Developing an Alternative Approach for Interoperability Testing of Library Z39.50 Servers Page: 1
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Developing an Alternative Approach for
Interoperability Testing of Library Z39.50 Servers
A Request for an Extension
William E. Moen
<wemoen@unt.edu>
Texas Center for Digital Knowledge
School of Library and Information Sciences
University of North Texas
March 30, 2004
Introduction
In our December 31, 2003 interim status report on the Z39.50 Interoperability Testbed Project (Z-Interop)
[available at: http://www.unt.edu/zinterop/Documents/InterimReport31Dec2003.pdf], we highlighted the
challenges of individual libraries to participate in the Z-Interop testbed. Attachment A contains two
sections from the interim report that discusses in more detail these challenges. Most libraries only have a
production system for their integrated library system and online catalog; they do not have a testing
environment where they can load the Z-Interop test dataset of 400,000 MARC records, index those
records separately from the production bibliographic database, and have that available for interoperability
testing. The approach of the Z-Interop Project worked well for the vendors; they were able to set up a
separate implementation of their Z39.50 server and online catalog products, prepare it for testing, and
have the Z-Interop Project conduct interoperability testing.
In the interim report, we suggested an alternative method for interoperability testing for Z39.50 servers
that could accommodate these limitations of individual library systems. The idea for this approach came
from Sebastian Hammer, a principal in Index Data that is a company specializing in Z39.50 and
networked information retrieval. The alternative method will use a small set of very special MARC records
(we refer to these as "radioactive MARC records," explained below) that can serve as diagnostic
mechanisms for assessing system functionality, performance, and interoperability. We think this
alternative approach has potential for providing interoperability testing services to individual libraries. In
addition, this approach may be adaptable to other protocol and metadata contexts beyond Z39.50 and
MARC.
This document describes a plan of work to develop and test this alternative approach for interoperability
testing. We request an extension to the existing National Leadership Grant through February 2005 to
support this work. The resources needed to carry out the work are estimated at $49,521. This approach
builds on the conceptual and technical infrastructure developed during the Z-Interop Project [information
on the project available on the project website at: http://www.unt.edu/zinterop/].
Brief Overview of the Approach
The idea for a radioactive MARC record is based on current medical diagnostic techniques for people.
When a person has a particular medical condition, there may be two approaches for diagnosis. One could
be considered invasive, where the person would undergo a surgical technique for physically examination
of the problematic area or anomaly. The other approach could be considered less invasive, where the
patient is injected with a dye, possibly radioactive, and once it has spread throughout the body, scanning
techniques allow a medical professional to identify structural or mechanical problems or anomalies.
A "radioactive" MARC record approach for interoperability testing would be less "invasive" for an
individual library. It would not require loading a large test dataset such as used in the Z-Interop Project.
Nor would it require a separate testing environment on the local implementation. Instead, the library
William E. Moen, Ph.D. 1 March 30, 2004Texas Center for Digital Knowledge University of North Texas
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Moen, William E. Developing an Alternative Approach for Interoperability Testing of Library Z39.50 Servers, paper, March 30, 2004; (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc111279/m1/1/: accessed May 6, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT College of Information.