Authority control

In information science, authority control is a process that organizes information, for example in library catalogs, by using a single, distinct spelling of a name (heading) or an identifier (generally persistent and alphanumeric) for each topic or concept. The word authority in authority control derives from the idea that the names of people, places, things, and concepts are authorized, i.e., they are established in one particular form. These one-of-a-kind headings or identifiers are applied consistently throughout catalogs which make use of the respective authority file, and are applied for other methods of organizing data such as linkages and cross references. Each controlled entry is described in an authority record in terms of its scope and usage, and this organization helps the library staff maintain the catalog and make it user-friendly for researchers. The unique header can guide users to all relevant information including related or collocated subjects. to other files within them is the work of librarians and other information catalogers. Accordingly, authority control is an example of controlled vocabulary and of bibliographic control.

While in theory any piece of information is amenable to authority control such as personal and corporate names, uniform titles, series names, and subjects, It can be used in conjunction with keyword searching using "and" or "not" or "or" or other Boolean operators on a web browser.

Consistency of records.
Organization and structure of information.

| style="font-weight:bold;" | Wikidata

|Wikidata identifier: Q9685

| style="font-weight:bold;" | Integrated Authority File (GND)

|GND ID: 118525123

| style="font-weight:bold;" | U.S. Library of Congress

|Diana, Princess of Wales, 1961–1997

| style="font-weight:bold;" | WorldCat Identities

|Diana Princess of Wales 1961–1997

| style="font-weight:bold;" | Biblioteca Nacional de España

|Windsor, Diana, Princess of Wales

| style="font-weight:bold;" | KANTO – National Agent Data (Finland)

|Diana, Walesin prinsessa / KANTO ID: 000104109

| style="font-weight:bold;" | Getty Union List of Artist Names

|Diana, Princess of Wales English noble and patron, 1961–1997

| style="font-weight:bold;" |

|Diana, prinses van Wales, 1961–1997

The English Wikipedia prefers the term "Diana, Princess of Wales", but at the bottom of the article about her, there are links to various international cataloging efforts for reference purposes.

Same name describes two different subjects

Sometimes two different authors have been published under the same name. They contain enough information to establish that a given author or title is unique, but that is all; irrelevant but interesting information is generally excluded. Although practices vary internationally, authority records in the English-speaking world generally contain the following information:

Headings show the preferred title chosen as the official and authorized version. It is important that the heading be unique; if there is a conflict with an identical heading, then one of the two will have to be chosen:
Cross references are other forms of the name or title that might appear in the catalog and include:
see references are forms of the name or title that describe the subject but which have been passed over or deprecated in favor of the authorized heading form
see also references point to other forms of the name or title that are also authorized. These see also references generally point to earlier or later forms of a name or title.
Statement(s) of justification is a brief account made by the cataloger about particular information sources used to determine both authorized and deprecated forms. Sometimes this means citing the title and publication date of the source, the location of the name or title on that source, and the form in which it appears on that source.

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For example, the Irish writer Brian O'Nolan, who lived from 1911 to 1966, wrote under many pen names such as Flann O'Brien and Myles na Gopaleen. Catalogers at the United States Library of Congress chose one form—"O'Brien, Flann, 1911–1966"—as the official heading. The example contains all three elements of a valid authority record: the first heading O'Brien, Flann, 1911–1966 is the form of the name that the Library of Congress chose as authoritative. In theory, every record in the catalog that represents a work by this author should have this form of the name as its author heading. What follows immediately below the heading beginning with Na Gopaleen, Myles, 1911–1966 are the see references. These forms of the author's name will appear in the catalog, but only as transcriptions and not as headings. If a user queries the catalog under one of these variant forms of the author's name, he or she would receive the response: "See O'Brien, Flann, 1911–1966." There is an additional spelling variant of the Gopaleen name: "Na gCopaleen, Myles, 1911–1966" has an extra C inserted because the author also employed the non-anglicized Irish spelling of his pen-name, in which the capitalized C shows the correct root word while the preceding g indicates its pronunciation in context. So if a library user comes across this spelling variant, he or she will be led to the same author regardless. See also references, which point from one authorized heading to another authorized heading, are exceedingly rare for personal name authority records, although they often appear in name authority records for corporate bodies. The final four entries in this record beginning with His At Swim-Two-Birds ... 1939. constitute the justification for this particular form of the name: it appeared in this form on the 1939 edition of the author's novel At Swim-Two-Birds, whereas the author's other noms de plume appeared on later publications.

[[File:Sample Catalog Record.png|thumb|220px|Card catalog records such as this one used to be physical cards contained in long rectangular drawers in a library; today, generally, this information is stored in online databases.

Cooperative cataloging

Before the advent of digital online public access catalogs and the Internet, individual cataloging departments within each library generally carried out creating and maintaining a library's authority files. Naturally, there was a considerable difference in the authority files of the different libraries. For the early part of library history, it was generally accepted that, as long as a library's catalog was internally consistent, the differences between catalogs in different libraries did not matter greatly.

As libraries became more attuned to the needs of researchers and began interacting more with other libraries, the value of standard cataloging practices came to be recognized. With the advent of automated database technologies, catalogers began to establish cooperative consortia, such as OCLC and RLIN in the United States, in which cataloging departments from libraries all over the world contributed their records to, and took their records from, a shared database. This development prompted the need for national standards for authority work.

In the United States, the primary organization for maintaining cataloging standards with respect to authority work operates under the aegis of the Library of Congress Program for Cooperative Cataloging. It is known as the Name Authority Cooperative Program, or NACO Authority.

Standards

There are various standards using different acronyms.

Standards for authority metadata

MARC standards for authority records in machine-readable format.
Metadata Authority Description Schema (MADS), an XML schema for an authority element set that may be used to provide metadata about agents (people, organizations), events, and terms (topics, geographics, genres, etc.).
Encoded Archival Context, an XML schema for authority records conforming to ISAAR.

Standards for object identification, controlled by an identification-authority

Legal personality identification systems (person-IDs) and authorities:
[[International Standard Archival Authority Record|serey

(CPF) – International Standard Archival Authority Record]] for Corporate Bodies, Persons, and Families. Published by the International Council on Archives

ISNI – International Standard Name Identifier
ORCID – Open Researcher and Contributor ID, a subset of the ISNI, to uniquely identify scientific and other academic authors.
DAI – Digital Author Identification, another subset of ISNI.
GRID – Global Research Identifier Database
GND – Integrated Authority File (Gemeinsame Normdatei), authority file for personal names, corporate bodies and subject headings.
KANTO – National Agent Data (finaf), authority file for persons and corporate bodies.
LCCN – Library of Congress Control Number
NDL – National Diet Library
VIAF – Virtual International Authority File, an aggregation of authority files currently focused on personal and corporate names.
WorldCat/identities
Bibliographic object identification systems and authorities:
DOI – Digital object identifier
urn:lex, for law-document identifiers, controlled by local law authorities.
ISBN – International Standard Book Number
ISSN – International Standard Serial Number
Other identification systems (for generic named-entities) and authorities:
GeoNames
TGN – Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

Standards for identified-object metadata

vCard
Dublin Core