On Mon, 6 Apr 2009, Jonathan Rochkind wrote:

> Joe Hourcle wrote:
>> 
>> Perhaps a slightly different perspective on looking at requirements:
>>
>>  	What should be easier to do, but is a pain currently?
>
> My answers to that won't point to a more simplified data structure I think 
> some are hoping for.
>
> 1. For a serial title, identify if a particular issue of that serial is held, 
> and where.
> 2. Group alternate editions of the same work.
> 3. Identify the form/genre of an item
>
> There are more. This is what immediately comes to mind. Most of these issues 
> are issues of metadata control, and not trivial to solve.


The really sad thing is -- I agree with every one of those items, as 
they're problems that I run into with my own (non-bibliographic) data.

I've got a few others that might not be as useful in libraries:*

 	Identify items contained in more than one catalog:
 		eg, Hugo award winners that were also on the NYT best
 		seller's list.
 	Identify the lack of correlation between catalogs:
 		eg, Identify items in this week's NYT best sellers list
 		that we _don't_ have at our library.
 	Group (or filter) results by similar form and/or processing;
 		eg, All unabridged audio books in English on CD; Large
 		print books in Spanish in hardback; etc.
 		(or, as an alternative, allow users to set preferences to
 		select their preferred formats)


(I don't follow ILS features, so it's possible that some might be able to 
handle these, but when I've talked to folks in the past, their responses 
have seemed to suggest that I have an odd way of looking at records)

-Joe


* Examples are approximates ... I'm actually looking for records such as:

 	Find periods of time where there was coronal dimming before a
 	coronal mass ejection.

 	Find where there are entries in the LASCO/CME catalog that aren't
 	in the CACTUS catalog (and visa-versa)

 	Only show Level0 data if there isn't associated Level1 data for
 	the observation;  Only show reduced data if there's no full
 	resolution data;  Use SOHO/EIT data unless there's a gap of more
 	than 1 hr, then fill using data from the highest resultion  EUV
 	telescope in the sun-earth line)