Working with OCLC

As UW Libraries staff discuss our WorldCat Local implementation with others in the library community, one of the questions asked most frequently is “How long does it take to implement?” As a development partner, our experience was very different from what new subscribers will experience. In the words of Rob Ross, one of the OCLC WorldCat Local implementation managers, they are prepared “to work at the pace at which libraries can make decisions about how their instances of WorldCat Local will look and work.” ¹ Libraries that meet OCLC's criteria (have their holdings current in WorldCat, have indexed OCLC numbers in their local catalog, etc.) and are prepared to make decisions quickly can go live in approximately one month; others may initiate the process and then choose to wait for a particular feature to be implemented before moving forward.

Generally speaking, once a library signs a contract for WorldCat Local, they are assigned an implementation manager—someone who works with the library to ensure success of the implementation. As part of the process, the following general steps are worked through:

1. Assess catalog records and, if necessary, perform a batch load project.
2. Analyze other records in the OPAC that are not in WorldCat to determine if they can be loaded (e.g., third-party records/sets).
3. Analyze other collections not currently in the OPAC that might be available in WorldCat Local (e.g., institutional repository).
4. Meet via phone with the OCLC implementation team to begin mapping out work flows and discuss configuration information.
5. Configure system and make available for testing.
6. Go live!

Some of the key activities as part of the steps above include

1. OCLC conducts a brief introductory meeting with the library to discuss overall library objectives, schedule, key activities, and responsibilities. This meeting includes the project manager/key library contact, OCLC implementation manager, and other OCLC staff.
2. OCLC conducts project kickoff with key library staff (representatives from cataloging, reference, information technology, etc.).
   • Review project time line and key activities.
   • Review configuration questionnaire/work flows used to collect information about the local library environment/systems and how WorldCat Local should be configured.
3. Library completes configuration questionnaire and reviews it with the implementation manager. This online questionnaire contains setup questions related to:
   • branding WorldCat Local to match the library's look and feel
   • interoperability with the library's local system, resource sharing system, and URL resolvers
   • relevancy ranking of search results
   • fulfillment options
4. OCLC tests library's WorldCat Local implementation.
5. Library tests its WorldCat Local implementation.
6. Library conducts library staff training.
7. Library promotes WorldCat Local to end users.
8. Library reviews statistical reports provided by OCLC about WorldCat Local usage.
9. Go live!
   • WorldCat Local search box is placed on library Web site and other appropriate places.
   • Additional services, such as the Google gadget and Facebook widget, are made available to end users.

The above is a simplified view of the process, as the local systems in place at each institution are unique. The next section provides details on what is required in each of the functional areas defined earlier.

Implementation Team: Public Services

Implementing WorldCat local requires the expertise of staff familiar with technical and cataloging issues. Although these issues are complex and are the focus of much of the process, OCLC recommends that the project team include public services staff. As part of the initial development and implementation work, their perspective can keep the rest of the group focused on the reason why WorldCat Local is needed: the user.

Experience with the WorldCat Local pilot libraries taught OCLC that one of the keys to a successful implementation lies in the marketing and rollout phase. Public services staff with experience in instruction and outreach play a primary role in organizing training sessions and creating a marketing plan. It is particularly important to provide background, context, and training for library staff so that they understand how the service works and are familiar with WorldCat Local features prior to assisting users. This increases staff comfort with the system and enables them to respond to questions that might arise at a service desk. As with any new system or service, discomfort is inherent when there is a perceived loss of expertise. If staff do not accept or trust the new system, they will be less likely to use it and recommend it to users. Offering a second series of sessions to staff a few months into the implementation reinforces the initial training and allows staff to learn about changes, ask questions, and exchange information about best practices. Staff should be encouraged to share success stories, since those illustrate the benefits of WorldCat Local for users.

In early 2008, electronic training materials and tutorials were created by OCLC to aid with the staff training process. As with WorldCat Local itself, these materials are constantly improved based on feedback from library staff and should reduce the overall time that staff have to spend developing their own local training materials. In mid-2008, online help within WorldCat Local itself (accessed through the “Help” link at the bottom of every page) was greatly enhanced to provide additional detail about the system. Much of the content was driven by user questions and queries.

