multilingual access to subjects (macs)

Federal Department of Home Affairs FDHA

Swiss Federal Office of Culture FOCSwiss National Library SNL

Multilingual Access to Subjects (MACS)

Patrice Landry

Swiss National Library

M-CAST Seminar, Prague24th November 2006

2 MACS | Multilingual access to subjectsPatrice Landry



Approaches to multilingual subject access - Construction

- Translation (RVM, MESH)- Satellite thesauri approach (linking various online

thesauri) – with a common search interface- Switching (Renardus)- Direct mapping (equivalences between terms in

different controlled vocabularies or between terms and classification numbers)




Methods used for link storage and access

• Authority records (equivalences coded in a local or networked database): RVM, MSAC

• Links database: MACS• Semantic Network (organised structure where each

unit is linked to a cluster of equivalent terms): UMLS




Why the MACS approach?

• In 1997, the need to find a « neutral » solution for linking SHLs forced some national libraries to find a solution not based on translation

• Approach to add value to existing data instead of creating new data (value added data)

• Linking work and management outside of each library’s authority files




What is MACS?

• A project that is developing a system that offers multilingual subject access using current subject headings languages (SHLs)

• A project that is based on a coordinated approach between national libraries

• A system that will permit users to search library catalogues in the language of their choice




Library of Congress Subject HeadingRépertoire d’Autorité-Matière

Encyclopédique et Alphabétique Unifié

Schlagwortnormdatei /Regeln für den Schlagwortkatalog

Die Deutsche BibliothekSWD/RSWK

Deutsch

Die Deutsche BibliothekSWD/RSWK

Deutsch

The British LibraryLCSH

English

The British LibraryLCSH

English

Bibliothèque nationalede FranceRAMEAU Français

Bibliothèque nationalede FranceRAMEAU Français

Swiss National Libraryproject leaderSWD/RSWK

Deutsch

Swiss National Libraryproject leaderSWD/RSWK

Deutsch

3 SHLs

On behalf of CENL

Partners




Basic principles

• Equality of languages and SHLs (no pivot) with autonomy of each SHL (only local, MACS is an external link database)

• Establishment of equivalences (no translation) between the SHLs involved (no new thesaurus)

• Equivalence links conceived as concept clustersMACS = mappings and numeric identifiers

• Consistency of results (goal = users retrieval)• Extensible to other SHLs




indexer assigns headings in German user has

to search in German

Doc. in Russian

SH English

SH German

SH Italian

Doc. in French

Doc. in German

Doc. in English

SH French

Indexer German

User English

? ??

Subject searching in a MONOLINGUAL environment?




indexer assigns headings in German

user can search in English

Doc. in Russian

SH English

SH German

SH Italian

Doc. in French

Doc. in German

Doc. in English

SH French

Indexer German

User English

Subject indexing and searching in a MULTILINGUAL environment




Milestones

• Proposal & Feasibility study (1997-1999)• Prototype development (2000-2001)• Testing & Link Management (LMI) upgrade to production

database (2002-April 2004)• New Link Management Interface production database

accepted by partners (2005)• New Project Proposal: June 2005 (revised August 2006)• Move to production: adding SWD headings to RAMEAU-

LCSH links (2006)• Integration in The European Library : end 2006?




Short overview of the Link management database and search interface

• The project has produced a Link Management Database which presently contains:

- 70’000 RAMEAU-LCSH links and 3’000 RAMEAU / LCSH / SWD links

• A search Interface that was developed as part of the prototype and will be fully developed as part of the MACS development




This is the screen where allof the linking work starts




Links are organised by domains




Search is used to locate a link (using either a term, authority

Number or a MACS number




Display of results fromwhere work on adding ormodifying a link is done




With the « edit » button a SHL can be modified




Work is organised in a decentralised

environment and managed by « To Do »

And « To Know »




Your search results in the libraries...

Home | Browse translations

Swiss National Library: One hit.

1.

Schattenspiel / Kind / Krankenhaus / Erlebnisbericht

Théâtre d'ombres : jeu et animation pour toute circonstance / Véréna Clausen - Genève, 1998




Becoming operational (or how to move an international project into a library)

• The « project syndrome » is a common occurance in international projects: succesful projects but difficulties in moving to production or applying results generally

• The MACS project accomplished many tasks with a lot of enthusiasm (and human resources, and a little money) but ….

• The longer a project exists, the more there is the risk of staff turnaround and the decrease of institutional committment to the project




The four MACS Project constraints

• Consortium agreement• Financing • Human resources• Strategic




The solution: A new project proposal

• A new project structure with roles and responsabilities (project and within each partner’s institution)

• A project manual with specific action plan• A strategic plan (operational and

development)• Takes in consideration mapping

recommendations from BS 8723, Part 4 (draft), in particular source and target language strategy




Current activities

• MACS has moved to production (2006) – work is underway to add SWD headings to RAMEAU-LCSH links

• Search Interface (SI) – New interface needs to be developed

• MACS linking manual is being written (using the BS 8723, Part 4 (draft) as standard source)

• Investigating integration in The European Library (TEL)




Future

• An operational system and cross-language subject access to the Catalogues of European National Libraries

THANK YOU!




Contacts

• http://macs.cenl.org

• [email protected]• [email protected]

multilingual access to subjects (macs)

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