material already in publication but which is deemed in retrospect to be relevant to an emerging topic. Librarians are more unlikely to index exhaustively enough to identify secondary or tertiary issues within a resource when indexing it, and they are even more unlikely to retrospectively edit a record to add further index terms. Social indexing is a great advantage at this particular point.
3. Entry Fields of Research
It must be recognized that social indexing offers fewer barriers to involvement in that users do not need a previous knowledge of complicated thesauri or controlled vocabularies in order to participate in the process.8 Novice information seekers are drawn to the practice because this lack of necessary instruction. It is somewhat intuitive for personal use. This also explains Rolla’s conclusion that tagging is more commonly employed for popular works, with the consequence that its usefulness for special and academic libraries remains in ques-tion.9 More specifically, Montana State University Libraries had concerns over whether social indexing would be adequate for the electronic dissertations and theses (ETDs) and discovered that though the average ETD in their collection had four LCSH headings, only 2.4 percent had tags assigned by users.10 Clearly social indexing is best reserved for more popular settings.
Conclusion and Summary
Controlled vocabularies easily vanquish the problems of polysemy, synonymy, and basic-level variation, all of which are significant problems with the social approach to indexing. However, Peter Rolla’s comparative study of tagging on LibraryThing with LCSH found that in every LibraryThing record the tagging community assigned at least one concept not covered by the subject headings in the catalog record.11 Both approaches, then, have clear strengths. But determining when to employ each requires a purposeful approach. It is here argued that the use of controlled vocabularies – especially in academic settings – is to be preferred, but due to the slow nature of these systems in responding to new topics social indexing can serve as a helpful and viable intervening measure. This approach ensures the continued careful treatment of topics by professional manual indexers, while taking advantage of the adaptability of social indexing. Indeed, the two can learn from each other without the resultant “bad measures” that flow from acting on the impetus that “something must be done.”
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1 Fadiman, Clifton Fadiman, The American Treasury, 1455-1955 (New York: Harper, 1955) 338.
2 Laura Kane McElfresh, “Folksonomies and the Future of Subject Cataloging.” Technicalities 28, no. 2 (March/April 2008): 3-6. Library Lit & Inf Full Text, WilsonWeb (accessed October 11, 2009).
3 Thomas Mann provides an entire chapter on subject headings in his Oxford Guide to Library Research [How to Find Reliable Information Online and Offline] (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2005).
4 Reformation–Czech Republic–Bohemia–Correspondence
5 Tom Steele, “The New Cooperative Cataloging” Library Hi Tech 27, No. 1 (2009): 70. Library Lit & Inf Full Text, WilsonWeb (accessed October 11, 2009).
6 Steele, 72.
7 See, for example, Louise F. Spiteri, “The Use of Folksonomies in Public Library Catalogues,” Serials Librarian 51, no. 2 (2006): 75-89.
8 See Darlene Fichter, “Intranet Applications for Tagging and Folksonomies,” Online 30, no. 3 (2006): 43-46; See also Ellyssa Kroski’s assertion that metadata is now in the realm of Everyman in L. Gordon-Murnane, “Social bookmarking, folksonomies, and Web 2.0 tools,” Searcher 14: 26-38.
9 Peter J. Rolla, “User Tags versus Subject Headings: Can User-Supplied Data Improve Subject Access to Library Collections?” Library Resources and Technical Services 53, no. 3 (2009): 178.
10 Elaine Peterson, “Patron Preferences for Folksonomy Tags: Research Findings When Both Hierarchical Subject Headings and Folksonomy Tags Are Used,” Evidence Based Library and Information Practice 4, no. 1 (2009): 55.
11 Rolla, 183.
Popularity: 23% [?]
It has been said, “There is no substitute for experience, but letting your wife do it is the next best thing.”1 This colloquialism expresses an idea that is more profound than an initial reading might suggest. The idea is that a personal, first-hand, internalized knowledge of information is ideal since it is entirely available to the individual at the point of need – assuming, of course, that it can be remembered. Otherwise, however, the presence of a substitute that points an individual to the needed information is the next best thing. In the real world, however, such substitutes become the practical ideal since not everyone has the same knowledge or vocabulary. The illustration here is clear: the use of surrogate records to point to information resources is, for a multiplicity of reasons, the most practical and therefore the best only real solution to the problems inherent in information representation and access.
Full-Text Indexing
The popularity of many full-text databases is likely attributable to their seeming ease of use, though, ironically, the simpler user interfaces usually require more non-intuitive and advanced knowledge to search effectively. Anyone can enter “jaguar” into Google’s single search box, but not many know how to limit the results to either the car, the old Mac operating system, or the animal. Yet, convincing a searcher that there are better, more efficient, ways to arrive at a desired set of results is not an easy task.
One of the impediments to successfully convincing searchers to learn what they consider to be needlessly complicated and irrelevant search syntax when using full-text databases is convincing them that using an intermediary layer between them and the text (or other information resource) is often more efficient. Understandably, most searchers balk at the thought of distancing themselves from the information in order to find it. It seems counter-intuitive. Who are we, anyway, to dictate the terms under which they can access information? Herein lies the rub, however. Without a system that quite literally does exactly that, most information resources will be less likely identified by the majority of searches. There are too many difficulties inherent in present-day full-text indexing methods for searches yield accurate and comprehensive results, and someone must indeed dictate the terms under which a resource can be found.