WorldCat Local includes features that many library catalogs do not, such as faceted browsing, FRBR-ized results sets, searching and delivery integration, and myriad social features. Faceted browsing has become a standard feature in many databases and is thus familiar to public services staff, but it is entirely possible that staff have little experience with such social features as RSS feeds, bookmarking, and tagging, and may question the need for these. As part of the training, it might be worthwhile to review some of the Web 2.0 technologies and perhaps invite a student to talk about why these features are important to them. ²

WorldCat Local was unveiled at the University of Washington on April 30, 2007, almost halfway through the spring quarter. OCLC developed customizable marketing materials, including posters, pencils, bookmarks, and pads of paper, and these were posted and distributed around the campus. Librarians promoted the service in instruction and consultation sessions, demonstrating the search, discover, and request features, as well as highlighting the availability of articles. Subject librarians also sent e-mail about WorldCat Local to their departments. Other than that, we chose to implement the system with little fanfare or advance notice because users were preparing to leave for the summer and would not be able to provide much structured feedback. We intentionally replaced the UW Libraries Catalog search box on our home page with the WorldCat Local search box as a way of promoting its use and obtaining initial user reaction.

Public services staff perform a primary function in establishing a mechanism for user inquiries, ensuring that questions are handled by appropriate staff in a timely manner. The University of Washington has used OCLC's QuestionPoint since 2002 to manage information and reference questions, making it easy to incorporate WorldCat Local into this stream. A link to the service was provided on WorldCat Local pages. An electronic mailing list was created for the WorldCat Local team, and staff monitoring QuestionPoint knew to assign questions about the service to that list. The appropriate team member could then respond to the query. At times, the team engaged in prolonged discussion prior to formulating an answer, particularly when multiple issues were involved. Additionally, a “from page” field in our QuestionPoint Web form captures where the user was when encountering a problem. Often the questions posed had nothing to do with WorldCat Local per se, but with next steps, and that helped to point out where information needed to be more clearly presented. Finally, public services staff were able to collect questions and anecdotes at service desks and send those to the team.

Implementation Team: Library Systems

As mentioned earlier in this chapter, it is important to have the following individuals involved in WorldCat Local implementation:

• link resolver/knowledge base local manager
• ILS manager/coordinator
• consortial/union catalog coordinator
• Web services manager/coordinator

In this section, we focus on the systems aspects in each of these areas.

Circulation and Interlibrary Loan

WorldCat Local has to be viewed as a delivery tool as well as a discovery tool. Thus, it is important to have someone with knowledge of circulation and interlibrary loan policies and practices on the implementation team. The lines between circulation and interlibrary loan, which are often seen as separate, need to be blurred to bring about seamless integration of delivery for users.

As noted in the section above, we decided to route all requests for UW or Summit materials through the Summit requesting system. All requests for materials not held at University of Washington or Summit would be routed to ILLiad. In thinking about how to integrate delivery into discovery with WorldCat Local, we had to think through the various scenarios and work flows in all three areas: local circulation, Summit borrowing, and ILL borrowing. During implementation, we worked with OCLC staff to develop detailed work flow scenarios and determine at each juncture whether requesting was allowed and what kind of link should be offered to the user.

In order to maximize the full capabilities, it is best if delivery services such as local paging, scanning, and interlibrary loan be robust and well supported. The UW Libraries have long had a program that allowed for local requesting, or paging, of UW materials. Users could request many materials through the local catalog and pick them up at any UW library. We also wanted UW users to be able to request UW materials through Summit borrowing, not only to reduce complexity, but also to support remote users. Over the years, we have worked hard to make sure that local requesting policies aligned with Summit requesting policies as much as possible. However, in implementing WorldCat Local we discovered disconnects, some based on system issues and others on policy.

We had some materials (such as books that circulated for 14 days) that could be requested through the local catalog but not through Summit. There had been local concern about these materials circulating to non-UW sites. This was a policy issue and was resolved by changing our policy and allowing any user at any Summit library to request these materials.

