Newsline from EDINA
April 2005: Volume 10, Issue 1
The launch of SUNCAT as a 'pilot service' was celebrated by the JISC and a grand array of Library on 15 February at a symposium in central London. The mood was upbeat, with the number of serial records in SUNCAT topping 4 million, contributed by 22 of the UK's largest university and research libraries, the scope of SUNCAT expanded to include the British Library, National Library of Wales and National Library of Scotland and data from the CONSER database and the ISSN Register.
As the 'key online UK facility for serials', SUNCAT will assist researchers and librarians in the discovery, location and access of serial material, typically journals but including newspapers, annual reports and other 'ongoing publications'. SUNCAT will also assist libraries upgrade local records with standardised and high-quality bibliographic records.
Presiding at the symposium, Derek Law, Chair of the SUNCAT Steering Committee, stressed the significance of SUNCAT as having "the potential to lift the level of serials records of all libraries up to an unprecedented level", and Andrew Green (National Library of Wales) emphasised SUNCAT's importance for the wider definition of researcher, and for legal deposit.
The JISC have now given the go-ahead for SUNCAT Phase 2. During the calendar years 2005 and 2006, SUNCAT will move from its pilot test stage to become established as a full service, with continuously increasing coverage of other university and specialist research libraries and with increased functionality. The parallel set of development activities are geared to including information on 'open access' journals and to tackling tricky issues about standard ways to represent information on electronic subscription: with joint project work on the Electronic Rights Management Initiative (ERMI) carried out by the US Digital Library Federation and Onix for Serials by the NISO/EDItEUR Working Group. The SUNCAT Project Team is keen to make contact with library staff and projects with interests in taking this further, as the development of SUNCAT will be fully integrated with other serials-focussed activity in JISC Information Environment.
SUNCAT is very much a collaborative venture, with Associate Partners acting as guides and playing a key role in testing procedures during Phase One, and with excellent commitment and cooperation from contributing partners, including the British Library who have increased staffing to advance the assignment of ISSNs. The SUNCAT Team is now establishing comparable relationships with up to fifty more contributing libraries.
SUNCAT has been developed at the University of Edinburgh by EDINA and Edinburgh University Library in partnership with ExLibris, providing and adapting the Aleph 500 software.