MarcEdit Updates

I spent some time this week working through a few updates based on some feedback I’ve gotten over the past couple of weeks.  Most of the updates at this point are focused on the Windows/Linux builds, but the Mac build has been updated as well as all new functionality found in the linking libraries and RDA changes apply there as well.  I’ll be spending this week focusing on making Mac MarcEdit UI to continue to work towards functional parity with the Windows version.

Windows/Linux Updates:

6.2.100
* 6.2.100
** Bug Fix: Build Links Tool — when processing a FAST heading without a control number, the search would fail.  This has been corrected.
** Bug Fix: MarcEditor — when using the convenience function that allows you to open mrc files directly into the MarcEditor and saving directly back to the mrc file — when using a task, this function would be disconnected.  This has been corrected.
** Enhancement: ILS Integration — added code to enable the use of profiles.
** Enhancement: ILS Integration — added a new select option so users can select from existing Z39.50 servers.
** Enhancement: OAI Harvesting — Added a debug URL string so that users can see the URL MarcEdit will be using to query the users server.
** UI Change: OAI Harvesting — UI has been changed to have the data always expanded.
** Enhancement: MarcValidator — Rules file has been updated to include some missing fields.
** Enhancement; MarcValidator — Rules file includes a new parameter: subfield, which defines the valid subfields within a field.  If a subfield appears not in this list, it will mark the record as an error.
** Enhancement: Task Menu — Task menu items have been truncated according to Windows convention.  I’ve expanded those values so users can see approximately 45 characters of a task name.
** Cleanup: Validate Headings — did a little work on the validate headings to clean up some old code.  Finishing prep to start allowing indexes beyond LCSH based on the rules file developed for the build links tool.

 

Mac Updates:

1.4.43
**********************************************
** 1.4.43 ChangeLog
**********************************************
* Bug Fix: Build Link Tool: Generating FAST Headings would work when an identifier was in the record, but wasn’t correctly finding the data when looking.
* Enhancement: RDA Helper:  Rules file has been updated and code now exists to allow users to define subfields that are valid.
* Bug Fix: RDA Helper: Updated library to correct a processing error when handling unicode replacement of characters in the 264.
* Enhancement: RDA Helper: Users can now define fields by subfield.  I.E. =245$c and abbreviation expansion will only occur over the defined subfields.

MarcValidator Changes:

One of the significant changes in the program this time around has been a change in how the Validator works.  The Validator currently looks at data present, and determines if that data has been used correctly.  I’ve added a new field in the validator rules file called subfield (Example block):

020    R    INTERNATIONAL STANDARD BOOK NUMBER
# Uncomment these lines and add validation routines like:
#valida    [^0-9x]    Valid Characters
#validz    [^0-9x]    Valid Characters
ind1    blank    Undefined
ind2    blank    Undefined
subfield    acqz68    Valid Subfields
a    NR    International Standard Book Number
c    NR    Terms of availability
q    R    Qualifier
z    R    Canceled/invalid ISBN
6    NR    Linkage
8    R    Field link and sequence number

The new block is the subfield item — here the tool defines all the subfields that are valid for this field.  If this element is defined and a subfield shows up that isn’t defined, you will receive an error message letting you know that the record has a field with an improper subfield in it.

RDA Helper

The other big change came in the RDA Helper.  Here I added the ability for the abbreviation field to be defined at a finer granularity.  Up to this point, abbreviation definitions happened at the field or field group level.  Users can now define down to the subfield level.  For example, if the user wanted to just target the 245$c, for abbreviations but leave all other 245 subfields alone, one would just define =245$c in the abbreviation field definition file.  If you want to define multiple subfields for processing, define each as its own unit…i.e:
=245$c
=245$p

You can get the download from the MarcEdit website (http://marcedit.reeset.net/downloads) or via the MarcEdit automatic download functionality.

Questions, let me know.

–tr


Posted

in

by

Tags: