The British National Bibliography Experience in the Share Family Linked Open Data Environment
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Date
2025-02-20
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Publisher
International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA)
Abstract
This case study presents the experience of the British Library with a renovated approach to the curation of the BNB - British National Bibliography, supported by the Share Family Linked Data Ecosystem technology.
The Linked Open Data BNB was launched in 2011, nevertheless the potential of linked data was not fully expressed with that implementation. As the technology matured, the British Library joined the Share Family to take BNB forward.
Working with colleagues from other institutions on Share Family working groups, British Library staff contribute to the development of the underlying data structures and the presentation of data. This collaborative approach has enabled delivery of the British National Bibliography as the first institutional tenant of the Share Family National Bibliographies Portal. BNB data is enriched with URIs and has been remodelled and clustered to make it more compatible with current data models and standards, including the IFLA Library Reference Model, RDA: Resource Description and Access, and Bibframe. This environment offers the potential for aggregating and searching multiple national bibliographies on a single platform, while offering a range of outputs including:
- data publication by different means (SPARQL interface, data dumps, API endpoint, end user discovery portal);
- data enrichment with URIs from several sources;
- regular data updates;
- collaborative environment for data curation.
The BNB is available to explore in Beta: https://bl.natbib-lod.org.
This study addresses similar use cases where libraries need to transition to linked data national bibliographies. By adopting the vision that the Share Family of initiatives relies upon, institutions curating national bibliographies can extend the visibility of their data, contribute to the creation of a collective, global catalogue of national bibliographies, and share their experience and their own datasets in a network of institutions of varying nature and vocation, while maintaining their specificity, their autonomy and their role.
Note about the authors:
Thurstan Young is the British Library's Collection Metadata Standards Manager
Anna Lionetti is R&D Assistant and facilitator for research and development projects at Casalini Libri
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Keywords
Linked data, Bibliographic data, National bibliographies, Authority data