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Dear Colleagues,

I am writing to let you know that as of June 1, the CONSER Publication
Pattern Initiative will officially begin.  This is a two-year experiment
to add publication pattern and associated holdings data to CONSER records.

Project participants, working with CONSER Enhance authorizations, will use
the OCLC-defined 891 field to embed pattern information (fields 853-55)
and associated holdings (fields 863-65). CONSER records distributed to
RLIN and other subscribers will contain fields 853 and 863 and an 852
field identifying the holdings fields as *universal pattern data.*.

In addition to patterns contributed by project participants, CONSER
records will be seeded with pattern data from Harvard. This data may not
always be complete and will be updated as appropriate by project
participants when encountered.  There is no date for the seeding at this
time.

Other activities planned by the CONSER Publication Patterns Task Force are
a survey of vendors to determine their use of the MARC Holdings Format and
continued proposals for revision of the format, as well as a study of
workflow implications.  A major goal is to work with vendors to enable
import and exporting of pattern data and compatibility of the data across
systems.

Questions concerning the CONSER patterns initiative may be directed to
Jean Hirons, CONSER Coordinator, Library of Congress ( Diane Hillmann,
Cornell University, who is coordinating the experiment ( or Rich Greene,
who is coordinating OCLC participation in the experiment ( Complete
information on the CONSER initiative can be found at
http://lcweb.loc.gov/acq/conser/patthold.html.

Jean Hirons
CONSER Coordinator
Library of Congress
<jhir@LOC.GOV>