Summit requesting is based upon two factors: the item type and whether requesting is allowed. In WorldCat Local, requesting is based upon the system's being able to determine that materials had the status “Available” when checking Summit for information. This difference in determining availability for requesting also caused a disconnect. We discovered that while we allowed older bound periodicals in storage units to be requested through Summit, they couldn't be requested through WorldCat Local. Some careful investigation was needed to determine the problem. Initially the problem was caused by our WorldCat Local work flows having a “don't allow requests” choice for serials since generally the University of Washington and most Summit libraries did not allow requesting of bound journals. We had OCLC reset the work flows to allow requests of serials if it was determined there were copies available for requesting in Summit. After the change, however, we were puzzled because we couldn't request volumes from storage even though they were coded as available in Summit. We determined that the problem was caused by the serial display in Summit showing only the first 30 volumes of a serial; additional volumes are displayed on a secondary screen. The volumes in storage showed on the secondary screen, but WorldCat Local “pinging” of Summit for availability checked only the first screen. In order to solve this problem, the UW Libraries decided to allow requesting of all bound journal volumes through Summit. This expanded the range of materials available not only to UW users but to users across the consortium.

Cataloging/MARC Data

One of the strengths of WorldCat Local is that it provides appropriate services to the user depending on both the data in the WorldCat record and any corresponding local data in the library's catalog, the consortial catalog, and/or the library's link resolver. In addition, a library can use OCLC services, products, and profiling that will result in an improved WorldCat Local user experience.

One obvious person to be on the implementation team is the person responsible for library catalog (MARC) record policies and practices. This is typically a head of cataloging/metadata, although in some places it might be an associate/assistant director or a (principal) cataloger (whether librarian or staff member). This person (or possibly several people) should be responsible for policy for and/or management of:

• local cataloging work flow (including identifying where OCLC contribution appears in the local work flow)
• local library cataloging policies (e.g., use of single vs. separate records in the library catalog, provision of access to online content/links from the library catalog)
• cataloging projects (retrospective conversion/reclamation) and cataloging priorities

Because the OCLC record number is one of the crucial elements in linking the WorldCat database with the local or consortial catalog, this person (or one of these people) must be able to identify classes of materials that lack OCLC record numbers and should also have the knowledge to develop projects or work flows to improve OCLC record number coverage in the local or consortial catalog.

In addition to having the cataloging expert, it is important to also have the primary OCLC local contact on the implementation team. OCLC provides a number of services, products, and profiling that support or improve WorldCat Local services. These include eSerials Holdings, NetLibrary/Electronic Collections Online, PromptCat, ContentDM, Resource Sharing, WorldCat Link Manager, and QuestionPoint. It is not necessary to have every local contact on an implementation team responsible for each of these services, but it is crucial to at least have the primary local contact know which local experts are needed for consultation.

As previously mentioned, the OCLC record number is a crucial element in linking between WorldCat Local and the local ILS. Thus the OCLC record number must be indexed in your local and/or consortial system. In addition, populating your local records with OCLC record numbers will be one of the major pieces of data preparation any library must undertake. With the exception of some services already discussed, an OCLC record number in the local record is required in order to surface local data (including URLs) in WorldCat Local.

In our experience, several types of local catalog records may lack OCLC numbers:

• records created prior to a library's use of OCLC (including records that have never been through retrospective conversion).
• records for which OCLC doesn't lend itself to bibliographic control (such as archival collections), or resources that didn't merit cataloging in OCLC (such as a disposable paperback recreational reading collection)
• third-party record sets lacking OCLC record numbers (In our case, these consist primarily of Serials Solutions e-serial sets and other microform and electronic sets, such as Early English Books Online or Eighteenth Century Collection Online.)
• In-process or on-order records that have not yet been through cataloging.

Depending on the library's environment, there may be other classes of records that don't include OCLC record numbers.

The implementation team should be able to identify these classes of materials and come up with strategies to supply OCLC record number or provide alternative access. At the University of Washington, we've had a number of projects to get OCLC record numbers into our local records that lack these numbers. Records still requiring retrospective conversion are a significant portion of those. At the beginning of project planning, we had approximately 18,000 serial records and 1,400 monograph records that have not been through retrospective conversion. For the serials, we contracted with OCLC RetroCon to provide retrospective conversion and batch creation of original records as necessary. Because there are many fewer monograph records needing retrospective conversion, these are being processed by local staff as time permits. We also have some collections that have never been cataloged (including 1,000 environmental impact statements and 2,000 sound recordings). As time permits, we will locally identify and process records for these collections so that they will be surfaced in WorldCat Local.

