How to Introduce Naxos Music Library Titles to OPAC - The Lingnan University Library Experience

This article provides an update on the Web-OPAC as Library Resources Portal Project, launched by Lingnan University Library, Hong Kong. In August 2004, Lingnan Library introduced a new feature to the Web-OPAC as Library Resources Portal Project, i.e., by converting some 300 Naxos Spoken Library titles into MARC records, with the use of an in-house developed software programme. The result was that on top of allowing users to gain direct access to the NSWL titles from the WebOPAC, it also enhanced their intellectual access to different collections held inside the Library. Such a setup allowed a unified retrieval from multiple translations or different expressions of the same work -enhancing users’ ability to search across different collections under the same platform, regardless of their media or formats. Following the success of the NSWL Project, Lingnan Library announced at the 5 Annual Hong Kong Innovative Users Group Meeting on 1 December 2004 that as the second phase of the Web-OPAC as Library Resources Portal Project, they successfully converted a total number of 4,676 Naxos Music Library titles into individual MARC records. The NML MARC Project adopted basically the same concepts and principles in making the NML titles inter-searchable with other library collections, to further reinforce the concept of OneStop searching for the library users under the Web-OPAC. Lingnan Library’s users are now able to access Naxos’ complete catalogue of music recordings at any time of day or night via Lingnan’s Web-OPAC, inside the library at a listening station, or from any computer with Internet access via remote log-in options, etc. This is almost an unlimited access to an online resource of more than 80,000 audio tracks that takes up no shelf space at all. This paper documents Lingnan Library’s experience in: (1) how to introduce the NML titles to the bibliographic database, and its subsequent finds, as well as its impacts on the cataloguers and users. It also features the locally developed System Software, together with technical procedures explaining how to convert the 4,676 NML titles in MARC format, as well as the necessary manpower and expertise involved for the preparation and implementation of the project. (2) the techniques in bringing consistency to the bibliographic records, and authority control to names of individual composers, lyrists, musician-performers, as well as other professional music groups, after the NML titles were successfully uploaded onto the bibliographic database. This paper is also supplemented with a brief analytical study on the contents of the NML at the end. Journal of East Asian Libraries, No. 137, October 2005 40