Normalization is the process by which the Knowledgebase manages metadata differences amongst providers that offer the same journal or book. The below FAQs about normalization start by defining what is a holding in the Knowledgebase.


What is a holding in the ProQuest Knowledgebase?

A holding is an occurrence of a book or journal title within a specific package or database offered by a content provider. The same title can be held in multiple databases, so libraries may subscribe to one or more holdings of the same title. Unfortunately, content providers are not always consistent in the way that they refer to a title, so the various holdings of the same title could actually appear as different items with different names.

What is an authority title?

An authority title is the official title for a work as specified in an authoritative MARC record from a reliable source such as CONSER or the National Library of Medicine. The Knowledgebase contains millions of authority records from these sources and others.


What is normalization?

Normalization reconciles all the different ways a title may be presented in a provider's holdings and links these variations with an authoritative title record.


Why is normalization important?

Normalization allows different representations of the same resource to be found and accessed via the E-Journal Portal (A to Z List) and 360 Link. A researcher can search for variations of a title and get the correct results. Or, they may search for the authoritative title and find holdings for a vendor that uses a variation. Furthermore, normalization is key to successful linking from referring sources (starting points for research such as subscription databases, Summon and Google Scholar) to full-text targets with inconsistent journal or book names.





 

• Date Created: 10-Aug-2015
• Last Edited Date: 11-Aug-2015
• Old Article Number: 13064