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Annual Users' Meeting 2000

ANCJK SERVICE REPORT

Database growth and maintenance

The ANCJK database grew at a steady rate during the period from July 1999 to June 2000. The total number of records is now 1,151,415 in the Pinyin database and the number of holdings is now 346, 573.
41,840 holdings (item) records and 211,282 bibliographic records were added for the year. The bibliographic records were sourced as follows:

  • 48, 209    Library of Congress
  • 13,740     RLIN
  • 127,968   National Diet Library
  • 12,045     Members on-line contributions
  • 9,320       Members off-line contributions (file loads)

Quality control

Duplicate removal activity continued with 67,000 duplicate records removed from the Pinyin database. Emphasis was also placed on upgrading brief or corrupted records with better quality records from the Library of Congress and RLIN.

In addition, the Library of Congress’ adoption of Pinyin Romanised Chinese geographical names in early 1999, lead to increased work on the ANCJK authority files as staff implemented LC’s changes on the NCJK database.

Down-grading the Wade-Giles database

When the ANCJK Service first started in September 1996, it provided access to a Wade-Giles and a Pinyin database, to meet the needs of member libraries that required parallel support for both of these Chinese language Romanisation schemes. Though identical in bibliographic and holdings data coverage, the Wade-Giles database functioned as the major update database, with Pinyin assigned reference status.

However, during the last quarter of 1999, the two largest users of the Wade-Giles database converted existing Wade-Giles records to the Pinyin scheme, and commenced using Pinyin for current cataloguing. With the Australian National University and the National Library of Australia no longer needing access to Wade-Giles data, the ANCJK Service was able to establish the Pinyin database as the major update database in March 2000.

Access to the Wade-Giles database via the ANCJK WebPAC, and OPAC ceased at the same time and it is currently only used by ANCJK staff to load Chinese records sourced from the Library of Congress and RLIN, who still use Wade-Giles Romanisation. Loading these original LC and RLIN records to the Wade-Giles database first increases the accuracy of records matching (particularly against brief or old ABN interim records in the ANCJK system), and minimises the number of conversion errors when data is converted to Pinyin. The Wade-Giles database will be completely decommissioned when LC and RLIN fully adopt Pinyin Romanisation, possibly in October 2000.

Member libraries contributions

The National Library of Australia and Melbourne University Library commenced retrospective cataloguing projects for their uncatalogued Chinese language collections. Staff from both libraries has indicated that they can source copy cataloguing for approximately 75% of their retrospective work from the ANCJK database. This has been further supplemented by access to the RLIN databases, which has increased the overall copy cataloguing hit rates to around 95%. Both libraries are pleased with the quality of records available and the ease of accessing data from external utilities. Libraries are able to view and use records selected from RLIN within 24 hours.

9,320 records were added through off-line bibliographic data contributions from the Australian National University, Deakin University and Melbourne University. There was a net benefit in this activity as it enabled the ANCJK database to increase locations. Members were also able to benefit through this process as many of their poorer quality records (often brief, incorrectly Romanised or without vernacular script data) were matched to much better quality ANCJK records which could then be re-loaded into local systems. The match rates were sometimes as high as 95% for university libraries, and 55% for public libraries. Due to the lower quality of the records supplied, many of these uploads consume considerable ANCJK staff resources.

Wade-Giles to Pinyin Conversion Program

A program to convert Chinese bibliographic records from Wade-Giles to Pinyin Romanisation was made available to the East Asian library community in February. The program was released as freeware though some restrictions apply to its use and distribution.

Called 'W2P', the program converts records that have Chinese words in Wade-Giles Romanisation into Pinyin Romanisation, and can convert Chinese bibliographic records, as well as records in other languages such as Japanese, Korean or English which include words in Wade-Giles, from Wade-Giles to Pinyin.

The release of this program has attracted worldwide interest from libraries that are contemplating Wade-Giles to Pinyin conversion of their own data, in particular, libraries in Hong Kong and the United Kingdom. Interested libraries can download the program as well as the user manual, and so far, more than 50 institutions have acquired the program.

Access

The ANCJK databases can be accessed via a Z39.50 gateway from KineticaWeb. In period July 1999 to June 2000 just over 83,000 searches of the CJK databases were performed via the KineticaWeb gateway, representing just over 1% of all Kinetica search activity. Access and use of the ANCJK database via KineticaWeb could improve if problems with the display of holdings information are resolved.

As part of re-structuring the LAN within the National Library of Australia, the ANCJK Service was moved to the Kinetica LAN server in June 2000. This resulted in a change to both the host and IP addresses for the service which are now "cjk.kinetica.nla.gov.au", and "202.6.91.12" respectively.

Software upgrades

Two upgrades to the software that underpins the ANCJK system were successfully implemented this year. Innovative Interfaces Innopac software Release 2000, Updates A and B, were installed during March and May respectively.

Promotions and visits

The ANCJK service was successfully promoted at the following events, coinciding with promotion of the Kinetica system and services:

July 1999 Chinese Studies Association of Australia Conference, Perth
September 1999 Korean Studies Association of Australia Conference, Sydney
October 1999 The Australasian Innopac Users Group (AIUG), Melbourne
April 2000 CONSAL (Congress of Southeast Asian Librarians), Singapore
June 2000 APA Australian Book Fair, Sydney

During some promotional activities, ANCJK staff took time to visit the following member libraries. These visits were very positive and enabled staff to build relationships with member institutions.

July 1999 Murdoch University
September 1999 Randwick City Library Service, Sydney City Library Service, Macquarie University, City of Botany Bay Library Service
October 1999 University of Melbourne, Monash University
June 2000 Sydney City Library Service

Membership

22 libraries are members of the ANCJK Service with Deakin University recently joining in June 2000. The Hong Kong Hospital Board Library ceased its membership in February 1999.

Full Members (16)
Australian National University
CAVAL Ltd.
City of Botany Bay Library Service
Griffith University
Hurstville City Library
Macquarie University
Monash University
Murdoch University
National Library of Australia
University of Melbourne
University of New South Wales
University of Newcastle
University of Queensland
University of Sydney
University of Technology, Sydney
University of Western Australia
Search and Holdings Members (6)
Bond University
Deakin University
La Trobe University
Randwick City Library Service
Sydney City Library Service
University of Adelaide

User manual

The 2nd edition of the ANCJK User Manual was released in July 1999. Due to some major changes to the ANCJK system, there may be a third edition released toward the end of 2000.

 

Bemal Rajapatirana
25 July 2000

Draft agenda Kinetica Annual Users' Meeting 2000