VRAG Annual Reports

VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY WORKING GROUP (VRAG) Annual Reports

  • 2021 - 2022

    2022 VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY GROUP (VRAG)

    Rebecca Bearden and Susanna French, co-chairs

    Heather Buckwalter stepped down as co-chair in July 2021 and Susanna French became co-chair for the 2021-2023 term. The current co-chairs, Rebecca (Becky) and Susanna, met via Zoom 7 times between Sept. 2021-June 2022. During that time, the co-chairs communicated about several topics and projects. They worked on overhauling the existing Vendor Records for Digital Law Collections spreadsheet, per feedback at the 2021 meeting, discussed some problems with linking e-journal titles to the Alma Community Zone, a member’s question on My Communities regarding MARC records from Oxford, and continued concerns relating to serial and multivolume set records in LexisNexis Digital Library’s MARC records from both sources. They also talked about the continued desire to have Bloomberg MARC records available within OCLC Worldshare Collection Manager, and more recently, about Cassidy Cataloging’s migration to a new FTP server. They provided some configuration information to Cassidy to help the set-up process within Alma for other customers. They were also in touch with AILA for AILAlink, encouraging them to look into MARC records, and provided some information. Becky also served in a NELLCO working group which authored Preservation, Discovery, and Accessibility: Talking Points of a Critical Nature, a document which links out to VRAG as a valuable resource in the discovery section. They also discussed ideas for marketing VRAG to AALL members who may not be aware of its purpose, which will be a goal for 2022-2023. Rachel Decker will become co-chair for the 2022-2024 term, as Becky steps down. The annual VRAG meeting was held virtually, via Zoom, on Monday June 13, 2022 at 2:00 PM Eastern time. Aside from reporting on what was worked on for the past year, the quality of the Aspen Learning Library MARC records on WorldShare, Alma CDI interoperability, and drawing a line between vendor records and ILS’s containing records (ex. Alma CZ records) was discussed. Goals for the upcoming year include updating the website, dividing spreadsheet duties, reviewing the co-chair duties, and marketing the group. It was requested that the frequency of meetings be changed to semiannual.

  • 2020 - 2021

    2021 VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY GROUP (VRAG)

    Heather Buckwalter and Rebecca Bearden, co-chairs

    The VRAG meeting was held virtually, via Zoom, on Wednesday, July 7, at 2:00 PM CDT. The co-chairs met 4 times and corresponded throughout the year. Thomas Ma stepped down as co-chair and Becky Bearden became co-chair. We verified the members of VRAG and Alan Keely updated the My Communities list. Alan Keely contacted Dan Rosati at Hein concern adding the OCLC number to the Hein KBART files. The spreadsheet for Vendor Records for Digital Law Collections was updated with information concerning the Wolters Kluwer Online Study Aids Online records. Becky contacted Edard on behalf of a members’ concerns regarding certain fields in the vendor’s records. After receiving a response from Edward Elgar, an email was sent to the member summarizing the response of the Vendor.

    NOTE: This report was included within the 2021 TS-SIS / MMSC ANNUAL REPORT, hosted at https://www.aallnet.org/tssis/about-us/committees/metadata-committee/arcataloging/

  • 2019 - 2020

    Vendor Records Advisory Working Group (VRAG)
    Cataloging and Classification Standing Committee
    Annual Report 2019-2020

    June 19, 2020

    Thomas Ma and Heather Buckwalter – co-chairs

  • 2015 - 2016

    VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY WORKING GROUP (VRAG)
    CATALOGING AND CLASSIFICATION STANDING COMMITTEE
    ANNUAL REPORT 2015-2016

    • VRAG has looked at and made comments regarding several groups of sample records from Wolters Kluwer. Several VRAG members were in communication with Wolters Kluwer, about the MARC records that they have developed for Intelliconnect and now Cheetah. This involved multiple conference calls over the course of the past year.
    • Last year, VRAG was asked to include Margie Maes, the AALL vendor liaison, in all communications with vendors. After the position was eliminated in October 2015, VRAG has included the CRIV representative for that particular vendor in all communication.
    • Angela Jones and Caroline Walters wrote a short history and description of VRAG for the CRIV Sheet, in the February 2016 issue.
    • The spreadsheet of vendor record sets sets continues to be available.

