A c t i o n f o r L i b r a r i e s — N o v e m b e r 2 0 0 5

OCLC Update

By Regan W. Harper
Enhancements to WCRS Searching Installed
OCLC installed enhancements to request searching on Sunday, October 9. Searching requests in Request Manager can now be accomplished more efficiently using a variety of methods: keyword, phrase, truncation or exact match. The searching process varies for different search types. The procedures are outlined in full in the online Help files and in online documentation at www.oclc.org/support/documentation/resourcesharing/using/searchrequests/default.htm.

Please note: this enhancement does not include searching archived requests as previously announced. Archived request searching will be installed at a later date. For more information, contact Heather Clark (hclark@bcr.org) at BCR.

Longer Records Enhancement
OCLC products that output OCLC-MARC records still have record size limits. The ability to output longer records is expected to be enabled in the MARC Subscription service by early 2006, with the same enhancement for other products to follow. For now, use Connexion to export large records to load the full records into your local system.

Currently, OCLC products that output OCLC-MARC records (MARC Subscription, WorldCat Collection Sets, Bibliographic Notification, PromptCat and GovDoc) have record size limits of up to 50 fields or up to 4,096 characters, whichever comes first. Records that exceed these limits are truncated, with the most critical fields remaining, including 9xx and 852 fields.

Union Listing Moving to Connexion in February
OCLC has announced a February 19, 2006, date for union listing using Passport software to migrate to the Connexion browser interface and be incorporated as "Local Holdings Maintenance" using the MARC Format for Holdings Data (MFHD). For more information on the move and related issues, see the BCR Web site at: www.bcr.org/resourcesharing/oclcul.html. For further information or questions, contact Heather Clark (hclark@bcr.org) at the BCR offices.

Connexion Enhancements Installed
OCLC installed additional changes to the Connexion service in October. Below is information about the changes.

Previously when bibliographic records with 007s were replaced, an error message, "Not authorized to replace record," resulted even for users with the appropriate authorization level. This problem has been resolved for both Connexion browser and client interfaces.
Connexion client offline validation errors for 049 with special characters were resolved. Connexion client 1.40 offline validation will no longer produce an error message saying that the 049 is too short.
Now when logged on, users can validate imported records to update the holdings information and then use the Delete Holdings command.
Previously, when bibliographic records contained paired fields for non-Latin script data and corresponding romanized data, the Control All action (Edit, Control Headings, All or <Shift>) incorrectly deleted the romanized field or deleted the indicator values on the romanized field. The problem is now resolved.

For more information about the Connexion service, visit the OCLC Connexion Web page at www.oclc.org/connexion/ or contact Regan Harper (rharper@bcr.org) at BCR.

Connexion Client Documents Available in Spanish
Spanish translations of the following Connexion client documents are now available on OCLC Web: Getting Started, Setup Worksheet, Use Client Interface, Set Options and Customize and Manage Local Files. To find the Spanish translations, go to www.oclc.org/support/documentation/connexion/client/default.htm.

CONTENTdm Version 4 Update 1 Released
An update kit for CONTENTdm version 4 is now available and can be downloaded from the User Support Center at www.contentdm.com/USC/. Update 1 includes fixes for known issues in CONTENTdm 4 as well as a new Reference URL feature. DiMeMa recommends that all organizations apply the update to its CONTENTdm 4 installation. For more information about changes resulting from Update 1, see www.bcr.org/oclcsrvs.html.

DiMeMa will apply the fix pack to all hosted CONTENTdm servers. Hosted users are being contacted by e- mail to schedule a time for update application. If you have questions about installing Update 1, please contact DiMeMa support at support@dimema.com.

Mackin New PromptCat Vendor
Mackin Library Media Services, located in Burnsville, Minnesota, has joined the growing list of OCLC PromptCat vendors. Mackin is known for service to K-12 libraries. More than 1.5 million titles from 12,000 publishers, including books, DVDs and more are available from Mackin. Visit Mackin's Web page at www.mackin.com/ to discover more details about Mackin Library Media. The current list of PromptCat vendors is available at www.oclc.org/promptcat/about/vendors/.

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