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On 16/11/2009 15:09, Ross Singer wrote:
> No, holdings aren't exported to Zebra.
>
> That being said, the opacxml format could be pretty easily added to
> the jangle connector.  There's also something similar (well, sort of)
> in Keystone.
>
> What exactly are you looking for?  Does this functionality work with
> AquaBrowser implementations on Voyager or III?
>
> I guess what I'm asking is, is the Z39.50 holdings format exactly what
> you want, or would there be a more ideal format to use?  The opac
> format gets pretty gnarly with serials, for example (of course,
> everything does).

Good question.

When our Aquabrowser service was set up (http://catalogue.sussex.ac.uk/) 
by Medialab, they used - wait for it - screenscrapping to get holdings 
from our ILS catalogue (Talis Prism 2).

But I guess I'm trying to take step back and say what should our 
suppliers be supporting?
If you were designing a web interface to search one or more ILS tomorrow 
(replacement catalogue interface or perhaps a union catalogue) what 
would you need to implement to show holdings information?

It seems the answer so far is z39.50 is your best bet for some systems. 
Jaggle seems like promising next step.

But z39.50 isn't exactly a protocol of a web age. However it looks like 
there is nothing out there at the moment which can provide holdings via 
the web. Perhaps that is what ISO 20775 is trying to achieve?

What was I asking? Not so much a question, but I wanted to understand 
what the current situation is. And what I should be encouraging 
suppliers to support. (and what I should be checking for when evaluating 
systems)

There are a lot of new-ish 'Discovery layer' apps out there:
http://dltj.org/article/niso-discovery-presentation-links/
But it seems none of these can perfectly plug-in to any ILS and act as a 
replacement catalogue while there are no (decent) standards in this area.

These systems can have fantastic ranking, great looks and more, but if 
it can't show if the item is on loan, or which library it's in, or 
classmark, then users will see this as a step back.

It seems odd that this seems something that isn't really resolved yet 
(though I may be wrong, still getting my head around it). Interested in 
anyone's thoughts on the matter.

Cheers
Chris



-- 
Chris Keene                                     [log in to unmask]
Technical Development Manager                   Tel (01273) 877950
University of Sussex Library
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/library/