USEMARCON E-EndUser 2003 5.9.2003 in Helsinki Arne Hedman / Helsinki University Library Thomas Roos / CSC
Feb 03, 2016
USEMARCON
E-EndUser 2003
5.9.2003 in Helsinki
Arne Hedman / Helsinki University Library
Thomas Roos / CSC
Agenda
– What is USEMARCON?– Versions available– What must be defined before use of
USEMARCON?– Where to get help?– Our conversion of 30 million records– Two cases
What is USEMARCON
• MARC-converter for any MARC data in exchange format (ISO 2709)– user control– free of charge
• USEMARCON is developed in late 1990’s by partners of the consortium from Holland, UK, Germany and France, supported by EU’s Telematics Applications Programme
Versions available
• Original Windows-version by Jouve S.I– MS Win 3.1x, MS Win 95 and Solaris 2.4– Requires XVT C++ toolkit to compile– GUI only– Memory leaks– ftp://ftp.bl.uk/pub/nbs/ec/usemarcon
cont…
Versions available
• Usemarcon Plus by Crossnet Systems Ltd– Separate MS Win and Linux/Unix versions
– API calls possible
– Tested by us on Win 2000, Solaris8 and Debian Linux
– Builds with VC++ or GCC 2.8, but not GCC 3.X
– Used by EISI as a platform for on-the-fly conversions
http://www.bl.uk/services/bibliographic/usemarcon.html
cont…
Versions available
• Usemarcon Plus by ATP Library Systems ([email protected])– Merged Windows and Linux versions– Elimination of all known memory leaks– Command line enhancements– code restructuring for better readability– build tested with
• MS Visual C++ 6 on Windows XP• GCC 3.2 on Red Hat Linux 8.0• GCC 3.3 on Debian unstable
– Will be available from BL shortly
What must be defined before use of
USEMARCON?• All files and tables are text files very easy to
handle• Initialization File (.ini)
– names of tables and input/output files
• Look up tables (.tbl)– codes to be converted
• Format checking tables (.chk)– List of fields and subfields allowed and their occurences
cont…
What must be defined before use of USEMARCON?
• one table for input data and one for output data
• Character Set Translation Table (.trs)– only non-standard characters to be defined– conventional ASCII characters specified in a– default character set table
• Configuration file (.cnf)– a list of fields without indicators (001-009)
What must be defined before use of
USEMARCON?
• Rule file (.rul)– conversion rule for all the tags– a tag without a rule will be dropped out
Where to get help?
• Guide to USEMARCON in web– http://www.bl.uk/services/bibliographic/
guidetousemarcon.pdf
• British library email:[email protected]
Our conversion of 30 million records
• Elements in records can be handled in many ways:– maintain– change– delete– add
Tools for change are numerous:
•Boolean instructions(OR, AND, NOT)•Conditional instructions (if… then)•Loop instructions•Memory instructions•String functions•Number functions
Some experiences
• Editing text files technically easy
• Quick testing possible, because changing rules in text files with the help of error files is fast
• In tricky conversions the manual does not help you very much. There has been bugs in manual, too
cont…
Some experiences
• Repeatable tags with different subfield structure are problematic
• Changing fixed fields can cause problems,if many conditional instructions exist
• Do not convert too big files. It’s better to link the files to be converted.
Weaknesses in USEMARCON
• Not handy in changing the contents (tag/subfield code/constant/data) in one tag
• Character set conversion without other definitions is not possible
• No tool to choose and pick certain material from a file for conversion
cont…
Weaknesses in USEMARCON
• Not possible to merge two files
• If USEMARCON goes down becauseof an unqualified record, the corruptedrecord is not easy to find
To make conversions effectively, some tools
are needed• A program to browse input and output data
for comparison
• A hexeditor to remove bad records
Case 1VTLS to Voyager
• Conversion of cyrillic data from VTLS (FINMARC) to Voyager (MARC21-Fin)– extracted 2 versions of the databases to
ISO2709• cyrillic and translitterated
cont…
Case 1 VTLS to Voyager
Case 1 VTLS to Voyager
•10 conversions later
•7 custom-made programs and 3 usemarcon conversions
Case 1 VTLS to Voyager
Case 2Usemarcon in Voyager
• Use of USEMARCON in Voyager– Convert during import
• with Pbulkimport
– Convert during export• with Pmarcexport
– Convert on-the-fly with the z39.50-server• /m1/voyager/lindadb/ini/z3950svr.ini
– Finmarc=/m1/voyager/usemarcon/mafi2fi.ini
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