National Library Home > News & Events
Gateways

The End of the VI (Visible Index): All non-Asian National Library serial records are now online

A major milestone was achieved in February 2007 with the completion of a project to create online catalogue records for all non-Asian serials held by the National Library.

This was a huge task spanning more than 20 years, and involving the conversion of information from the manual visible index (VI) which was used for the entry of serial issues received, and also from various card catalogues and shelf lists that had been created over the years. Making this information available online now means that anyone anywhere in the world can use the National Library’s OPAC, or Libraries Australia, to view details of the National Library's serial holdings.

The ambitious goal of creating online records for all our serials really became a possibility with the advent of ABN in 1981. Staff began cataloguing new non-Asian serials onto this system, and by June 1982 there were about 4000 National Library holdings added to it.

The first dedicated serial conversion project was undertaken between December 1985 and March 1986. The project was aimed primarily at supporting a new service introduced by Document Supply. The ‘fast track’ service gave priority to requests that supplied the National Library call number, so it was important to make this information available in ABN. Titles listed in the major indexing and abstracting tools were targeted as being the most likely to be requested. There was a high copy cataloguing hit rate of around 94% for these titles on ABN. Most titles were mainstream, English-language journals. 6700 holdings were added to ABN in this project.

The second conversion project was undertaken between June 1986 and April 1987. Staff worked their way through the Library’s large visible index doing copy and original cataloguing for titles purchased on subscription. A larger proportion of foreign-language and non-mainstream titles reduced the hit rate for copy cataloguing on ABN to 72%. 4000 holding were added to ABN during this project.

A conversion team of six people was formed in November 1987 and was in full swing by March 1988. Initially the team concentrated on serial titles listed in the Library’s divided card catalogue which comprised titles catalogued or recatalogued between 1967 and 1981. In 1988 and 1989 the team catalogued over 18 000 serial titles. Thereafter, conversion continued gradually as part of routine serial collections maintenance.

In September 1995, the Australian Serials Conversion Team was formed, with the task of converting all remaining Australian serials to ABN and adding detailed holdings information and check-in records to the Library’s ILMS. This team worked its way through the various runs wherever Australian serials were to be found: such as obscure pamphlet collections, strange brown-paper bundles in the strong room, and the far reaches of the Ferguson Collection, as well as more obvious places like the visible index, the old dictionary card catalogue and the divided serial card catalogue. Staff were rotated through this team. The Australian conversion project was completed on 8 January 2001. The team catalogued 42 953 serial titles, and for the first time all records for Australian serials could be found in the one place.

The Overseas conversion project began in March 2001, with a smaller team—never more than three, and usually only two people. While all of the Australian serials were stored onsite, making checking easy, cataloguing the overseas serials entailed visits to the Library's offsite storage facility (fondly know as the old warehouse) to check holdings. A number of important old titles of historical value for which no holdings were previously recorded in Australia were catalogued during this process. It also made staff au fait with the vagaries of pre-AACR I cataloguing: cards written in beautiful copperplate (with such subject headings as ‘European War, 1939-’); ‘temporary’ cards replacing those withdrawn in the 1950s (in Canberra, we had a ‘temporary’ Parliament House which wasn’t replaced for 60 years, so this had an honourable precedent); and the card with the plaintive message: ‘HELP! I am being held prisoner in a catalogue card factory’ typed on it.

Finally, in February 2007 the Overseas conversion project was completed. The team catalogued 19 734 titles during this phase of the project and overall the Library now has holdings on over 260 000 serial records on Libraries Australia.

A party was held to celebrate this momentous achievement. All current and former staff members who had worked on the project were invited, and it was a wonderful opportunity to catch up with old friends and reminisce about the days when manual card catalogues and the visible index covered most of the floor in the serials work area.

Nikki White
Overseas Serials Conversion Project
Collection Management
National Library of Australia