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National Library News |
by Louise Tousignant,
Acquisitions and Bibliographic Services, Electronic Publications Acquisitions Section
With some 2 071 titles, the National Library of Canada’s electronic collection offers direct access to recent publications and is an interesting source for users and researchers who wish to consult new publications in a field. From the electronic collection Web page at <http://collection.nlc-bnc.ca/e-coll-e/index-e.htm>, the user can find the work in question by title, by subject, or by conducting a full-text search with keywords of most documents in the collection. The user may not be aware that to facilitate access to the publications, the National Library of Canada (NLC) uses techniques and procedures in the background that are specifically aimed at making this access easier and more transparent.
Hence, before a document available in the NLC archived network can be read on screen, several steps must be taken. The publication must, of course, be received, but its presentation also has to be organized, especially in the case of a periodical. Access to the various issues is organized differently depending on its frequency of publication. Take, for example, the case of the publication entitled Daily Noon Rates (vis-à-vis the Canadian Dollar) = Taux de change quotidien (vis-à-vis le dollar canadien), published by the Bank of Canada. Formerly published in printed format under the title Daily Memorandum of Exchange Rates = Bulletin quotidien des taux de change, it is now available as an electronic version in HTML and PDF formats. After finding the electronic version (http://collection.nlc-bnc.ca/100/201/301/daily_noon-ef/index.html) on the electronic collection Web page, the first page displayed on screen is the choice of consultation format. In fact, when a title is available in more than one format, the user has the choice of format before accessing the actual content of the electronic publication; the Library creates an initial HTML page that offers the various format options. The user can, therefore, select the format of the publication to be consulted. This offers certain advantages, especially when the publication is available in a standard format such as HTML and in a proprietary format such as PDF. If the user does not own the appropriate software for reading a proprietary format, he or she still has the option of reading the standard HTML format using a Web navigator.
The second page displays the years for which the publication is available, while the third page displays the description of the issues available, which is represented here by the choice of weeks. By clicking on the hypertext link for the required week, the user accesses the publication’s content. Note also that the presentation page header always contains the title of the publication along with its format. Organizing the periodical files in this manner allows the user to avoid the need to consult very long Web pages, puts the title into context, and facilitates rapid access to the publication’s content.
First screen:
Daily noon rates (vis-à-vis the Canadian dollar) = Taux de change quotidien (vis-à-vis le dollar canadien)
Second screen:
Daily noon rates (vis-à-vis the Canadian dollar) = Taux de change quotidien (vis-à-vis le dollar canadien) (HTML)
Third screen:
Daily noon rates (vis-à-vis the Canadian dollar) = Taux de change quotidien (vis-à-vis le dollar canadien) (HTML) - 1999
This is not the only way by which the NLC organizes and presents information in order to facilitate its access.
Electronic serials have not escaped title changes. Even though the electronic collection has been in existence for only a few years, the Library already has publications that have changed title. In such cases, the NLC establishes a title change relationship not only in its related cataloguing record but also on its Web pages. A note is written at the year level when the title change took place and at the description level of the last available issue. For the new title, a note is written in the first year it is available under this title. This is another way to help the users find what they are looking for.
To illustrate these cases, let’s use the example of the title Copyright and New Media Legal News. This title ceased to appear in 1999 and was continued by Copyright, New Media Law & E-Commerce News. In this case, a note is added to the last year published under the original title, as well as to the description of the last issue which appeared. The note indicates the new title under which the subsequent issues will be published.
Old title at the year level
Copyright and new media legal news (ASCII)
Old title at the issue description level
Under the title Copyright, New Media Law & E-Commerce News, a note is also added at the year level indicating that this title is the continuation of another title:
Note for the new title:
Copyright, new media law & e-commerce news (ASCII)
1999 -- (Please note, continues: Copyright and new media legal news)
These different examples illustrate the efforts the Library makes to create a bridge between its electronic publications and the Net surfers requiring access to them.
For more information concerning the electronic collection, please contact
Louise Tousignant
Electronic Publications Acquisition Section
Acquisitions and Bibliographic Services
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0N4
Telephone: (819) 953-3997
Fax: (819) 953-8508
E-mail: e.publications.e@nlc-bnc.ca