Jon Phipps

Core services in the architecture of the national science digital library (NSDL)

We describe the core components of the architecture for the National Science Digital Library (NSDL). Over time the NSDL will include heterogeneous users, content, and services. To accommodate this, a design for a technical and organization infrastructure has been formulated based on the notion of a spectrum of interoperability. This paper describes the first phase of the interoperability infrastructure including the metadata repository, search and discovery services, rights management services, and user interface portal facilities.

Reconsidering Universal Bibliographic Control in Light of the Semantic Web

The article discusses the future of universal bibliographic control in the context of the Semantic Web. Resource Description Framework RDF), the basis of the Semantic Web, allows the replacement of attempts at one-size-fits-all schema, rules and other international/global standards with what might be termed an all-sizes-fit-one approach, as shown by the example of VIAF (Virtual International Authority File). This approach can support a much richer ecology of bibliographic communities and their standards, achieved by establishing the semantic mapping of individual properties, and sets of properties (or RDF graphs), to form a connected web into which legacy metadata and newly-minted statements can be deposited. Such deposits are made at the natural level of the source standard, preserving local granularity, semantic focus, context, and the data itself, using one-to-one RDF representations of the standard. The web of semantic links then allows this data to be readily assimilated into a universal, web-scale environment which connects all bibliographic metadata as “library linked data”. The article is illustrated with examples drawn from IFLA standards such as FRBR and ISBD, and other international standards such as Dublin Core and RDA.

Building a Platform to Manage RDA Vocabularies and Data for an International, Linked Data World

The management of vocabularies in the evolving linked data environment requires different tools and processes from those libraries and other memory institutions have used in the past. The RDA (Resource Description and Access) standard has taken the lead in building tools and providing services as part of its RDA Registry development. The evolution of the current RDA Registry and the Open Metadata Registry (OMR), on which the RDA Registry is built, are described, including the rationale for directions, decisions, and ongoing development.