    Submitted by Angela Jones and Caroline Walters.

  • 2014 - 2015

    VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY WORKING GROUP (VRAG)
    CATALOGING AND CLASSIFICATION STANDING COMMITTEE
    ANNUAL REPORT 2014-2015

    Submitted by Angela Jones and Caroline Walters.

    • VRAG was in contact with multiple vendors are interested in the idea of creating MARC records for some or all of their digital collections. These include West, Lexis, and Wolters Kluwer. We have had one or more discussions with each of these vendors, but at this time none of them have yet produced a set of sample MARC records.
    • VRAG also had a few short conversations with other vendors that produce MARC records, including Cassidy Cataloguing and Bloomberg BNA.
    • We communicated with Bloomberg BNA and Oxford University Press, offering suggestions about a centralized place to find all their MARC records.
    • VRAG has been asked to coordinate vendor communications with Margie Maes, the AALL Vendor Liaison. In the future, the group will include Margie in vendor correspondence and communication.
    • The spreadsheet of vendor record sets sets continues to be available.

  • 2013 - 2014

    VENDOR-SUPPLIED RECORDS ADVISORY WORKING GROUP (VRAG)
    CATALOGING AND CLASSIFICATION STANDING COMMITTEE
    ANNUAL REPORT 2013-2014

    Submitted by Angela Jones

    The vendor records group was re-named (was formerly the Task Group on Vendor-Supplied Bibliographic Records) and a new mission statement and group structure was drafted.

    Several members of this year’s VRAG group were members of the Task Force on Vendor-Supplied Bibliographic Records Creation and Distribution Models (Yael Mandelstam, Alan Keely, and Angela Jones). Because the Task Force report strongly encourages database vendors to supply MARC records with their products, we are very hopeful this will encourage additional vendors to work with VRAG in providing high-quality MARC record sets for their products.

    As part of the task force above, several members of VRAG, mostly notably Yael Mandelstam, contributed to a spreadsheet listing MARC record availability for many law-related databases. Other VRAG members have since contributed information for the spreadsheet. The spreadsheet is still a work in progress, but is now publicly accessible through both the Task Force report as well as the VRAG web page. VRAG plans to continue to update this spreadsheet as needed.

    VRAG distributed a crosswalk that can be used to add LCGFT genre headings to bib records for the MOML 7 database (Making of Modern Law: Foreign Primary Sources). These headings were added to the records by Christopher Thomas.

  • 2007

    TASK GROUP ON STANDARDS FOR VENDOR-SUPPLIED BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORDS
    CATALOGING AND CLASSIFICATION STANDING COMMITTEE
    2007 ANNUAL REPORT

    To date various committee members have been assigned to assist with Charges 1 and 2.

    The members dealing with charge 2 have had the most activity. Many members of the Task Force and members of subcommittee no. 2 held a conference call with James Cahoy re: the Westlaw records that Thompson/West was considering offering for purchase. After the conference call, James Cahoy contacted Joni Cassidy about the records and I believe that Thompson has decided that they would not try to do the records on their own. Subcommittee no. 2 also reviewed and made progress with Cassidy’s WLX (Westlaw/Lexis) records. As a result of our communication with them they addressed and resolved the two main issues with their records: authority control and, in some files, incorrect coding for integrating resources. Joni Cassidy assured us that in the future all update files will run through name and subject authority review before they are distributed to WLX subscribers.

    The Task Group will meet in person for the first time since its inception on Tuesday at 7:30 a.m. during which we will discuss the above charges and also problems with the MOML records supplied by Gale.