The previous standard for serials, ANSI Z39.44, did not specify
spacing between enumeration and chronology but showed examples of
holdings statements both with and without the spacing.  It was
very confusing. My then supervisor interpreted "no spacing" at all,
but I disagreed on the basis that it would be difficult to read a
long string of characters without spacing  (this was before
the days of Web OPACs). We tried it her way and found that long
Level 4 statements were almost impossible to read. We changed our
holdings statments to include spacing between enumeration and
chronology, with spaces after commas and semicolons as well.

My current library's serials module adds spacing from the 853
fields that automatically collapse into Level 4 holdings statements
for current check-ins. We follow the same format when we add our own
866 holdings statements for back issues.  Like Marilyn, I am used to
seeing spaces between enumeration and chronology, and it is unlikely
that we will be dropping the spaces. I do not think that the display
format will affect data interchange.  Of course this may be a moot
issue if library system vendors modify their serials module to
follow the new standard to the letter (or space, in this case).

Lillian Gassie
Technical Services Librarian
US Army Research Laboratory
Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD
<lgassie@MAIL.ARL.MIL>

------------ Original message -------------
From: Marilyn Quinn <quinnma@rider.edu> on 01/04/2000 05:24:58 PM
To: SERIALST@list.uvm.edu
Subject: New punctuation definition for ANSI/NISO holdings

Hello,

I just noticed that the new ANSI/NISO Z39.71-1999 standard for holdings
defines the parentheses that surround the chronology as having no spaces
before and after, i.e. "Parentheses are neither preceded nor followed by
a blank" (p. 11). This affects the so-called "adjacent" option for
placing chronology next to the enumeration. An example would be the
following: v.3(1985)-5(1987)

To my knowledge spacing was not specified for this in the previous
standard. (I had a discussion about this on this list a number of years
ago.) Most people preferred to include a space between the enumeration
and the first parenthesis. I seem to see this alot as a result in
various OPACs, although I see holdings statements without the space
also.

Does anyone know why this requirement was introduced? Is it important
enough to worry about and change in my database? That is, should I
change my practice midstream? We are still creating summary holdings in
the 866 and are used to seeing this space.

Marilyn Quinn
Rider University
<quinnma@RIDER.EDU>