Hi Amanda
I have to tell you that keeping electronic holdings up to date is virtually
(even literally!) impossible.  We use a variety of methods including Serials
Solutions, SFX, the Ejournal Holdings module in Innovative, information we
get from Ebsco for print journals that we subscribe to that include 'free'
online access, and a variety of publisher and aggregator websites, and we
are NEVER up to date.

We have 4-5 people working on this part of their time (we probably have 1.5
FTE librarians per month taking care of the many tasks that need to be
done).

There are numerous problems to be encountered, the most notable being
suddenly having electronic access to something and not knowing you have it
unless you come upon it serendipitously. Other problems we encounter daily
include wrong or no ISSNs, content being pulled, changed, and added by
aggregators and publishers, different aggregators calling one journal by
different titles, and claims of full text when none is present, to name a
few.

Although we subscribe to databases that have both full-text and abstracts
only, we do not list ejournals in our OPAC unless full-text is purported to
be available.

Regards,
Sandy Heft
Technical Services Librarian
University Library
Jean & Charles Schulz Information Center
Sonoma State University
1801 E. Cotati Avenue
Rohnert Park, CA 94928
707-664-2528
707-664-2876 (FAX)

> From: "Lafferty, Cindy" <CLafferty@SF.EDU>
> Reply-To: "SERIALST: Serials in Libraries Discussion
> Forum"<SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU>
> Date: Thu, 04 Sep 2003 14:07:11 -0500
> To: SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU
> Subject: FW: maintaining electronic journals holdings information
>
> I am interested in this topic also.
>
> Cindy Lafferty
> Librarian Assistant
> University of Saint Francis
> Clafferty@sf.edu
> 260-434-7454
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Zeigler, Amanda [mailto:azeigle@SANDIA.GOV]
> Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2003 11:46 AM
> To: SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU
> Subject: maintaining electronic journals holdings information
>
> It has recently come to our attention that the electronic journal holdings
> information in our PAC is not as complete as it might be. For example, we
> have not noted when access is for full-text, abstracts only, or some
> combination of the two. I am interested in learning how other libraries go
> about maintaining holdings information for electronic journals. For example,
> does someone on your staff periodically check the holdings information for
> each e-journal?
>
> Replying off list is fine, unless this question is of interest to others as
> well.
>
> Thank you for the information!
>
> Regards,
>
> Amanda Zeigler, MLS
> Contract Serials Librarian
> Technical Library
> Sandia National Laboratories
> azeigle@sandia.gov
> (505)284-0219