Hi there,
We’ve got about 1200 entries with no title at all…..which is potentially more problematic :-(
These will, I assume, have come from the time of a printed list where you had an overall title and a series title such as ‘Accounts’ and then each entry would just have the dates and reference.
There are ways to make this work on the Web of course, but its not so good for interoperability, as when you move data around into different system and interfaces, title-less entries do prove problematic.
I do find these types of issues interesting because of the way that different environments change the way we think about the data and change the pros and cons of how we catalogue. It’s not just online and ‘offline’; its different systems and search engines, and ways of navigating and faceted searching and so on.
Jane
On 19 Feb 2016, at 14:04, G Sheldrick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I've just done a quick check on some of my recent cataloguing projects, which probably provide a sample of a few thousand catalogue entries, and the longest title I used was 214 characters including spaces, where the title was based on the original title of the item ("Gloucester Cooperative Society Minutes of Subcommittee Appointed to Consider the Subject of the Celebration Of The Society's 70th Anniversary and Special Subcommittee Appointed To Consider The Mutuality Club System") . I wouldn't normally be comfortable with a title this long, so I would have thought 240 or 250 characters would be easily long enough for everyday use.
>
> Gillian
>
>
> On 16 February 2016 at 10:28, Jane Stevenson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Hi there
>
> We’ve been working a good deal on search engine optimisation, and I agree this is a very important aspect.
>
> I think my question about a title was more to do with supplied titles. I’m not sure there is much that exists that has a formal title of several hundred words. In terms of search engines finding relevant collations, there are so many elements to that, and the title is just one aspect. The header title is just as important, for example, and things like URLs and non-repetition of content. Also, I think we have very few searches where the user clearly knows the title they want. But that may be because we are an aggregator. And its worth saying that this problem is usually at item level, and the main collection level title is usually much more self-explanatory.
>
> Of course, you do get the opposite problem with item level descriptions - ‘Miscellaneous’, ‘Accounts’, ‘Unknown’….. These are far more common that very long titles. There are different challenges there, as the item really does need to be viewed in the context of the collection, otherwise it becomes a rather curious orphan.
>
> cheers,
> Jane
>
>
> Jane Stevenson
> Archives Hub Service Manager
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> On 16 Feb 2016, at 10:03, Meic Pierce Owen <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > Dave
> >
> > I think the example you use, with item types and dates added either end and with a little tightening, would work perfectly and be readily-found by the big search engines
> >
> > Reports and papers re high-frequency vibration generation mechanisms in resiliently-packaged systems, 1994-2008
> >
> > I also believe that Google etc look beyond the title wherever they are able so whilst I see the value of a paragraph summary titles of an entire 'thing' if collections are locked from web search beyond the title, I would have though collection level entries would be made visible and therefore the problem largely negated.
> >
> > This is a good thread. It is good when there is real discussion- after all, making an omelette does require breaking eggs :)
> >
> > meic
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Dave Caroline [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> > Sent: 16 February 2016 09:54
> > To: Meic Pierce Owen
> > Cc: [log in to unmask]
> > Subject: Re: Title length
> >
> > What I see here is lack of knowledge of how a search engine works, if you just take the meaning of a title a search engine has a much harder time matching the users exact search term(original title) to your edited form with the meaning.
> >
> > Any form of prettifying a title to any rules presupposes the search engine know the rules you used.
> >
> > An example title
> > Mechanisms of high-frequency generation of vibrations in resiliently packaged systems
> >
> > Prettify and try searching and also search that string
> >
> > Dave Caroline
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