[DCRM-L] OCLC's IR webinar (May 13)

[Jennifer MacDonald]

Dear colleagues,

I have been silent on all of this, but I guess it's time to chime in. 
University of Delaware became the first "major" institution to adopt 
WorldShare Management Services, and we migrated last summer.

WMS (which goes by many derogatory nicknames here, like WMD) is the way 
OCLC takes over your ILS. Circulation, reserves, cataloging, 
acquisitions, everything.  Not to put too fine a point on it, hearing 
talk about going to check an institution's local catalog makes me 
cringe, because WE NO LONGER HAVE A LOCAL CATALOG. We have OCLC records 
with extra things dangling from them. Whenever I explain it to someone 
outside of our library, they ask if I'm looking for another job (I'm 
not). The library spent about 18 months working with OCLC on the system, 
then another 12 months when it became clear that they wouldn't be ready 
for the go live date, and there is still continual communication and 
activity between UD and OCLC.

When I search for a record in the metadata module of WMS, it takes me to 
the master record, the Local Bib Data (if there is one), and the Local 
Holdings Record (if there is one). Local notes go into the LBD (natch, 
but you never know with these things). Because I've been in denial for 
the past year, I haven't checked what our records look like on the other 
end, but I figured now was the time, and I have had a friend at a 
different institution take a look. _It is, in fact, possible for others 
to see the LBD_. When the holdings come up in WorldCat.org (I don't know 
about FirstSearch, I didn't check that yet), if you click on the holding 
library's name, the notes come up under the "Details" section. This 
isn't a very exciting record (the book happened to be on my desk because 
one of the copies dropped out in the migration, which is a story for 
another day), but if you want to take a look, this is the record she 
checked: 
http://www.worldcat.org/title/entailed-hat-or-patty-cannons-times-a-romance/oclc/1875667&referer=brief_results

Believe me, I'm not a fan of WMS, but at least for now, I know people 
can see our local data. Or at least she could ...

Jennifer MacDonald

On 5/14/2015 5:31 PM, Allison Rich wrote:
> Hi Karen:
>
>>
>> Furthermore, the Harvard Library has 30 OCLC symbols in use; I asked in the 11am webinar if individual libraries would be able to view the others' LBD. The response was that we would only be able to view the symbol associated with the login.  Speaking personally, I can't imagine that the LBD would ever be more useful than Harvard's shared local catalog (or even the notes on our old catalog cards, for that matter).
> Ah interesting. Then I heard that wrong. I apologize for making that 
> claim then.
> As that is the case then searching in HOLLIS will give you a far 
> better idea than LBDs!!
>
>> I also found the statement that no end of life date has been determined for Connexion quite ominous.  More generally speaking, I found the responses were often very vague and didn't necessarily answer the question being asked in a meaningful way.
> Very much agreed, Honor. The answers were very vague that way and most 
> unsatisfying.
>
> ~Allison
>
>
>
> -- 
>
> ********************************
> "Outside of a dog,
> a book is probably man's best friend,
> and inside of a dog,
> it's too dark to read.
> - Groucho Marx"
>
> Allison Rich
> Rare Materials Cataloguer
> ESTC and NACO Coordinator
>
> John Carter Brown Library
> Providence, Rhode Island
> Allison_Rich at brown.edu
>
> ********************************


-- 
Jennifer MacDonald
Associate Librarian and Coordinator,
Special Collections Cataloging and Processing
Metadata Services Department
University of Delaware Library
Newark, DE 19717-5267

302-831-1512

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