WorldCat live in Windows Live Academic search tool

WorldCat metadata will help power Microsoft’s Windows Live Academic, a new search engine that lets Web users search a spectrum of academic content. Currently, WorldCat records for about 275,000 theses and dissertations are included in the service’s beta release, which was launched in April and indexes eJournals in computer science, electrical engineering and physics.

When the beta release is concluded, 3 million records representing the most widely held WorldCat books will be added to the search tool to increase Web visibility of library collections. OCLC’s involvement in Windows Live Academic is part of the Open WorldCat Find in a Library program, where OCLC integrates library content and services with Web search engines, Iinternet booksellers, online bibliographies, library portals and commercial publishers. For more information go to academic.live.com.

One-click access to everything!

As part an effort to help libraries manage their growing digital collections, OCLC has purchased Openly Iinformatics, a Bloomfield, New Jersey company that builds software, systems and services that link people to information more efficiently.

Openly’s 1.2 million-record database of linking metadata for eJournals, eBooks and other electronic resources will be used to enrich WorldCat and enhance WorldCat applications, such as FirstSearch WorldCat, WorldCat Resource Sharing, WorldCat Collection Analysis and Open WorldCat. The metadata will also boost OCLC’s current eSerials Holdings pilot, which allows libraries to automatically contribute holdings for licensed eJournals to WorldCat.

WorldCat will extend the Openly Iinformatics database by contributing metadata covering materials in other electronic formats, including eBooks, digital audiobooks, digital theses and dissertations. For more information, visit www.oclc.org/news/releases/200601.htm.

The Dewey Decimal Classification debuts in German

The Project DDC team at Die Deutsche Bibliothek has completed work on the first German translation of the Dewey Decimal Classification system. Based on DDC 22, the translation was published in both print (October 2005) and Web (January 2006) versions. The Web version is called Melvil and can be used as a classification tool as well as a retrieval tool for documents with Dewey numbers.

The Dewey Decimal Classification system has been translated into more than 30 languages and serves library users in over 200,000 libraries in 135 countries worldwide, making it the world’s most widely used library classification system. More than 60 of these countries use the DDC to organize their national bibliographies.

RLG to combine with OCLC

The Board of Directors the Research Libraries Group and the OCLC Board Trustees have recommended that the two service and research organizations be combined effective July 1, 2006. If approved by RLG member institutions, RLG’s online products and services will be integrated with OCLC products and services, and RLG’s program initiatives will be brought forward as a new division of OCLC Programs and Research.

A combined organization would provide an opportunity to leverage program strengths, services and innovative research initiatives, and to deliver more value to a greater number of libraries, museums, archives and other research organizations around the globe. For more information, go to OCLC’s Web site to view a Frequently Asked Questions document: www.oclc.org/news/releases/oclcrlgfaq.htm.

From Jay Jordan | Web 2.0