Relating to SFX

Effective with the December 2007 software update, SFX has implemented a way to link between "related" journal titles. SFX's definition of a "related" title is broad, and includes most variations on the serials librarian's favorite theme, "Title Change".

I've already blogged a user-friendly description of this service. This post describes some of the esoteric data logic things the service does, for good and ill. Examples are included; follow along in a separate tab or window.

Basic normal behavior:

The SFX menu will display a section called "Related title" for journal titles searched or browsed via Get It - that's the the EJournals list, Citation Linker, or Get It button from an external source. The Related title display can kick in under these conditions:

• K-State Libraries has access to the journal
  OR
  K-State Libraries has access to a journal related to the original search
• AND the relationship is established in the SFX KB

Here's an example. Search the EJournals List for Brain Research. Click it to get a menu. We don't have access to Brain Research, but we do have access to one of its related titles, Gene Expression Patterns. The menu displays both the searched title (at the top) and the related title (in the "Related title" section). Because our access is to GEP, the GO button will link users to that title only. If we had some access to BR, its holdings and GO button would appear in the usual "Online" section at the top of the menu. In that instance, "Related title" would appear immediately after "Online".

Basic quirky behavior:

New features always have quirks. These two are the most likely candidates for creating confusion, although I'm sure we'll find more.
"Related title" will appear in an otherwise qualified SFX menu if:

• The originally searched journal is the preceding title in the relationship.
  In other words, the feature looks forward in time, not backward.
• The related journals are not active in the same target.
  This is a strange bit of display logic that I'm taking up with Ex Libris.

Here's an example that illustrates both quirks. Search the EJournals List for Castanea. It's active in BioOne and JSTOR, right? But no sign of any related titles. Now search for Journal of the Southern Appalachian Botanical Club. It's active in JSTOR for one year and is related to Castanea. JSABC is the preceding (older) title, so the menu displays a relationship. Castanea is the subsequent (younger) title, so the menu displays no relationship. Why? I don't know.

In its own menu, you see that Castanea is active in both BioOne and JSTOR. When it appears as the related title in JSABC's menu, only BioOne is displayed. This weirdness is caused by SFX's inherent display logic that we can't control. The SFX menu will not display the same target twice for one object. Apparently this logic extends (intentionally or not) to related titles. JSABC and Castanea are active in exactly the same JSTOR target: JSTOR_BIOLOGICAL_SCIENCES_COLLECTION. If and when Ex Libris fixes this bug, I'll let you know.

Advanced quirky behavior:

You're likely to see this one while using the service yourself or helping users who are looking for specific articles. It will only occur on a handful of our publications, but you should still be prepared.

"Related title" will not normally appear in the SFX menu if a user searches for a specific article citation (via Citation Linker or the Get It button in an external source). However, if the original and related titles' dates overlap, "Related title" will (unfortunately) appear. 1 picture per 1000 words: the best way to understand this is to try it yourself.

Search Web of Science for Publication Title = Brain Research. Use the Get It button to link to a 2007 article. See the related object? This link to ScienceDirect will fail because GEP is not a replacement for BR; both are currently published and have overlapping dates.
Now go to the last page of your WoS results and use the Get It button to link to a 1969 article. No related object - because we don't have access to 1969 electronic issues of BR, and at the time there was no related title.

Why does the feature do this? The behavior is designed to help users who are unaware of a title change and may using the wrong title or ISSN to search for a citation. It tries to create a seamless search for the user by keeping other citation information while substituting a related journal title where appropriate. To make such substitutions work, it assumes that a previous title ended when a subsequent title began. As we saw with Brain Research and its children, this is not always the case. As we and other customers experiment with this service, we'll find more bugs like this one and request improvements. Don't expect this problem to hang around for forever, but do be prepared to see it for a while.

A side note about relationships:
Specific text in the SFX menu describes a relationship between two journals. In our first example, Brain Research is "continued in part by" Gene Expression Patterns. The SFX KB defines 15 possible relationships between journals, each with its own description. I've referred users to the Help Desk for assistance with relationship descriptions. As you assist users, please send me any of your own questions or suggestions about the relationships.

Comments

[Jason]

Thank you for this excellent description of these quirks, Jamene! Do you have a list of the 15 possible relationships that you could post? I want to make sure I understand all of them completely.

Jason

[Jamene]

Thanks for the feedback, Jason.
The relationships that will invoke the "Related Title" section in the SFX menu are:
Absorbed by
Absorbed in part by
Continued by
Continued in part by
Continues
Continues in part
Formed by the union of
Merged into
Related to
Split into
Supplement parent
Supplement
Translated as