It is not an easy thing to ensure that data imported, or manually added, into your library management system (LMS) is clean. Having clean data is critical to ensuring the results returned from any search is a true reflection of your resources.

You can tidy up much of your data using the processes available in your Liberty LMS, or you can use Softlink IC’s Premium data cleansing service to do it for you. What is not an option is leaving it dirty.

What ‘dirty data’ could my system have?

There are lots of giveaways that you might need your data cleaned! Hands up if you have noticed:

• Searching is producing incomplete or oddly random results?
• Random dashes and trailing punctuation?
• Inaccurate or incomplete authority records?
• Incorrectly formatted ISBNs and ISSNs?
• List files that contain similar or misspelled or include a dash while others don’t, for example Non Fiction, Non-Fic, NF and Non-Fiction?
• Authors entered in a number of different ways, for example Anthony, Piers, Anthony, P, Anthony, Piers (1934 – )?

If you have noticed any, or all those issues and more, your data might need a good clean!

Can my dirty data be cleaned dirt cheap?

Well, that depends on what you mean by dirt cheap. Whether you and your staff tackle the dirty problem, or you decide to use Softlink IC’s Premium Service, you will need to consider:

• How much of the data in your system is dirty?
• Has it compromised your search results?
• How much staff time you will need to put aside for “cleaning”?
• How much can be done in bulk using Liberty, and how much manually?
• What will be the cost of library staff time – assuming you have enough time and staff these days?
• How much would Softlink IC’s data cleansing service cost?

If doing it yourself is an option, the following section gives you an idea of what process in Liberty can help you spring clean your data.

Liberty gives you the power to clean some of your dirty data!

If you have the time, do you want to clean your dirty data yourself? If so, Liberty can help you. It includes several bulk data cleaning processes you can run in Liberty. Of course, you can also manually edit each record as you come across them, but that can be time-consuming and inefficient.

Helpful Liberty processes include:

• Duplicate check on authority records which tags any duplicates.
• Bulk deleting of unused authority terms.
• Bulk authority punctuation clean-up based on specific criteria.
• A global change function for Collections, GMDs, Formats and Statuses – global changes should be undertaken with extreme caution and we recommend you check with us first!

Nonetheless, even with the processes available in Liberty, it is a lot of work! If you want your data cleaned quickly, efficiently, and cost-effectively ask us about our Premium Service.

Does Softlink IC’s Premium Service clean my dirty data dirt cheap?

Softlink IC does dirty data cleansing as Premium option of the data conversion, but we also offer it as a service to existing customers. Compared to the cost of your time and effort, it is dirt cheap.

Our Premium service gives your data a thorough going over. We clean up your:

• List Files
• Authority records
• ISBN/ISSNs
• Web address issues such as URLs with http:// rather than the secure https://.
• Source fields –would data benefit from having part of the field converted one way and another part of a field converted in a different way, for example, into two different destination fields.
• Other fields with inconsistent data.

Not only do we clean more of your data, but we also clean it faster. Think of it as another way Softlink IC cost-effectively enables you to concentrate on delivering the services your users need. That makes using our data cleansing service dirt cheap!

Make records that compromise your users’ search results due to dirty data a thing of the past. Let us help you clean that dirty data. Be confident the search results in Liberty will be a true reflection of your library’s curated resources. Want to know more about our Premium Service? Just contact us here. You won’t regret it.