Via: sun3.nsfnet-relay.ac.uk; Tue, 7 Apr 1992 18:30:06 +0100
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Tue, 7 Apr 1992 18:34:01 BST
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Philip Guest <MZGXXPG@CMS.MANCHESTER-COMPUTING-CENTRE.AC.UK>
Subject:      RE: Carto-bib & UK Arc/Info address info
X-To:         GIS-L <GIS-L@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu>

UK Arc/Info list:

Following David Douglas' comment about access to UK Arc/Info list the
following commands (on separate lines) may be helpful:

    send mailbase user-guide
    lists full
    index chest-arc-info

and mail to:  mailbase@uk.ac.mailbase

As for the North American component, the letter string should be reversed.
For Bitnet, specifying the UK Academic Relay node UKACRL may be necessary:
    mailbase%ukacrl@mailbase.ac.uk

Mailbase is functionally similar to 'LISTSERV' but the commands are
different, hence, it is worthwhile to read the user-guide.

Carto-bibliographic project:

Incidental to the above, I have been asked about the purpose of the carto-
bib project.  An ideal held within the map library community is access to
cartographic and other spatially-related collections by means of defining
an area component (typically, 60-90% of enquiries) and using an automated
retrieval system to find the relevant records.  Cartographic materials
retrieval systems such as Carto-net, from Edinburgh Univ, have established
the feasibility of such an approach, however, there remain the considerable
problems and costs of building a worthwhile database of catalogued
materials.  It is these issues which we seek to address.

An interesting parallel can be drawn between book versus cartographic
materials.  Bibliographic utilities such as OCLC and RLG hold substantial
numbers of records and there now exists a worldwide infrastructure to
support the further growth of these databases.  Although OCLC holds some
260,000 cartographic records these are predominantly single sheet maps and
geographic access is essentially restricted to LC country classification
codes.

Other groups are addressing these problems.  For example, Chris Baruth at
the AGS wrote the GEODEX program and has built-up an informal network of
contributing cataloguers; some 250,000 records of multi-sheet topographic
map records with sheetline co-ordinates have been recorded.  We are
building an inventory of carto-bibliographic record sources on a worldwide
basis, both from holdings of cartographic collections and publishers, and
are examining these to see to which standards they conform.  From this
quantitative and qualitative information we will be in a better position to
assess their suitability in relation to existing AACR2/MARC cataloguing
standards, and then to consider the work necessary to enhance such records.
For multi-sheet topographic series mapping it may be more realistic to
catalogue the series description to AACR2/MARC but accept some minimum
standard for sheet-specific data.

Other issues which we seek to address are mechanisms for data transfer,
coordinate data capture and data quality management.

Philip Guest & Chris Perkins, Carto-bibliographic Project
Dept of Geography, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK, M13 9PL.
email: MZGXXPG@UK.AC.MCC.CMS          (non-UK: MZGXXPG@CMS.MCC.AC.UK)
phone: +44 61 275 3670                    fax: +44 61 273 4407
The Carto-bibliographic Project is funded collaboratively by
John Rylands University Library & The British Library R&D Department
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU