Making the library OPAC sing : how to introduce Naxos Music Library titles to online public access catalogues : the Lingnan University Library experience

In August 2004, Lingnan University Library, Hong Kong converted 300 Naxos Spoken Library (NSWL) titles into MARC records, with the use of an in-house developed software programme, thus enabling the end-users to gain direct access to the NSWL titles from the Web-OPAC. Enhancing Phase II of the project was the conversion of 10,176 Naxos Music Library (NML) titles into individual MARC records. The NML Automatic MARC Conversion Project adopted basically the same concepts and principles in making the NML titles inter-searchable with other library collections under OPAC. This paper documents Lingnan Library's experience in introducing NML titles to the bibliographic database, and its impacts on the cataloguers and end-users. In addition, it discusses the locally-developed System Software, together with the technical procedures explaining how to convert the NML titles into MARC format, as well as the necessary manpower and expertise involved for the preparation and implementation of the project.