Libraries that haven't maintained their holdings in WorldCat also have the option of undergoing a reclamation (synchronization) project. In this process, OCLC basically deletes all holdings for a library and reloads the holdings by loading their current catalog records. We decided not to pursue this option because our processes have been pretty closely tied to OCLC and our database is much too large to easily process as a reclamation project.

Vendor set records also may not contain OCLC record numbers. One approach to handle these is to batch load them into OCLC to get record numbers and then to reload them (with OCLC record numbers) back into the local catalog. Record sets that are not allowed to be redistributed (e.g., Early English Books Online) cannot go through this process by the terms of the record set licenses. OCLC is currently in negotiation with record set vendors to allow these records to appear in WorldCat Local (for access purposes) but not to allow catalogers to use these records in the Connexion system.

As previously mentioned, it is important to have your OCLC services contact involved in WorldCat Local implementation as there are a number of OCLC services and products that affect or improve any particular implementation of WorldCat Local. For example, having a PromptCat subscription (or having a local order work flow that includes exporting an OCLC record) may integrate your on-order/in-process materials into WorldCat Local displays. Libraries that use ContentDM can have OCLC harvest their ContentDM metadata. In doing so, OCLC will create MARC records based on library-developed crosswalks, and these records will appear in WorldCat Local. With crosswalks in place, OCLC can provide machine-generated “cataloging” of these digital objects with no additional effort on the part of the library (aside from the original metadata creation).

Other OCLC services can affect a library's WorldCat Local implementation. For example, if a QuestionPoint-subscribing library includes a link to QuestionPoint from all its WorldCat Local pages, additional staff training and QP profiling may be involved. We had several reports of QP requests from our users being picked up by partner libraries whose reference staff would insist, “Articles do not appear in the library catalog” (even though our users had found article citations in WorldCat Local). Of course, resource-sharing services are crucial to the operation of WorldCat Local, and the person responsible for resource sharing should be included in any implementation effort.

Electronic books and electronic serials in WorldCat Local can be particularly problematic. OCLC encourages libraries to subscribe to NetLibrary and Electronic Collections Online as titles profiled in these services will appear in WorldCat Local with no additional effort on the part of the library (beyond having to locally load MARC records provided by OCLC). Other e-book sources are more problematic. Depending on your local cataloging practices (single/separate records and batchload sets vs. individual cataloging on WorldCat), some e-book content may not surface in WorldCat Local. Situations to troubleshoot:

• If you follow the single-record approach, do the links to your e-books appear in the display for the print book?
• Are your holdings set in WorldCat on e-book records (and if they are set, do you actually get access to the e-book)?

Providing WorldCat Local access to your electronic serials can be difficult to implement due to data considerations. In the first six months of product development, OCLC implemented some workarounds to help libraries surface their e-serials (and corresponding links). Because libraries often rely on third parties to provide e-serial bibliographic records and different libraries follow different cataloging approaches (single vs. separate records) for e-serials, implementation will require a thorough analysis to determine how best to surface as many e-serial records and links as possible. What follows is based on the analysis and decisions we made to best surface e-serials in our version of WorldCat Local.

First ask yourself: For my library's e-serials, which are represented by WorldCat holdings? For most libraries, the answer to that question likely will be some, but not all. Every library incorporates e-serials into its cataloging work flow in a slightly different way. For which e-serials do you attach holdings in OCLC? When you answer that question, then you know which WorldCat e-serial records will (and won't) surface in search results as held by your library. Libraries that follow the single-record approach (i.e., attaching e-serial holdings locally to print version records) have probably not attached their holdings to the WorldCat e-serial record, but only to the print version record. Because users often prefer online versions, they may retrieve the WorldCat Local e-serial record or use the Internet Resource facet to limit search results to online resources only to determine that (apparently) your library doesn't have access to a particular e-serial. If you have created separate records for all your e-serials and attached OCLC holdings for these, then you are in better shape than those libraries following the single-record approach. At the University of Washington, we follow the single-record approach as much as we can within our local work flows. Thus the only e-serial WorldCat holdings that we have manually attached holdings for in OCLC are those e-serials that we don't already hold in print. For those e-serials that we already hold in print, the only place where the user will see online access is from the print version record.

