Cataloguing activities and the new SBNMARC Index

At present, two different protocols are working on the same database:
  1. The SBN protocol, which allows the interaction with SBN hubs and supplies all functions provided by the previous Index;
  2. The SBNMARC protocol, which allows a larger number of functions and the management of a larger amount of data, among which the specific areas relating to printed and manuscript music, librettos, graphic art and cartographic materials, as well as the specific fields related to authority files (information on reference sources, cataloguer’s notes, etc.)
The new protocol was developed in order to facilitate the realization of interaction activities with the Index within the library management  applications: to this end, it employs the UNIMARC semantic, adopts the UNICODE-UTF8 standard instead of the former esabyte codes for special characters, simplifies the dialogue, converting it into a set of simple and autonomous functionalities, thus excluding the support base, and assigns  all control activities relating to correctness and  congruence of data, which were formerly carried out by the hubs softwares, to the Index.

Moreover, the new protocol provides the possibility of setting up different hub and user profiles, on the basis of the enabled operations, the different types of materials processed and the kinds of the A. F. managed.

The new potentialities offered by the Index can be used by the SBN hubs if they adopt applications able to dialogue with the SBN protocol.

At this stage, it is necessary to manage difficulties caused by the coexistence of these two protocols, as the integrated database  holds information that hubs working with the SBN protocol can’t exploit.