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WorldCat Registry : At a glance

WorldCat Registry at a glance

OCLC's WorldCat Registry is a free Web tool that provides a single location from which any library can manage and distribute data that describes its institutional identity and services.

Benefits

For all libraries inside and outside the OCLC cooperative:

  • Reduces redundant staff effort and eliminates need to update library identities across numerous applications
  • Centralizes information sharing and ensures data currency for technology vendors, electronic content or service providers, fellow consortium institutions, funding agencies and other bodies with which libraries maintain relationships
  • Shared data allows library service providers to better support continuity and quality of their services
  • Automate vendor interactions such as the activation or renewal of a subscription information service, reducing the chance that such services will "go dark" when internal system parameters such as IP addresses change
  • Information seekers at search engines and other Web sites enjoy a streamlined linking experience from search results with bibliographic data to OpenURL-based content at your library via the OpenURL Gateway (see Features, below)

For consortia:

  • Create a master consortium profile that is always up-to-date and is easily and securely referenced by content providers, other vendors and member institutions
  • Keep electronic service data applicable to the entire group (such as IP addresses, shared catalogs and OpenURL servers) in one place
  • Associate members' individual Registry profiles with the group's, and see status of members' profiles at a glance

For WorldCat-participating libraries:

  • Get greater Internet visibility for your collections and electronic services. Profile data is distributed on WorldCat.org; through partner programs to popular search sites such as Google and Yahoo!; and via a variety of freely distributed WorldCat linking syntaxes, software widgets and Web services

Features

  • Easy-to-use Web interface that allows authorized library personnel to maintain data about their library, including: identifying codes assigned by various standards or industry organizations; details about physical location, contacts, Web sites and electronic services; hierarchical relationships such as parent consortia or child branches; and administrative and statistical data concerning staff, service usage and user population
  • Many institutional profiles have been automatically created and pre-populated with information already known to OCLC or from other sources maintained by the worldwide library community.
  • Downloading of Registry profile as XML file to a local/network location for importation into spreadsheet software and offline maintenance and review
  • Sharing of profile data by "obfuscated" (encoded) Web hyperlinks. Library staff can send links to designated parties at any time via the Registry's embedded e-mail facility; link recipients view profile data as a read-only Web page or XML
  • Profile data related to OpenURL services is automatically utilized by OCLC's OpenURL Gateway. This institution-independent resolving service directs link traffic to an appropriate library resource when the information seeker's IP address matches your Registry-specified address or address range

Requirements

  • Internet connection
  • Current-generation Web browser

Related services

Data in the WorldCat Registry is surfaced in:

  • WorldCat.org
  • OCLC FirstSearch
  • WorldCat Local
  • OpenURL Gateway