Full-text indexing is accomplished automatically, that is, it is a computerized process that extracts terms according to a defined algorithm. The process can be rather complex but is really rather simple in its conception: lexical analysis and term selection. Lexical analysis is the process by which formatted, punctuated, inflected text is dismantled into unformatted, uninflected, words. These tokens, as they are frequently called, then undergo the term selection process in which certain stop-words are removed. Some words are “stemmed,” or truncated, to remove any inflection from their verbal roots and to group lexically related words under their simplest form. Others, such as hyphenated words, are broken into their constituent parts. The terms are then “weighted” to determine their relative importance based, usually, on their frequency of occurrence.
The benefits of this type of indexing are, in my judgement, few but important. Full-text indexing is inexpensive and is becoming increasingly so. This is no small benefit. Libraries are chronically under-funded, and the bottom-line is always a concern. Database vendors, the primary producers of such databases, are for-profit businesses. Taken together, under-funded libraries and profit-driven vendors are constantly engaged in a tug-of-war as each pleads their case. Full-text indexing, though often a high-cost initial entry endeavor, appeals to both for the same reason: it is affordable.
The second important benefit to full-text indexing is that it removes the inconsistencies that result from the use of manual indexers. Spelling variants between indexers (color or colour? indexes or indices?) as well as the inevitable inconsistencies that a single indexer may apply are avoided with an indexing algorithm’s prescribed procedures. They will be followed correctly every time. Consistency is no small benefit either. Without it, the architectonic purpose of indexing is nullified.
These benefits are important. Taken together with the increasing expectation by searchers for full-text search capabilities, a strong argument is made for the implementation of full-text indexing of information resources -– especially of textually-based resources. Lest we rob Peter to pay Paul, however, there are further considerations to be had.
Surrogate Records
A surrogate record is “a presentation of the characteristics . . . of an information resource.”2 When referring to surrogate records in a catalog of bibliographic resources, this metadata typically includes three primary types of information: descriptive data, subject data, and classification data. These records are used to help render the resources for which they stand as intermediaries more identifiable to searchers. They do not provide the resource per se, but point to the resource. These records are no longer singular in their directionality, however. Rather, properly created surrogate records provide multiple points of access to the resource through the fields such as subjects and classifications, as well as the author’s name and the resource’s title. Indeed, the access points in contemporary surrogate records render the record multidirectional, and allow the resource to be identified via several avenues.
The crux of this argument lies in the appropriation of controlled vocabulary – a process which heretofore has proven elusive to automatic methods. Controlled vocabulary in a surrogate record includes the normalization of spelling, the assignment of preferred terminologies in order to address homographic and synonymic issues, and thereby reduces ambiguity. For example, without some terms being dictated one would not know whether to look under “C. S. Lewis” or “Clive Staples Lewis” as an author. The task of pursuing both in full-text searches becomes cumbersome without complicated syntax. The application of an authoritative term is really quite valuable.
Homographic problems are also illustrative of the usefulness of surrogate records. Does “Mercury” refer to the planet, the metal, the automobile, or the mythological god? Full-text indexing has no way to differentiate them. Controlled vocabularies have devised a multiplicity of solutions, and in the case of subject classification and its manifestation in a catalog’s surrogate record for a bibliographic item, render resources on each of these possibilities uniquely identifiable.
Such precision is perhaps the strongest benefit of this approach. This precision, however, is important enough to outweigh the potential weaknesses of this approach. Admittedly, indexing to produce surrogate records with controlled access points allows for the potential for a number of lesser problems. Foremost among these problems is cost. At present, no automated process is sufficient for the task. This lack of automation requires that controlled vocabularies be appropriated manually – a rather costly endeavor. This cost is off-set somewhat with collaborative cataloging, a fact on which I rely when indicating that this cost factor is a lesser problem in comparison to the benefit of precision. Inconsistency (both intra-and inter-indexer) will always be a potential when human indexers are involved. Additionally, and commonly, searchers choose terms not included by indexers.
These potential problems have prompted many to attempt to bridge the divide between full-text indexing and manual indexing with the use of computer programs. More specifically, projects are underway which endeavor to link the primary terms gleaned automatically through the aforementioned application of stemming programs, etc., with particular controlled subject vocabularies such as the Library of Congress classification scheme. These ongoing projects are exciting developments in the field, and hold promise for future use, but are not yet viable for widespread use.
Conclusion
Surrogacy is a term that brings instantly to mind the idea of a substitute. It may seem counter-intuitive to render a resource more findable by inserting an artificial layer between the resource and the searcher, but such is the case in the modern indexing world. Full-text indexing is gaining in popularity, but it is my judgment that until automated indexing can solve the various problems of inaccuracy by providing clear, accurate, and specific results, someone must do it themselves. The only practical way for this to happen is through the creation of records containing information about the resource that provides the user with multiple points of access to the identification of the resource. As long as physical collections of resources are the locus of consideration, only some system of surrogacy will allow for a collocated organization of the collection. In other words, surrogacy is the way to go – it removes much of the labor!
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1 Evan Esar, 20,000 Quips & Quotes (New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1995) p. 284
2 Arlene G. Taylor and Daniel N. Joudrey, The Organization of Information, 3rd Edition (Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2009) p. 473.
Popularity: 16% [?]
