Back in February, I announced the results of EPC 146A, our editorial committee’s most recent asynchronous meeting. I mentioned that one of the proposals was returned for further consideration, while the rest were already live in WebDewey, with the exception of EPC 146A-S78.1 Music and Texts.
Those changes went live about a month later, so you may have seen them in WebDewey in the meantime. Why mention it now? For one, it’s almost time to share some new proposals for EPC’s upcoming annual meeting, in July—watch this space! I also wanted to touch on one aspect that made EPC 146A-S78.1 a bit more complicated.
Who doesn’t love a good flow chart? Well, probably plenty of people are neutral towards them at best, but catalogers? I’m probably not alone in greatly appreciating the way they can break down complex processes into neat, step-by-step ones.
There are five flow charts in the DDC Manual (PDF two for literature in Table 3, and one each for music, travel, and history. They helpfully break down number building in some areas where it can be especially complex. However, under the hood, they’re stored separately from the rest of the DDC data, which uses MARC Classification and Authority formats. That means they’re nowhere near as easy to update; they also require some careful tweaking in terms of layout when preparing print views of the Manual, including new print-on-demand versions.
See where I’m going with this? EPC 146A-S78.1 involved a change to the music flow chart. Fortunately, the change involved removing some nodes, meaning the decisions are simpler. But it still took a bit of wrangling to produce the new one.
Everything is updated now, at any rate. If you’re curious, the updated flow chart is on page 170.
I hope you find the flow charts useful! I’m not sure we’ll add a new one any time soon, and where we can keep the number building process simpler, that’s a good thing too. But if there are areas where you could use a chart to help visualize things, please let me know.
