On Mar 15, 2005, at 11:07 PM, Ross Singer wrote: >>> No, that's the part that is likely to vary among systems. >>> Using CUFTS would give us at least an openly available >>> source of IDs, with broad coverage - son-of-JAKE. Those of >>> us who are committed to proprietary systems like SFX would >>> have to work out linkages from the CUFTS id for a given >>> resource to the SFX id. >> >> i'm working on something currently that would benefit >> greatly from this....would the CUFTS folks be willing to >> share their internal IDs right now? >> >> anyway, i can get by using my own IDs, but was just >> wondering if I could begin this project with at least SOME >> interoperability from the get-go..... > > IESR is a definite possibility. In fact, it looks like there'd be > a ton of uses. I have to admit that I'm not entirely sure what > all I am looking at, but is there a way to relate similar > collections together in it? > > Is it strictly UK? The current metadata seems pretty heavily > UK-centric. How would "database concordance" occur? (i.e. > www.jstor.org = uk.jstor.org) Do UK catalogs have any reference to > these items? Is there any effort to attain that? I had the privilege of visiting the IESR folks a couple of weeks ago with a few other people. IESR's goal is similar to one of the goals of the Ockham NSF Project, namely, to create a machine-to-machine registry (directory) of digital library services and collections. They have articulated a very Dublin Core-like metadata scheme and added a few other things to describe just about any type of digital library entity. Now that I think about it, each item in the directory will have a unique key, if that is what you require. Similarly, I believe the Ockham Registry will have a similar feature, especially considering that we (the Ockham folks and the IESR folks) plan to be working more closely together. FYI. -- Eric Lease Morgan University Libraries of Notre Dame (574) 631-8604