This article is from the June 2004 issue of Update.
If you are unable to read standard print, even with the help of corrective lenses, you face a series of obstacles in trying to access anything you want to ‘read’ — whether this is fiction, poetry, music scores, study materials, or newspapers. First, very little of the annual publishing output of the UK (less than five per cent) will be transcribed into a format other than standard print. Second, of the titles that are transcribed, some will be available in only one or perhaps two formats — which you may or may not be able to use. Third, these formats are produced, lent and sold by a wide variety of organisations — voluntary organisations of varying sizes, transcription services (including prison workshops), education support services and schools, and public libraries — so how do you find out who’s got what? And finally, there are no resources equivalent to Books in Print or the British National Bibliography, the British Library has no remit for these materials under its founding act of Parliament, and in the past there has been no co-ordination of the resources that do exist.
However, things are changing. A new library and information resource for visually-impaired people, Revealweb, was launched in September 2003. Revealweb provides a union catalogue of materials in accessible formats and a database of suppliers (holders, producers and sellers) of accessible format materials in the UK.1
How it came about
In 1999 the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) funded a programme of initiatives to improve library and information services to visually-impaired people. Share the Vision (STV) and the Library and Information Commission (LIC) identified several projects and managed the programme. Two major parts of the programme were the creation of a best practice manual for libraries 2 and work on upgrading the National Union Catalogue of Alternative Formats (Nucaf), created by the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB).
Nucaf at this point was a union catalogue of bibliographic records in UKMarc format held on the RNIB in-house library system, but it was not accessible directly by the end-users — visually-impaired people and their intermediaries. Instead requests had to be made to RNIB Customer Services to make the searches, although by the mid-1990s there was also some access for library and information professionals via the Unity union catalogue and Laser’s V3 catalogue. Additionally subsets of the database were available for download to schools and colleges.
In addition, Nucaf did not list everything that was available. It was created by adding titles held by other organisations to the RNIB catalogue of its own holdings. Effort was limited to what could be spared from cataloguing RNIB titles, so there was little time to search out new sources, or for regular checks that items were still in stock, with the result that Nucaf was both incomplete and incorrect. The STV/LIC programme identified updating Nucaf to a more comprehensive and accessible database as a priority.
UKOLN’s involvement began when it was asked to undertake the technical metadata specification for Nucaf; that is to identify the data required to be held in the catalogue records and the format in which the data should be held. Information was gathered on the accessible format types, what data was currently held and what other data would be useful to end-users. Using this information, the Revealweb strategy was drawn up, which was to create a web-accessible union catalogue using international cataloguing standards and format, which would be supported by a collections register using a standard metadata schema. Recommendations were also made about the cataloguing format, indexing and data required.3
Moving from strategy into reality
A feasibility study in 2000, funded by the British Library Co-operation and Partnership Programme, outlined how a web-accessible catalogue could be achieved and looked at possible costs for set-up and long-term maintenance and funding.4 The next challenge was to secure funding to create Revealweb; this was finally resolved by the National Library for the Blind (NLB) and RNIB creating a formal partnership to support and manage Revealweb, and Resource (now the Museums, Libraries & Archives Council) contracting the NLB/RNIB partnership to deliver the service.
With these agreements in place, work began with the contracted library system supplier, Geac, in late 2002. The data held in Nucaf was mapped to the Revealweb bibliographic standard ready for data migration. (The Revealweb bibliographic standard was initially created in 2001, but was modified during 2002-03 as specific cataloguing problems were addressed.) The first trial downloads of data from the Nucaf database were made in spring 2003, with a final download at the beginning of September. The service was formally launched on 16 September and Deborah Ryan began work as the Revealweb Manager5 at the beginning of November.
Accessible formats
A major consideration was the range of materials to be included in the catalogue. Material accessible to visually-impaired people exists in a number of formats. Visually-impaired people often use a variety of formats, though some can only use a single format.
- Text in the tactile formats: Braille and Moon in hard copy; Braille electronic file; children’s titles in Braille or Moon interleaved with standard print. Braille can also be produced in an enlarged form known as Jumbo Braille.