In addition to e-serials that you process locally, there is likely another class of e-serials that won't surface in WorldCat Local: those that are held in full-text aggregated databases. It is very unlikely that a library will locally process and catalog every serial title in every full-text database. So these will also not appear in WorldCat as being held by the library. If the library believes it is important to surface the records in WorldCat Local, then holdings will need to be attached through alternative means. That alternative is the OCLC eSerial Holdings Service.

eSerial Holdings is a freely available service provided by OCLC that takes data either from your e-serial service provider (the companies OCLC currently works with are Ebsco, Serials Solutions, TDNet, and WorldCat Link Manager) or data that you provide to OCLC and attaches your holdings to the corresponding e-serial records. The eSerials Holdings service is relatively conservative about attaching holdings from this data, so you can be assured that if a record indicates that an e-serial is held by your library, it really is held by your library. E-serial holdings are maintained on a monthly basis. Because OCLC identifies whether a holding is attached directly by the library or through this service, there are very few accidental attachments or deletions of holdings. One of the results of using the eSerials Holdings service is that additional e-serial records will surface in WorldCat Local displays with an indication that you hold the e-serial. More information about the service is available from OCLC.

The next question to ask yourself is this: Are there WorldCat e-serial records to which I have my holdings attached for which my local record lacks an OCLC record number? (Read this question through several times until you are sure you understand it.) Remember, the OCLC record number is the data element that WorldCat Local uses to identify the corresponding local record and to retrieve status and availability information. E-serial records in your local library system may lack e-serial OCLC record numbers. This is true when following the single-record approach, as the local record will be for the print version, not the e-serial. Without the e-serial record in your local system, WorldCat Local will fail when it is unable to retrieve a record based on the e-serial OCLC record number. Ideally, when the library has attached its electronic holdings to the print version record, the library would like WorldCat Local to display the electronic holdings from the local print version record.

OCLC developers created a workaround for this. Knowing that the OCLC record number for the print version record is typically in the MARC 776 (Additional Physical Form) field of the electronic version record, WorldCat Local sends over not only the record number appearing in the MARC 001 field (the OCLC record number) but also any OCLC record numbers appearing in 776$w. If WorldCat Local doesn't match a record in the local system on record number in 001, it then tries record number in 776. The result is that WorldCat Local will identify a print version record to display status/availability information for if it does not match specifically on the e-serial record. Basically what this does is that for serials where we locally follow the single-record approach, both the print and e-serial holdings will display from both the WorldCat print version and e-serial records.

Are there any other e-serial records in your local system that lack OCLC e-serial record numbers? If you load vendor records that lack OCLC record numbers (such as from Serials Solutions, TDNet, or MarcIT), then the answer is yes. Because vendor records typically contain no OCLC record number, it is not possible for WorldCat Local to retrieve the locally loaded record in order to display status/availability information. So in this case (and for all cases where holdings are attached to an e-serial record but WorldCat Local fails to identify a corresponding local system record), WorldCat Local will offer a link to the link resolver (behind a Check for Electronic Resources button). If the e-serial title is included in your knowledge base, then you should be able to provide some form of title-level link (or at least a link to your local catalog) when WorldCat Local linking fails.

One other area where local cataloging policies and practices comes into play is in a consortial catalog. Our WorldCat Local implementation was developed to serve data from an Inn-Reach (Innovative Interfaces) catalog. That catalog has a very specific way of handling record matching and overlay. If WorldCat Local is serving data from a consortial catalog, the implementation team should include someone who understands these processes well. In our case, many WorldCat Local discrepancies could be traced back to problems with the consortial catalog record. One common problem was that the consortial catalog record didn't contain an OCLC record number (even though our local copy of the record does). An understanding of these processes and contribution policies is critical for WorldCat Local to work well within a consortial environment.

Although not critical, there are some additional data projects that will improve WorldCat Local service. Local holdings records (even summary level) will improve identification of holdings statements for articles. In the future, when a serial record has your local holdings record with holdings coded following the MARC Format for Holdings Data, WorldCat Local will be able to identify whether your library holds a particular article that is being presented to the user. Without the local holdings record, WorldCat Local will assume that your library holds any article from a journal to which you've attached holdings. The ability to scope to the branch level (a future enhancement) will also be dependent on having local holdings records that include a branch location.