CD Focus Workshops |
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CD Focus Workshops |
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This workshop presented an introduction to collection-level description. It introduced the RSLP Collection Description Model and Schema and explored how the schema might be applied to the collections described in the Resource Guides.
The Fifth Collection Description Workshop concentrated on user needs, incorporating experiences from a range of disciplines and domains. The workshop explored user studies and evaluation reports in order to highlight the ways in which CLD's can help to facilitate information disclosure and discovery.
The workshop focused on the needs of the "end-user", who may be a researcher, a student or a member of the public and looked at issues of accessibility with special reference to the physical accessibility of both collections and collection-level descriptions.
The fourth Collection Description Focus workshop explored the relationship between collection-level description and collection management with specific reference to the needs of professional information managers within the context of the 'Distributed National Collection'
Recent strategies, outlined in Resource's "Preserving the Past for the Future" document, recognise the different approaches to "stewardship" in the library, archive and museum domains, but stress the growing need for, and evidence of, collaboration across the domains. Resource's Collections Management & Development Group is working to develop this collaborative approach.
The workshop brought together views from a range of professionals involved at different stages of the collection management process. The workshop explored how collection-level description can be used in the collection management process both as a tool for information managers and an effective means of disclosure and discovery for users.
The third Collection Description Focus workshop concentrated on the issue of content standards and terminological control for collection-level description, with particular emphasis on the use of subject terminologies and thesauri. The workshop also explored the use and applicability of collection strength indicators.
The consistent use of subject terminologies in collection-level descriptions is an essential component if those descriptions are to contribute to improved cross-domain resource discovery. A methodical approach to describing the strength of a collection can assist a researcher in comparing the results of that initial resource discovery process.
The second Collection Description Focus workshop concentrated on how collection-level descriptions are used and particularly how they are re-used. A collection-level description provides an overview of an aggregation of items - and such an overview may be useful in a wide range of contexts.
Resources such as directories and guides of various forms are often sets of collection-level descriptions gathered together on the basis of the geographical location of the collections or the subject material of the items in the collections. The administrator or owner of a collection should not be required to re-describe their holdings each time they create an entry for such a resource. The requirement for "reusability" is, then, an important consideration in the creation of collection-level descriptions.
The first Collection Description Focus workshop explores the concept of the collection, and how it is interpreted and deployed within the different traditions of information management. The emergence of networked information services and the expectations of information users to be able to access resources from across the holdings of diverse organisations, has led to a growing recognition that resource description at collection level in a structured, machine-readable form can facilitate resource discovery.
Target audience: The event is aimed at practitioners working in this area, including those describing collections or developing and implementing services which utilise such descriptions, and those with an interest in the development and deployment of standards in this area.
There is no charge for this event.