- Text in enlarged print in various font sizes; around 75 per cent of people with a visual impairment can use enlarged print. Known as large print and giant print.
- Audio recordings of text on audio cassettes, CD-Rom, digital talking books (and in the future DVD-Audio).
- Music scores in Braille, enlarged print or audio (talking scores).
- Maps and diagrams in tactile form (with text labels in Braille) or in enlarged format. Some have accompanying audio descriptions on tape.
- Audio described videos (with additional narration describing action and facial expressions when there is no dialogue).
- Electronic text files. These can be read using computer screen magnification, or by special software to output through a speech synthesizer or a Braille display keyboard.
Some of these formats are also used by those with other physical impairments (e.g. those who cannot hold a book or turn pages), and with cognitive conditions such as dyslexia.
A web-accessible union catalogue
The union catalogue directly replaced Nucaf. It aims to hold details of all transcriptions available to visually-impaired people in the UK. It includes fiction and poetry, non-fiction works of general interest and from the education sector (e.g. National Curriculum texts), maps, music scores and packs of tactile art representations. Tactile diagrams and maps will also be included in the future.
Initially it was decided to follow British Library practice and use the UKMarc format. However, in the early stages of work on the bibliographic standard it was decided to use Marc21 instead, for two reasons. First, more libraries in the UK were already moving to Marc21, making it more likely that Revealweb would need to consider such a move in the future. Second, using both Marc21 bibliographic and holdings formats proved more hospitable to cataloguing accessible format materials.
For example, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice has been published many times and in the UK eight separate standard print texts have been used as the source for 20 transcriptions in various formats. Using traditional item-level cataloguing, 20 records are created. If a user wishes to restrict their search to a specific format, the number of records found will vary from five Braille transcriptions to only one Moon transcription, but a search for all available transcriptions of the work results in 20 (or more if new transcriptions are made) records being displayed. Long lists of titles are difficult for visually-impaired users, whether they are using screen magnification, text-to-speech software or Braille display software, as the information is presented in a linear fashion and they cannot skip backwards and forwards as a sighted person can do.
Revealweb therefore decided to use FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records) concepts of work, manifestation, etc to support hierarchical results displays. It did this by using both the Marc21 bibliographic and holdings formats, thus providing more flexibility than the ‘one bibliographic record for every transcription’ model. Bibliographic format records are used to hold details of the standard print item that was used as the source for a transcription, while holdings format records contain the details of a specific transcription. Some bibliographic records have only one transcription record attached (David Frape’s Equine Nutrition and Feeding is only available in Braille), while others have several (Terry Pratchett’s The Colour of Magic is available in audio cassette (two-track), and RNIB Talking Book cassettes as well as Braille). Pride and Prejudice requires eight bibliographic records (one for each standard print text) with varying numbers of attached transcription records.
Bibliographic records
Bibliographic records hold details of the standard print item used as the source for a transcription. While most of the record is created as if carrying out traditional item-level cataloguing, there are some differences. The 007 field is not used at the bibliographic record level, but at the holdings record level, as it carries coded data on the physical format. The 300 physical description field is not used as this would refer to the standard print item and could confuse the user; details of number of pages, volumes, cassettes, etc in transcriptions are held at holdings level.
Summary note field 520, often not present in records for print-based libraries, is used to hold a brief description of the content; a repeat of the 520 field is also used to hold occasional ‘warning’ information about audio transcriptions. These statements indicate if an item contains strong language, violence or sex scenes, to alert users of audio transcriptions who wish to avoid playing these items aloud in a family situation.
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are used for non-fiction titles. As Nucaf had relied on in-house terms derived from Dewey classification schedules, additional work is required to assign LCSH to existing records. Fiction titles have more access point indexing than is currently found in most library catalogues and Revealweb is following British Library guidelines on indexing fiction. Genre is indicated where appropriate using the Guidelines for Subject Access to Individual Works of Fiction and Drama (GSAFD). Some titles also have LCSH, for example where adoption is the focus of a novel. For other titles it may be useful to create 600 entries for primary characters in long series whose name does not appear in the titles (e.g. Ellis Peters novels featuring Cadfael the medieval monk ‘detective’) to assist searching. Series entries are also created when appropriate for fiction titles, allowing Revealweb users to identify all Poirot mysteries by Agatha Christie that have been transcribed. Revealweb also makes use of the linking fields 780 (indicating the previous title in a sequence), and 787 (indicating a related title — e.g. J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Hobbit is a related title to The Lord of the Rings).
