Wednesday, March 5, 2008

"X" marks the spot ... needing correction


x-Biography (for "x Biography" or "-- Biography")

Today's entry is not technically a typo--it's an omission. By omitting the MARC subfield code delimiter you will skew the retrieval of subject headings. Try typing in your search key as both "xbiography" (without a space or hyphen) and as "x-biography" (with a hyphen) and try with a space as well to find all those wrong entries. The different search keys will retrieve different results. You may be surprised to find a dollar sign was substituted for the subfield delimiter! Here are some examples:

Artists $z United States $x Biography

A search for "x-biography" results in this display:

Composers -- France -- x -- Biography

Note: Be on the lookout for "Malcolm X -- Biography"! "Malcolm X" is a correct entry!

Wendee Eyler

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