Identification Work Package 2 of Telematics for Libraries project BIBLINK (LB 4034)

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4. Requirements for an Identification Scheme for BIBLINK

4.1 Requirement introduction

Identification schemes are used throughout the life cycle of a document and by all the parties involved in the production and publication process, in the process of ordering and selling and in copyright management systems. The different parties involved will have different needs and requirements for an identification scheme. For some of these purposes it may be relevant to identify items smaller than a complete document, for example an article, a chapter or an illustration.

Different distribution channels are followed for text documents like books and journals, for sound recordings and for video and film recordings; therefore different identification schemes are used.

In libraries, unique identifiers are used for many purposes. Records in the automated cataloguing systems are identified by internal record numbers. «External» identifiers, for example ISBN/ISSN, are used in both acquisition and the bibliographic description and retrieval of documents.

National libraries use unique identifiers on all levels:

• Assigning: In many countries the national library is responsible for the national ISSN/ISBN agency. In some countries the assignment of ISSN/ISBNs is linked to deposition of the document. Publishers that request an ISSN or an ISBN for a document should deposit one or more copies of the document at the deposit library as soon as it is published.
• Acquisition: In countries with voluntary deposit, new ISSNs and ISBNs are collected by the deposit acquisition service and matched with deposited publications. In this way publications that have not been deposited are detected and ordered.
• Registration: Newly deposited publications may be registered by their identification number.
• Description: Identifiers are a part of the bibliographic description.
• Retrieval: Identifiers are indexed for retrieval purposes and are one way to locate publications in OPACs and to order them for inter library loan purposes.
• Presentation: Identification schemes are visible in the presentation of the bibliographic record i.e. in ISBD-format on screen (OPACs) and in listings on paper.
• Bibliographic verification: Identification schemes are used in citations.

As we can see, the different parties involved in handling electronic documents will have different requirements for identifiers that will meet their demands. The idea of defining one identification scheme to meet all these needs is unrealistic. The use of identifiers is very much incorporated into the publishers business methods and it might be difficult, if not impossible, for the national libraries to impose one standard on all publishers simply because this would be convenient for the national libraries. The national libraries and BIBLINK must cope with several identification schemes.

For BIBLINK purposes the objective is to pinpoint existing standard schemes that meet the requirements of the national libraries with regard to the publication of national bibliographies. Specific publisher related requirements, e.g. the need to identify every right owner in a document or to track pieces of content through the production process, are not a part of the requirements. This is also the case with bar-coding, which is needed by trading parties, i.e. booksellers and subscription agents. Facilities such as these do not exclude identification schemes but they are regarded as secondary.

4.2 What will a BIBLINK identification scheme identify?

The identification scheme chosen for BIBLINK must cover all documents in the BIBLINK scope.

Quotation from Deliverable D0.1 Scoping document:

« [...]similar to the selection criteria used by each national library when selecting items for inclusion in their national bibliographies. [...] As a rule this criteria are content based and do not consider the medium by which the publication is made available. Another ruling principle for inclusion in national bibliographies is that the publication must be publicly available. [...]

1. the item must include, in part, some electronic content.
2. the item does not need to be text only.
3. the item is not solely a sound and/or vision broadcast.
4. the item is not solely software.»

The identifier should not only identify content, but specific formats and carriers of a publication. The identifier should apply to the «end products» of electronic publication, which means that different versions of a publication (e.g. one on CD-ROM and one on the World Wide Web) should be identified separately and each have a unique identifier.

The level of granularity of the identifier will be defined by whatever the publisher chooses to publish as a separate item and present to the national library for deposit. The deposited item is what the national library will have to record in the national bibliography and preserve in its deposit. If a publisher presents a monograph to the national library, the monograph should have an unique identifier and if a publisher presents an article as a separate document, the article should have an unique identifier.

The identifier should preferably not contain the document location (if the document is an online document). A general problem with Internet publications is that their location tends to change. Documents move from one location to another whenever this is convenient for the document owner. Users consequently have problems in retrieving the document. In order to solve these problems initiatives have been taken in the Internet community to develop a persistent identifier for documents.

4.3 Requirements for BIBLINK identification schemes

The identification schemes recommended for BIBLINK must meet the requirements of the national libraries and must be based on the conditions in section 4.2. In order to evaluate existing identification schemes a set of requirements has been drawn up.

The identification scheme(s) chosen for BIBLINK should meet the following requirements:

1. Cover all types of documents in the BIBLINK scope
   • As defined in Workpackage 0 (See section 4.2)
2. Be under the control of a naming authority and assigned by an authorised party.
3. Standard
   • Recognised as a standard by international bodies or a proposed standard that is likely to become a recognised standard in the near future.
4. Global uniqueness
   • There should be a guarantee that identifiers will not be used for more than one item. The identifier must be unique for every specific form of a document. A document published in several versions (e.g. on CD-ROM and the World Wide Web) should have separate unique identifiers.
5. Persistence
   • The identifier should remain unchanged throughout its lifetime and be available and usable in foreseeable future.
6. Extensibility
   • The identification scheme should permit future extensions (include new features and scale up to the quantities of identifiers needed) without a complete revision of the scheme.
7. Human readable
   • The identifier should be human readable on the document itself for citation purposes.
8. Transportable
   • It should be possible to transfer the identifier by common Internet protocols for the exchange of metadata.
9. Simple validation
   • It should be possible to validate the identifier easily.

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