Cataloguing & Metadata

The Cataloguing and Metadata Unit creates, updates and maintains descriptive records and classification for most of the Library’s physical collection (including books, audio-visual materials, etc.) as well as some of its virtual collections (including ebooks and eprints).

The Unit also physically prepares newly acquired monographic materials for the shelves. This includes applying barcodes, stamping pages with one of the official library stamps, and affixing call number labels to the items.

In addition, the Unit provides advice, guidance and training for online record creation by library branch staff who wish to provide public access to titles on order, gift materials, titles on reserve for courses, and ephemeral or pamphlet materials.

UBC Cataloguing & Metadata is also in charge of assigning ISBNs (International Standard Book Numbers) for a number of University of British Columbia departments. To find out more or submit a request, please read and fill out this form.

For information on obtaining an ISSN (International Standard Serial Number) for periodicals and journals, please visit the ISSN Canada homepage.

Until 2003, UBC Library provided CIP (Cataloguing in Publication) data to publishers in Western and Northern Canada. Now CIP is provided by Library and Archives Canada.

For information about Legal Deposit at Library and Archives Canada, please visit the Legal Deposit homepage.

Basic Cataloguing Policy

• Levels of Cataloguing Report (16 September 1996)

Basic Cataloguing Manuals

The UBC Library Cataloguing and Metadata Unit uses as its core manuals the following:

• For all materials
• Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd edition, revised (print, soon to be replaced, in 2010 by Resource Description and Access, an online tool)
• MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data and its complementary works for authority and holdings data
• MARC Code Lists especially those for languages, countries and geographic areas
• NISO Z39.71 Holdings Statements for Bibliographic Items
• For serials specifically
• CONSER Cataloging Manual (print)
• CONSER Editing Guide (print)

Additional Policy Documents

• Inclusion of URLs in the catalogue (30 May 2006)

Voyager Basics Procedures
Branch Procedures
Central Cataloguing Procedures
Better World Books

Voyager Basics Procedures

• MARC 21: a quick summary (24 March 2004)
• Relationships among bibliographic records, holding records and item records (24 March 2004)
• How to enter diacritics in the Cataloguing client (8 March 2004)

Branch Procedures

• Basic item maintenance in the Circulation client (27 April 2004)
• Cataloguing client settings for branches (June 2010)
• Call number corrections (22 July 2004)
• On-the-fly items (22 July 2004)
• Transfers and slides (22 July 2004)
• Withdrawals (22 July 2004)

Central Cataloguing Procedures

Searching for Cataloguing Copy

• AMICUS
• Worldcat
• OCLC Connexion

Call numbers

• Classification Exceptions (Updated March 2011)
• UBC Cutter table
• List of standard suffixes for use in call numbers and in item records (June 2008)

Holdings

• UBC Library’s application of NISO standards for monograph & serial holdings statements (20 March 2007)
• The “Diversion List”

Cataloguing Services

The department provides a number of library-wide services in the interests of providing and maintaining optimum access to our collections, in the most timely way possible. These services include the following:

• Cataloguing of current receipts
• Approvals
• Firm Orders
• Cataloguing of gifts and “take ins”
• Rush cataloguing (upon request of patrons and staff)
• Cataloguing pdfs and other printouts from the Web
• Cataloguing of ebooks: individual and sets
• Catalogue maintenance
• Branch revision requests
• “Report a problem” follow-up from the OPAC
• URL additions to the catalogue for open access electronic surrogates
• Projects:
• Inventory cleanup
• Retrospective conversion
• Broken link (url) resolution

Metadata Services

The department also engages in a number of activities to support the identification, housing, circulation, preservation and security of our physical collections. These activities include the following:

• cIRcle
• Electronic Theses & Dissertations (ongoing)
• Projects
• Retrospective Theses and Dissertations
• Mine Reclamation symposia papers
• 2011 Tailings and Mine Waste conference papers
• CONTENTdm
• Chinese-Canadian Historical Recognition Project

cIRcle Projects

• ETD work
• Mining

Book Prep

The department also engages in a number of activities to support the identification, housing, circulation, preservation and security of our physical collections. These activities include the following:

• Receiving materials to be catalogued from Library branches
• Barcoding
• Tattletaping
• Top-stamping
• Spine labeling
• Shipping catalogued materials to Library branches

Gifts handling

The department assists selectors in the dispersal of gift materials, both to the cataloguing department for processing for UBC Library branches and to an external organization for distribution to other libraries.

• Basic gift preparation guidelines
• Better World Books guidelines

Better world books

UBC Point Grey, UBCO, and the UBC Bookstore have developed partnerships with Better World Books, an award winning online bookstore “with a soul” based in Atlanta, GA. This company is considered a trail blazer among newly emerging socially and environmentally responsible businesses that makes every effort to resell materials sent to it from libraries and institutions around the world. Together with its network of major second hand book sellers it goes the extra mile to sell as many of the materials sent to it as it can, often donating educational materials to organizations throughout North America and the world over. It is mindful of recycling all materials that it can not sell, in an environmentally responsible manner. No landfills are used.

A portion of all proceeds from the sale of materials sent from our libraries are returned to our library. Another portion of each sale is donated to literacy partners around the world. UBC has agreed to support Room to Read, which helps bring educational programs to children around the world.

For UBC Libraries, it should be noted that sending materials to Better World Books (BWB) is an option or a sober “last” look for discarded material and unneeded gift books. It is not in any way meant to replace existing or potential relationships with local and second hand book dealers or local charities, or branch book sale programs.

Better World Books makes it easy for the partners, as it pays for the boxes, shipping and handling of each shipment. With these costs in mind, we are encouraged to follow their acceptance guidelines, if at all possible. Online pre-search tools and support also make working with them easy.

A list of materials that they will or will not accept can be found here.

If you have three minutes, please, also watch: www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeweMRT3FT4

For instructions on how you and your branch can participate here at UBC Libraries, please, refer to the UBC staff intranet site.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Rudolf Traichel, the Manager of the UBC Library BWB partnership, at 2-3083 or email Rudi.

• Rush cataloguing request
• Web resources printout
• URL addition to the catalogue
• ISBN (International Standard Book Number) Request