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EADs...was the name of a famous Civil Engineer too



-----Original Message-----
From: Fowler/Wasz
Sent: Monday, October 30, 2000 5:09 PM
To: ARCHIVES@LISTSERV.MUOHIO.EDU
Subject: Re: Egad, its EADS!!!!--grumping back


"John Howard Fowler" wrote:

>A simple catalog entry for an entire collection is darned near
>useless, especially if the collection has any depth or breadth of content.<

Following this line of logic, we could say that a catalog record for a book
is also useless, since it fails to describe the contents of each chapter.
The subject entries and added author entries are also useless for book
cataloging since such records do not reflect every author listed in the
bibliography of the book, nor do they reflect every possible subject heading
for those works cited in the bibliography.

>The whole point of archival processing is to create an accessible
collection
>of materials.   If it cannot be accessed, it's just so much trash.

Who says the finding aid is access?  It is just one more layer of
description; it is not the material itself.  If you mean that someone has to
have access to the collection itself, then you'd better get scanning and
typing in that metadata, because you will be doing it until doomsday.


>Given that, a standard way of constructing finding aids is not a bad
>idea--after all, patrons who use one finding aid would be greatly
>convenienced if they did not have to learn another system with each new
>research facility.

Ultra groovy to have finding aids that look alike, but you are saying here
that a researcher must learn at least TWO systems to find information with
EAD: using the OPAC and then using the EAD search engine.  Unless you are
saying that all that information someone using the OPAC is "darned near
useless."

I still say that creating good cataloging records is the first step in
archival description, the tip of the pyramid that understandably cannot
possibly cover the base.  Once the tip is in place, go down to the next
level and get creative if you must, but I guarantee you that there are
actual researchers out there who know and love OPACS and actually use them
to find out what you have FIRST.

Kim (not so grumpy today, but fiesty as ever) Scott

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