The purpose of this Focus Group was not to reach a final consensus on any of the issues but to gather information and examine whether trends or predominant practices were emerging within the group. The Serials Focus Group consisted of four groups. A member of the Task Force who had handouts and examples for distribution introduced each of the three topics. The following represents a summary of the issues raised and discussed but in no way represents the recommendations that the Task Force has yet to make. Although serials bibliographic records represent an important part of the Prospector project, the actual number of records which may cause problems are actually a small percentage of the entire database - which is expected to exceed 5 million MARC records.
Most libraries appear to have individual methods and practices for recording holdings statements.
While most agreed that consistency in Prospector was desirable, most also acknowledged the impracticality of going back and retrospectively changing their existing holdings statements. Concern was expressed that any changes in practice for the display of serials holdings would also have impact on reference and instructional services. CARL libraries currently using the serlev 3 summary holdings have 10 rows by 60 columns to record summary information. The Innovative INN-Reach software allows only 4 rows for data. There is an issue with how the CARL serlev3 information will be converted and displayed in Prospector.