Holdings records
For each transcription there is a holdings record that is attached to a bibliographic record. The holdings record contains the 007 data, which has been extended in a few places to hold more detailed information. For example, additions to the tactile coding include print/Moon combination, Old Moon and New Moon (not separated previously), Braille grade 3 (only grades 1 and 2 currently coded), and the language of the Braille code (French Braille has characters for its diacritics). A code for giant print (larger font sizes than large print) has been added to the text coding and large print to the notated music coding. Codes for Talking Books (a specific audio cassette format) and Talking Scores have been added to sound recording coding and audio-described video and subtitled video to the video coding. Computer file coding has been extended by adding coding for digital Daisy format files to indicate the version, the level of navigation indexing, and the combination of text and audio files of the specific transcription.
Field 843 Reproduction Note holds most of the transcription information. Subfields in 843 hold details of the type of transcription (e.g. Braille), the producer, the date of production (including ‘in production’ details), additional details about the format and how many pages/volumes/cassettes, etc. The note subfield holds details that don’t fit into other subfields, such as playing time.
Field 845 Terms Governing Use and Reproduction holds information about access to the transcription. Subfields hold information about whether the item is for loan or for sale, and who can access it (e.g. only members of Calibre Cassette Library for the Blind and Print Disabled).
Visually-impaired people using audio formats often have preferences and dislikes regarding the narrator. They may dislike a certain person’s voice, or prefer female speakers (a higher register may also be more audible if you have a hearing impairment). It may also make a difference to audibility if the first language of the narrator is not that of the text — a French text may sound somewhat different if the narrator’s first language is English rather than French. Therefore an additional local field has been defined to hold narrator details — name, gender, and native speaker information.
Using this structure of records means that the records displays are more hierarchical. The initial results listing shows the brief details of the bibliographic records found, to enable the user to assess whether they have the work they are searching for — author, title, summary. Following a hypertext link shows the searcher the full bibliographic record with a list of the transcription formats and locations — for example, ‘Audio two-track cassette at Calibre’. Following the hypertext link at this point will show the full format details and contact address for the location.
A web-accessible database of suppliers
Having found a record in the union catalogue that shows that the text you want is in the format you want and held by Organisation X, the user then wants to know ‘Can I borrow or buy this item?’, ‘Are there any charges?’, and ‘How do I contact them?’ To support users in their search for this type of information, Revealweb has a web-accessible suppliers register based on the RSLP (Research Support Libraries Programme) collection-level description schema.6
While collection-level descriptions are not new, having existed as directory entries, etc in the past, there is now a metadata schema to record this information. This metadata schema, based on Dublin Core metadata elements, was devised to record collection-level data as a support tool for projects funded under the RSLP. The schema has fields for describing a collection (title, description, details of coverage, subjects), plus elements describing owners, collectors, administrators, and locations. The schema has subsequently been used, with or without modification, in a number of databases based on collection data — for example the Cecilia database of music collections.7
Revealweb decided to use this schema, with some modification. A few of the elements were given new labels for public display purposes to assist end-users. For example, ‘physical characteristics’ became ‘media available’, while ‘users and charges’ replaced ‘access control’. Two elements were added, one to indicate the target audience of the collection (adults, teenagers and children) and another to indicate educational level of items in the collection (there aren’t many National Curriculum materials in accessible formats and they’re not easy to track down). Three further elements were added. The first holds customer services details (phone numbers and hours of availability) as visually-impaired people do not visit these collections, but either phone or email their requests. Another element holds details about the holding organisation and how it contributes records to the union catalogue, and the final element holds details about a contact person responsible for the record transfer — these two elements are not visible in public display.8
Data collection
With the elements defined, Samsara Research,9 a software development company, was contracted to develop an SQL database to hold the data, with appropriate search processes. The database was installed in early 2003 and a data collection officer appointed for 15 weeks. The data collection officer contacted all organisations known to be holders, producers or suppliers of accessible formats to get permission for entries to be made in the suppliers register and to collect the data. Collections may be large (NLB, RNIB and Calibre collections contain thousands of titles) or small (Living Paintings Torch has less than 50 titles), while producers range from the Scottish Braille Press, to prison Braille units and individuals who offer transcription services.
The data collection officer then entered the data collected into the database. With the initial data collection and entry phase completed, NLB and RNIB took responsibility for contacting further organisations and adding their details to the database. In addition, individual organisations will be able to log into the database through a secure authentication process and amend most of the details in their own entries (for example if they change their contact details, stock levels or range of materials).
Although the data migration worked well, there is still a large amount of cleaning up to do on the database. NLB and RNIB are working on this as time and resources permit. The various tasks have been identified, an estimate made of the number of records affected and the time required to make the changes, and priorities allocated.
Duplicate records need to be merged where computer merging has failed to identify two or more records as the same because of missing ISBNs, variance in title/subtitle data, and form of author name. LCSH need to be added to most of the records, as they were not previously assigned. Fiction genre headings were largely created through the mapping of Nucaf and NLB genre categories to GSAFD headings, but additional indexing (characters and series) has still to be added. Work has also had to be done to ensure consistent current cataloguing practice by both NLB and RNIB, and in some cases to retrospectively amend records for consistency. More work will also be done on developing user interfaces and search options.
Other collections
With the import of data from Nucaf complete, work goes on to get holdings of other collections, such as the National Centre for Tactile Diagrams, on to the union catalogue. Further work is also needed to get details from more organisations and create entries for them in the suppliers register. Eventually it is hoped to make hypertext links between the two databases, so that having found that the item you require is at RNIB, you can move to the collections register and find out more about the collection and how to obtain the item. Reveal also has a Z39.50 client, so potentially can be cross-searched with other catalogues.
Since 1999, support and funding for the development of Revealweb has been received from the British Library, Resource (now MLA), Lloyds TSB and the Ellerman Foundation. Core funding from MLA is guaranteed until 2005-06 but there is still a need to get the service funded in the longer term.
And finally, Revealweb is there to be used. Have a look at it yourself, let your users know about it, and think about making a link from your library service web pages. If you hold materials in accessible formats that are not on Revealweb, contact the Revealweb Manager to discuss getting them listed.
References
1 Reveal website (www.revealweb.org.uk/).
2 Library and Information Services: a manual of best practice. Resource, 2000 (http://bpm.nlb-online.org/).
3 Ann Chapman. Project 1 part A: The Future Role of Nucaf and a Technical Specification of the Metadata Requirements. A report to the Nucaf Development Steering Committee, December 1999 (www.ukoln.ac.uk/services/lic/sharethevision/).
4 Ann Chapman. Developing a National Database of Resources in Accessible Formats: a feasibility study. A report to the British Library Co-operation and Partnership Programme and the Reveal Development Steering Committee, September 2000 (www.ukoln.ac.uk/services/lic/sharethevision/).
5 Deborah Ryan, Revealweb Manager, National Library for the Blind (0161 355 2082; deborah.ryan@nlbuk.org).
6 RSLP Collection Description Schema (www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/rslp/schema/).
7 Cecilia (http://dev.lib.ox.ac.uk:28080/cocoon202/cecilia/ [dead link 20 April 2005}).
8 Ann Chapman. Reveal Collections Register. Collection Description Focus Case Study 1. UKOLN, 2003 (www.ukoln.ac.uk/cd-focus/case-studies/).
9 Samsara Research (http://samsararesearch.com/oldsite/). A new site is under construction.
Ann Chapman is Research Officer for Bibliographic Management, Policy and Advice Team, UKOLN, University of Bath (a.d.chapman@ukoln.ac.uk).