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IMRC - Indexing Federal Government Web Pages:
Guidelines for the Development of an Indexing Policy
Indexing Federal Government Web Pages
Guidelines for the Development of an Indexing Policy
Final version of: July 12, 2002
Table of Contents
Introduction
Reasons For an Indexing Policy
Standards
Policy Issues
Level of Specificity
Sources of Vocabulary
Official Languages
Training
Quality Assurance
Risk Assessment
The present indexing policy recommendations apply to the Common Look and Feel
metadata element: Subject, expressed as <dc.subject>. This document
serves as a guideline for the development of an indexing policy for individual
departments. It is highly recommended to develop a local policy and to use local
expertise such as:
- CLF Centre of Expertise members;
- GOL Metadata Working Group members;
- Departmental Librarians.
- Under Common Look and Feel (CLF) Standard 6.3
(http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/clf-nsi/inter/inter-06-tb_e.asp#6.3),
all Government of Canada (GoC) Web sites must adopt five core metadata
elements for the description of Web resources including
<dc.subject>.
- The purpose of indexing is to provide an easier
and more precise access to intellectual content.
- Poor indexing practices degrade information retrieval and
have serious cost implications.
- A well-designed indexing policy will ensure consistency of
access to all government information resources.
Indexing policies should be developed and used in conjunction with:
- TBITS 39: Treasury Board Information Management Standard,
Part 1: Government On-Line Metadata Standard
http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/its-nit/standards/tbits39/crit391_e.asp
- TBITS 39: Treasury Board Information Management Standard,
Part 2: Controlled Vocabulary Standard
http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/its-nit/standards/tbits39/crit392_e.asp
- The larger the number of documents to be indexed, the
greater will be the requirement to establish priorities among document types
to be indexed.
- In general, index as many pages as possible, but index main
pages, such as welcome and home pages first. In addition, index pages
containing:
- Programs or services in high demand (especially online services);
- Information about entitlements, rights or obligations;
- Information about dangers or risks to health, safety or the environment;
- Information required for understanding major new priorities, laws,
policies, programs or services.
The TBS Metadata Standard (TBITS 39.1), Section 3 provides a complete list of
resource types to which metadata (including index terms) should be applied.
http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/its-nit/standards/tbits39/crit391_e.asp
- To represent a concept or a subject, be as specific as the
list of authorized descriptors allows you to be.
- Use as many authorized descriptors as needed to fully
describe the contents of an information resource.
- More than one subject descriptor will be needed to describe
most resources.
As specified in TBITS 39.2, the default source of controlled subject vocabulary
is the Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus (CST)
http://en.thesaurus.gc.ca/these/thes_e.html
This means that in the absence of a suitable, registered vocabulary, the CST
must be used. If your organization has developed its own controlled vocabulary
for use in indexing, then it must be registered with the National Library of
Canada (NLC). Another option is to select a vocabulary from the list of
registered vocabularies on the NLC site. For more information, consult the list
on the NLC Web site.
http://www.collectionscanada.ca/8/4/r4-281-e.html
Documents are indexed in the language of the resource.
- Indexers may be recruited from a number of areas and bring a
wide range of skill levels to the required tasks. Indexers may include:
- Authors;
- Content Developers;
- Librarians;
- Professional Indexers;
- Webmasters.
- Various levels of training will be required depending upon
the skill levels of particular individuals.
- Some consideration will have to be given to the language
skills of indexers because indexing must be done in the language of the
resource.
- A process of quality assurance should be developed and
implemented to support the indexing process, in order to ensure that a
particular concept or subject will always be represented in the same way.
- Information managers should be accountable for consistency
and accuracy
- Departmental librarians are a good source of expertise in
this area and should be consulted.
Failure to develop and implement a policy for
indexing and the application of metadata may result in the inconsistent and
inappropriate population of the relevant metadata elements.
This would seriously affect the efficiency and quality of information
retrieval. Indexing and metadata
application are likely to have significant costs associated with them whether
the work is done properly or not.
Revision of incorrectly or inadequately applied metadata will increase
costs in the long term.
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