Technology and Support Services Division
Cataloging and Metadata Department

Stodocs Project

Stodocs Team Meeting Notes

August 16, 2010

Present: Carol, Cindy, Jackie, Jodi, Jan, Fern, Hank, Terri, Nancy, Susan, Cathy, Betsy, and Jimmie

ASERL Summit

Chelsea, Jan, Winston and Jimmie went with Dean Judy Russell to the ASERL Summertime Summit on Federal Documents Aug. 3-5. Chelsea reported on the Panama Canal Commission as a Center of Excellence. Winston reported on development of a database at UF to allow depository libraries to easily communicate about documents needs and offers. Jimmie reported on the StoDocs project. Judy was on a Deans’ task group proposing cooperation among the southeastern depository libraries and co-led the summit. One hoped-for outcome would be having other depository libraries catalog more of their federal documents, which would improve our hit rate in OCLC as well as provide hugely improved service to selective depository libraries and the public. Jan sent a link to the group after the meeting for the recordings of the presentations: http://dllive.gatech.edu/aserl_2010/

Supplies updates             

• More binders like others on order.
• Metal fasteners for smaller pages on order; one box ordered to try out for use in combination with file folders. More will be ordered if they work well.
• Barcodes in good supply.

Workstations

Increased staff will mean more workstations are needed. There is a possibility that when the public computers in LW are replaced some may become available for use in ALF. Chairs are also needed, and Hang has been looking for usable chairs already at ALF. Others may also need to be taken there. The overall layout of the ALF computers workspace will be reviewed with Cathy in recognition of the impending and future increases in staff working there both on StoDocs and preparation of other stored materials for the high density facility to be built.

The poor connection speed at ALF has been reported many times and Cathy said she has asked Systems to try to make it better. After the meeting she passed along word from Logan that he expects to achieve improvement in this in about 10 days. This will be a big help to the project.

What to do sooner (gathering order)

Stick with true serials and monographs in series on existing priority list. Hank and Nancy reported true serials are getting harder to find. Some staff will soon be shifted from serials to monographs.

Staffing update

Two time limited positions with benefits: in process, closed 8/6.

One additional student assistant: hiring process beginning, one interview Wednesday. Kay is currently working full days Monday-Thursday, but will resume part-time on a new schedule next week when classes begin.

Round Robin: Current activities, changes, problems              

• Susan has been working on Peace Corps materials.
• Nancy has been working on Facts for Industry and needs binders that fit. She asked Cathy whether the folders should be cut down to fit or left their full size. Cutting them to fit is not necessary but will be helpful if this doesn’t take too much time. Some of these may benefit from LKR’s, and Jimmie will look into this Wednesday when she is at ALF for the student interview.
• Fern is working with Flood Insurance reports again since some were unboxed among the former Yon hall storage boxes. Fern and Jackie have been working in tandum on monographs that required subject analysis with Jackie assigning the subjects, etc. in OCLC and Fern completing the work in Aleph and this is working out really well.
• Jackie is still working on the Code of Fair Competition monographs but is down to one m ore stack. There is lots of bad copy in OCLC such as when there is only a title and date and the title is in all-caps so it has to be re-typed. (Collective groan). Other libraries cataloging their documents will benefit from the work we do in OCLC to improve these as well as the new records we enter.
• Carol said she hadn’t gotten many questions lately. Catalogers are finding Andriot’s very helpful, the “Bible” of federal documents.
• Cindy is “working on the railroad all the livelong day” (sing), but hopes to finish that in a week or two. She will be off this Thursday and Friday.
• Chelsea reported having gone to the ASERL Summit. She said progress is being made on the skinny guys Internet Archive cost projecting. There are 40 examples in IA of the test items we sent for scanning previously.
• Cathy said there will be more people working at ALF, especially beginning in winter, to prepare for the high density facility. Some of these will need intermittent access to a computer workstation that can be shared among them. She will need to plan the workspaces and lockers.
• Betsy said she would be sending statistics, and she has done so now.
• Hank said it is getting harder to find true serials. He has been working on agriculture and the zero OCLC titles others have referred to him.
• Terri had thought she was about caught up with withdrawals, but the truck filled up so she has more to do again.
• Todd works on serials and has CONSER maintenance statistics.
• Jan likes hearing about the documents being worked on, and so do I.